- NBA Championships: 0
- Last NBA Championship: N/A
- Claim to Fame: The Nets made back-to-back Finals appearances in 2002 and 2003.
- Claim to Shame: The Nets gave up five players and three future first round picks for aging veterans Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Jason Terry back in 2014.
The Nets began in the ABA in 1967, when they were the New Jersey Americans. They would move to Long Island in 1968, and were renamed the New York Nets.
Led by Julius Erving, the Nets won a pair of ABA Championships before the franchise shifted to the NBA in 1976, and took up residence in New Jersey.
The Nets enjoyed just six winning seasons until the year 2000. Their fortunes changed the following year when the Nets traded point guard Stephon Marbury to the Suns in exchange for Jason Kidd.
Kidd led the Nets to two straight Finals appearances (and five straight winning seasons overall), losing to the Shaq-Kobe Lakers in 2002 and the Tim Duncan-led Spurs in 2003.
In 2012, the team announced they were moving back to New York and would play in Brooklyn. After their first season in their new surroundings, the team made a trade for 37-year-old Kevin Garnett and 36-year-old Paul Pierce from the Celtics.
In exchange, the Nets gave up and handful of players, but most notably, three first round picks (2014, 2016 and 2018), as well as the right to swap picks in 2017. It is still considered one of the worst trades in NBA history.
The on-court product was disjointed, ending up with a second-round loss to the Miami Heat in 2013. Pierce and Garnett were gone shortly after.
You can argue that outside the Toronto Raptors, no team has had a better 12 months than the Brooklyn Nets. Last year’s pesky team built around D’Angelo Russell, Caris LeVert, Spencer Dinwiddie, and Jarrett Allen snuck into the playoffs and took a game off Philadelphia as the six seed led to what was a grand slam summer for GM Sean Marks and the front office.
Kyrie Irving decided to bring his talents to Brooklyn and bring along a guy named Kevin Durant. With the two superstars in toe, they were able to also add DeAndre Jordan, Wilson Chandler and Taurean Prince in a trade with the Hawks. The future is sky high, and something special is cooking in Brooklyn.
