INSIDER: Danny Wolf MUST STAY In Brooklyn Nets’ Rotation After DOMINATING Bucks | Will Team Listen?

INSIDER: Danny Wolf MUST STAY In Brooklyn Nets’ Rotation After DOMINATING Bucks | Will Team Listen?

On today’s show, Danny Wolf dominates in Milwaukee during his second game, seeing extended minutes with Brooklyn. I’ll tell you why the rookie needs to remain a full-time member of the Nets rotation right now. [Music] You are Locked on Nets, your daily Brooklyn Nets podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. Welcome in to Locked on Nets right here on the Locked On Podcast Network. Now the number one sports podcast network. It’s your team, the Brooklyn Nets, every single day. I’m Eric Slater, Brooklyn reporter for clutchpoints.com. Thank you for making me your first listen of the day. The show is 100% free on all those great platforms. Today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Head to fanduel.com to get started. And on today’s show, the Nets suffer a blowout loss while shorthanded in Milwaukee. But Danny Wolf and Ben Saraf, they impress while getting the call up to Brooklyn. And starting with Wolf, this performance confirms that Danny Wolf needs to be up with this NBA team moving forward. The Nets need to find minutes for him one way or another because he was dominant during this game against the Bucks. There’s really no other way to put it. I mean, the Nets get blown out, but they were far better during Danny’s minutes. And he was he was really impressing, you know, during minutes where there were guys like Giannis and Tennacoupo, Bobby Portoris, you know, whatever whatever other highle NBA players you want to say on the floor. He looked more than the part during this, you know, extended, I guess you call it, audition, whatever you want to say it is. But you look at Danny in this game, he had 22 points, four rebounds, four assists, two turnovers, eight of 16 from the field, five of nine from three in 30 minutes. And he was really doing it all offensively. Like I’m going to start with the offense, then I’ll get into some of the defense and how I think it was encouraging. Also, maybe some of the concerns. But from the offensive standpoint, you know, it starts with a three-point shooting in this one. I mean, Danny was on fire out of the gate. He made his first four three-point attempts uh during the first half and was really looking like a highle floor spacer in this one. I mean, these were not easy open looks. These were deep quick trigger threes and this is something that obviously is going to be a big swing skill for Danny moving forward. He’s a guy who it always looked like he had shooting potential at Yale and at Michigan, but he didn’t exactly, you know, shoot at a high percentage, but you thought that it was translatable and it was, you know, it was scalable up to the NBA level that he’d be able to improve. move and he looked really good in this one. And I asked Jordy about Danny’s G-League performance uh before Friday’s game, the loss to the 76ers. And Jordy said one of the top things he highlighted was that he really wanted him to be ready to shoot threes at all times. Then he thought that Danny passed up some open looks during his last G-League appearance. And Danny was more than ready from three in this one. He was more than willing from three in this one. And you know, if he can shoot threes at this level and he is this kind of like quick trigger, you know, defenses need to respect him, that’s going to open up so much for his game because we know what he can do off the dribble. I’m going to get into that in a second, but that opens up the positional versatility because you can play him alongside a traditional five like Nick Claxton or Dron Sharp. Like the three-point shooting, if he’s going to play, you know, power forward or even the wing like the Nets have during these first two these last two games with him, the three-point shooting is a non-negotiable. And then also if he plays the five, which I think could be his most natural and most impactful position moving forward, that gives him so many things that he can do in terms of being a guy who can be a pick and roll option and a short roll playmaker or a pick and pop option and, you know, a floor spacer in that regard. Or if he can shoot off the dribble, you know, pick and roll ball handling. If guys go under screens, he could pull up. So, the three-point shooting is going to open a ton of him, a ton for him, especially with what he can do on the ball. And the onball stuff, in addition to the three-point shooting in this game, was very impressive. I mean, very impressive. There were questions obviously about how Danny’s on ball creation would translate at the NBA level because he was this guy who played with his back to the basket for two seasons at Yale and then he goes to Michigan and he’s this 6’11 almost point guard pick and roll ball handler in a lot of his sets and he has this you know funky handle with the hesitations and all that stuff but you wonder like 6’1 the handle’s a little bit higher because he’s so tall he’s you know not the most athletic or quick guy like would he be quick enough to get by NBA defenders would all of this work and at least in this Bucks game. It looked very good in this Bucks game. I mean, the movement, the fluidity, the ball handling, like he’s moving like a guard in this game. And I’d say these first two games, he looked good. And you look at him against some NBA level defenders who were no slouches. And he didn’t at all look like it was too slow or he was struggling to get by anyone. I mean, there was a possession in this game, and this speaks to like some two-way stuff that we saw from him. There was a possession in this game where Danny deed up Giannis in an isolation on one end and then on the other end going the other way he shook Giannis with kind of like a jab step fake, you know, half jab step, half shot fake. Drove to the basket and finished over Miles Turner at the rim. There’s another possession in this one where he comes down and he’s handling in the pick and roll with Nick Claxton setting the screen. The Bucks switch it. He gets Miles Turner on him. He’s near the top of the key. hits him with like a hesy to his right, cross back to his left, drives, shoulder bump, finishes over Miles Turner at the ring. So rim. So those are just possessions where you see the ball handling, you see him playing against these guys who are highle NBA defenders and he’s not struggling to get downhill and he wasn’t struggling to finish at the rim on those possessions. He missed some other easy layups, but overall like that stuff in addition to the three-point shooting really, really encouraging, especially like a pick and roll rep like that, like we saw with Claxton, like we know that’s something that Danny did a lot at Michigan and pick and rolls with him and Claxton could be really interesting because you’re talking about sets where, you know, Danny could be handling the ball and you have Nick rolling and if they try to switch, first of all, if they try to go under, he can pull it from three. That’s one thing. And then if they try to switch guards, he can try to back them down. He could overpower them a little bit. just going to the basket using his size. If they switch big men onto him, he can be a matchup problem like we saw with him taking Miles Turn to the rim on that possession. So, it’s just a lot of offensive possibilities with Danny and it’s a reason why a lot of people said that he was one of the most exciting players in the draft and a lot of draft analysts that I talked to and NBA people said that he was the most exciting pick of the, you know, Nets rookies in the sense that he had the most NBA ready skill set and the most things that he could do right now and they thought that he could be the most fun. And I mean, you just talk about like the offensive skill set that I’m describing and another reason why I think that Danny just has to be up at the NBA level as a 21-year-old rookie this season because you look at this Nets team and you say how many guys on this Net’s team are legit dribble, pass, shoot threats. And by that I mean they can break guys down off the dribble. They can make highle passing reads and defenders have to respect their outside shot in some capacity. I mean, how many guys on this Nets team have the potential to check all of those boxes? Like I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that Danny Wolf may be the only one because you look at the other top offensive players on this Net’s team right now. Like MPJ, very high level, you know, three-point shooter, one of the best in the league, can pass, you know, pretty well. He’s doing well at this this season. But I don’t think anybody would say that he can break guys down off the dribble consistently. That’s not a strength of his whatsoever. You look at Jagor Gilman, very elite passer, you know, obviously is shooting at a very high level right now, but he cannot break anybody down off the dribble. can’t get downhill without an advantage created for him in the pick and roll and you go on down the line. Like even if you bring Cam Thomas into the conversation, obviously Cam Thomas is not making highle passing reads consistently. Like there’s just not a lot of guys on this Net’s roster who can do all of those things. And Danny, like he’s not there, like he’s not all the way there yet in all of those areas, but I think it’s pretty clear that he has the potential. Like he has the three-point shooting potential. He can break guys down off the dribble. and he obviously has pretty elite passing ability for a guy his size. Like that’s one of the main things that attracted the Nets to him in this draft process. Like I’ve talked to people around the Nets organization. Also, if you guys watched the Nets scout series when they were talking about Danny and what led them to, you know, attract what what attracted them to him and led them to pick him, they said you can’t find a connector like this at this size with this kind of passing ability. So, all of these things that Danny can do, like there’s few other guys that on the Nets who can do them offensively. And then you talk about the defense and there was obviously major concerns about how Danny would be able to guard in space if he played the four, if he played the five, how would he be able to be a rim protector. And you look at these last two games, like it’s nothing great, but I wouldn’t even say it’s good, but like it’s fine. Like I think that he was holding up well in this game against the Bucks on the ball when defending guys like Bobby Portoris and Kyle Koosma. I mean, he had another possession where he was switched on Kevin Porter Jr. in isolation. He was kind of stumbling like a little off balance, but he was able to force him into a really tough shot and stick with him on some crossovers. I talked about the other possession where he guarded Giannis in isolation. It was nothing crazy, but like he was able to stay in front of him. And I think that Danny’s struggles in this game actually came defending off the ball. I think there were some possessions where he got lost. I think there were some possessions where he also struggled struggled to navigate screens off the ball on the perimeter. And a lot of that is because in these first two games like the Nets are playing him extended minutes legitimately on the wing. Like we’ve talked about the positional conversation being would he play the four, would he play the five? And you know the Nets are playing him on the wing alongside like Nick Claxton or Don Sharp and Noah Clowny for large stretches in these games. That’s a lot to ask of him defensively and then offensively I think that kind of con constricts the floor in a way that doesn’t benefit him. And his best minutes I think were when he was playing alongside just one of the Nets bigs. whether Nick Claxton or Dron Sharp. So, I think overall, my point of this segment, the Nets need to find minutes for Danny Wolf. There’s no reason that guys like Jaylen Wilson or even Zire Williams should be playing big minutes, like 20 plus minutes in some games while Danny is in the G-League. And I understood why the Nets put Danny in the G-League. They have this crowded front court rotation. He’s getting a lot of reps. Like, not like that G-League, those G-League minutes aren’t beneficial to him. I think they are, but with his age being 21 years old, two years older than a lot of these other Nets rookies, and with the skills that he clearly does have, and he showed in this Bucks game, you got to you got to keep him up in the NBA, and you have to be finding him minutes because, frankly, he’s deserving of it. And you look at the rotation, like I mapped it out quickly last night, and there’s a 10-man rotation that’s not that difficult to put together. Like, you have the main net starters of Jaor, Terrence, man, MPJ, Clowny, Claxton. You look at a second unit, you have, you know, Tyrese Martin, Drake Pal, Zyra Williams, Danny Wolf, and then Dron Sharp. And you can find Danny 20 minutes per game in that rotation pretty easily. And if that means removing guys, removing a guy like Jaylen Wilson from the rotation on most nights and taking a few minutes away from guys like Terrence Man or Zire Williams, that’s totally fine. And the Net should be totally comfortable doing that. And that’s not to say that like Danny’s going to look great every night. like he looked really good in this game, but there’s going to be nights where there are growing pains with Danny playing at the NBA level in his first NBA games as he gets acclimated. We saw several G-League games where he had six plus turnovers. He had some defensive struggles, but that’s fine if he struggles at the NBA level because it’s clear that he has the tools, especially offensively, and this is a tanking season. Like, if he struggles and he has to work through some growing pains, that’s fine. and NBA reps at his age with the tools that he clearly has and the potential that he has that’s going to benefit him. And with him being 21 years old, you do want to speed up that timeline a little bit more where there aren’t, you know, there might be not as much urgency for a guy like, you know, Nolan Troy or Ben Saraf. So Danny should be up with this NBA team. But Danny wasn’t the only Nets rookie who really impressed in this one. Ben Saraf coming back from his ankle injury and playing his first extended NBA minutes in over a month. He looked really good in this one. So, what did I see from Ben Sarroth and what should fans be expecting from him rotationally with the Nets moving forward? I’ll get into all that after a quick break. This episode is brought to you by Prize Picks. The holiday season is one of the best times for sports. 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Prize picks. It’s good to be right. Coming back from the break on today’s Locked on Nets episode talking about Brooklyn’s blowout loss in Milwaukee. But focusing on the rookies and Danny Wolf and Ben Saraf were the Net’s most impressive players in this game by far. And in addition to Danny, you know, Ben played extended minutes. Danny played 30, Ben played 29. They were playing most of the game. And, you know, Ben in this one had 10 points, seven assists, three turnovers, four of eight from the field, two of four from three, as I said, 29 minutes. And I thought that Ben, you know, just looked very good for a guy who just missed a couple weeks, hasn’t played in a game in a couple weeks, and hasn’t played in an NBA game in over a month or played, you know, extended minutes in an NBA game in over a month. I thought that he was really impactful and it really brought me back to some of the strengths that I thought that Ben had that I thought he he flashed in the preseason and at points during those first five games that he started before the Nets removed him from the rotation. But you look at in this one just like a professional handle like he had, you know, as I said, seven assists of three turnovers. He had one play where he got stripped near half court, but then he actually hustled back and had a really athletic block recovering to the rim in transition. So that was nice. But overall, like I thought that he looked comfortable paneling against the Bucks defensive pressure. And now the Bucks aren’t a team that are at all known for, you know, their perimeter defenders or their ball pressure, anything along those lines. But still, like this is an NBA team that he’s facing, a playoff hopeful team. And I thought that Ben looked really comfortable handling the ball. And I thought that he also he makes a lot of professional passing reads with the ball in his hands. And we saw that, you know, during the preseason. We saw that in spurts during his first five NBA appearances when he was starting. And we’ve seen that some in the G-League level. Like sure, he struggled with some turnovers, but Ben’s a guy who can break guys down off the dribble. He can get downhill. He can be physical as a driver and finish at the rim. And he knows how to leverage that driving ability into creating for his teammates around around the rim or kicking out to the perimeter. I thought I think you saw that a lot in this one. And you know, the three-point shooting like that’s going to continue to be the question because the three-point shooting has been shaky. You look at Ben’s four G-League games after that extended stint with the Nets where he really struggled from from an outside shooting perspective. Ben shot 29% from three across those four G-League games, but he was taking eight per 36 minutes. So that’s high volume. He’s buying into a message from the Nets coaching staff, which has clearly been, you know, preaching to him that he needs to take these three-point shots whether off the dribble or off the catch when given space. And he was doing that. And I think we saw it also, you know, in this game against the Bucks. He took a couple of threes that I thought were really nice attempts. Like he hit one where he was coming off of it was a DHO into a pick and roll near the left wing and a defender went under. He had a little bit of space. He stopped and popped and he hit it. So that in addition to the ball handling ability that he clearly does have and the passing ability that he clearly does have which is you know I think it’s NBA level whether you know not NBA level maybe right now but I think it’s pretty clear that he is the most polished ball handler and I would say you know maybe like live dribble passer like I don’t know if he’s a better live dribble passer than Jay Gordy I don’t think but he’s able to create those advantages more consistently because he has a better handle he’s a little bit quicker he has more shake to him so all of that I think benefits him. And I think that I’m pretty confident that like Ben Saraf is going to be something at the NBA level. Does it mean that he’s going to be like a starting caliber player? Does that mean he’s even going to be like a very impactful player? I don’t know. It’s way too early to say, but I’m pretty confident that Ben Saraf has the tools to be an, you know, a passable rotation player at the NBA level, presuming that the three-point shot can get to a decent level, which is no guarantee. Like that’s the biggest question about him moving forward. But with that, you know, given what I just said, I thought it was a little hasty the way the Nets pulled him from the rotation and he went from starter in their first five games straight to the G-League. Like that’s not something that you see very often. And I think part of that was due to the fact the Nets struggled in a huge way in those first five games. And we heard right at at the end of that stretch, we heard Michael Porter Jr. in the locker room. He said to us, you know, in response to questions that we asked, you know, the biggest problem is the Nets point guard, you know, minutes during those first five games. And we have a lot of rookies playing and clearly there was some trouble, you know, in the locker room in terms of how some of the vets felt Michael Porto Jr. And I would presume some other guys about Jorman and Ben getting all the rotation minutes at point guard when the Nets were struggling that much. But even with that, like the Nets haven’t like they’ve looked better in these last however many games, but do they look great? No. And I think that the biggest factor in them looking better is frankly, you know, or one of the biggest factors is Cam Thomas going out and them kind of changing the way that they play and them being much better defensively cuz like MPJ was talking a lot about, you know, the offense in those quotes and the offense has been around the same, you know, before and after. Like it’s m it’s been the same, you know, since precam’s injury and after. The biggest change has been the defense. And I think that Ben Saf is, you know, a poor defender at this point as a rookie, as most of the Nets rookies are. And I think that he did struggle a lot during those first five games, but I think that, you know, with the offensive tools that he has, I think that you should be trying to find him NBA minutes as the season progresses. But finding him those minutes, it’s going to be a little bit harder for him than it is for, you know, the Nets for a guy like Danny Wolf because right now you have Jagor Gman and Tyrese Martin splitting the point guard minutes. And you know, as much as Nets fans get frustrated about a guy like Tyrese Martin because he’s this older journeyman guy and he’s taking minutes away from Jagor and some of the other rookies, Tyrese is playing very well right now and he’s done everything the Nets asked of him. He’s 26 years old. I do think he’s showing promise to be a, you know, NBA level player, probably like an end of rotation guy, but the Nets could have something with him. And with the way that he’s playing right now, you know, over these last six games, like Tyrese is at 14, 15 points per game and he’s shooting, you know, over 50, 40, 90. Like, I don’t think that you can remove him from the rotation. Like, that’s just that would be, you know, totally wrong with what Jord’s been saying about minutes being earned, guys getting rewarded for things that they’ve done, right? I don’t think you can remove him from the rotation. That wouldn’t sit well with him, obviously, and I don’t think that would sit well with the rest of the Nets locker room. And, as I said, you already have Tyrese and Jagor splitting the point guard minutes. you already have another rookie in Drake Pal who’s playing a lot of backourt minutes. As much as you know Nets fans think maybe Terrence man shouldn’t be playing all these minutes, he’s a veteran. He’s the oldest guy on the team that aren’t going to remove him from the rotation. So, it’s going to be a little bit more difficult to find minutes for Benth. Maybe you could look at it and as I said with Danny, you can, you know, remove some minutes from guys like Terrence Man, guys like Zire Williams. you take Jaylen Wilson out of the rotation, but I named that 10-man rotation before adding Danny Wolfen and taking Jaylen Wilson out. Are they going to put Ben Saraf in there and then you got 11 guys in the rotation? You got three point guards. You have a crowded back court. Like, I’m not sure how feasible that is right now, but as the season progresses, I think there’ll be injuries. I think there’ll be maybe some trades. I think there will be things that can open up minutes for him. And I don’t think that Ben Saraf continuing to get minutes in the G-League is the worst thing for him because I do think that he has these NBA level skills, but I think he needs to improve in his decision-m at times. Obviously, his defensive ability on the ball and off the ball in terms of his positioning and understanding of things. And you look at Ben, Ben’s the eighth youngest player in the NBA right now. He’s the second youngest player to ever start a game for the Nets. I mean, this is a kid who turned 19 a couple of months before the draft. So, him getting some minutes or like getting extended minutes from the G-League for a little bit, I don’t think it’s the worst thing in the world, but I do think that he has NBA ready skills. And I do think that even though it looked really ugly in those first five games, I think that he’s capable of playing with this Net’s rotation and at least being like passable and not completely embarrassing because he does have, I think, the most NBA level handle of any of the Nets rookie point guards. And I do think that he’s bringing a lot of other things on the table and putting him in NBA games, letting him kind of learn through the fire defensively and then also with this offensive decision-m I don’t think that would be the worst thing either. So it would be interesting to see how the Nets handle this moving forward. But also this Nets Bucks loss, it moved the Nets up in the draft lottery standings. And after the Nets had those three wins over the Pacers, the Wizards, and then the Celtics, there were some Nets fans concerned with the Nets tank outlook because the bottom of the NBA standings has looked so dreadful early this season. But I think that these last few games have made me confident in terms of the Nets approach and in terms of the rest of the league that the Nets are going to have a very good tank outlook. So I’ll tell you why I feel that is when I close out Locked on Nets after a quick break. Guys, NFL Sundays move fast. one big play and suddenly everything feels different. That’s what makes live betting with FanDuel so exciting. You’re not just watching the game, you’re reacting to it in live time. With FanDuel, you can place live bets as the action unfolds. Every drive, every momentum swing, every highlight moment. Live betting is the best when the game starts to shift, a receiver gets hot, a defense tightens up, or the momentum flips after a turnover. FanDuel lets you jump into the moment. Guys, live spreads on money lines adjust instantly on FanDuel. player props update. As a guy heats up, you can bet next touchdown scores, drive results, totals, and more. It keeps you locked into every snap, every drive, every possibility. So, if you want to be right in the middle of the action this season, visit fan.com and place your NFL live bets all season long. FanDuel, the game moves fast and so can you. Coming back from the break, closing out today’s lockdown Nets episode. I want to hit a little bit on Brooklyn’s tank outlook because this has been a conversation in the coming in the past, you know, couple weeks with the Nets winning three games. And you look at it with this loss last night and also the Pacers won last night. The Nets moved third into third place in the draft lottery standings. You look at where they’re at. They’re 3-6 after 19 games. That’s a 13 win pace. And the only reason that anybody was concerned about the Nets tank outlook, it was because it’s relative to the rest of the league and how the bottom or the top of these draft lottery standings have looked because the league has been so historically bad at the bottom this year. But even with the league being that historically bad, I would not be worried if I were a Nets fan because as I said, 3 and 16, 13 win pace and we’re seeing like as the season progresses, the rookies are going to play more minutes and the Nets are going to be I would say more conservative with injuries as we’re already starting to see. I think they could make some trades, but I think that they’ll they’ll make it a priority to find these rookies minutes. And I’ve said this because Jordi Fernandez has made it clear and he told me and other reporters that the goal is going to be for the Nets rookies to play 60 games between the G-League and the NBA and they’re going to have to play extended minutes and extended games in the NBA to get to that mark. So, as the season progresses, we’re going to see them do that. I think we could see some trades like there’s guys who are going to be trade candidates whether you talk about Nick Claxton, uh Dron Sharp, maybe a Michael Porter Jr., Haywood Highmith, like whoever else enters that conversation. And then also think I also think that they’ll just find ways with the way that they handle injuries, the way that they handle the rotation that they’ll find minutes for these rookies. And we’re already starting to see that like MPJ missed the Net’s last two games due to lower back tightness. Jagor Deman sat out the second half of this backto-back due to injury management for his plantar fascia tear. that comes after like Jagor sat the Nets the second half of the Nets’s first back to back but then he played the Nets’s last two backto-backs both games and they sit him in this one and you know just starting and talking about MPJ like MPJ the Jordy Fernandez told me that MPJ started experiencing some lower back tightness in the Knicks game on Monday so he missed the 76ers game he was a surprise scratch for that one and then he’s ruled out for the second half of the backtoback but you look at it like the Nets played the Knicks on Monday they had three days off after that game before Friday 76ers matchup. You do not usually get three g three days off during an NBA season. And I’m not saying that MPJ is not injured. But I’m saying it makes sense for them if there’s any issue with him whatsoever. The Nets saying, “Hey, like sit this back toback. We don’t need you to play. If you have any discomfort whatsoever, just rest, stay healthy, stay at home. We’ll, you know, play this back toback and we’ll get the other rookies some reps. guys like Danny Wolf, guys like Ben Saraf, all these guys that have been in the G-League and will they continue to be in the G- League? We’ll see. But in that situation, you can call them up, you can get reps, they’ll kind of play through struggles and you’ll probably lose. And that ultimately is going to benefit the tank. And I think that that’s how this is going to go for the rest of the season. And that’s how the Nets should be handling this is if there’s any injury whatsoever to anybody, especially a veteran, let them sit out. Be conservative with it. You know, that’ll help you lose. That’ll get the rookies more minutes. And that’s how you should be going about it in addition to the trades that the Nets could potentially make. And now just closing it out looking at the tank landscape now in the NBA after last night’s results. You have the Wizards who are in first. You have the Pelicans who are in second and the Nets are like a half game behind both of them in third. You look behind beyond that, Pacers are four, Clippers five, Kings six, Mavericks seven, Hornets eight, Jazz nine. And just talking about why I’m confident that the Nets are going to be able to finish at the top of this among that group. A, it’s because they’re terrible. We all know that. And B, it’s because you look at teams like the Pelicans and the Clippers right now are really bad. As I said, the Pelicans are in second. The Clippers are in fifth. They’re really bad, but I’d say they have to finish ahead of the Nets because they don’t have their draft picks this season and they’re going to be trying to win all season. Whereas, as the year progresses, we’re going to see the Nets lean more into the tank. You’re going to see those teams just continue to try winning because there’s no benefit to them losing. So, I’m not worried about those two teams. And then you look at the other teams. You have the Pacers who have a much better roster than the Nets even with Tyresese Hallebert and injured, but they’re probably going to be tanking hard most likely because we’ve seen that from them early this season. And it benefits them to try to get a high pick in this, you know, loaded draft and then just get that player alongside Hallebertton and the rest of the rest of the guys they have and move forward. So, they’ll be in the mix with the Nets and Wizards, I’d say. And then beyond that, you have the Kings and the Mavericks who are trying to win right now, but they may blow it up at the deadline because it’s pretty clear they’re going nowhere. But even with that, I I have a really hard time seeing those team those teams finishing with a worse record than the Nets just because they’re going to be trying to win for probably leading up until the trade deadline, at least for the first half of the season. They’re already the Nets are already ahead of those teams and I’d have a really hard time seeing those teams catch the Nets. And then beyond that, you have the Hornets and the Jazz who the Nets have already created some separation ahead of. I think both of those teams will probably join the tank race more aggressively as the season progresses, but that’s not a guarantee for the Hornets because they’re playing better and they’ve been tanking for so long and they finally have some excitement surrounding Coniple and some of these other guys. They might be trying to win. And then the Jazz are nine right now, but they owe a top eight protected pick to the Oklahoma City Thunder who just own like all of the good draft picks in the NBA somehow a year after winning the title. Amazing job by Sam Prey there. So the the Jazz will enter it, but the Nets are already three games ahead of them and they have a much worse roster. So for all those reasons, if I were a Nets fan, I’d be able to put my if you’re a Nets fan who supports the tank, I’d be able to put my head calmly on the pillow at night and feel good about where the Nets are going to be that they’ll at least be in the top three. Can they get that top spot? We’ll see. But I feel like there’s a good chance that they’re in the top three of these draft lottery standings. a really good chance or a great chance I’d even say when it’s all said and done. But that’s all I got for you guys on today’s Locked on Nets episode. If you guys do not already, make sure to subscribe to Locked on Nets on YouTube and wherever you get your podcast, whether Apple podcast or Spotify. If you enjoy the content, take a second, smash that like button, leave a comment, leave a fivestar review. Anything you could do to engage is much appreciated. We got the Nets coming back on Monday against the Hornets and they got a few more games the rest of the week. So, I’ll have coverage of all that and more when I’m back tomorrow talking more Brooklyn Nets basketball.

Erik Slater outlines why Brooklyn Nets rookie Danny Wolf must stay in the team’s rotation after dominating the Milwaukee Bucks. He also discusses Ben Saraf’s outlook and the NBA’s tank landscape a quarter of the way through the season.

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