The Brooklyn Nets have 52 jersey numbers worn by over 600 different players over the course of their history since the franchise was founded in 1967 as a charter member of the American Basketball Association (ABA), when the team was known as the “New Jersey Americans”. Since then, that league has been absorbed by the NBA with the team that would later become the New York Nets and New Jersey Nets before settling on the name by which they are known today, bringing their rich player and jersey history with them to the league of today.
To commemorate the players who played for the Nets over the decades wearing those 52 different jersey numbers, Nets Wire is covering the entire history of the franchise’s jersey numbers and the players who sported them since the founding of the team.
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The first of those 52 different numbers is jersey No. 00, which has has had a total of six players wear the number in the history of the team. The sixth and last of those players wearing No. 00 was Brooklyn small forward alum Royce O’Neal.
O’Neal went unselected in the 2015 NBA draft after playing collegiately at Denver and Baylor, signing overseas to play with Riesen Ludwigsburg and Gran Canaria before the Utah Jazz brought him on in 2017.
There, the Killeen, Texas, native would play the first five seasons of his NBA career before he would be dealt to the Nets for draft assets in 2022.
His time in Brooklyn would be brief (just 49 games in one season) before he would be on the move again — this time to the Phoenix Suns — as part of a three-team trade.
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During his time suiting up for the Nets, O’Neal put up 8.3 points, 4.8 rebounds, and 3.4 assists per game.
This article originally appeared on Celtics Wire: Nets jersey history No. 00 – Royce O’Neal (2022-23)