Netlinked 10/8/12: Preseason Begins (For Other NBA Teams), Nets Have 1st Barclays Practice, Gerald Wallace Afraid of NYC

A-V-E-R-Y coaching up his new team at the new digs

It's official, the NBA preseason for the 2012-13 season has officially started. Well, to be fair, it started on Friday night when the Celtics lost to Fenerbahce, a Turkish team that has two players which the Nets hold the draft rights to. Those guys are Ilkan Karaman and Bojan Bogdanovic, who combined to score 15 points in their team's stunning upset of Boston.

There were also a bunch of games on Saturday and Sunday including Nets South (the Atlanta Hawks) beating the Heat and LeBron (no Wade due to injury) and the Nuggets beating the LA Clippers in Las Vegas on a buzzer-beating layup by Ty Lawson. However, unfortunately, the Nets don't open up their preseason circuit until this upcoming Saturday, October 13th, in Atlantic City, NJ against the 76ers.

Shot Analysis: Joe Johnson

Joe Johnson's deathscare is pretty scary. At least the body that's attached to that face can shoot.

This is the 2nd in a series I'm doing analyzing shot charts of the more important Nets (sans Brook Lopez because of his limited play last year) and how they fared from the field last season. We continue with one of the newest Nets, Joe Johnson. Deron Williams was analyzed last.

Blah blah blah Iso-Joe, we've heard it all. Ever since the trade Joe Johnson this summer, us Nets fans have been hearing all of these writers, bloggers, and analysts talk about how overpaid he is, how much he shoots, how bad he is on defense, how the Hawks never succeeded in the playoffs with him, blah blah blah blah blah. I, personally don't want to hear it anymore.

Joe is a star shooting guard, undoubtedly one of the best pure shooters in the NBA right now. However, he is still widely labeled as overrated even though he has averaged at least 18 points per game in the last seven seasons of his career.

Interestingly enough, only 4 other NBA players have averaged 18 ppg over that same time-span from the 2005-06 season until last season, 2011-12. (Noted: This list contains only players that QUALIFIED for the scoring championship in each of those seasons by having enough shot attempts. That's why Dwyane Wade and Paul Pierce aren't included). Who might those 4 players be? 

Season-In-Review: Jordan Farmar

Ugh, I miss this guy already. What I don't miss? The empty seats behind him in this picture.

This post, along with the other posts I will do in the Season-In-Review series, will take a deeper look at how all the Nets did last season on the court and possibly off of it. We continue with Jordan Farmar. I covered Kris Humphries last.

March 7th, 2012. The game was just another run-of-the-mill Nets-Clippers game at the Prudential Center on a Wednesday night, except that it was one the Nets won. The game had the feel of many the Nets have played in recent years against playoff teams: They race ahead to a quick lead, but watch their lead slowly deteriorate as the game progresses. In this one, two Chris Paul free throws gave the Clips their first lead of the game with 8.9 seconds, putting them ahead 100-98. Then, magic happened.

Deron Williams sent a beautiful cross-court skip pass to Jordan Farmar who sunk a rainbow three-pointer with 0.2 seconds left to give the Nets their 13th win on the season and a signature win over one of the West's better teams. Farmar scored 16 points in 19 minutes of play in that game, something not completely out of the ordinary for the former Laker to do in his two seasons in Jersey.

Netlinked 9/18/12: Nets Fill Out Training Camp Roster, Jordan Williams Waived by Hawks

In order to fill up their training camp roster at 18 players, the Nets have signed three players to non-guaranteed contracts. Guard Stephen Dennis and forwards James Mays and Carleton Scott were signed by the team yesterday. Dennis went to Kutztown University, Mays went to Clemson, and Scott, a member of the Nets' 2012 Summer League team, is a Notre Dame grad. None of these guys are expected to play a significant role and/or even make the roster coming out of training camp but they do add some sort of depth if needed to perform in some capacity for the Nets this year. I've never personally seen Dennis play but from what I've seen of Mays and Scott, they are both guys who have decent scoring skill and can perform the intangibles needed to be valuable to a NBA team.

And finally, in sad news relating to former Nets, the Atlanta Hawks have requested waivers on Jordan Williams, the power forward from the University of Maryland who was sent to Atlanta from the Nets as part of the Joe Johnson deal. As someone who personally roots for Maryland sports, I'm very upset with the Hawks and frankly, don't understand the move from a basketball perspective for Atlanta. J-Will isn't making much money and showed at the end of last season that he's a serviceable big-man back-up who a depth-starved team like the Hawks could probably use.

Hello Josh Childress, Goodbye Damion James

The Nets traded up to get James in with the 24th pick in the 2010 NBA Draft. He showed some promise with the team but just couldn't stay healthy long enough to make an impact. Yet another Nets draft pick to not turn out and another Nets player to head to Atlanta this offseason. On the bright side, he fit all the trends!

It looks like the Nets' roster for training camp might be actually filled out now. After some rumors that there was mutual interest and a potential workout was set up, veteran wingman Josh Childress has indeed signed a one-year, partially-guaranteed contract with the Nets and will be the 2nd player picked up by the Nets this offseason that had been amnestied by their old team. Of course, the other is former Wizard and current headcase, Andray Blatche.

As I said a few days ago, I don't really see the need for a player like Childress on the Nets but he's another low-risk, medium-reward signing by Billy King, who is becoming shockingly shrewd late in the off-season after saying "YOLO" with the first few moves he made after the 2011-12 season.

Another little tidbit of info regarding former Nets is that 2010 1st-rounder Damion James has signed with the Hawks after the Nets did not renew his rookie contract this offseason. As you all probably remember, we got James (24th overall) from, ironically, the Hawks for the 27th overall pick (Jordan Crawford) and the 31st overall pick (Tibor Pleiss).

James, a former standout at the University of Texas, played pretty well for the Nets in just 32 games over his two seasons with the team. However, constant injuries (32 games in two years is pretty bad) and the numbers game with this roster just left him with no place on this year's incarnation of your Brooklyn Nets.