The Brooklyn Nets have fired Lionel Hollins and moving forward this season the team could consider trades with players like Joe Johnson, Brook Lopez, Shane Larkin or Bojan Bogdanovic. The team has also reassigned general manager Billy King and reports have the team going after John Calipari as their next head coach option.
The Nets have struggled quite a bit this season and that sparked changes for the team on Sunday, with Hollins getting fired and King re-assigned, according to ESPN.com. The Nets announced that assistant Tony Brown will take over until the team makes a hire for a replacement for Hollins. Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov said in a released statement that the team needs "new leadership" and that he wants to create a "wining culture" in Brooklyn moving forward.
The Nets reportedly want John Calipari to take over as head coach and president, according to a report from Adrian Wojnarowski. Yahoo Sports reports that Nets CEO Brett Yormark wants to offer Calipari the head coaching job and title of team president. Calipari went to Twitter on Monday to deny any reports and wrote that he "plans on being at Kentucky for a long time."
The Nets have struggled this season and are only better than the Philadelphia 76ers in the standings. The team spent a ton of money on players and pulled off trade deals to bring in the core of Deron Williams, Joe Johnson, Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett, but it did not result in any strong playoff runs for the team. The Nets now have Brook Lopez as their centerpiece player, but the team needs to add more around him before they can get back to winning.
Joe Johnson has been mentioned in trade rumors for the team since last season and according to Marc Stein at ESPN, Johnson's contract makes him very hard to deal. Stein writes that Johnson's salary at over $24 million makes a trade very tough and that Johnson is "not pursuing" a buyout with the team at this time. Johnson is averaging just 11 points per game this season and with a salary as high as he has, teams may not pursue him in trades. Fred Katz of Fox Sports reports that a buyout could come after the trade deadline and details two scenarios about how that could go down. Check out the details here.
According to the Sporting News, Bojan Bogdanovic could be a potential target at the trade deadline for the Charlotte Hornets. Bogdanovic has been averaging 9.5 points per game for the Nets and is shooting 42 percent overall and he could be a fit for the Hornets with the Nets totally out of the playoff picture. The Hornets reportedly want to add some wing depth and Bogdanovic could be a target.
Lopez is unlikely to get traded after just signing a contract with the Nets and according to NorthJersey.com, Lopez said that he has no regrets about signing back with the team. Lopez likely will remain as the franchise player for the Nets as they try and rebuild moving forward.
