Brooklyn Nets: Will below-average defense doom the star-studded Nets?

How much will their below-average defense cost the Brooklyn Nets?

For a team that is so gifted offensively, the Brooklyn Nets have looked equally unimpressive on the defensive end through the first third of the season thus far. The weird part about this is they [Nets] look even worse against lesser teams than they do against the better teams in the league.

The Nets did just beat the Indiana Pacers who are 12-13 but currently sit in sixth place in the Eastern Conference. In the previous game, the Nets lost in Detroit to a 6-18 Pistons team and gave up 122 points in the loss. The Pistons are only averaging 109 points per game this season. This is a theme that is becoming a regular occurrence for this Brooklyn squad.

In all fairness, Kevin Durant has been out recently. And KD did miss the game against the Pistons due to health and safety protocols.

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This collective of superstar players is still learning how to play together since the Nets traded for James Harden in January. But something needs to happen quickly. The Nets’ defensive woes can only continue to be blamed on chemistry issues for so long. Eventually, the Nets will have to break through and begin to beat good teams along with lesser teams like the Pistons and Washington Wizards.

After that loss to the Pistons, Kyrie Irving touched on why he thinks the season has gone the way it has while speaking to reporters.

"“I don’t think that we go out every single day of our lives and sacrifice the time in order to be average at anything. I know you don’t wake up, I know that no one here on this call wakes up to be average at anything that they do. And we look very average.”“We have the experience in terms of some of our guys that have been through certain things, circumstances to be able to battle through. And we’re dealing with a lot of that of the reality that we’re putting this together on the fly.”"

Will bad defense catch up to the Brooklyn Nets?

At some point, these losses to bad teams are going to add up. While the season is still young, the home stretch will be upon the Nets before they even realize it. Luckily, they are in the Eastern and not the Western Conference.

The Nets are currently 15-12 and sit in third place in the East as of Wednesday night. Over in the west, the San Antonio Spurs are in sixth place with a 14-11 record, only one-half game ahead of the Denver Nuggets. Just imagine what the talking heads would be saying about the Nets were they a team in the West right now. There would be even more doom and gloom swirling around this team than there is currently.

Head coach Steve Nash and his staff will have to figure out a way to get this team to want to play better team defense consistently. It can’t just be against the top four or five teams in the league.
The offense is there. No one ever thought that would be an issue. Durant and company need to figure out how to get hyped for a Tuesday night against the Pistons, Wizards, or Toronto Raptors. The Raptors being another sub .500 team that recently defeated the Nets, 123-117.

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Many analysts and experts have picked the Nets to represent the East in the NBA Finals this season. If Brooklyn keeps up with these less than inspiring defensive efforts, they might not make the Eastern Conference Finals, let alone the NBA Finals.

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