Question Is Not If, But How And When Deron Williams Departs

When the Brooklyn Nets franchise — then, located in New Jersey — traded for Deron Williams in a mid-season deal during the 2011 NBA trade deadline, they were expecting to receive an elite point guard of the same ilk as a Chris Paul or a Tony Parker; someone who could quarterback them into a perennial championship contender.

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Williams would play up to par at first, living up to his sterling resume and earning an All-Star nod in 2012, averaging a career-best 21.0 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 8.7 assists per game on a TS% (true shooting clip) of 52.7 percent and a PER of 20.3.

The team didn’t win much — accumulating just 22 wins during the lockout-shortened 66-game campaign — but, at least Williams was producing like an upper-echelon point guard, and a player worth building around.

However, since signing his massive five-year, $98.7 million contract back in the summer of 2012, the artist formerly known as D-Will has been on a steep and steady decline.

Provided by Basketball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 5/12/2015.

In addition to the precipitous plunge in his anecdotal production, his advanced statistics have endured a similar brand of recession. Most notably, his PER has dipped from 20.3 in 2011-12 to 15.7 this season — barely crawling above the league median.

Likewise, his win shares per 48 minutes has dwindled from 0.184 in 2012-13 to 0.083 this year — the lowest mark since his rookie campaign.

Maybe it’s the injuries; or maybe it’s the pressure of moving to, and having to play in, Brooklyn; whatever the cause of his dire play is, this new version of the former Fighting Illini star is here to stay.

Sure enough, after consecutive years of paying an asinine amount for their payroll — and thereby venturing into the repeater taxpayer category — only to produce middling results, Nets general manager Billy King is finally ready to cut bait with the team’s two highest paid — and often times, most disappointing — backcourt “stars.”

More explicitly, in a conference call held with the Nets’ contingent of season ticket holders last Thursday, King expressed his desire, among other things, to transform Brooklyn into a much younger and athletic team this summer. 

He also mentioned the team’s intentions to retain Brook Lopez and Thaddeus Young — both of whom are likely to exercise their player options this summer — but, made no mention of Williams.

A day earlier, however, King did make a statement regarding the future of the Nets in general; in particular, regarding the team’s financial state, and the possibility of breaking this current rendition of the Nets up for good this off-season.

Certainly, finding an trade suitor for Williams is nothing short of a lost cause at this point, as no team (well, I shouldn’t say no team… there’s always the Lakers and the Kings) in their right mind would buy low on a severely overpaid former star who just crossed wrong side of 30 this past year.

Trading away Johnson seems to be the more likely scenario, as the 6-foot-8 swingman is entering the final year of his max deal. And although he is due more than $24.8 million next year, some fringe contending team will assuredly rent his shot-making services for a full, or partial, season.

Getting rid of both Williams and Johnson will surely lift a major burden off of the luxury-tax paying Nets. After shattering the record for the amount of luxury tax penalties paid last summer, Brooklyn’s brass maybe hesitant to continue its prolonged stay in the repeater tax bracket if it continues to yield a first-round-and-out outcome.

Without their handsomely paid backcourt, the Nets can afford to refurbish the team to their liking, and more importantly, without going over the salary cap threshold.

The most sensible way to dump Williams’ albatross of a contract is to simply employ the stretch provision on Deron’s remaining two years. However, TNT analyst and NBA.com columnist David Aldridge shot down the possibilities of the Nets stretching, or buying out, their rapidly declining lead guard. 

In Aldridge’s article Monday, the long-time insider definitively stated the option of a Williams’ buyout will not be considered. Here’s an excerpt from his piece:

"But a buyout of Williams, while potentially saving the Nets millions of dollars via the “stretch” provision, is not in the cards. The Nets are not interested in giving Williams $43 million to not play. The intriguing question is whether the Nets can deal Joe Johnson and his expiring contract, at $24.8 million next season. For one year, even at that price, Johnson would have suitors."

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How the Deron Williams saga ultimately unfolds in Brooklyn remains to be seen. While he will most likely start the season off as a Net, his time with the organization is undoubtedly numbered.

For Brooklyn Nets fans, the upcoming year will be trying and gloomy as the team tries to dispose of their damaged assets without the aid of a tradable first-round draft pick (due to the Stepien Rule) until 2020.

Come the summer of 2016, however, with a boatload of cap space — as the league’s new TV money kicks in — and a free-agency pool headlined by the likes of Kevin Durant and Mike Conley, as well as (possibly) LeBron James, Kevin Love, and Chris Paul if they so choose to opt in or out, Brooklyn may once again materialize into an ideal big-market destination.

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