Brooklyn Nets: 2017-18 player grades for Allen Crabbe

Allen Crabbe came to the Brooklyn Nets as a salary dump, but he provided far more than the average salary dump could in his first season as a Net.

Allen Crabbe was always a player the Brooklyn Nets wanted. In the summer of 2016, the year that the infamous salary cap spike happened, virtually every team in the NBA had loads of cap space to throw around. Everyone from Evan Turner to Evan Fournier got max or near-max deals, because so many teams had money to spend.

Due to this trend, the Nets saw an opportunity to attack the market by doling out max contracts to young restricted free agents. For Brooklyn, this was a win-win: they’d either acquire the player they wanted all along, or force his incumbent team to match the egregious offer.

The Nets did this with Crabbe, and the Portland Trail Blazers matched it. However, just one year later, Portland gave up on Crabbe, and shipped him away for Andrew Nicholson as a salary dump.

To say the Nets were happy to have him would be accurate. Brooklyn’s 3-point heavy scheme welcomed Crabbe with open arms, as he finished second in the NBA in 3-point efficiency in 2016-17.

His 2017-18 campaign was not nearly as twine-ripping, but few players increase their efficiencies as their usage rises. Crabbe had an overall solid season, and now it’s time to review that season.