3 storylines to watch as the Nets enter training camp

Of all the seasons Nets GM Sean Marks has been in the running for Executive of the Year, this might be the year his peers tip their hats.

Marks and team governor Joe Tsai stared an explosive situation in the face – a potential detonation of a championship franchise in the wake of Kevin Durant’s summertime trade request – and steadied the ship through turbulent waters.

Durant remains a Net ostensibly against his will, Kyrie Irving appears motivated on what’s serving as a one-year deal, Ben Simmons both looks and sounds healthy, and the Nets, yet again, return as championship contenders powered by a Big 3 that might be the best in basketball.

But will it be enough? History has shown, especially for this franchise, that the talent on paper is not the end-all, be-all to making a deep playoff run. Entering Year 4 of the Seven-Eleven era, the Nets have just one playoff series victory to show, with the same number of sweeps to boot after the Celtics dusted off the broomsticks and knocked them out of the first round in disappointing fashion last season.

This time, it should be different.

The Nets are getting a clean takeoff through training camp and are bringing largely the same core group back with a couple of new complementary faces. That familiarity will help them in the ways the lack of it doomed them last season. After starting last year with 10 new faces on the roster, seven of the 10 players who project to play meaningful minutes are returning from last year’s team.

That doesn’t mean it will be smooth sailing all the way through. Here are three potential icebergs the Nets have to navigate around on a championship cruise.

Is second-year big man Day’Ron Sharpe ready for primetime?

Also known as ‘Do the Nets have enough size?’ While the numbers say the Nets were statistically an OK rebounding team last season, watching them battle for boards before acquiring Andre Drummond in the James Harden deal was a sight for sore eyes.

The Nets were routinely out-rebounded, especially after a big wing in Joe Harris was ruled out for the season because he needed two ankle surgeries. Drummond provided size where Nic Claxton lacked it, but the lack of a rebounding presence was thoroughly exploited in the first round of the playoffs. The Celtics averaged 39.5 boards and the Nets only hauled in an average of 34. Those rebounds proved costly in a series decided by small margins.

The Nets got bigger this summer for sure. Royce O’Neale, whom the Nets acquired from the Utah Jazz for a trade exception and a first-round pick, plays bigger than his 6′4″ height would suggest. He averaged five rebounds for his career but has a season averaging seven boards as a 3-and-D who fits seamlessly alongside this talented group. TJ Warren checks in at 6′8″, 220 pounds. Markieff Morris isn’t known as a rebounder, but he’s 6′9″, just under 250 pounds.

Not to mention a healthy Simmons is a rebounding machine with the capacity to grab a board and take it the length of the floor for either a finish at the rim or a dime to an open teammate.

But Drummond left for Chicago and the Nets never signed a legitimate backup center despite having the cap mechanisms to do so. Instead of going after DeMarcus Cousins or Hassan Whiteside, the Nets are entering training camp with second-year big man Day’Ron Sharpe as the only other big man on the roster aside from Claxton, whose photos out of training camp also suggest he has put on more muscle weight to his once-considered lank frame.

Claxton, due to a variety of injuries and illnesses, has also only played in 97 regular-season games in his first three NBA seasons, giving a heightened chance that there will be times when Sharpe is the only center available to play. Sharpe has proven to be an effective rebounder but hasn’t adequately tested those instincts against the league’s best because he didn’t get much playing time as a rookie.

The first few games of the preseason and regular season will dictate whether or not Marks’ additions have helped compensate for the Nets’ lack of a brute force rebounder and defender like Drummond. If Brooklyn’s rebounding struggles continue, the Nets may need to add depth at the five

Will the Nets finally get a string of good health?

Speaking of Claxton’s availability history, the Nets have six players projecting to play critical minutes who have not been reliable for playing a full slate of games. Take TJ Warren, for example, whose size and scoring ability make him an excellent option to help take the load off Durant’s shoulders for spurts at a time.

Until you remember Warren hasn’t played in each of the past two seasons because of a nagging foot injury.

The injury bug festered in Brooklyn last season, and the Nets have a combustible roster with players who could be subject to aggravating old ailments. Harris hasn’t played basketball since Nov. 14 after attempting to make a comeback on an ankle that needed a second surgery.

Simmons hasn’t played basketball in a year-and-a-half and is coming off a microdiscectomy after dealing with a herniated disc in his lower back. Claxton’s availability has already been mentioned and the numbers alone speak volumes for Irving, who has appeared in only 103 games in his first three seasons in Brooklyn and has both regular-season and playoff injuries to show.

Of course, there’s Durant, the basketball machine who has said on multiple occasions to “let me die out there on the court” because he wants to play as many minutes as his team needs him to win games. He is three seasons removed from rupturing his Achilles – though his play makes it look like it never happened – and suffered an MCL injury that cost him a month-and-a-half on a freak play where Bruce Brown tumbled into his knee.

Every team’s season hinges on players being available, but the Nets have had bad luck in that department. Will this be the year they finally string it together?

How will Steve Nash maximize his players’ talents?

It’s not every day a superstar and former league MVP goes directly to the franchise owner and calls for both the jobs of his team’s head coach and general manager. And it’s certainly not every day that a team owner says no to a superstar’s demands – while also declining to fulfill his trade request.

But such is the status in Brooklyn, where things have to be at least a little awkward after Durant requested a trade, then reiterated that trade request with an ultimatum – ‘either trade me or fire both Steve Nash and Sean Marks’ – that went unfulfilled.

And while Marks’ resume as a general manager may have earned him a reputation as one of the best in the business, there is no doubt Nash – who took the Nets job two seasons ago with no prior coaching experience – has something to prove.

From rotations to in-game adjustments and timeouts, there have been times where Nash has looked in over his head as the leader of a team with championship aspirations, no time more glaring than when his former assistant Ime Udoka lapped him with defensive strategies that clamped the Nets’ two star scorers.

This season, success for Nash will be dictated by how fluid the offense looks and the variety of ways in which he’s able to unlock Simmons’ game. Nash said last season the Nets would use Simmons often at the center position, but his previous head coaches used his gifted playmaking abilities to start him at the point guard. The Harden deal also proved the Nets need a point guard to organize the offense so Durant and Irving aren’t tasked with doing so.

It will be on Nash not only to maximize Simmons’ talents but to get the most out of everyone and install an offense not nearly as predictable as the one opponents game-planned for last season.

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