Billy King Says Paul Pierce Cost Too Much To Keep In Brooklyn
The Brooklyn Nets were the big story of last offseason when they acquired Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett in a blockbuster deal with the Boston Celtics. They also flirted with and surpassed luxury tax limits in the process.
Pierce is now with the Washington Wizards, but his buddy KG stayed put in Brooklyn.
Nets general manager Billy King spoke on the difficulty in negotiations with Pierce, via Tom Bontemps of The New York Post:
That was the plan of attack, and when we started negotiations, the numbers they asked for were [too high], and I thought at one point he was definitely leaving.
So, you start switching gears because you start hearing he’s going to end up some other place so you have to start preparing, and when he came back to us we had already moved on.
King on the Nets’ record payroll and luxury-tax bill of over $190 million last season:
Our goal is not to be where we were. We got there last year, but that wasn’t the intent when we started.
While the Nets certainly saved long-term money and lessened luxury tax payments by letting Pierce walk, it’s no question that they’ll likely regress on the floor this season. Without the cap exceptions to sign a serviceable replacement the Nets are left to hope that Deron Williams can return to form and Brook Lopez can return from his injury to carry more of the load.
