With the Nets’ season on track and another head coach leaving, general manager Sean Marks said Tuesday in Brooklyn, “We’re in a results-oriented business,” which is why he fired Jack. He said this was the reason he made the decision to do so. Vaughn will be replaced by interim head coach Kevin Ollie.
But even Marks acknowledged the roster wasn’t good enough and talked about “accountability,” but there were few positive results in Brooklyn for much of his tenure.
He noted that Marks wanted to see a “level of competition” within the group, which was 15-15 just after Christmas, but has since fallen to 6-18.
And he pointed out his own shortcomings and why his own professional status was questionable.
“When you have to walk away from coaching, you have to look back on it and say, ‘What went wrong?'” What could we have done differently? What else could we have done? Did you support him enough? Did you have the correct list? ” Marks said. “I am absolutely responsible for the roster.”
And that roster is part of the reason Vaughn lost his job.
“We’re not going to be the most talented team in the league,” Marks said. “I’m not an idiot. I totally get that. But at the same time, I think this is a talented group of young men and there are plays and my expectations, and their expectations are the little things, the effort plays, the plays. Loose balls, contested shots, things like that went off the floor. So if you’re in a situation like we’re in right now where you’re trying to do everything, those are things you should expect. . That’s what I’m expecting for the next 28 games and that’s probably what I’m not seeing, frankly, and the level of effort and the level of competition isn’t necessarily going to be there. ”
Marks acknowledged the flaws in the roster and questioned why he is still at the top despite the fact that he now has another head coach after Kenny Atkinson, Steve Nash, Vaughn and O’Ree. The quest to find a permanent replacement for Vaughn, who also sounded confident in his position within the organization.
He was hired by former owner Mikhail Prokhorov in 2016, and the Nets have advanced past the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs just once.
Vaughn was fired less than a year after receiving a multi-year contract extension.
“We have shown the ability to put this franchise on top of the world,” Marks said. “That’s the plan. Let’s do it again. We want to be a place where we can develop our own players and not just free agents want to come.”
Marks said Tuesday that he and owner Joe Tsai “have always had a perfect partnership.” And that doesn’t mean we always agree. It takes a good discussion and a solid discussion, but Joe and I will make this decision, and he hasn’t given me any reason to believe that I can’t make that decision. ”
However, the GM acknowledged that the entire organization is responsible for the current state of the team, including Marks.
“First and foremost, we all need to be accountable for this,” Marks said. “I have to take responsibility. The roster is my responsibility. I’m not shy about it. When you have to make a decision, like resigning as a head coach, it’s not a complete decision. [Vaughn’s] It’s because of this place. We all look in the mirror and ask ourselves, what could we have done differently? What can we do better? I think we need to get back to playing hard and competing. ”
The turning point in the season came with a lopsided loss to Milwaukee in the second game of the series in which the Nets elected to rest most of their starters, a decision that led to the team being fined and the season quickly ending. It has been restarted. Go down the tube.
“First of all, I don’t think we lost a team that day,” Marks said. “I think there was obviously a comment and I appreciate the fact that the players want to play. They want to play night in and night out. Again, to this day, I don’t think the record or this decision. I don’t think there was one single decision that ultimately influenced it. I think there were a lot of things that went into it.”
Still, there’s no denying how the season changed after that game, and Marks was the first player under Vaughn since the Nets made the playoffs last season after Kevin Durant was traded to Phoenix and Kyrie Irving was traded to Dallas. I reflected on how the team played.
On Tuesday, he criticized this year’s team’s effort level.
Asked about the next low point of the season, a 50-point blowout loss to the Celtics that was Bourne’s last game, Marks said, “It would be a little ridiculous for me to say” that it led to Bourne’s firing. Ta.
“When you reach a crossroads here and… you don’t get the results you wanted, look at the overall scheme of things and the record of the past few months, the direction of the team and the underlying trends. It was an opportunity to make a difference at this particular time,” Marks said.
