Sean Marks Reflects on Nets' Flexibility: 'We Don’t Want to Get Sped Up'

Having concluded year one of a complete rebuild, the Brooklyn Nets head into the offseason with a firm direction in place—as well as a host of future assets. Courtesy of last July's Mikal Bridges trade and December's dealings of Dennis Schroder and Dorian Finney-Smith—compounded by a projected $91.8 million in cap space—general manager Sean Marks has the flexibility to turn Brooklyn around in just one summer. But will he?

“In this market we’re always going to have various different free agents and opportunities thrown at us, just simply being in a top five market in the league; that’s going to happen,” Marks said via C.J. Holmes of the Daily News. “We don’t want to get sped up. We’ve talked multiple times about being systematic and strategic in how we build here."

After being named the Nets' general manager in 2016, Marks strung together savvy moves to build a playoff contender in just under three seasons. The team's success and stability ultimately attracted Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant, albeit the pairing experienced limited success. If presented with the opportunity to reel in a big fish (Giannis Antetokounmpo, perhaps?), Marks is prepared to pull off a blockbuster move.

"The market speaks for itself, right? Our ownership group speaks for itself. So, we’re very fortunate to be able to go all in at the right time," Marks continued. "We’ve done it before. We’ve done it several times. Would we do it again? I think Joe [Tsai] is sitting there going at the right time, you give me the word, and we’ll go.”

However, Marks clarified that going "all in" doesn't necessarily mean replicating the past. Five years ago, "all in" meant forming a superteam—often rostering a minimum of three All-Star-level players. Seemingly having learned from past mistakes, Marks mentioned the possibility of continuing to develop in-house alongside head coach Jordi Fernandez.

“There’s a lot of cap room at stake. And how we use that, it’s probably too early to determine. But there’s a variety of different pathways we can go on. And it’s just about being opportunistic as to how we build and when we go all in again, so to speak," he said." And that could be going all in with whether it’s free agents or trades, but it also could be go all-in with systematically growing some homegrown talent."

Brooklyn and Marks await May 12's draft lottery, where the franchise will find out where it'll be selecting in the first NBA Draft post-rebuild commtiment.