Put aside reports that Kevin Durant’s MCL sprain is not as bad as last year’s injury, which sent the Nets on a 5-16 spiral. That’s one point of optimism. The other is that the Nets are in better shape than last year, better equipped to handle the rigors of the mid-season NBA. The records — and concern — may be strikingly similar, but the Nets should do better.
As Brian Lewis writes Wednesday, the lineup the Nets put on the floor after KD went down in January 2022 was not ideal:
It’s important to note this is a very different Nets team than the one that crumbled in the wake of Durant’s injury.