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Jason Kidd to Joe Johnson prior to a typical Joe play: 'We know it's coming to you!' (Video)
Dating back nearly one decade, when the Atlanta Hawks franchise wrapped its well-heeled arms around him, Joe Johnson’s isolation-heavy style of play has been an NBA staple. “Iso Joe” plays on the Brooklyn Nets now, and though he’s on his sixth coach in six seasons, the practice continues unabated.
One of those coaches, former Nets coach and current Milwaukee Bucks coach Jason Kidd, took great delight in both anticipating the Nets’ inevitable choice to go to an isolation set featuring Joe Johnson late in the second overtime on Wednesday evening, with the YES Network cameras catching Kidd not only calling out the play to his young defenders, but also informing Johnson himself that he knows exactly what was coming next.
With the game knotted at 112-112, via Deadspin, you’ll never guess what came next:
As you know, Kidd’s Bucks went on to win in the third overtime after Brandon Knight redeemed himself in full with a pair of clutch free throws.
The game was the first between Kidd’s surprising Bucks and his former Nets team, and it was not without controversy. After Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov used some of your Aunt Linda’s language to bid farewell to Kidd earlier in the season, perhaps the greatest Net in their NBA history returned to Brooklyn amid boos and many questions about his acrimonious departure from last June – one that came after a reported coup attempt pitched by Kidd in hopes of unseating general manager Billy King.
Kidd once again denied he tried to make such a power move. From Newsday’s Roderick Boone:
"No. No, I didn't try to promote myself," he said. "Billy's the GM. He put the Brooklyn Nets together, so it is what it is. I didn't try to promote myself. I'm still learning to be a coach. This is my second season. I had a very interesting first year as a coach. I thought it was kind of funny that you guys were marking down how many times I held the clipboard. You do that to [Lionel] Hollins?"
Lionel Hollins would be the veteran now charged with running the Brooklyn Nets from Kidd’s old seat.
Bergen Record reporter Steve Popper chronicled the Nets' collective eyeroll at Kidd's denial:
But Kidd also said that he never tried to promote himself over King — something several Nets’ front office members bristled at Wednesday night, but refused to comment on the record.
The “[Billy King] put the Brooklyn Nets together” line from Jason is less of a factual statement coming from Kidd’s mouth as it is a diss. The team nearly hit $200 million in payroll last season after luxury taxes and coaching expenditures were accounted for, and it just barely made the second round of the playoffs in a weakened Eastern Conference. We’d hardly trust Jason Kidd to run our basketball team’s front office, but we certainly wouldn’t want Billy King anywhere near that hypothetical front office. Kidd likely feels the same way, which is why he left a playoff team in a massive city for a tiny market featuring the NBA’s worst team.
The 7-5 Bucks aren’t the dregs of the NBA anymore, not by a long shot, and it’s fair to credit Kidd’s coaching as much as you would health and a better set of overall attitudes. Kidd’s Bucks are a top five defensive team already, an impressive mark for such a young squad, and they haven’t even gotten a whole heck of a lot from rookie stud Jabari Parker so far – below 12 points and six rebounds in around 30 minutes a night.
Of course, Kidd can’t help but wade into a little controversy even while coaching in relative anonymity up in Milwaukee.
On Thursday, CBS Sports’ Ken Berger published a strong feature detailing the heretofore unchecked conflict of interest that arises when agents are allowed to represent both players and coaches or executives. The NBA forbids such a relationship, but that hasn’t stopped agents from working in backhanded, unofficial channels – channels that may have funneled Kidd’s move to Milwaukee last summer.
[Jeff] Schwartz, a respected and powerful player agent with 36 clients totaling more than $200 million in salary this season, is hardly alone on the edge of the rules. But Schwartz's role in brokering Kidd's exit from Brooklyn, and Kidd's public disclosure of it, brought the widespread existence of such conflicts to the forefront.
Upon arriving in Milwaukee to take over as coach, Kidd and Bucks co-owner Marc Lasry matter-of-factly discussed Schwartz's role in the power play in a nationally televised news conference on July 2. To those familiar with the union's rules forbidding such behavior, and the steps taken by many in the industry to disguise it, such transparency was stunning.
"The process started when Jeff asked for permission, permission was granted and I talked to Wes [Edens, another Bucks co-owner] and Marc," Kidd said. "That's when the ball started rolling. I liked what I heard from Wes and Marc, and from there, it was taken out of my hands."
Berger then went on to quote agent David Falk, who represented Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing and others as players, but stepped down as their representative when they moved into executive and coaching roles:
“My company's called FAME,” Falk said. “Suppose I set up a separate company called FAME Coaches. I'd have one person working for me to do the coaches, and I'd do the players. I know I could do it, but I wouldn't do it because the reason for the rule is when I walk down the hall and say, ‘Hey, let's talk about how much money you're asking for so and so,' you can't separate it out.
“What if the guy wants to be traded and the coach or GM doesn't want to trade him?” Falk said. “Who are you representing? … You can't represent people on both sides of the table without having a conflict.”
Two sides, havin’ a conflict. Jason Kidd loves this stuff.
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is an editor for Ball Don't Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at KDonhoops@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KDonhoops
