Right now, the Nets have a big problem. As in: They don’t have any big men.
The only two centers on the roster — starter Nic Claxton and backup Day’Ron Sharpe — are sidelined, injured and unavailable.
Both will miss Tuesday’s NBA Cup tilt at Barclays Center against the visiting Hornets.
Sharpe hasn’t played all season due to a strained left hamstring, and the status of Claxton’s lower back strain that required an epidural isn’t expected to even be updated until the end of the week.
Their returns won’t come a moment too soon for the undermanned and undersized Nets, who’ve dropped five of six.
“We didn’t have one center. Obviously, it’s always good to have Nic, it’s always good to have Day’Ron, because they’ve got great attitudes, they’ve got great energy, and they just help the team,” coach Jordi Fernandez said. “The reality is this is part of the NBA. Guys will be out. The good thing is it’s not major injuries. They’ll be back soon, and when they’re back, we’ll be happy to have them back. But right now, this is our reality, and we’ll find a way to play.”
Their absence has had a trickle-down effect.
It has not only left the Nets vulnerable on the boards and in the paint, but also taken Ben Simmons out of the one position in which he’s comfortable and forced him to play somewhere he’s clearly ineffective.
Noah Clowney, still just 20 and stringy, has added some muscle but still isn’t physically ready to defend centers.
The 6-foot-9, 230-pounder got bullied out of the way multiple times Sunday against the Knicks by Karl-Anthony Towns.
Simmons is an inch taller, 10 pounds heavier and has started at center both in Claxton’s current absence and also earlier in the season when a hamstring injury had Claxton under a strict minutes limit.
But the Nets — a poor-rebounding, small-ball squad under the best of circumstances — have struggled on the glass the past two games without Claxton.
“We’ve got to box out more, find our man on the box outs,” Simmons said. “It’s a factor. Rebounding is a part of it. You’ve got to box out. So, if you don’t hit somebody or you don’t know where your man is, you’re not going to get the rebound.
“We’ve got to get the ball to run in transition. So, we’ve got to rebound first. You can’t leak out.”
An update on Sharpe was expected Monday, but his progress is still unclear other than his unavailability vs. Charlotte. And the necessity of starting Simmons at center has made him ineffective, taking him away from playing the point.
“Ben plays point guard. He’s one of our point guards, playmakers, like [in New Orleans] he had 10 assists in the first half, 12 for the game. So that’s what we want him to do, is push, help us find those good shots early in the clock,” Fernandez had said. “He’s important for us because of that versatility defensively, his size. He always helps us play fast and it’s one of the things we want to do.”
When Simmons has come off the bench backing up starting point guard Dennis Schroder, he’s averaged seven points, 10 assists and 5.5 rebounds with a 2.2 net rating and a 55.6 assist percentage that would be elite.
But starting at center, those numbers plummet to just 4.9 points, 6.3 assists, 5.9 boards, a minus-6.7 net rating and a poor 39.1 assist percentage.
The drop-off is glaring.
“The personnel we have is the personnel we have. I believe in all our guys. … You’ve just got to be better, and we all know that,” Cam Johnson said.
“One thing we always want to do is run in transition, but we can’t let that impact our defensive rebounding. … We’ve got Dorian down there. He’s a good rebounder, but he’s really occupied boxing out. Same with Ben. So it’s on everybody else to come back and rebound and have that effort. … So we’ve just got to find that balance between running and everybody converging back on the ball.”