Once upon a time Sean Marks was the general manager of a plucky underdog Brooklyn Nets team, inheriting the job at a time when few would have envied the task ahead of him but quickly transforming the entire perception of the franchise as he and head coach Kenny Atkinson instilled a fresh, modern, humble, team-first culture. Players who’d been counted out, players who were in need of a second or maybe even first chance, they rocked up at the Nets and they got better playing within that system. It was a rebuild made without sexy draft picks. Without tasty trade bait. It was pure ground-level foundations and it won Marks and his team plenty of adoration around the league... not the least of which from Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving as they chose to sign together with the Nets in free agency, thus drastically changing the whole course of the franchise.

You already know this story. It was a battle between the past and the future and the future won, with Kenny Atkinson sacked and eventually Steve Nash of all people was brought into to coach the team. New priorities require new pathways and the great work that had been done to get the Nets to this point had to be largely thrown out in order to accommodate their new superstars. That was probably always the plan. You don’t win championships with good intentions and underrated role players... you need All Stars for that task, mate. And with All Star players come All Star expectations, All Star ambitions, and All Star egos.

It’s been a funky little scene watching how Sean Marks’ job has changed so drastically over the last 18 months. And fair play to the bloke because he’s not exactly swimming against the tide here. Some may say that having two of the most notoriously difficult (in their own unique ways) personalities in the NBA on the same roster is too much to handle. Not Sean Marks though. Instead he’s gone and upped the ante even more by bringing in a third notoriously difficult personality... and in the process trading away half a decade’s worth of first round picks and the two most exciting young players on the roster, two dudes that he drafted himself and helped turn into genuinely fascinating basketballers. There are many things which caught us unawares in 2020 but who could possibly have predicted the 2021 Sean Marks Heel Turn?

Okay it’s not quite a heel turn, but Nice Guy Sean has his work cut out here. You listen to that interview and Marks is so ceaselessly diplomatic when it comes to praising and appeasing his star players. He’d long since set that tone and now he’s gone even further in that direction to where player power rules at the Brooklyn Nets. The Kenny Atkinson firing probably needed to happen in order to clarify things moving forward but it was pressure from KD and Kyrie that led to that happening. Then there was that Instagram Live vid where the pair of them spoke about this team not really needing a head coach at all. Kyrie Irving backtracked on those comments later on, praising the recently-hired Steve Nash for his insight and tactical nous but yeah this was a tough balance trying to keep everyone happy before and now you chuck in James Harden to the mix.

Quick recap of how James Harden’s season has been going...

• Requested a trade back in October away from the Rockets, who he’d helped take to two conference finals and three more conference semis in the last six years. A few weeks later Russell Westbrook was traded to Washington.

• Doesn’t turn up to preseason on time as he’s busy partying at strip clubs with rapper Lil Baby in both Las Vegas and Atlanta to celebrate his mate’s birthday. Where he was videoed gifting the birthday boy what are now known commonly as honeybuns: $100k bundles of cash. After which he had to do his covid precautions which delayed his return even longer.

• As reports of Harden’s preferred destinations emerged (Nets, 76ers, Bucks, Heat), he missed the team’s first preseason game. He finally featured in their third preseason outing and not only played poorly but also looked overweight and unfit.

• Harden faced the media for the first time, answering questions about his absence earlier in preseason in which he claims he was working with his personal trainer.

• Even still the fella rolled up and was brilliant in the season opener against Portland, dropping 44 points and 17 assists in 43 minutes looking every bit like an MVP candidate.

• Until he sprained an ankle, sat out one game, then was rubbish for the next five games.

• Rockets head coach Stephen Silas called a team meeting to address their 3-6 start, at which both John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins both challenged Harden’s commitment... both guys also appear to call Harden out in public for the same thing albeit without naming names.

• James Harden to the media in a 90-second zoom conference: “Umm, you know, I love this city. Umm. I literally, you know, have done everything that I can. Umm, you know... I mean, this situation is crazy. It’s something that I don’t think can be fixed. So umm... yeah. Thanks.”

• The Brooklyn Nets trade happened.

• Harden scooped a 32-point triple double on debut for the Nets, looking trim and healthy and even smiling a few times.

(So... was old mate wearing a bullet-proof vest or something under that jersey or what? Because there’s no way he lost that much weight that quickly)

And that’s the thing because this Nets team has looked amazing these first couple games with Harden and Durant together. Defensively they’ve got more than a couple questions but El Beardo & KD recapturing that old Thunder magic means relentless scoring and this was before Kyrie Irving even came back. Speaking of which... Kyrie Irving is one of the fellas who comes out worst in this trade. He’s now the third option at Brookie and it happened at a time when he’d basically gone AWOL, disappearing without telling his coach where he was at or how long he’d be away. It was more evidence of Steve Nash and Sean Marks being extremely careful with their words to protect Kyrie, saying things like: Ky will explain everything in time, I don’t wanna speak for him. And other variations on the theme of not saying anything at all. But the need to protect him like a fragile heirloom isn’t so strong now.

That situation was bonkers. Whether they gave him a rark-up in private, who knows, but that doesn’t seem like the way things are done in Brooklyn. However with James Harden in town now they don’t necessarily need Kyrie Irving in order to win games and that leaves him in a place without anywhere near the leverage he had prior. They could even trade him, possibly. One thing’s for sure is he can’t just go walkabouts in the middle of the season again without explanation... Kyrie’s a bloke who has made it clear that basketball is not the most important thing in his life. A lot of these dudes in his position are driven by chasing championships, James Harden certainly has been, but Kyrie Irving won one of those early in his career in which he hit one of the biggest three pointers in Finals history. He’s not desperate in that same way. He’s hugely involved in civil rights activism. But if his indifference becomes a hindrance to the Nets now (not saying it will, of course – if anything this’ll spark him up) then the Nets don’t have to take it lying down.

As to where Irving actually was, this’ll explain it...

Last season was a gap year. There will be none of those while Kevin Durant is healthy and playing as incredibly as he has been lately. The aim of the game for Sean Marks: every season that KD is there is a title contention season and that means urgency is at a maximum and if an opportunity is there to improve the team then he simply has to go for it. Also remember that Spencer Dinwiddie is out for the season too which is another reason to add another major player.

But that’s just one of about a million fascinating aspects to this trade. Like Brooklyn giving up control of their own draft picks for waaaay beyond the time they’ll have this trio in place. Or James Harden reuniting with his former head coach Mike D’Antoni, who is one of Steve Nash’s assistants. Or the fact that D’Antoni and Nash are trying to orchestrate this incredible offence with huge defensive limitations just like they once did with the Seven Seconds or Less Phoenix Suns.

Or especially the way that every other team involved seemed to come off better by this trade as well. Dunno how Cleveland wrangled themselves into the mix but Jarrett Allen is an amazing get for them (and proof that Kevin Love and Andre Drummond ain’t long for the Cavs) while the Indiana Pacers took a bit of a gamble in moving on from Victor Oladipo’s injuries to grab the perennially underrated Caris LeVert but that’s been a really handy Pacers team so far even without Oladipo and the best ability is availability (although ironically a health scare there has complicated things in the short term, delaying LeVert’s debut). And obviously Houston, man. With all them picks plus Victor Oladipo. Exorcising the psychic damage that Harden had been doing to their chemistry. Score.

It’s the Sean Marks thing that stands out though, at least for this New Zealand website. Because we’re kinda used to these high-achieving kiwi sports personalities succeeding through humility and hard work and all them cliches that the NZ public laps up and through all those abilities and more Sean Marks has taken the Nets from irrelevance to being the most relevant team out there at the moment. Even LeBron’s Lakers have had to take a backseat for a few days.

But in doing so he’s crafted a team that is pretty much the opposite of all those values... it was almost poetic that in bringing in James Harden (after his elongated tantrums in Houston), Marks had to trade away Caris LeVert and Jarrett Allen who are arguably the two blokes who most reflect the good vibes of the rebuild, two players that he drafted himself from outside the lottery and who have been developed in-house to where they are today. Obviously you can’t trade for a superstar without giving something up in return and the fact that they lost so many draft picks also shows that they were unwilling to lose too many players given that they kinda wanna win a championship (also Houston would’ve preferred the picks anyway). That’s the price of doing business.

Make no mistake, the average fan is going to be cheering against the Brooklyn Nets come playoff time. Nobody really enjoys the idea that championships can be bought or traded for... they can’t, but when a huge trade happens and people start reassessing their predictions that’s the feeling folks do get. The Brooklyn Nets were loveable underdog battlers not so long ago. Now they’re a team of supervillains. Welcome to the Dark Side, say hello to your old mate Sith Lord Sean Marks.

As to what this means for the rest of the league trying to compete with these dudes...

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