While the Nets are busy tanking to land their next young foundation piece, Jordi Fernández is busy trying to develop the record rookie crop he already has in the fold.
That means a healthy supply of tough love from the head coach, who had to dole out some to first-round draft picks Egor Dëmin and Drake Powell.
Both underwhelmed in Friday’s loss at Dallas, seeing their playing time curtailed — along with not-so-subtle warnings that they could lose even more, starting Sunday against the Bucks.
Dëmin, the Nets’ first lottery pick in 15 years, has been a fixture at point guard.
But he struggled through his worst performance since entering the starting lineup with just three points in an error-prone 18:10.
The Russian teenager shot 1-for-7 overall and 1-for-4 from deep, with just one assist, one rebound and two turnovers.
Dëmin has been prodded to drive more, but clearly he tried to force things Friday and made ill-advised gaffes.
He got blocked trying to go into traffic — seemingly looking for a foul call — and later threw the ball away on a behind-the-back pass.
The result was getting pulled and limited to just 2:14 in the fourth quarter.
It was his first negative game score in the NBA, per Basketball Reference.
“He was trying to fix mistakes by trying to make things happen, and this is not how you want to do things,” Fernández said of Dëmin. “I need him to play with better readiness and better physicality.
“This is not the way that the team needs him to play. So he’s got to be better. Otherwise, the minutes are going to go down, and somebody else will take advantage of that. So I know that he cares. He’s always responded and punched back. So, he’s way better than what he performed [Friday].”
The rookie had averaged 9.9 points, 4.2 assists and 3.4 rebounds as a starter on 39.4/36.3/90.0 percent shooting splits.
More to the point, he’d been even-keeled.
“It’s just his consistency as a person,” Fernández said. “He listens, he asks questions. You know he’s going to go out there and try to do his best. His verticality, his deflections, that, to me, stands out. He took a huge charge the other day and playing team defense and being on point with those things.
“And then offensively, he is a really good playmaker, especially finding the 3-point line for others. His shot looks great. We want him to be aggressive and taking the proper space, where he has to touch the paint and then make decisions. So, [we’re] very happy with the production. We’re extremely happy with the person.”
Powell was not afforded the opportunity to play through quite as many mistakes.
Since joining the rotation on Nov. 7 he’d averaged 21.1 minutes, and logged at least 13:22 in every appearance.
That is, until Friday when he was limited to just 2:41 — all in a sloppy first quarter.
Part of that was fellow rookie Nolan Traore getting called up from the G-League and the French teenager being handed 8:48, minutes that normally would have gone to Powell.
But part of it was gameplay.
“Correct. Yeah, it was just the readiness to play,” Fernández admitted. “These young guys need to understand how important every minute you play is. And not that you’ve got to play worried about not making mistakes, [but] you cannot make three in a row for readiness and for concentration. If the intentions are there, then I’m completely fine. But if the mistakes are for just easing into the game, that’s not how we do it here.
“And it’s not just him; that goes for everybody. So, happy that I saw Nolan. I know that Drake, when the opportunity comes back to him, he’ll be 200 percent and ready and paying attention to everything. And Nolan played with confidence. He did good things. So meaningful minutes there.”
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