His will and his words were strong, but his gait was weary. Jason Kidd, as he had for six seasons, pumped every ounce of belief, focus and fortitude into the Nets on Friday night. He carried them as far as his 34-year-old legs would allow, until they finally buckled under the burden.
“I was just hoping that someone would pick it up from where I left,” Kidd said. “But unfortunately that didn’t happen.”
Kidd had All-Stars to his left and his right, but Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson never answered the call.
LeBron James surged, the Nets wilted and the Cleveland Cavaliers won a trip to the Eastern Conference finals.
For the fourth consecutive spring — after one first-round exit and three second-round appearances — Kidd will be a spectator for the N.B.A. finals. He has logged 1,046 games in 13 seasons, each ending without a championship.
So while Kidd boldly predicted several more years of elite play, and everyone talked about staying together, the Nets’ decisions this summer will not be so simple. Kidd has played alongside Jefferson for six years now, and with Carter for three. Their billing as one of the league’s top perimeter groups rings more empty each June.
For all their talent, it is possible this is as far as they can go together.
“That is something you obviously look at,” Rod Thorn, the team president, said earlier this week. “But saying that, do you tear your team up? The marketplace we’re in, that’s a tough one.”
It may be a necessary one. And it may not entirely be up to the Nets. Carter can opt out of the last year of his contract, and it seems likely he will — either to change teams or to seek a longer deal from the Nets. As a high-scoring, highly marketable highlight reel, Carter will probably command more than $10 million a year. Whether he can deliver a title remains questionable.
Carter was largely invisible for long stretches of the playoffs. He averaged only 19.7 points and shot .354 from the field against the Cavaliers. As the final minutes of the Nets’ season dwindled, Carter faded away.
He took 11 shots to score 11 points, went to the free-throw line only five times and failed to score in the final quarter.
That is hardly the sort of performance that inspires a team owner to commit another $40 million or so to a player. The Nets could choose to let Carter leave, or use him in a sign-and-trade deal that rejuvenates the roster.
But merely keeping the core of this team together might not guarantee the Nets anything more than an annual cameo in the postseason.
There is one notable asterisk in evaluating their run, however. Nenad Krstic, the Nets’ first-round pick in 2002, was blossoming into a top-tier center before tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee in December. For a time, the Big Three appeared as if it would become the Big Four.
“You never base long-term plans on one game, two games, one series,” Thorn said. “You try to look at it as a body of work. And the key with us is: If you look at our team, if we had Krstic, where would our team be?
“Would we be better? Obviously, we’d be somewhat better. How much better would we be? If Krstic is healthy, and he should be next year, and you keep what you have and you add one or two pieces, can you get to another level? It’s what we have to look at. Or will we just be where we are?”
The Nets surely could have used Krstic’s inside scoring and rebounding against the Cavaliers’ beefy frontcourt. They got surprising production from the journeyman Mikki Moore (14.8 points, 4.7 rebounds in the series), but Moore is a free agent who figures to cash in on a breakout season.
Carter said Friday that he intended to be back with the Nets. Kidd said that he wanted Carter back and waved off the possibility of being traded himself.
But Kidd, who passed up a chance to sign with the San Antonio Spurs in 2003, may be better off chasing a championship somewhere else. A number of talented teams might be just a Kidd away from the title. This could be the franchise’s last chance to cash in on his value before Kidd’s body breaks down.
“We have a lot of questions to answer,” Thorn said. “There’s no doubt about it.”
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