The Brooklyn Nets are trusting the process, just not one that includes any notion of tanking this season.



The Nets currently own their first-round draft pick for the first time since 2013 when the franchise selected Mason Plumlee No. 22 overall. Brooklyn and Atlanta swapped picks in 2015 as part of the Joe Johnson trade. As part of the Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce trade, Brooklyn gave up its first-round picks in 2014, 2016, swapped picks in 2017, and gave up its first-round pick in 2018 to Boston.



Now, after winning 48 combined games over the past two seasons, Brooklyn enters the third – and most important – season of the Sean Marks and Kenny Atkinson era. The Nets could land a high draft pick, create cap space for two maximum salary contracts, and have a young core of Jarrett Allen and Caris LeVert on rookie-scale contracts with D’Angelo Russell and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson eligible for restricted free agency this summer.



Marks and Atkinson...