Seeing as how Brooklyn is the reigning king of all things hyperlocal and only beloved if you can get there by bike, it’s shocking, shocking, that the Nets chose to keep practicing in Jersey after moving here. But not they’re taking steps to correct that, with new plans to open a giant training facility in Sunset Park’s Industry City, home or Jacques Torres chocolates and MakerBot. Who knows, maybe if they hadn’t had been tired from the back-and-forth between here and Jersey, they wouldn’t have opened the season with a loss to the Cavs.
NetsDaily shares the news that the Nets new practice facility will run them $50 million and will be on the roof of a building in Industry City. They also take a shot at the Knicks for practicing in Westchester, so if word gets back to James Dolan, expect him to buy Rucker Park and make that the team’s new practice court.
The Nets are being mum on a ton of the details at the moment, but NetsDaily says the team will be selling the facility’s naming rights (Forest City Tax Dodge Practice Facility, perhaps?) and that there are plans to make it open for the public. Sadly for people who like seeing really old basketball players, the facility won’t be opening until at least summer 2015, by which time Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce’s contracts will be done. But fans will still be able to see sights such as Deron Williams icing his ankles, the ghost of Joe Johnson, Brook Lopez practicing his Lopez Face and the BrooklyKnight practicing his trampoline dunks, so at least there’s that.