Brooklyn Nets Trade Rumors: No Plans to Trade All Three Star Players

The Brooklyn Nets have reportedly let other teams know that they would be willing to trade their three highest paid stars, Deron Williams, Joe Johnson and Brook Lopez. However, according to the latest rumors, the Nets only plan on trading one or two of them, not all three.

Howard Beck of Bleacher Report writes:

"The more likely scenario, per team sources, is that the Nets will trade one of the three, two at most, and keep retooling around whoever is left. Team officials want to rebuild while staying competitive."

Nets general manager Billy King has not openly denied the rumors that the Nets would be willing to trade any of their three stars. However, King has stated that the players would not be trade for the purpose of dumping salaries.

"My job is to listen to people and to make calls and to make calls back," King said according to the New York Post. "Does that mean we're having a fire sale? Absolutely not. I'm doing my job, as well as asking the players and the coaches to do their job. But my job is to work the phones, see what's available. If things make sense you make trades. If they don't, you don't do it. But we're not shopping or having a fire sale."

He added, in regards to the Andrei Kirilenko trade, "I look at it as, it happened, and you move on. You can't look back and say 'What if.' I mean it, we would have liked him to play more for us, but you can't worry about that now. We expected him to be a big part of it, but he wasn't, so you move on."

The Nets, who are 10-13, could use a change to their roster. On top of that, the Nets could benefit from dumping salaries in order to lower their luxury-tax bill although King has adamantly denied that reason.