ESPN’s Daily Dime: … So the Nets are stuck, just like they’re stuck in the Meadowlands for at least another season. Lakers coach Phil Jackson said that location was the primary reason he didn’t accept the Nets job despite a substantial offer back in 1999.
“I interviewed with the Nets ownership in ’99 and talked a lot about the fact that being a basketball team in the swampland there is very difficult,” Jackson said. “It’s different in Giants Stadium [across the parking lot]; everyone can come out, spend three hours in the parking lot getting ready before the game. They have a community that goes in there and roots for the Giants, roots for the Jets, whoever it is that’s playing in Giants Stadium. It’s another thing to have your games in that building, where there’s no heartland, there’s no paper really that represents them.
“I liked the personnel that they had. They had some young personnel, interesting personnel. The offer was probably the best offer that I’ve ever seen as a coach. It certainly wasn’t enough. I just didn’t think it has what a team has to have, a heartland, a fan base, an energy source.”
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