So much for the circus-atmosphere general manager Billy King said the Nets would avoid this year. Can’t wait to see what happens when they open their first training as the Brooklyn Nets.

Their last camp as the New Jersey Nets began with reports that Dwight Howard would ask for a trade from Orlando and could be Newark-bound by Friday afternoon. Then reports said the Magic were considering filing tampering charges because members of the Nets organization, including owner Mikhail Prokhorov, had met with Howard.

King denied that was so. And the Nets were not close to acquiring Howard on Friday. But for the second straight year – which happens to be the second year of the Prokhorov-King-Avery Johnson era - the Nets were embroiled in drama before the basketballs hit the court for

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. – The lockout hasn’t stopped Avery Johnson from making some pretty impressive rounds this offseason. It’s just prevented the Nets coach from visiting and talking to his players – for the most part.

The one exception was last month when Johnson attended the wedding of Kris Humphries and Kim Kardashian. He got league approval to go to California and had to have congratulated the groom, which would have made it the only time since 11:59 p.m. on June 30 that Johnson communicated with one of his players.

“My wife had a great time,” he said.

A few weeks later, Johnson had a great time during a trip to Russia.

He held a clinic for 100 coaches at Moscow Sports University, conducted a camp for children 13-and-under and played in an exhibition

The Nets want to get more athletic across the board, add depth, find another shooter, a reliable small forward, a big man and would like to bring in defensive players.

That’s their general offseason wish list and they can start trying to find some of those things in tomorrow night’s NBA Draft.

When you’re picking at Nos. 27 and 36 you’re limited as to what you can get because everything depends on what happens before you select. But as you probably have read somewhere by now, Nets general manager Billy King rarely picks where he’s supposed to anyway.

As we detailed in a story in The Record over the weekend, King made trades on seven of the 11 draft days he spent as a 76ers executive. He completed six trades during the 2006 and 2007 drafts and was a part

The Nets are in the process of building a new arena in Brooklyn and trying to build their team into a playoff contender. On Sunday, they added a farm club, as they officially took over the basketball operations of their NBA Development League affiliate, the Springfield Armor.

The Nets don’t own the Armor. This “hybrid affiliation,” means the Nets are in charge of the basketball operations and pay for expenses related to that, as existing local owners pay for the off-the-court costs of doing business.

It may not seem like a big deal, but it is significant in many ways. The biggest one is it’s another example of how serious and committed owner Mikhail Prokhorov is about spending money to improve the overall operation and how the Nets are run.

“We’re

The Nets ended the first season of the Mikhail Prokhorov/Avery Johnson/Billy King era with 24-58 record after a tough, hard-fought 97-92 loss to Chicago Bulls last night.

The Nets doubled last year’s win total but still have plenty of work to do to become not only a playoff team, but a championship contender as Prokhorov promised. The next phase of that process begins now, but here’s a look back at that first year.

MOST VALUABLE PLAYER: Naturally, if Deron Williams would have been with the Nets all season, it would have been him. He proved that in his 12 games as a Net. But for the duration of the season, it was Kris Humphries. He did it all for the Nets in terms of defense, dirty work, physical play and rebounding and finished the season with career-high averages of 10.0

The last couple of weeks of this season have felt a little like last year. The Nets have been decimated by injuries and have lost 14 of 16 games heading into Wednesday's finale against the Bulls.

But this season has been different. The Nets have doubled their win total (24) and are in a better place than at this point last season.

First of all, the team didn’t have a clean-up day last year. The players left Miami after the finale and went their separate ways after one of the most dysfunctional and frustrating seasons in NBA history. Many of them didn’t fly back to New Jersey. They couldn’t wait to get rid of last season.

This season, everyone is flying back from Chicago, doing their exit interviews Thursday with general manager Billy King and coach Avery Johnson, and

In the NBA’s first-ever regular-season game in Europe, Deron Williams won for the first time as a Net. Both could be significant developments for the future of the organization.

Owner Mikhail Prokhorov’s vision is to make the Nets a global team, but they can’t be one if they don’t have superstars and they don’t win. They finally have a legitimate superstar in Williams and they finally won a game with him, beating the Toronto Raptors 116-103 in a historic game in London on Friday.

Now the key is keeping Williams, which is another big part of this European trip.

They’re trying to grow their brand and connect with people in England. Remember, Barclays, which owns the naming rights to the Nets’ arena in Brooklyn, is based across the pond.  They

When the Nets went to Russia and China in the preseason, they were looking forward to bonding, developing chemistry and getting better acquainted with coach Avery Johnson and his system.

The Nets are hoping for some of the same things in London this week as they try to incorporate Deron Williams into Johnson’s system.

Unfortunately for the Nets, they don’t have this week plus another two of camp and exhibition games to build something. They have to do it on the fly, and with Williams probably limited to no practices on the trip.

The way the schedule has worked out, the Nets have had three games, two shootarounds and no practices since Williams flew to New Jersey last week after his blockbuster acquisition from Utah. The Nets are expected to have two practices and at

SAN ANTONIO – Mikhail Prokhorov attended his first Nets road game because he wanted to personally meet and welcome his new superstar point guard Deron Williams to the organization.

Prokhorov did the right thing by staying mostly out of the public eye and letting this night be all about Williams. Prokhorov had a private room at the AT&T Center, where he met Williams for the first time.

The Russian billionaire didn’t comment or gloat about the Nets’ big catch, even though he could have and some owners probably would have after some of the things that were written and said about Prokhorov’s inability to sell the biggest names on his team.

This night was about Williams, and in the Nets’ 106-96 loss to the Spurs, you could see what kind of impact he is going