http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1767590-brooklyn-nets-announce-head-coach-jason-kidd-to-have-no-5-jersey-retired
Brooklyn Nets Announce Head Coach Jason Kidd to Have No. 5 Jersey Retired
The Brooklyn Nets have announced that they will retire Jason Kidd's No. 5 jersey, and rookie Mason Plumlee is the one who told you first. No, seriously, he did.
Well before the Nets went public with the information, Plumlee told Bleacher Report that he was unable to choose jersey No. 5 upon being drafted because Brooklyn intended on retiring it.
"I don't want to spoil it, but I think they're going to retire it," Plumlee said of the jersey at the time.
Kidd spent six seasons with the then-New Jersey Nets before being traded to the Dallas Mavericks during the middle of his seventh. He averaged 14.6 points, 9.1 assists and 1.9 steals per game while in New Jersey, leading the Nets to two Eastern Conference championships and six total playoff berths.
Between 2002 and 2008, Kidd and Chris Paul were the only players in the league to post at least 14 points, nine assists and 1.5 steals per game. The point man helped put New Jersey on the map, transforming the Nets from a lottery dweller who saw the playoffs just once in the previous seven years into a perennial title contender who routinely won close to 50 games.
The move, then, comes as no surprise given all his ties to the organization. Not just on the court, either.
Kidd retired from the NBA so that he could pursue a coaching gig with the Nets, and soon after, the New York Post reported he would be purchasing an ownership stake in the team from Jay-Z. With all that's happened over the last couple of months, it's fitting that Kidd add this to his list of accomplishments.
Once his jersey is lifted up into the rafters, he'll become the seventh player in franchise history to have his number retired. Wendell Ladner (No. 4), Bill Melchionni (25), Julius Erving (32), John Williamson (23), Drazen Petrovic (3) and Charles "Buck" Williams (52) have all previously had their jerseys retired by the Nets.
This is just the first of many post-career honors Kidd will receive. His crowning achievement will likely come five years from now when he's inducted into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot.
For now, it's about his career with the Nets. The one that has ended for good as a player, and the one he's about to embark on as a coach.
