What's plaguing the Nets?

What's wrong with this much hyped and insanely expensive Brooklyn Nets team, whose $102 million payroll and splashy summer hasn't been able to keep them from an ugly 2-5 start?

In a word, everything.

I usually preach patience when early season streaks and slumps go against conventional expectations for a team, and often times signs of a progression or regression to the mean are present in said early streaks and slumps, but that's not the case with these Nets.

The Warriors, for example, are a solidly unspectacular 5-3. Dig into the numbers and their schedule, however, and you can easily make the argument that they've been one of the best two or three teams to start the season. It's near impossible to find such a silver lining for Brooklyn.

In fact when looking at all of the factors in play, I've come up with five red flags for the Nets as opposed to finding evidence of a turnaround in sight.

1: They haven't been able to take advantage of a cream puff schedule

The Nets have only played two of their seven games against teams with winning records (splitting games against the Heat and Pacers), and the combined record of their seven opponents is 25-33, so the fact that they've had so much trouble in nearly every facet of the game (which I'm about to get into) is seriously concerning.

2: They've been awful on the road

If one thing sticks out before even really digging into some of the more advanced numbers, it's Brooklyn's atrocious start to the season away from home. At Barclays Center, the Nets have beaten the Heat and played a competitive game with the undefeated Pacers (they also easily disposed of the 1-8 Jazz), but they're 0-4 on the road, with those four losses coming by a combined 50 points in Cleveland, Orlando, Washington and Sacramento, where last night they were thumped by 21.

If you're wondering, the combined records of those four road opponents of which the Nets haven't been able to beat is 11-22.

3. All of the numbers are going against them

If you're into using early season advanced metrics to predict how teams will fare as the year progresses, you'll find that this Nets team may be in some serious trouble.

The Nets currently boast the 26th-ranked offense at 96.5 points per 100 possessions even though five of the seven teams they've faced have a defensive rating that ranks between 17th and 28th (The Pacers and Magic are 1st and 6th). On the defensive side of the ball, the Nets are smack dab in the middle of the pack (15th), allowing 101.7 points per 100 possessions even though five of their seven opponents have an offensive rating that ranks between 17th and 30th (Heat and Pacers are 1st and 13th).

Their 2-5 record is bad enough when you consider the poor quality of the opposition so far, but perhaps the most troubling part isn't just that the Nets are losing, but rather how they're losing, as right now the only teams that sport inferior point differentials to Brooklyn's -5.4 are the Jazz, Cavaliers and Lakers.

And then there's really the most troubling sign, the 'Four Factors.' If you're not familiar with that term, a while ago Dean Oliver came up with what he considered to be the "Four Factors of Basketball Success," the four things that most affect whether a game is won or lost and how successful a team will ultimately be. Oliver found those Four Factors to be a team's and their opponents' performance when it comes to Effective Field Goal Percentage, Turnover Percentage, Offensive Rebound Percentage and FTA Rate (free throws attempted per field goals attempted).

For the Nets, their Effective Field Goal Percentage through seven games is 47.6 while the eFG% of their opponents is 48.5. Their turnover percentage - an estimate of turnovers per 100 plays using the formula 100*TOV/(FGA+0.44*FTA+TOV) - is 16.5, while that of their opponents is only 14.9. Their offensive rebound rate is 22.7 while their opponents grab 26 percent of available offensive rebounds. And their FTA rate is actually solid at .323, but even still, their opponents' is slightly better at .327.

I suppose you can look at all of those numbers going against the Nets and assume that they can't get any worse and that there's nowhere to go but up. But I look at all of those numbers referenced above and see a team who literally hasn't been able to do one thing better than their opponents (even the things they do fairly well) through seven games despite the fact that they've generally played some crappy opponents. If anything, you can make the argument that it will only get worse for the Nets as their schedule gets tougher.

Kevin Garnett has aged about 100 years

KG is one of my all-time favorites, and it's no slight against his legacy that after 1,461 career games between the regular season and playoffs and nearly 53,000 total minutes on the court, he's slowed to the point of looking like a non-factor early in his 19th NBA season. But a non-factor is exactly what Garnett has been so far, and even that may be putting it mildly.

Of the nine Nets players who have logged over 100 minutes this season, Brooklyn's 92.7 offensive rating with Garnett on the floor is the worst mark and their 108.2 defensive rating with Garnett on the floor is second from the bottom to only Jason Terry's 109.6 mark, leaving the team with a net rating of -15.5 when KG plays. The next worst net rating of the nine Nets who have played at least 100 minutes belongs to Alan Anderson...at -8.9. Brooklyn's offensive rating swells to 100.5 with Garnett on the bench and their defensive rating drops to 98.2, meaning that of the nine players in question, the only one who watches the team post a positive net rating (+2.3) while on the bench is Garnett.

The 37-year-old is just nowhere near the player he once was when it comes to impacting an NBA game. It's sad, but sad because it's unfortunately true.

Jason Kidd won't tinker

There's something to be said for sticking with the same starting and finishing lineups and sticking to the same predictable rotations game in game out, especially when dealing with a team carrying a lot of new players that need to get used to playing together, but Kidd's reliance on the same starting unit (Brooklyn's starting five has already logged 74 minutes together, good for 18th) and the same combinations in general is a little concerning, considering how much the team is struggling.

In looking at the numbers, the most obvious correction Kidd can make is bumping Andray Blatche's minutes while decreasing Garnett's, as the combination of Williams, Johnson, Pierce, Garnett and Lopez has a point differential of -9.1 and a net rating of -6.0 in 74 minutes together, while the same combination but with Blatche in for Garnett has a +26.2 differential and a net rating of +22.6 in 35 minutes.

Kidd should definitely have a grace period when it comes to rotation management and coaching in general given that he's a rookie in the field, and for all we know he could end up as a great coach sooner rather than later, but the very fact that he does need a grace period is a perfect example of why you don't generally hire a rookie head coach who had played in an NBA game more recently than the players he was now expected to manage, when you're headed into a championship or bust season.

The Nets are just a mess right now, and though 75 games is obviously more than enough time to right the ship and embark on a championship journey, there's also no clear sign of an improvement ahead anywhere you look (I love Kirilenko's game and his return will help stabilize their lineup, but there's a lot more to correct).

So what's wrong with the Nets? The complex, long winded answer can be found in the words and the numbers above. The short, simple answer right now, is 'everything.'

All stats courtesy of NBA.com (Four Factors & lineup info) and ESPN.com