SAN ANTONIO — Nets general manager Sean Marks is growing the latest branch of the Spurs’ tree up in Brooklyn, but comparing them to the NBA’s model franchise is preposterous.
Saturday, the Nets got a reminder of why. In Marks’ first trip back to San Antonio — where he had been a player, assistant coach and assistant GM — he saw his current team get routed 130-101 by his old one at the AT&T Center.
“We have a long way to go. Right now to compare us to them is almost absurd,’’ coach Kenny Atkinson said.
“Watching how they move and share the ball, how quick their decisions are is good for us as a staff and good for our players to feel what it’s like. Hopefully one day we’ll try to imitate that.”
The Nets — just 7-of-27 from deep — have a long way to go after falling to 6-16.
Kawhi Leonard poured in a game-high 30 points, and the Spurs sliced apart the Nets’ defense with ball movement. San Antonio (19-5) had 38 assists, hit 14-of-26 from deep, and put up 41 points in the first quarter, all season highs.
Yes, the Nets’ defense will do that for teams.
“It’s a good look for our guys to see, the way we could be and should be playing,’’ said Brook Lopez, who had 14 points and five rebounds. “A lot of their strengths and what they do is similar, definitely mirror ours.”
It’s not shocking they would mirror the Spurs, albeit as a cracked version, with Marks having apprenticed under Spurs coach Gregg Popovich.
“There’s definitely a level of emotions, such great memories. This is where I cut my teeth, at everything,’’ Marks said. “I learned from [Popovich] and R.C. [Buford, the GM] and the rest of the staff over the years I was here as a player, front office, coach. It’s just been great.”
Marks earned a ring in 2005 as a player and another in 2014 as an assistant coach.
“Sean was a joy to work with because he was cordial, humorous, ready to go every second he was in the office,’’ Popovich said. “He was just fun to be around, highly intelligent, fun to talk basketball with, whether it was pick-and-roll or how to assess a player or what one should look for when one is scouting.
“He could just talk out of the box about any of that stuff. But mostly, just talking about life and eating dinner together and having a glass. He’s a great teammate and a great guy.”
Brooklyn will need him to be a great general manager, because the rebuilding job is massive.
The Nets fell to 4-13 without Jeremy Lin. They trailed 29-26, but let the Spurs open it up with a 14-0 run. It reached 112-74 on a dunk by Pau Gasol (15 points, six boards) with 9:09 left in the third.
Bojan Bogdanovic led the Nets with 20 points, but this year is really about building for next year and the year after, so the valuable minutes for rookie Caris LeVert and Spencer Dinwiddie, who made his debut, were more vital.
Marks doesn’t have the luxury of a Duncan to build around, joking, “I tried to get Tim out of retirement, and he wouldn’t come.”
But he has imported talent from San Antonio, with Trajan Langdon, Andrew Baker and Mitch Heckart in the front office and assistant coaches Jacque Vaughn and Bret Brielmaier all part of the Spurs tree.
“Really, that was everything,’’ Marks said. “R.C. was a coach, Pop was a GM, so they’ve seen it from all different angles. It was important for me to see it from both sides. And they were so inclusive, there were no hidden secrets. The fact they let me run with it, from the D-League to my opportunities here, which was amazing.”