CHICAGO - For the salary cap-challenged Brooklyn Nets, whose inflated payroll is second highest in the NBA at $167.3 million, signing Blake Griffin was a no-brainer.
Bought out by the Detroit Pistons with just a season and a half left on his massive five-year $173 million deal, Griffin was acquired at a bargain basement price of $1.2 million.
A six-time All-Star with ten years experience, the 6-foot-10, 250-pound aerial acrobat will help somewhat. But the idea that his addition increases the Nets' title chances is absurd.
Griffin turns only 32 next week. But he already looks old, spent and diminished.
He skipped an entire season due to a knee injury after being drafted No. 1 overall in 2009. He also missed a total of 185 games in his first eight seasons, a stunning absence rate of 23.1 games per season, which is more than one-fourth of the NBA schedule.
Things didn't get any better in Detroit, either. He played in only 18 of the Pistons' 66 games last season and he logged just 20 of 36 this season.
There was a time in 2011 when the explosive redhead soared over a Kia to become the league's undisputed dunk king. In 2014, at the peak of his Lob City heyday with the Clippers, Griffin repeatedly defied gravity.
Those days are long gone. Griffin now travels only in altitudes so low he doesn't even have to worry about the fog and the clouds. Per ESPN, he hasn't dunked in an NBA game since 2019.
Griffin's potential contributions to the Nets will be minimal at best.
He plays the same position as Kevin Durant, who will eat all the minutes at power forward. And with James Harden and Kyrie Irving hogging the ball, Griffin will settle for crumbs when it comes to field goal attempts.

Ranked 26th in the league in defensive rating (114.2) and 27th in points per game allowed (116.1), the Nets need a big man who has the quickness and the physical wherewithal to protect the rim.
Except for the luster of a once starry, starry name, Blake brings none of those qualities anymore.
And that is why I think this kerfuffle about Griffin to Brooklyn is much ado about nothing.
FAKE NEWS. Those who follow this column and my Twitter account regularly know that I normally do not engage anybody unless it's a reporter peer, a friend, or someone I think deserves my time.
I'll make a rare exception here.
Some random dude accused me of reporting "fake news" about Bobby Ray Parks Jr. He armed his wicked accusation with the useless nugget that he "talks" to the disgruntled player every day.
I talk to Jesus every day, too. I just wish He would talk back to me.
As for Parks, well, he isn't exactly a gushing, squirting fountain of truth. Just ask TNT,
I stand by my unimpeachable sources and SPIN.ph doesn't just print whatever I write here without doing its due diligence. It's called editing and vetting, genius.
AND 1. It was so nice of Rain or Shine to go out of their way to explain how they would go about having a coach and an active consultant at the same time.
But just as I was about to get some clarity on how the job descriptions were defined, their statement made me dizzy with "macro" and "micro" as if I were sitting in a dull economics class.
Isn't coach and GM a better, easier set-up?
Just a thought.
Finally, Jason Brickman told me he will grant me an interview once he gets more time to assess his current situation.
I don't talk to him every day but I have a feeling that Jason will be a gushing, squirting fountain of truth.
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