Nets add Tosan Evbuomwan, cut Jaylen Martin in switch of two-way wings

The 6’7” Princeton grad and former British baller is in, Jaylen Martin, a two-year two, is out.

After losing 11 straight games and finishing the G League’s Tip-Off Tournament with a league-worst 2-14 record, the Long Island Nets are making moves and on New Year’s Day switched out two-way players, both athletic wings, signing 6’8” 23-year-old Tosan Evbuomwan while putting 6’6” 20-year-old Jaylen Martin on waivers.

Shams Charania was first with the news Wednesday morning…

Then later Wednesday, the Brooklyn Nets confirmed the signing of Evbuomwan with a tweet and press release.

The Nets now have a full complement of two-way players in Evbuomwan, Tyrese Martin and Reece Beekman.

Evbuomwan stands at 6’8” tall, and features potential as a 3&D forward. In college, he was one of the best Ivy League players, playing for Princeton where he graduated with a degree economics in 2023. In fact, on his Twitter page, he lists his profession as “economist.”

His Princeton coach Mitch Henderson listed Evbuomwan’s strengths to Adam Zagoria of N.J.com after news of the signing broke.

“Great teammate, sees the floor, makes others around him better, relentless in how he wants to improve,” Henderson said by text.

He won the Ivy League Player of the Year in 2022 and was a two-time First Team All-Ivy League player in 2022 and 2023 when he led the Tigers to the Sweet 16. He’s currently the only Ivy Leaguer in the NBA and the first Brit to play for the Nets. Evbuomwan has played for Great Britain in the FIBA Europe U18 tournaments in 2018 and 2019 and for the British 3-x-3 team.

The Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England, native saw action in 17 games (eight starts) with the Pistons and Grizzlies last season during his rookie campaign, averaging 5.9 points and 3.5 rebounds while and shot 38% from beyond the arc in 21.6 minutes per contest.

Here’s some highlights from his time with Detroit.

He also played in 18 regular season games (16 starts) last season with the Pistons’ NBA G League affiliate, the Motor City Cruise, posting averages of 15.5 points, 8.8 rebounds and 3.1 assists in 34.5 minutes per game. This season, in 18 games for the San Diego Clippers, he’s averaging 19.0 points, 6.8 rebounds and 1.6 assists in 32.4 minutes. He had one of his best games, a 23-point outing, ten days ago vs Long Island in the G League Winter Showcase.

Evbuomwan has some history with one Long Island Nets player. In Detroit last season, he played with, Killian Hayes, now Long Island’s starting point guard.

It remains to be seen exactly where Evbuomwan will play most of his games. However, it’s expected that he will spend time on the Long Island Nets. Britball fans of the Nets were thrilled at the signing.

His signing is the latest in a series of moves the Nets organization has made in the last week to improve their G League affiliate who has lost 11 straight games and finished the 16-game Tip-Off Tournament with only two wins.

In addition to signing Evbuomwan and waiving Martin, Long Island has traded Patrick Gardner, their only big man, for Trevon Scott, a 6’8” veteran of the G League, acquired the two-way rights to 6’3” point guard Reece Beekman as part of Brooklyn’s Dennis Schroder trade, and dealt Amari Bailey for 6’10” 24-year-old Drew Timme. They’re also likely to have access to Maxwell Lewis, the 6’7” 22-year-old forward Brooklyn got along with D’Angelo Russell in the Dorian Finney-Smith trade.

The moves come as a little bit of a surprise as Martin has been one of the team’s brighter spots this year. After suffering a leg injury earlier in the season, Martin came back and seemingly was playing the best basketball of his career.

Recently, Martin even picked up his career-high in points with 30 against the Rip City Remix in the final game of the G-League Winter Showcase. This game marked Martin’s best game in his two years of G-League play.

• Nets sign former Princeton star to Two-Way Contract – Adam Zagoria – NJ.com