After the Los Angeles Lakers traded Russell, Maxwell Lewis and three second-round picks to the Nets last month in exchange for Dorian Finney-Smith and Shake Milton, he dropped 22 points off the bench in his season debut with Brooklyn in a 130-113 loss to the Toronto Raptors on Jan. 1.

Here are the Brooklyn Nets player grades following Tuesday's 99-95 loss to the New York Knicks in Mikal Bridges' return to Brooklyn.

Russell has struggled to stay on the floor since joining the Nets in a Dec. 29 trade from the Los Angeles Lakers. He's missed six of the team's last 13 matchups while battling shin and hamstring ailments. The veteran point guard has shouldered a much heavier on-ball burden than with the Lakers during the first half of this season.

On Tuesday evening, the Brooklyn Nets will be in Oregon to play the Portland Trail Blazers. For the game, the Nets could get one of their best players back in

Despite a close miss by D'Angelo Russell, the Nets lost to the Lakers 102-101 in what was supposed to be a revenge game for Russell, who had 19 points, six rebounds, and eight assists off the bench. Ziaire Williams had 15 points and Tosan Evbuomwan had 15 points and six rebounds off the bench to continue his impressive stretch for Brooklyn after being one of the team's recent Two-Way signings.

Russell (hamstring) is questionable for Saturday's game against the Heat, Erik Slater of ClutchPoints.com reports. Russell missed the 108-84 loss to the Suns on Wednesday, and the questionable tag suggests there might be a chance of the floor general missing yet another game.

Cam Johnson and D’Angelo Russell returned Tuesday night for the decimated Nets, though Nic Claxton got added to their long injury list.

In the crosstown rivalry game, New York nearly let up a fourth-quarter comeback, scoring just 15 points in the final 12 minutes. However, Brooklyn's 20 fourth-quarter points weren't enough. The Nets had relatively even scoring across the board,

D’Angelo Russell is adjusting to a featured role with the Brooklyn Nets following a trade from the Los Angeles Lakers. After a tumultuous start to the season in Los Angeles under head coach JJ Redick,

Russell of course is a two-time member of both the Lakers and the Nets, and was making his first return to Los Angeles since the team dealt him to Brooklyn last month. After missing the game winner, Russell took to X with a cryptic message that had Nets fans buzzing. “Muted emotion,” wrote Russell in his post.

As the calendar turned toward 2025, the Los Angeles Lakers made a bold roster move, trading D'Angelo Russell to the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for versatile forward Dorian Finney-Smith and sharpshooter Gabe Vincent.