Phooey! The dream of an 82-0 season down the drain.
These games have been real wars of a sort we haven't seen many of around here in a long while, but if you look carefully at this particular gritty battle you'll still notice the opponent scoring 110 on us on 50% shooting, which is about as gritty as a Keith Smart/Kenny Natt double header. On the positive side, Cuz was again a force, but wilder this time and made more mistakes. IT was explosive off the bench until the stretch run, and the reemergence of old friends MT and JT began to give us the look of something more than a 2 man team. On the negative side our SFs were just awful all night ( a 3 year hole yet to be patched), our rookie's defense was as rookielike as can be (and really now its the regular season, he can't guard Crawford and we know it, no need to keep on proving it), and despite the low turnover total we just made too many mistakes on both ends of the floor. that last is a generalized platitude, but its true. Missed open shots, passes we didn't need to make, others we did, leaving guys open on the perimeter, various hacks on defense including some terrible ones in the 4th at the three point line, even an odd coaching decision by Malone to randomly try hack a DeAndre. Just too much to overcome.
Hey hey! Its a full 5 man Grading Consortium tonight!
Your Graders Tonight Will Be:
Bricklayer
spudfan
sdballer
Henkel
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 29min 2pts (1-7, 0-1, 0-0) 1reb 3ast 2stl 1blk 1TO
Salmons ( D ) -- Another appearance by the Stinky Fish tonight, if you can call what he did tonight as even appearing. He went 0-5 in the first half, and was 1-2 in the second. By all accounts virtually invisible on the offensive end during the game. Somewhere he managed to rack up 3 assists which I guess is a plus... This may have been a poor performance, but it was nothing in comparison to how terrible his defense was which actually caused quite a bit of damage. Salmons was constantly cheating off of Barnes and Dudley to provide help to the middle when it wasn’t needed. This lead to many untimely open looks for both Dudley and Barnes that just didn't need to happen. He often seemed to forget who he was suppose to be guarding and ended up wandering aimlessly between the 3-point line and key. For whatever reason he appears to be confused by the defensive scheme and doesn't know when to help or when to stick with his man. Something that should improve in the coming games as familiarity with the defensive end sinks in, and if it doesn't, hopefully Luc can come back soon to take his place in the rotation.--Spud
Stats: 18min 6pts (3-8, 0-4, 0-0) 3reb 1ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Patterson ( D+ ) -- Houston, we have a problem. For some reason, our old GM was obsessed with Rockets shooters that failed to consistently shoot well once they donned a Kings jersey. PPat is an average defender, below average rebounder but overall good teammate. The problem is his value in the starting lineup is based mostly on his shooting and his ability to stretch the floor to open things up for Cuz. When he isn't hitting (like tonight) he doesn't do enough to justify major minutes, especially as he isn't a good defensive compliment our big man. Tonight he wasn't giving us anything on offense and #$*@ Griffin was too effective the other way. The good news, Malone recognized it and PPat rode the bench. Unfortunately, he was back in at crunch time due to "extremely well officiated" foul calls and was part of the crew that let things slip away. PPat does little things well and rarely kills his own team the way our SF's can but he's got to get his shooting under control. --sdballer
Stats: 35min 24pts (9-19, 6-9, 0-1) 10reb 4ast 3stl 2blk 4TO
Cousins ( A- ) -- We know Cousins is an offensive force. We know Cousins is a monster rebounder. But we're told again and again that Cousins is a downright poor defender. That characterization may have applied last year, but under Malone it appears it is no longer true. Cousins was a true defensive anchor tonight - blocking shots, making great rotations, using his long arms as a disruption (3 steals), defending the pick and roll, running out at shooters to try to clean up after our hideous perimeter D tonight...the list goes on and on. A few highlights: rotated on D to thwart a Blake Griffin baseline drive that would otherwise have resulted in a dunk; stopped DeAndre Jordan trying to drive to the hoop and forced a turnover; blocked a Griffin runner in the lane; forced Griffin into a very bad miss in the post; took a charge on a Dudley baseline drive on a sweet rotation; crowded Chris Paul on the perimeter and forced him into throwing the ball away; blocked CP3 on a drive late in the fourth (but got a Tech for some minor, minor taunting). He was our best defensive player tonight, by a large margin, and we would not have been in the game in the fourth quarter without him. Oh, by the way, he scored 24 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, too. It's just that we know that he's going to do that. He went to the Tim Duncan angle jumper off the glass for his first points of the game (the second game in a row that he's done that) and finished the game 3-6 on jumpers (2 misses to beat the shot clock) but did most of his damage in the post, including a highlight catch and layup off of a Greivis pass that wasn't quite where it was supposed to be. But Cousins had a few missteps this game too. Throughout the game he missed 3 of 9 free throws that really could have helped down the stretch. He tried to run not one, not two, but THREE breaks in traffic (all in the first half) and was lucky to avoid disaster on all of them. Find a guard, big man! Finally, he committed a bad reach-in foul on Chris Paul in the final minute with 7 seconds left on the shot clock and a five-point Kings deficit that sealed the game. We probably weren't going to win, but after that foul it was over. So he wasn't perfect, but a 24/10 line and the best D on the floor is enough to get into the A range.--Capt.
Stats: 33min 17pts (6-12, 3-7, 2-2) 4reb 1ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Thornton ( B ) -- Sort of a tough one to grade. Let's start with the good. Played the third option nicely by spacing the floor and playing off of our two big scorers all night long. Had a couple stretches where he was quiet, but I'll take a MT who's being conservative with his shot selection over the MT of the last couple years. Plus Marcus showed once again that he's comfortable taking big shots, which is a big deal for a team that has never looked comfortable in crunch time. At times in the preseason it was tough to see how Thornton was going to fit into this offense, tonight while playing mostly without the ball he fit in seamlessly. I don't want to make excuses for Thornton's defense but it should be noted that the poor perimeter defense tonight was truly a team effort. Bottom line is though the Kings got outplayed from the two guard spot partly due to MT's inability to guard his position. In what's sure to be a recurring theme we tried our best to hide him and McLemore as the game went on. A understandable strategy and one that's emblematic of a team whos best perimeter defender is Travis Outlaw. So sort of the classic Thornton dichotomy, how valuable is what he gives you on offense vs what you lose on defense? Tonight the good out weights the bad, let's just hope those shots keep falling.--Henkel
Stats: 20min 8pts (2-5, 0-0, 4-4) 2reb 4ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Vasquez ( C+ ) -- slow mediocre start again, but also again a better third before bowing out. From the start of the game was being run through a maze of screens up top on defense against CP3, but in the early going was doing a solid enough job of picking his way through them and CP3 wasn't really pressing the attack. On offense forced one random dumb shot off his dribble, but wasn't really the guy making things happen on offense in the early minutes. Began to get more assertive offensively as the quarter wore on but on the other end began to slow down getting around the screens and was the first starter subbed out. Returned to the gmae in the late 2nd alongside IT instead of replacing him, and was immediately scored over by Reddick. After turning the corner and throwing a flip attempt off the side of the backboard finally got a floater to go for his first hoop of the game in the final 2 min of the half and it woke him up a little. Cp3 came out to start the third with a three, but it was over Cousins on a switch. Unfortunately after half CP3 was picking up the intensity in general, and Grevis was no longer staying in front of him the way he had been early. On the other end however he was more aggressive, and despite getting another swooping flip knocked out of there he was attacking, and controlling our offense. As we surged back in the second half of the 3rd finally capped things by throwing one of his over the top passes to Cousins for a below the rim alley oop that only a guy with Cousins hands could catch and pull off. But with IT being so dynamic, and MT coming to life for a decent game, minutes and opportunities dried up for Grevis down the stretch. If he doesn't want it to become a common occurrence he's going to need to consistently be more dynamic. --Brick
These games have been real wars of a sort we haven't seen many of around here in a long while, but if you look carefully at this particular gritty battle you'll still notice the opponent scoring 110 on us on 50% shooting, which is about as gritty as a Keith Smart/Kenny Natt double header. On the positive side, Cuz was again a force, but wilder this time and made more mistakes. IT was explosive off the bench until the stretch run, and the reemergence of old friends MT and JT began to give us the look of something more than a 2 man team. On the negative side our SFs were just awful all night ( a 3 year hole yet to be patched), our rookie's defense was as rookielike as can be (and really now its the regular season, he can't guard Crawford and we know it, no need to keep on proving it), and despite the low turnover total we just made too many mistakes on both ends of the floor. that last is a generalized platitude, but its true. Missed open shots, passes we didn't need to make, others we did, leaving guys open on the perimeter, various hacks on defense including some terrible ones in the 4th at the three point line, even an odd coaching decision by Malone to randomly try hack a DeAndre. Just too much to overcome.
Hey hey! Its a full 5 man Grading Consortium tonight!
Your Graders Tonight Will Be:
Bricklayer
spudfan
sdballer
Henkel
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 29min 2pts (1-7, 0-1, 0-0) 1reb 3ast 2stl 1blk 1TO
Salmons ( D ) -- Another appearance by the Stinky Fish tonight, if you can call what he did tonight as even appearing. He went 0-5 in the first half, and was 1-2 in the second. By all accounts virtually invisible on the offensive end during the game. Somewhere he managed to rack up 3 assists which I guess is a plus... This may have been a poor performance, but it was nothing in comparison to how terrible his defense was which actually caused quite a bit of damage. Salmons was constantly cheating off of Barnes and Dudley to provide help to the middle when it wasn’t needed. This lead to many untimely open looks for both Dudley and Barnes that just didn't need to happen. He often seemed to forget who he was suppose to be guarding and ended up wandering aimlessly between the 3-point line and key. For whatever reason he appears to be confused by the defensive scheme and doesn't know when to help or when to stick with his man. Something that should improve in the coming games as familiarity with the defensive end sinks in, and if it doesn't, hopefully Luc can come back soon to take his place in the rotation.--Spud
Stats: 18min 6pts (3-8, 0-4, 0-0) 3reb 1ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Patterson ( D+ ) -- Houston, we have a problem. For some reason, our old GM was obsessed with Rockets shooters that failed to consistently shoot well once they donned a Kings jersey. PPat is an average defender, below average rebounder but overall good teammate. The problem is his value in the starting lineup is based mostly on his shooting and his ability to stretch the floor to open things up for Cuz. When he isn't hitting (like tonight) he doesn't do enough to justify major minutes, especially as he isn't a good defensive compliment our big man. Tonight he wasn't giving us anything on offense and #$*@ Griffin was too effective the other way. The good news, Malone recognized it and PPat rode the bench. Unfortunately, he was back in at crunch time due to "extremely well officiated" foul calls and was part of the crew that let things slip away. PPat does little things well and rarely kills his own team the way our SF's can but he's got to get his shooting under control. --sdballer
Cousins ( A- ) -- We know Cousins is an offensive force. We know Cousins is a monster rebounder. But we're told again and again that Cousins is a downright poor defender. That characterization may have applied last year, but under Malone it appears it is no longer true. Cousins was a true defensive anchor tonight - blocking shots, making great rotations, using his long arms as a disruption (3 steals), defending the pick and roll, running out at shooters to try to clean up after our hideous perimeter D tonight...the list goes on and on. A few highlights: rotated on D to thwart a Blake Griffin baseline drive that would otherwise have resulted in a dunk; stopped DeAndre Jordan trying to drive to the hoop and forced a turnover; blocked a Griffin runner in the lane; forced Griffin into a very bad miss in the post; took a charge on a Dudley baseline drive on a sweet rotation; crowded Chris Paul on the perimeter and forced him into throwing the ball away; blocked CP3 on a drive late in the fourth (but got a Tech for some minor, minor taunting). He was our best defensive player tonight, by a large margin, and we would not have been in the game in the fourth quarter without him. Oh, by the way, he scored 24 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, too. It's just that we know that he's going to do that. He went to the Tim Duncan angle jumper off the glass for his first points of the game (the second game in a row that he's done that) and finished the game 3-6 on jumpers (2 misses to beat the shot clock) but did most of his damage in the post, including a highlight catch and layup off of a Greivis pass that wasn't quite where it was supposed to be. But Cousins had a few missteps this game too. Throughout the game he missed 3 of 9 free throws that really could have helped down the stretch. He tried to run not one, not two, but THREE breaks in traffic (all in the first half) and was lucky to avoid disaster on all of them. Find a guard, big man! Finally, he committed a bad reach-in foul on Chris Paul in the final minute with 7 seconds left on the shot clock and a five-point Kings deficit that sealed the game. We probably weren't going to win, but after that foul it was over. So he wasn't perfect, but a 24/10 line and the best D on the floor is enough to get into the A range.--Capt.
Stats: 33min 17pts (6-12, 3-7, 2-2) 4reb 1ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Thornton ( B ) -- Sort of a tough one to grade. Let's start with the good. Played the third option nicely by spacing the floor and playing off of our two big scorers all night long. Had a couple stretches where he was quiet, but I'll take a MT who's being conservative with his shot selection over the MT of the last couple years. Plus Marcus showed once again that he's comfortable taking big shots, which is a big deal for a team that has never looked comfortable in crunch time. At times in the preseason it was tough to see how Thornton was going to fit into this offense, tonight while playing mostly without the ball he fit in seamlessly. I don't want to make excuses for Thornton's defense but it should be noted that the poor perimeter defense tonight was truly a team effort. Bottom line is though the Kings got outplayed from the two guard spot partly due to MT's inability to guard his position. In what's sure to be a recurring theme we tried our best to hide him and McLemore as the game went on. A understandable strategy and one that's emblematic of a team whos best perimeter defender is Travis Outlaw. So sort of the classic Thornton dichotomy, how valuable is what he gives you on offense vs what you lose on defense? Tonight the good out weights the bad, let's just hope those shots keep falling.--Henkel
Stats: 20min 8pts (2-5, 0-0, 4-4) 2reb 4ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Vasquez ( C+ ) -- slow mediocre start again, but also again a better third before bowing out. From the start of the game was being run through a maze of screens up top on defense against CP3, but in the early going was doing a solid enough job of picking his way through them and CP3 wasn't really pressing the attack. On offense forced one random dumb shot off his dribble, but wasn't really the guy making things happen on offense in the early minutes. Began to get more assertive offensively as the quarter wore on but on the other end began to slow down getting around the screens and was the first starter subbed out. Returned to the gmae in the late 2nd alongside IT instead of replacing him, and was immediately scored over by Reddick. After turning the corner and throwing a flip attempt off the side of the backboard finally got a floater to go for his first hoop of the game in the final 2 min of the half and it woke him up a little. Cp3 came out to start the third with a three, but it was over Cousins on a switch. Unfortunately after half CP3 was picking up the intensity in general, and Grevis was no longer staying in front of him the way he had been early. On the other end however he was more aggressive, and despite getting another swooping flip knocked out of there he was attacking, and controlling our offense. As we surged back in the second half of the 3rd finally capped things by throwing one of his over the top passes to Cousins for a below the rim alley oop that only a guy with Cousins hands could catch and pull off. But with IT being so dynamic, and MT coming to life for a decent game, minutes and opportunities dried up for Grevis down the stretch. If he doesn't want it to become a common occurrence he's going to need to consistently be more dynamic. --Brick
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