Is Willie Cauley-Stein still an option at center for Sacramento Kings?

[kingsfan101]

I disagree. Flawed as his gamr may be Willie is an asset, if you let him walk for nothing you have to ask yourself can you do better with the money? Let him go field offers come back and forced a sign and trade and get assets for him or decide if you're going to just let him walk. At this point the Kings have 60 million in cap space and they can always clear more space if they had to buy revoking an offer to Willy.

Perfectly agree. He's still young, and his game is made for the modern NBA. I think it's best that he plays somewhere else, given his statements, but I would be loathe to let him go without compensation.

Young players (Willie was a 3 year college player, so not the best comparison, but still), often blossom late. It will be bad if he plays well for some other team, but it will be worse if he does it and we don't get anything in return, after investing in him for four seasons.

 

[jiimbob]

I may have missed something, but I have not seen interest from any other team linked to Willie. Seems a bit odd.
Free agent open season can't come soon enough. I'm happy enough to move on from Willie but would sure like to know who our mystery front office is targeting.

 

[upinsmoke]

Perfectly agree. He's still young, and his game is made for the modern NBA. I think it's best that he plays somewhere else, given his statements, but I would be loathe to let him go without compensation.

Young players (Willie was a 3 year college player, so not the best comparison, but still), often blossom late. It will be bad if he plays well for some other team, but it will be worse if he does it and we don't get anything in return, after investing in him for four seasons.

No its not. If you cant shoot as a big you better lock down the paint and clean the glass.

 

[The_Jamal]

In a sign-and-trade deal, a team (in this example, OKC) simply needs to have the incoming/outgoing salary ledger legal under the normal rules. Since Adams' contract is $25.8M next year, in a sign-and-trade we could sign WCS to a contract up to $32.4M per year and still execute a legal sign and trade with OKC for Adams via the 125% rule. (That, by the way, is well over Willie's max salary of about $27M.) So there would certainly be no issues on the OKC side of a sign-and-trade if they were to send Adams back.

From the Kings' point of view, it would depend fairly heavily on how big of a contract OKC wanted to give Willie. If they wanted to get near the max, we'd have no issues with the cap since the salaries we'd be sending out and receiving would be close to equal. If they wanted to give him $10M a year as you suggest (I think that number ends up being a good bit lower than what WCS will end up getting), then we'd have to make sure we have the cap space to absorb Adams' contract. As it stands right now with Barnes having opted out, we have a pretty clear $56M of cap space whose only real encumbrance is the cap holds for Barnes ($32.7) and WCS ($14.1M). Since Adams + Barnes' cap hold makes about $58.5M, we'd have to make some sort of maneuver to make it happen coming our way (again, assuming the salary differential between WCS and Adams is big enough that we can't use the 125% rule for salary matching). The easy way would be to finalize the Barnes situation. Nobody expects him to sign for $32M, so if we just signed him to a deal at, say, $20-25M per year, we would then have the cap space to absorb Adams. Or, barring dealing with Barnes first, we could renounce his cap hold, which would give us plenty of space to absorb Adams and still leave us enough cap space after the deal (about $30M) to sign Barnes to a Barnes-size contract without having to retain his Bird Rights in the first place. If neither of those options are good, then we'd have to clear a little bit of room. Cutting Yogi's non-guaranteed money would be close to enough to bring in Adams while retaining Barnes' Bird Rights, but with cap holds for minimum roster size it would kind of be on the edge and I'm not inclined to whip out the slide rule to figure out if it actually works or not as this seems an unlikely scenario.

Bottom line is, we should be able to both re-sign Barnes and, if OKC and WCS are both game, to sign-and-trade Willie for Adams without too much crazy maneuvering.

Ok interesting. So can OKC actually negotiate with WCS out in the open? Or just a *wink wink, pay WCS 12 mil for us*?

 

[Section 101]

Ok interesting. So can OKC actually negotiate with WCS out in the open? Or just a *wink wink, pay WCS 12 mil for us*?

On july 1st they can.

 

[Suicide King]

You are an optimist. I need to spend more time with people like you.

Always look on the bright side of life

 

[Capt. Factorial]

Why go for Adams, when they could be going for Valanciunas and get similar level talent for less cap space.

Well, I was answering a specific cap-related question revolving around speculation that has popped its head up in here over the past week or two, and Adams was a specific part of that speculation.

 

[Jkbiker]

I see either Adams or Clint as an upgrade over WCS, both OKC and Houston have them available, both teams can use Willie as a C, both teams can use the smaller salary. both players are less cost than Horford, Vucevic for us.

If Willie helps us get better with a trade, I would feel much better than just letting him go for -0-

We can always release him in July after we either find a FA we like, or do one of the two trades above. If Kings dont work a deal, then it is Kings option to release him late july or keep or match cheap offers. But These options are all by the Kings NOT Willie

 

[iowamcnabb]

I wish WCS well on his next stop. I think he is a better player than given credit for here but he also has a bit of growing up to do. A change of scenery would probably do him good and give him a chance to truly reach his potential. I'd like to see him go to Boston.
A Rozier, Brown, Tatum, _____, WCS lineup has some potential.

 

[fansinceday1]

hopefully willie chooses teams carefully. Sacramento fans were rough on him at times but whats considered rough here is considered patty cake games by fans in say philly or NY. Or even boston. Boston fans would ravage Willie after one of his zero rebounding games.

 

[Sluggah]

I lived in Boston for awhile. Willie will be eaten alive there.

Edit: Upon reflection, strangely, that might actually be what he needs.

 

[burekijogurt]

hopefully willie chooses teams carefully. Sacramento fans were rough on him at times but whats considered rough here is considered patty cake games by fans in say philly or NY. Or even boston. Boston fans would ravage Willie after one of his zero rebounding games.

Their current (ex) center had 9 games with less than 4 rebounds despite playing almost 30 minutes in 5 of those games. Willie had 3 such games and he played 7,12,17 minutes in those. if he played 30 minutes in those I'm sure he would have managed Horford's 1s and 2s..

 

[SLAB]

I lived in Boston for awhile. Willie will be eaten alive there.

Edit: Upon reflection, strangely, that might actually be what he needs.

I think if dude gets paid, he won’t care.

 

[John Galt]

He just wants as much money as he can get. Having the qualifying offer attached to him lowers his value. Not a big surprise. Kings dont owe him a thing though. Put the qualifying offer on him and if we get him cheap and he is disgruntled, then we can trade him for value

I don’t know - I could be wrong - but I thing this statement lowers his market value.


Seemed to me that Joerger kissed Willie’s ass and gave him many many chances - when really a lot of fan base and I think front offices wanted to see more Marvin and more Harry and less WCS.

He comes off like a me-first malcontent.

 

[sergmatt]

Seemed to me that Joerger kissed Willie’s ass and gave him many many chances - when really a lot of fan base and I think front offices wanted to see more Marvin and more Harry and less WCS.

He comes off like a me-first malcontent.

I think Joerger had to in order to get Willie to play well. WCS seems like the type of player you have to coddle and hope for the best out of him. I don't think Willie is the type of player that you could yell at and ride like Pop does and expect him to respond in good fashion.

Willie is aloof with an inflated/unrealistic assessment of his own abilities. Those kinds of people generally respond poorly to criticism.

 

[VF21]

I don’t know - I could be wrong - but I thing this statement lowers his market value.


Seemed to me that Joerger kissed Willie’s ass and gave him many many chances - when really a lot of fan base and I think front offices wanted to see more Marvin and more Harry and less WCS.

He comes off like a me-first malcontent.

I think WCS is unlucky in the respect that he was gifted with a talent and didn't have to put in the effort so many others have to get to the NBA. I don't think he's a malcontent so much as he's not obsessed by basketball. To him it's a means to an end. It's a pastime - not something he thinks about every moment of the day. He doesn't have the hunger or the drive you generally see in successful professional athletes. He'll get paid - but he'll never be remembered as a player who took your breath away. And the sad shame is - he could be.

 

[KingsFanSince85]

I think Joerger had to in order to get Willie to play well. WCS seems like the type of player you have to coddle and hope for the best out of him. I don't think Willie is the type of player that you could yell at and ride like Pop does and expect him to respond in good fashion.

Willie is aloof with an inflated/unrealistic assessment of his own abilities. Those kinds of people generally respond poorly to criticism.

Sadly, I agree.

Perhaps I just didn't pay attention, but I didn't notice his attitude being quite the same while at Kentucky under Calipari -- who is known to be somewhat of a yeller.

I mean, I always knew WCS was somewhat of a different cat in terms of his personality, likes and tastes. But I just wouldn't have predicted the ego and belief that he can 'lead' a team.

 

[John Galt]

I think WCS is unlucky in the respect that he was gifted with a talent and didn't have to put in the effort so many others have to get to the NBA. I don't think he's a malcontent so much as he's not obsessed by basketball. To him it's a means to an end. It's a pastime - not something he thinks about every moment of the day. He doesn't have the hunger or the drive you generally see in successful professional athletes. He'll get paid - but he'll never be remembered as a player who took your breath away. And the sad shame is - he could be.

Well, I wish I had said something more along the lines of “I think this statement to the press doesn’t help him”. I had reconciled myself to having him back and I think he is a good player. But as you alude to - he doesn’t come across as someone who cares enough.

And I sort of cynically think that can be a learned behavior. Like Kevin Costner tried to teach Nuke Laloosh how to talk to the press.

Willie does not HAVE to come across as a guy who doesn’t care enough. But he does it over and over again. It’s strange. So that’s what I mean by “his statement could lower his value”. Some gm could be talking himself into Willie, and then he goes and opens his mouth and REMINDS you where his head is at.

 

[mac]

I think WCS is unlucky in the respect that he was gifted with a talent and didn't have to put in the effort so many others have to get to the NBA. I don't think he's a malcontent so much as he's not obsessed by basketball. To him it's a means to an end. It's a pastime - not something he thinks about every moment of the day. He doesn't have the hunger or the drive you generally see in successful professional athletes. He'll get paid - but he'll never be remembered as a player who took your breath away. And the sad shame is - he could be.

I would actually liken what you've described to someone like Tyreke (or at least, the people around him who have a large influence on him) more so than Willie. With Willie it's about the ends, but he also has some warped idea about the means! If all he really wanted was to get paid, he'd work on what we all want from him. On paper, someone with his physical gifts who defends well, rebounds and plays within the flow of the team is going to command a lot of money. Look at Capela! But no, Willie honestly has delusions of being the next Anthony Davis, so much so he's not even willing to do what the coach wants him to do.

 

[VF21]

I would actually liken what you've described to someone like Tyreke (or at least, the people around him who have a large influence on him) more so than Willie. With Willie it's about the ends, but he also has some warped idea about the means! If all he really wanted was to get paid, he'd work on what we all want from him. On paper, someone with his physical gifts who defends well, rebounds and plays within the flow of the team is going to command a lot of money. Look at Capela! But no, Willie honestly has delusions of being the next Anthony Davis, so much so he's not even willing to do what the coach wants him to do.

We'll have to agree to disagree. I think WCS has delusions of being a successful artist and avant garde personality and sees basketball as a way to that end. I'm not saying he doesn't envision himself as a talented NBA player - it's just not the first thing he thinks about in the morning and the last thing he thinks about at night. If he did, he'd be putting up incredible numbers.

You can't teach that hunger. It comes when you're a kid playing hoops down at the local school after dark, dreaming of the day when you take that fantasy shot at the buzzer to win the game. WCS came late to the game. I doubt if he's ever had that fantasy.

He's an enigma. The flashes of brilliance that we've seen are tantalizingly just that - flashes. If he goes to a team that can find a way to tap into that reserve, he might end up being an all-star. I just don't know if there's a coach in the league that could find a way to do it.

 

[Suicide King]

We'll have to agree to disagree. I think WCS has delusions of being a successful artist and avant garde personality and sees basketball as a way to that end. I'm not saying he doesn't envision himself as a talented NBA player - it's just not the first thing he thinks about in the morning and the last thing he thinks about at night. If he did, he'd be putting up incredible numbers.

You can't teach that hunger. It comes when you're a kid playing hoops down at the local school after dark, dreaming of the day when you take that fantasy shot at the buzzer to win the game. WCS came late to the game. I doubt if he's ever had that fantasy.

He's an enigma. The flashes of brilliance that we've seen are tantalizingly just that - flashes. If he goes to a team that can find a way to tap into that reserve, he might end up being an all-star. I just don't know if there's a coach in the league that could find a way to do it.

I really hope I get to see the amazing baller I believe resides within him someday, whether here or elsewhere. Just from a love of the game perspective. However it may never be the path he ends up walking while in the league. Time will tell.

 

[mac]

We'll have to agree to disagree. I think WCS has delusions of being a successful artist and avant garde personality and sees basketball as a way to that end. I'm not saying he doesn't envision himself as a talented NBA player - it's just not the first thing he thinks about in the morning and the last thing he thinks about at night. If he did, he'd be putting up incredible numbers.

You can't teach that hunger. It comes when you're a kid playing hoops down at the local school after dark, dreaming of the day when you take that fantasy shot at the buzzer to win the game. WCS came late to the game. I doubt if he's ever had that fantasy.

He's an enigma. The flashes of brilliance that we've seen are tantalizingly just that - flashes. If he goes to a team that can find a way to tap into that reserve, he might end up being an all-star. I just don't know if there's a coach in the league that could find a way to do it.

That's just it isn't it... On one hand his work "ethic" suggests what you say, that it isn't even a fantasy. On the other hand, he has said over and over again that he thinks he can be the next Porzingis if given the opportunity and freedom to showcase his offensive prowess. If that isn't fantasy, I don't know what is.

Let's be real, he's earned enough by this point to be some sort of artist if that's all he wanted to be. Keep his mouth shut, play some defense and the Kings would probably give him $10mil/year at the very least. Instead, he comes out with statements of wanting more freedom. Unless you're saying that this sort of delusion about his basketball abilities is part of his art? That's a scary thought... One that might not even be too far off

 

[pdxKingsFan]

I have seen what mac sees. For almost his entire tenure he's been talking about/working on his offensive game and his agent's statement was tantamount to this guy is a star and the Kings have held him back. All anyone wanted from Willie was for him to be a high energy defender who can also get some easy buckets in transition. Someone would easily reach and pay him 20mil/per if he did that. Instead he may struggle to get 10. Part of that is just poor market timing, but then a lot of the big contracts handed out since 2016 were sorely undeserved.

 

[fansinceday1]

I have seen what mac sees. For almost his entire tenure he's been talking about/working on his offensive game and his agent's statement was tantamount to this guy is a star and the Kings have held him back. All anyone wanted from Willie was for him to be a high energy defender who can also get some easy buckets in transition. Someone would easily reach and pay him 20mil/per if he did that. Instead he may struggle to get 10. Part of that is just poor market timing, but then a lot of the big contracts handed out since 2016 were sorely undeserved.

Willie being held back............
I’ll be very kind and give him pre joerger. Even if he was being held back before joerger how does he explain his play during joerger’s tenure? IMO Dave played Willie way way too much, to the detriment of our young bigs who I would have much rather seen out there. Obviously Dave was a huge fan of WCS.

To be blunt, Willie and his agent are full of ****. He’s gonna realize real quick how easy he had it here.

 

[pdxKingsFan]

Willie being held back............
I’ll be very kind and give him pre joerger. Even if he was being held back before joerger how does he explain his play during joerger’s tenure? IMO Dave played Willie way way too much, to the detriment of our young bigs who I would have much rather seen out there. Obviously Dave was a huge fan of WCS.

To be blunt, Willie and his agent are full of ****. He’s gonna realize real quick how easy he had it here.

I tend to agree that he was given every chance to succeed. Did we draft other bigs? Yes. But he got consistent minutes and in the NBA your job isn't a given it's earned. It was a contract year and he had every opportunity to go out and make an impression that would have gotten him paid and he dropped the ball. And yet even with his play falling off at the end of the season and Marvin and Harry earning minutes he was still logging plenty of time.

 

[ESP47]

We all saw the chart, a WCS LAYUP is the worst layup in basketball. Think about that for a minute.

He was also there for his midrange jump shot. So we have a guy who's collective offense minus his dunks are some of the worst shots in the game and he thinks he should be shooting more? The dude is delusional. He should be trying to help Joerger get hired somewhere and then sign on with him again because no other coach would have given him the freedom that Dave gave him. George Karl never ever would have let WCS do anything beyond what we've seen Koufos do in his tenure here.

I'm sure Capela would like to be Olajuwon but he's smart enough to know that no amount of shots given to him will ever make him Olajuwon. So he does what he does best, which is what the majority of NBA players do....except Willie.

 

[chief bromden]

No one was stopping him from hitting his free throws better 55% of the time other than himself. I like him as a person, but when you have don't have a good shot in this day then you aren't worth more than specialist money. I don't blame him for trying to get paid though, and I think this is a classic "I am breaking up with you before you can break up with me" to present a certain image to help the pay day potential. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

 

[gunks]

I agree with those who think WCS is just posturing for more money, but it's still irksome to see the guy claim he was held back by the Kings and needs a change of scenery. Dude had all kinds of minutes, and he had waaaaaay too many touches on offense.

Ah well, WCS was always a bit delusional.

I think we'll miss him short term, but long term we needed to upgrade or bench him anyways. Dude isn't a starting C for a playoff team (at least not with his off and on motor).

Hopefully Vlade works out a sign and trade. I think the market for WCS will be higher than people think.

 

[King Baller]

Willie must think if Lebron is in his ear he will play better and he may be right. I think the Kings are going to sign another Center or Two so Willie will get a change of scenery.

 

[KingsFanSince85]

We all saw the chart, a WCS LAYUP is the worst layup in basketball. Think about that for a minute.

I had no clue about that statistic. But I have no problem believing it to be true.

I get so frustrated when WCS has a chance to aggressively dunk the ball but instead opts to lay it up. Not only does he get it blocked from time to time, but he misses so many damn chippies! It’s infuriating!

As a fan and someone that’s played competitive basketball at a far, far, far lesser level all my life, I’ve often wondered what it would be like to switch places with someone like WCS for a day. Like in those silly movies we see from time to time. I sure as hell wouldn’t ever attempt a layup unless it was absolutely necessary or the play called for it. I’d try to aggressive dunk anything near the basket that I could — even if the end result looked like prime Duane Causwell far too often!