(Please note that against all appearances, I have a life outside of this so don’t expect one of these from me every game, especially if we start really really sucking
)
Marvin Bagley [B-] - 27 min, 13 pts (5/14 fg, 0/4 3pg), 9 rbs, 0 asts, 0 stls, 1 blk, 2 tov, 2 fouls
He’s finally healthy! Regardless of your opinion of him as a player, you have got to admit that it’s nice to finally see Marvin out on the floor. Admittedly, he played with the rust and jitters that you would expect a guy who has essentially been injured an entire season to have. Forced things badly in his first stint but really settled down after that despite not having the best night offensively. Physically, Bagley is much bigger than he was as a rookie but he’s still got that great second jump and really attacked the glass against a pretty large Denver team. Got targeted by Malone and Joker but managed to not get totally destroyed on defense and even made a couple nice contributions on that end. Wound up fouling out because Jokic moves at a snails pace and knows how to use his body.
Harrison Barnes [B+] - 42 min, 21 pts, 9 rbs, 5 asts, 2 stls, 0 blks, 1 tov, 1 fl
A long, long time ago, Harrison Barnes was ranked among the best high school prospects to ever play the game. This was, for one night, Harrison fulfilling that potential. Harrison made players on both ends of the floor, including tough defense on Jokic on the last play that resulted in a fastbreak dunk (that he got blocked/fouled on) and a bunch of nice passes to keep the ball moving throughout the night. If there were any flaw to his game tonight, it would be his outside shot abandoning him but him pretty much taking over overtime makes up for that pretty well. I don’t expect this every night but the same general style of play would be nice.
Richaun Holmes [C-] -
If there were any one player on the team that had a "bad" night, it was Holmes. Got absolutely bodied by Joker at times and generally struggled on both ends of the floor. At the same time, he gave the effort you’d expect from him and rebounded well before fouling out early in the fourth quarter.
Buddy Hield [C+] -
Let’s get this out of the way, Buddy had an absolutely bad first half and end of regulation. He did however, win us the game with pure hustle. Throughout the entire Buddy saga, the one thing you could never really question was his effort level while playing the game. You could question how he channeled that energy at times but the man is one of the best in the game at moving in transition and moving without the ball. This year, while still a young season, Buddy seems to be applying that same hustle to the defensive end of the floor. While he’ll never be Doug Christie out there, if Buddy plays defense like this all year, there Is absolutely no reason he shouldn’t be getting huge minutes every night even with all the brain farts considered.
De’Aaron Fox [B-] -
In my game thread post, I advocated not being too hard on Fox after his contract extension but, ho boy, did things look rough to start the game n.Missed a bunch of jumpers to start things off before finally realizing he could get to the paint at will at halftime. In the second half, he was probably our best overall player: attacking on offense and playing solid defense, including a game-saving out of nowhere block that led to Barnes tying the game. In the final sequence, he was the one who got the ball after Barnes knocked it loose and made the heady move to pass it ahead rather than try to take the last shot himself. Overall, the stats are pretty close to where they were last year but hopefully Swipa’s play down the stretch is just step one in his ”eff Amin campaign”
***
Cory Joseph [B+} -
It's CoJo contract season! The Kings don’t win this without Cory’s first quarter. While he’s always been a solid defender, the issue with CoJo has always been his propensity for taking the air out of the ball on offense but for whatever reason, while that still happened at times, he also hit some solid spot up threes tonight. If 3-and-D is actually a sustainable thing for the Kings, that changes the prospects of the season entirely, seeing as Luke Walton seems hellbent on playing him major minute every night. If regular CoJo remains default CoJo... Well, hopefully, this game boosted his trade value.
Tyrese Haliburton [A-] -
And the shiny new toy makes his big league debut. While the stat line is nice on its own, it absolutely does not tell the whole story about Haliburton's impact on this game. On defense, Tyrese remains one of the most impressive rookies in recent memory. Despite his general lack of bulk, Haliburton is already a terror on that end of the floor, using his length and range to affect passing angles and doing nifty things like receiving when he gets beat on drives to the point that he can block jumpers from behind. On offense, the dude is a remarkably heady glue guy, never forcing the issue (he had ZERO turnovers in thirty minutes!) and hitting shots despite his shooting stroke looking like something you'd make up to make the dudes at the local YMCA laugh during your pickup basketball games. If there was one flaw to Tyrese's game tonight it was that he was so intent on helping his team on defense that he lost track of his own guy on a couple of possessions and also the simple fact that I'm not quite sure he's got a grasp of how good he is on offense yet. But those are easily correctable things and nothing about how Tyrese has played to start his career has discouraged me from thinking that the Kings have acquired a key player for the next decade plus.
Hassan Whiteside [B+]-
Somewhere Bricklayer smiles as the promise of having a massive paint defender like Hassan come off the bench finally comes to fruition... Just ten years after we drafted him. No one‘s ever gonna accuse Hassan of being fast but his sheer size in the paint both gives our guards an instant lob target and immediate makes other teams scared of attacking the paint. Forced to play heavy minutes in the 4th as the rest of the bigs on the team fouled out and started to lose some effectiveness in crunch time and OT (but had a really nice block to stop a basket though) but overall it was as good of a debut for the big guy as you could have hoped for. Just don’t ask him to shoot.
Nemanja Bjelica [C] -
As the sort of forgotten fourth big in Luke's ninth man rotation, Bjeli had a typically solid night though he continues to have baffling issues shooting the ball that will surely end up in him randomly destroying some poor team with a 30-point night in which he is automatic from 40-ft out. Defensively, Bjelica seems to have settled into a groove as a designated help guy and on offense, the man wound up with two assists and ten points despite just sorta existing for sixteen minutes and them being relegated to Mateen duty as Walton went small to end the game.
)Marvin Bagley [B-] - 27 min, 13 pts (5/14 fg, 0/4 3pg), 9 rbs, 0 asts, 0 stls, 1 blk, 2 tov, 2 fouls
He’s finally healthy! Regardless of your opinion of him as a player, you have got to admit that it’s nice to finally see Marvin out on the floor. Admittedly, he played with the rust and jitters that you would expect a guy who has essentially been injured an entire season to have. Forced things badly in his first stint but really settled down after that despite not having the best night offensively. Physically, Bagley is much bigger than he was as a rookie but he’s still got that great second jump and really attacked the glass against a pretty large Denver team. Got targeted by Malone and Joker but managed to not get totally destroyed on defense and even made a couple nice contributions on that end. Wound up fouling out because Jokic moves at a snails pace and knows how to use his body.
Harrison Barnes [B+] - 42 min, 21 pts, 9 rbs, 5 asts, 2 stls, 0 blks, 1 tov, 1 fl
A long, long time ago, Harrison Barnes was ranked among the best high school prospects to ever play the game. This was, for one night, Harrison fulfilling that potential. Harrison made players on both ends of the floor, including tough defense on Jokic on the last play that resulted in a fastbreak dunk (that he got blocked/fouled on) and a bunch of nice passes to keep the ball moving throughout the night. If there were any flaw to his game tonight, it would be his outside shot abandoning him but him pretty much taking over overtime makes up for that pretty well. I don’t expect this every night but the same general style of play would be nice.
Richaun Holmes [C-] -
If there were any one player on the team that had a "bad" night, it was Holmes. Got absolutely bodied by Joker at times and generally struggled on both ends of the floor. At the same time, he gave the effort you’d expect from him and rebounded well before fouling out early in the fourth quarter.
Buddy Hield [C+] -
Let’s get this out of the way, Buddy had an absolutely bad first half and end of regulation. He did however, win us the game with pure hustle. Throughout the entire Buddy saga, the one thing you could never really question was his effort level while playing the game. You could question how he channeled that energy at times but the man is one of the best in the game at moving in transition and moving without the ball. This year, while still a young season, Buddy seems to be applying that same hustle to the defensive end of the floor. While he’ll never be Doug Christie out there, if Buddy plays defense like this all year, there Is absolutely no reason he shouldn’t be getting huge minutes every night even with all the brain farts considered.
De’Aaron Fox [B-] -
In my game thread post, I advocated not being too hard on Fox after his contract extension but, ho boy, did things look rough to start the game n.Missed a bunch of jumpers to start things off before finally realizing he could get to the paint at will at halftime. In the second half, he was probably our best overall player: attacking on offense and playing solid defense, including a game-saving out of nowhere block that led to Barnes tying the game. In the final sequence, he was the one who got the ball after Barnes knocked it loose and made the heady move to pass it ahead rather than try to take the last shot himself. Overall, the stats are pretty close to where they were last year but hopefully Swipa’s play down the stretch is just step one in his ”eff Amin campaign”
***
Cory Joseph [B+} -
It's CoJo contract season! The Kings don’t win this without Cory’s first quarter. While he’s always been a solid defender, the issue with CoJo has always been his propensity for taking the air out of the ball on offense but for whatever reason, while that still happened at times, he also hit some solid spot up threes tonight. If 3-and-D is actually a sustainable thing for the Kings, that changes the prospects of the season entirely, seeing as Luke Walton seems hellbent on playing him major minute every night. If regular CoJo remains default CoJo... Well, hopefully, this game boosted his trade value.
Tyrese Haliburton [A-] -
And the shiny new toy makes his big league debut. While the stat line is nice on its own, it absolutely does not tell the whole story about Haliburton's impact on this game. On defense, Tyrese remains one of the most impressive rookies in recent memory. Despite his general lack of bulk, Haliburton is already a terror on that end of the floor, using his length and range to affect passing angles and doing nifty things like receiving when he gets beat on drives to the point that he can block jumpers from behind. On offense, the dude is a remarkably heady glue guy, never forcing the issue (he had ZERO turnovers in thirty minutes!) and hitting shots despite his shooting stroke looking like something you'd make up to make the dudes at the local YMCA laugh during your pickup basketball games. If there was one flaw to Tyrese's game tonight it was that he was so intent on helping his team on defense that he lost track of his own guy on a couple of possessions and also the simple fact that I'm not quite sure he's got a grasp of how good he is on offense yet. But those are easily correctable things and nothing about how Tyrese has played to start his career has discouraged me from thinking that the Kings have acquired a key player for the next decade plus.
Hassan Whiteside [B+]-
Somewhere Bricklayer smiles as the promise of having a massive paint defender like Hassan come off the bench finally comes to fruition... Just ten years after we drafted him. No one‘s ever gonna accuse Hassan of being fast but his sheer size in the paint both gives our guards an instant lob target and immediate makes other teams scared of attacking the paint. Forced to play heavy minutes in the 4th as the rest of the bigs on the team fouled out and started to lose some effectiveness in crunch time and OT (but had a really nice block to stop a basket though) but overall it was as good of a debut for the big guy as you could have hoped for. Just don’t ask him to shoot.
Nemanja Bjelica [C] -
As the sort of forgotten fourth big in Luke's ninth man rotation, Bjeli had a typically solid night though he continues to have baffling issues shooting the ball that will surely end up in him randomly destroying some poor team with a 30-point night in which he is automatic from 40-ft out. Defensively, Bjelica seems to have settled into a groove as a designated help guy and on offense, the man wound up with two assists and ten points despite just sorta existing for sixteen minutes and them being relegated to Mateen duty as Walton went small to end the game.
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