Does Anyone Find it Weird...
- Thread starter Fresno King
- Start date
Reggie Theus is damn busy for one. He was introduced as head coach last Tuesday (6-19) in Sac after frantically flying commercial air to make the news conference on time. Immediately afterwards he returned to LA to see his daughter graduate from high school the very next day (6-20). Then he flew out to Las Cruces, NM to close up shop at NMSU with some emotional good byes, plus get his just purchased house on the market and start planning a big move to Sac. Over the weekend he was back in LA and then met up with Petrie in Phoenix early this week for draft planning. I understand he's been in Sac for the past 2-3 days looking for a new home here or maybe living in a hotel like our Governator at least for awhile. I'm sure Reggie will be commenting a plenty with local TV/radio interviews as soon as he catches his breath a bit - which won't take long.
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Someone just called on the Rise Guys and he claimed he was actually speaking with RT on the phone during the pick. They were both chanting "Acie Law". I guess they were thinking about a replacement for Mike Bibby.
It sounded like they were both very shocked and disappointed.
Of course, there is no way of knowing how true this story is or not.
It sounded like they were both very shocked and disappointed.
Of course, there is no way of knowing how true this story is or not.
I'm sure the guy was chanting "Acie Law" during the pick. But I highly doubt that Reggie Theus was chanting with him. I can't imagine the new kings coach on the phone with a friend chanting when his new team's pick is being made. If so, I think the Kings have more problems than who they picked at number 10.
You know what I find weird? Isiah Thomas made a great trade (a 20/10 guy for Steve Francis' corpse and Charmin Frye), Billy Knight drafted well (Horford and Law), and Billy King and the Sixers came away Thad Young, Jason Smith, Kyryolo Fesenko and Derrick Byars.
Meanwhile our formerly great GM couldn't get a pick, our billionaire owners wouldn't buy one, and we added the least athletic big in the draft to our least athletic frontline in the league.
That's weird.
Meanwhile our formerly great GM couldn't get a pick, our billionaire owners wouldn't buy one, and we added the least athletic big in the draft to our least athletic frontline in the league.
That's weird.
The problem was not the pick. The problem was a team too dumb, or unwilling, to start the rebuilding process earlier in the season (i.e. tank).
The Maloofs have an unpleasant decision to make: they can bite the bullet and blow up the team, which probably means buying out some contracts, or they can hang out in sucky team hell for years, which will also cost them a lot of money.
One thing to remember when you hear mention of all the money the Maloofs spend on the Kings is that they get a lot of PR and media attention out of owning the Kings that doesn't show up on the balance sheet.
The Maloofs have an unpleasant decision to make: they can bite the bullet and blow up the team, which probably means buying out some contracts, or they can hang out in sucky team hell for years, which will also cost them a lot of money.
One thing to remember when you hear mention of all the money the Maloofs spend on the Kings is that they get a lot of PR and media attention out of owning the Kings that doesn't show up on the balance sheet.
Well, that's not really a team decision, that's an upper management decision. And it didn't have to be early in the season at all! A difference of just ONE meaningless, late-season win -- the Clippers game, or whatever, take your pick -- and Brandan Wright could be a King. But the pick also shows that the powers that be are simply not on the same page as many of the fans.
We need athleticism, size, speed, rebounding and defense, and we need lots of upside in our rookies. They can have garbage skills now, because we're going to suck now anyway, but reasonable size and high athleticism are a must. In the past, GP has screwed this up by providing us with, for example, Quincy Douby, a skilled shooter who was also the third SG he had picked in a row (not counting the undrafted little combo guard he'd found during the same period). Was he super athletic? No. Big? No. Fast, a rebounder, a feared defender? No, no, no. He was all shooting skills and little upside. The perfect pick for a strong playoff team who just needed a little more offensive firepower coming off the bench. That team, unfortunately, is the opposite of the Kings.
Hawes has size, but virtually everything else about him is wrong. The only reason he had any shot at being a lottery pick was because he's got very advanced offensive skills for a 19 year old. Great rebounder? No, and wingspan less than some 6'5" guys. Feared defender? Perhaps, if you're too dumb to step around him before you shoot. Fast, super athletic? In the sprint, he came in 76th place out of 80. In lane agility, not much better, and his jumping ability is so low that virtually nobody who scored as badly got drafted at all. His 13% body fat was 79th-highest out of 80, with only Josh McRoberts managing to squeak past him. 71 out of 80 of the draft applicants were in the 3%-10% range, so we're not talking an extra pound or two, we're talking being in the militant vanguard of the flabby. More like Ostertag with a beer in one hand and a bag of pork rinds in the other.
So that's why I'm profoundly unhappy with this pick. It shows me that upper management just doesn't get it. We might have had Thornton, arguably the most athletic guy in the draft, in the mould of Gerald Wallace, and gotten a ton of upside for our pick, but we didn't. We might have traded down several picks and gotten Tiago Splitter, who would still have been a better-balanced big for our needs -- or heck, even just picked him at #10! -- but we didn't. We had our pick of several guys who are almost sure to have long careers as solid starters in the NBA, but we passed them all up for a flabby bag of shooting skills.
And the fact that he's, if anything, even more politically opinionated and outspoken than Joakim Noah (albeit in the opposite direction) is just an added bonus. He's known for turning the locker room into a debate forum,
like we didn't have enough chemistry problems already.
So, while of course I regret not losing one more game this last season, I still can't stand the way the front office squandered the opportunity that we did have.
We need athleticism, size, speed, rebounding and defense, and we need lots of upside in our rookies. They can have garbage skills now, because we're going to suck now anyway, but reasonable size and high athleticism are a must. In the past, GP has screwed this up by providing us with, for example, Quincy Douby, a skilled shooter who was also the third SG he had picked in a row (not counting the undrafted little combo guard he'd found during the same period). Was he super athletic? No. Big? No. Fast, a rebounder, a feared defender? No, no, no. He was all shooting skills and little upside. The perfect pick for a strong playoff team who just needed a little more offensive firepower coming off the bench. That team, unfortunately, is the opposite of the Kings.
Hawes has size, but virtually everything else about him is wrong. The only reason he had any shot at being a lottery pick was because he's got very advanced offensive skills for a 19 year old. Great rebounder? No, and wingspan less than some 6'5" guys. Feared defender? Perhaps, if you're too dumb to step around him before you shoot. Fast, super athletic? In the sprint, he came in 76th place out of 80. In lane agility, not much better, and his jumping ability is so low that virtually nobody who scored as badly got drafted at all. His 13% body fat was 79th-highest out of 80, with only Josh McRoberts managing to squeak past him. 71 out of 80 of the draft applicants were in the 3%-10% range, so we're not talking an extra pound or two, we're talking being in the militant vanguard of the flabby. More like Ostertag with a beer in one hand and a bag of pork rinds in the other.
So that's why I'm profoundly unhappy with this pick. It shows me that upper management just doesn't get it. We might have had Thornton, arguably the most athletic guy in the draft, in the mould of Gerald Wallace, and gotten a ton of upside for our pick, but we didn't. We might have traded down several picks and gotten Tiago Splitter, who would still have been a better-balanced big for our needs -- or heck, even just picked him at #10! -- but we didn't. We had our pick of several guys who are almost sure to have long careers as solid starters in the NBA, but we passed them all up for a flabby bag of shooting skills.
And the fact that he's, if anything, even more politically opinionated and outspoken than Joakim Noah (albeit in the opposite direction) is just an added bonus. He's known for turning the locker room into a debate forum,
like we didn't have enough chemistry problems already.
So, while of course I regret not losing one more game this last season, I still can't stand the way the front office squandered the opportunity that we did have.
I find it weird that all these great GMs on KingsFans.com don't have jobs in the NBA.
And the tanking talk ... can that be filed in the circular cylinder with all the other shoulda/woulda discussion [Horry's 3 pt. shot (and the basket that shouldn't have counted at the half); Weber coming back and disrupting the offense; poor officiating in game 7, etc]?
And the tanking talk ... can that be filed in the circular cylinder with all the other shoulda/woulda discussion [Horry's 3 pt. shot (and the basket that shouldn't have counted at the half); Weber coming back and disrupting the offense; poor officiating in game 7, etc]?
i think people need to not use the word tanking as far as the Kings are concerned. as i'd mentioned before, if we had one more loss, we'd be up two spots in the draft. do i think we should have tanked? no. but i'm more than a little pissed that so much effort to win was shown at the last second, when we needed it least
If the NBA actually hired GMs based on knowledge, they might.
The NBA is a good ole boys club. Its about connections, and very often about having played previously. Basketball is a simple sport. There are many MANy people who could do the job betetr than Danny Ainge and Kevin McHale. But they didn't get lucky enough to be world class atheltes, and hence no go.
People worshipping ex-jocks for their supposed brains and unique non-jock skillset is highly amusing.
As for the rest -- understanding what has went wrong is a key sign of getting it in general.
The NBA is a good ole boys club. Its about connections, and very often about having played previously. Basketball is a simple sport. There are many MANy people who could do the job betetr than Danny Ainge and Kevin McHale. But they didn't get lucky enough to be world class atheltes, and hence no go.
People worshipping ex-jocks for their supposed brains and unique non-jock skillset is highly amusing.
As for the rest -- understanding what has went wrong is a key sign of getting it in general.
