James worked out for us too and Vlade mentioned in the press conference he's known Vanja for a long time.
Soo.... yep.
2019 NBA Draft thread
- Thread starter VF21
- Start date
James worked out for us too and Vlade mentioned in the press conference he's known Vanja for a long time.
Soo.... yep.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
To be fair, you don't have to watch him work out to realize Kyle Guy is good at shooting though.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
Vlade has put the team in a good position but lets not act like he went through a million draft busts to get there. Tonight is about the draft. Free agency will be about free agency. Player usage is about coaching and player usage. You can and most certainly should compartmentalize each aspect in relation to the whole.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
Exactly, in fact watching him shoot over team defense is probably more important. I hope he gets a legit shot to take that backup PG spot. He would be a good compliment to Bogdan off the bench. Let Bogdan run point, let Kyle run off screens.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
I would also like to clarify. I'm not sure this is on Vlade as much as who he has working for him in scouting. Vlade probably doesn't know a lot of these players outside of the workouts but it's up to those who work for him to create an understanding of value, fit, and talent.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
One of the issues the Kings probably faced this season though is that without a first round pick, it was probably hard/impossible for them to get some of these fringe 1st rounders to come in for a workout.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
That's fine, but it's also why letting workouts convince you so heavily is an issue. In a world where there is a constant stream of video data on anyone and everything it's clearly not the best way to judge talent if the Kings recent draft record is any indication. Clearly they came into this draft with a set plan, they executed set plan, and very little that happened got in the way of that. The issue is outside of Guy likely none of these players were going to be drafted by anyone else. In Vlades presser he almost got defensive when broached with the issue and he said, "They were rated on our board". That's good, but again, historically their talent evaluation skills have been subpar so clearly your "board" isn't the best judge of talent. Part of that is obviously fit though and much like some of those past picks, fit with these picks may be an issue as well. If Kyle Guy gets a shot to play backup PG then he has a chance. Outside of that tough luck.
sactowndog
All-Star
Yep except so far Vlade doesn’t have either’s draft record.
Malachi, Skal, PappaG, Justin Jackson are all misses. Justin James may surprise us but 1) I follow the MWC and it’s not a great league 2) he shot poorly from 3 in a bad league and less than 75% from the line. 3) he is already 22 and older than a few players on the Kings.
We weren’t getting a starter but we needed depth and rotation players. If you aren’t going to sign free agents you have to maximize draft capital. Maximizing draft capital is how Toronto and Milwaukee became good.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
C'mon Robert Franks and Jordan Caroline!
sactowndog
All-Star
I don’t think anyone is complaining about the Kyle Guy pick.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
The last second round pick the Raptors drafted who has actually played in the league is Quincy Acy and Brogdan is the best player the Bucks have picked since Giannis.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
In all the hubbub I realized Naz Reid didn't get drafted. Dude, there were a lot of dumb GM's this year.
KingsFanSince85
All-Star
Thing is, you have no clue whether this is true or complete fiction.
Furthermore, if they didn’t select the guys they did in the 2nd round. Wouldn’t the players you’d rather have seen them draft in the same spots been in the same boat? The entire 2nd round, especially 40 and on is a complete crapshoot.
It all comes down to what a team sees in the player and how they might fit in with their team.
They had to use the ‘asset’ to draft someone. Or trade or sell it. People are upset when they sell one pick to drop 8 spots and they’re also pissed when they don’t draft the player they want — who is also far from a sure thing. I don’t get it.
I guarantee someone could say the same of whomever you feel would have been ‘wiser asset management’.
In all seriousness, what qualifies you to know that? I’ve been watching basketball since the late 70’s and haven’t missed many KINGS games in the past 25 years and I readily admit that I don’t know. I have preferences and players I like, but I don’t ever truly know for sure.
Hint, neither do you.
Lastly, you act as if other teams wouldn’t have been interested in the same players as undrafted FA’s. There’s no guarantee they sign with the KINGS if given multiple options. Drafting them ensures it. They obviously wanted these players and didn’t want to compete for them in FA, assuming nobody selected them before the end of the draft.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Yeah, this year's draft was really freaking bizarre on so many different levels that it's honestly hard to get work up about things either way.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
Vlade better jump on it, most of the big names are going quick!
kingsfan101
Starter
Doesn't make it right.
I understand it's business, and it's very easy for me to preach how someone else should spend their money. Without knowing the specifics of the deal, given the positions involved, I would speculate that the "cash considerations" was a drop in the bucket in NBA terms.
We are not a tax paying team. Hell, we had to make an effort to reach the floor. Given all this, it just looks bad (to me at least).
sactowndog
All-Star
I said maximizing draft capital. As you know the Raptors hasn’t had a second round pick in a while. But the did get Siakim at 27 and Anunby at 23. The Kings selected PappaG and Malachi before Siakim and Jackson and Giles before Anunoby.
coolhandluke
Starter
He signed a two-way contract with Timberwolves as per Shams.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
OG has spent a huge amount of time injured and has been a limited role player for Toronto who the jury is still out on as to whether he's good or bad. Siakam was a steal at 27 but I don't think even Masai envisioned him developing like this.
Iced Espresso
Starter
One more SG and we will start 5 in summer league.
sactowndog
All-Star
Well I can tell you for certain Justin James wasn’t even on one teams draft board. It was also telling ESPN said nothing because no one had a file on the guy. Even the SB Nation draft analyst said he had no idea who he was.
Justin James relatively was a reach equal to PappaG. For Kings fans sake let’s hope this works out better than Vlade’s previous reaches.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
The Kings needed a player like him though and he was a rotation player for them from day 1 pretty much. They won, period.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
This is certainly a take.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
It's like that old joke, 5 shooting guards walk into a bar.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Did they though? The Kings used JJ as an asset to trade for a supersolid SF in Harrison Barnes who is ideally what OG will eventually develop into AND drafted Harry Giles who has shown flashes of absolutely ridiculous upside.
SLAB
Hall of Famer
I know, right? He was on the Kings’!
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
JJ was hardly the catalyst for that deal. The Kings finally didn't blow their cap space on garbage and it worked out. You can't lump Giles into that. They could have had OG and Giles.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Was he though? For all we know, Vlade just drew a name out of a hat and handed it to the NBA without even knowing if it was the name of a player in the draft or not.
Telemachus
Starter
Yet Kyle Boone at CBS Sports gave the Kings a "B" when grading the pick.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
You mean in the same way that Thon Maker wasn't the catalyst for the Nikola Mirotic acquisition by the Bucks. JJ was an asset that we used with Z-Bo's contract to acquire Barnes from Dallas. Dallas, at the time, really did seem to envision him as being a role-player in their rotation for them.
