Bee: Returning home has problems for Kings

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http://www.sacbee.com/351/story/140709.html
Returning home has drawback for Kings
By Sam Amick - Bee Staff Writer
Last Updated 6:20 am PDT Tuesday, March 20, 2007


ATLANTA -- The joke was funny, albeit inaccurate.

If the Kings had to pick a game to look utterly putrid, why not do it at Atlanta, where the fans are sparse and the spotlight not so bright?

Except for the fact that, as Shareef Abdur-Rahim pointed out, there is that television medium to consider, not to mention the newspapers and radio in this global communication age. And, for Abdur-Rahim, there was the family factor, too.

The Kings forward enjoyed everything but the game in a rare visit to his home state, where his entire extended family that includes 11 siblings resides and where he played two-plus seasons with the Hawks. The 99-76 loss Monday night ended a five-game road trip.

"I'm embarrassed that it happened to me in my hometown with my family and friends watching," he said. "That's an extra embarrassment, just the situation we're in. We're two games out of that spot in the division, and we don't compete any harder than that?"

Before tipoff, Abdur-Rahim was hustling to hit his ticket count, with numerous players wondering why getting complimentary seats was so tricky in a place that was so empty. Though the announced crowd was 13,879, there didn't appear to be half that total.

"It's like a summer-league game," guard Kevin Martin cracked.

Injury report -- Center Brad Miller left the game for good after the first quarter when his left foot problem flared up again. He continues to experience swollen tissue in the foot.

Forward Kenny Thomas missed his third game since suffering a chip fracture in his left big toe against Charlotte on Wednesday. He said he is hoping to play Wednesday against Minnesota but remains day-to-day.

Hot-lanta -- The Hawks appear to have waited too long to make a playoff push, but they continue to play surprisingly well without Joe Johnson. The All-Star guard might miss the rest of the season because of a deep bruise in his right calf, but Atlanta is 5-2 since his injury and has won five consecutive home games.

Almost but not quite -- Players hate nothing more than just missing the elusive triple double, and Hawks forward Josh Smith came one point short of his first with no one to blame but himself. Smith had nine points, 10 assists and 12 rebounds, and he was 1 of 4 from the free-throw line.

About the writer: The Bee's Sam Amick can be reached at samick@ sacbee.com.
 
Though the announced crowd was 13,879...

13,879 what? Unless the Atlanta fans were, in homage to the New Orleans "paper bag" fans of some years ago, dressed like empty seats, there was no way there were 13,000+ fans there. NO WAY. In fact, I'd guess, as the article goes on to say, "half that total" might be a little more accurate.
 
Can we do any worse against teams without their star players???? What the heck is going on???? We aren't only losing, but we are being blown out. Can someone please bug the King's locker room, I think we are all very interested as to what happens in there at 1/2 time.

Even in tank the season mode, do we have to get blown out by the bottom dwelling teams??? Now that's just embarrasing. Maybe Muss is hoping the league will take pity on us and we'll manage a top 5 pick or something.
 
What's happening? We're no good. We're not a team. The group of players called a team doesn't have a coach they respect enough to listen to apparently. And at this juncture I can't say I blame them.

Hey, people wanted to see the team tank. This is what it looks like, only we don't have the luxury of saying they did it on purpose...
 
Hey, people wanted to see the team tank. This is what it looks like, only we don't have the luxury of saying they did it on purpose...

That unfortunately is a critical distinction, and preisely why you should take decisive tanking action before its forced on you. You steer the ship to the top, adn then turn around and steer it on down to the bottom, and all the while there is a plan and direction. But you you stupidly try to hang on too long, and ou aren't sterring anymore. You have no control as the team flutters and flops like a leaf in the wind, and everyone form the players to the coaches to the fans can sense it. Tanking indicates some level of choice. Thsi isn;t tanking, its sucking. And that's much much worse.
 
Yep. I'm not disagreeing; I'm simply pointing out that it's one thing to talk about a "structured tanking," so to speak, and another to watch what you've described. And, even in the case of the planned tanking, you still run the risk of a lot of people not understanding the distinction.
 
whether the kings are just sucking or tanking on purpose they're showing no pride in doing either. if you're going to lose, lose because you suck. not because you dont feel like getting in position to get a rebound or because you dont want to have an injury diving for a lose ball even though it could be the difference in the final possession of a game. for a team of this reputation i really hope that they wouldnt purposely tank. but losing to crappy teams without their best player is beyond daffy. and it makes you wonder.
 
id prefer structured tanking; it entails a little bit of experience given to younger players through increased playing time...
 
Yeah, there is absolutely no honor in being blown out by crappy teams without their star players. We have done this to an unprecented degree lately. Once or twice o.k., but we have been blown out in quite a few games really since Ron came back. Is it Ron being on the team, we know Muss is at fault...we have heard from the Sac Bee writer that quite a few players have lost faith in their new coach. I wonder if this continues if Muss will take a seat and not bark at the team. I haven't seen a coach bark at his players as much as Muss does and also add to this not to get the results from them. We have sure lost a lot of talent from where we were years ago when we should have won the Title, but the coaching has hit a all time low as well. All this with the Arena deal in the balance and it doesn't look good at all.
 
The way I look at it is this... Running a team is like taking an ATV up a very steep sand dune. If you have enough power, you go straight up the sand dune, all the time giving it more gas. Heading straight for the top. Once you reach that point where you stop moving forward and you aren't going to make it you either need to give it a boost of nitrous, or you need to turn around and head straight back down to the bottom. What the Kings have done is continued to head for the top, and what happens is eventually instead of that nice smooth ride back down because you turned that way, your ATV flips over, tumbles and flips all the way back down and smashes into pieces. All the while people get to watch in aww as it happens.
 
The way I look at it is this... Running a team is like taking an ATV up a very steep sand dune. If you have enough power, you go straight up the sand dune, all the time giving it more gas. Heading straight for the top. Once you reach that point where you stop moving forward and you aren't going to make it you either need to give it a boost of nitrous, or you need to turn around and head straight back down to the bottom. What the Kings have done is continued to head for the top, and what happens is eventually instead of that nice smooth ride back down because you turned that way, your ATV flips over, tumbles and flips all the way back down and smashes into pieces. All the while people get to watch in aww as it happens.

Great analogy.....I know exactly what you mean. We also are stuck between being so close to making the playoffs (8th seed) and being embarrased by Dallas rather then not fighting the fact we suck, play the youngins and get a good draft pick this year. I do feel that the Maloofs/GP realize they need to rebuild and really tried to dump Bibby and almost did, we were a scrub PG away which the Cavs didn't have, but tried to get for us through another team.

In all we just really got old and GP did a fairly good job of getting something out of a player at the end of his career. Christie for Mobley, Webber for the 'moveable pieces" which haven't been so moveable, Peja for Artest. In that same time our draft picks have been very late which hasn't given us much to work with, KMart has been a fluke and a really nice surprise being how late we in the draft we picked him up.
 
Damn, Kenny may come back on wednesday. I was hoping more time for Justin who should get time regardless of whether Kenny is dressed or not. :(
 
13,879 what? Unless the Atlanta fans were, in homage to the New Orleans "paper bag" fans of some years ago, dressed like empty seats, there was no way there were 13,000+ fans there. NO WAY. In fact, I'd guess, as the article goes on to say, "half that total" might be a little more accurate.
They obviously have the same people counting in Atlanta as we have here in Sacramento, because there is NO WAY that we've sold out every game this season...not even close. Must be the Jim Thomas leftovers, or something.
 
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