HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
if we're counting rebuilds, this might be rebuild 15.0
Calipari rumor quickly debunked ... by CALIPARI
- Thread starter Flopi
- Start date
if we're counting rebuilds, this might be rebuild 15.0
Potato, tomato. You say "exploitation," I say "appeasement."
Someone mentioned it earlier (I think it was whozit), but this rumor is different. This time John Calipari came out almost immediately and debunked it.
Woj has some 'splainin' to do, and Fegan has even more if he's attempted to use Cousins' beloved Coach Cal. Some of you are doing exactly what Fegan wants. You're about to turn on Cousins. That's what the Maloofs tried to do with Kings fans. Manipulate them into not caring about the team so they could take the money and run.
LET VLADE HAVE A CHANCE to make things right before you throw him, or Cousins, or anyone else not named Woj under the bus.
Woj has some 'splainin' to do, and Fegan has even more if he's attempted to use Cousins' beloved Coach Cal. Some of you are doing exactly what Fegan wants. You're about to turn on Cousins. That's what the Maloofs tried to do with Kings fans. Manipulate them into not caring about the team so they could take the money and run.
LET VLADE HAVE A CHANCE to make things right before you throw him, or Cousins, or anyone else not named Woj under the bus.
ockingsfan
Starter
Sacramento is an easy target for him. Throw any crap against the wall see what sticks.
If one thing comes true, then he is the first one to report it. Otherwise, people will forget what he said and he still gets headlines, no one will hold him accountable, especially not the national media.
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HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
Woj writes his articles so he doesn't have to own up to crap.
Look at todays. "No formal offer has been made to Calipari"
Now Calipari comes out and says "I WAS NOT OFFERED A JOB". and because of that little sentence Woj threw into his article, he still doesn't look wrong
rainmaker
Hall of Famer
I tend to doubt that.
This all appears to be Karl focused, from reports pre-hire suggesting Cuz's camp was against hiring him, to Karl's foolish comments in the media, to the leaks from Fegan's side concentrating on Karl, to Vlade's comments about having issues with Karl.
We've also got Cuz saying he wants to be in Sac, Vlade saying he's talked to Cuz while he was on vacation and WCS saying Cuz called him and is excited about playing with him. It could all be Cuz wanting out altogether but I'd say there's a fair amount more evidence suggesting the issue has been Karl and Cuz/Fegan are intent on giving him the boot.
So, fire him. Just get it over with and move on. Anything else and next season will turn into a ****storm at some point and end with Cuz leaving anyway.
That might end up being a distinction without a difference. Writers can only hide behind minutiae for so long. I strongly suspect Woj may have sold his soul to the devil, which Brickie hinted at earlier, and is now forced to play out his hand, only now realizing he's drawing dead.
gunks
Hall of Famer
Starting to feel that way. It sucks, but them's the breaks.
I wouldnt mind a "leak" about us contacting Thibs right about now...
HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
i haven't really seen anything recently from Cousins saying he "wants to play here"
Other than his "absolutely" tweet, which happens to have been deleted, and could have just been a PR thing organized by his agent, knowing they were working on an LA deal and trying to make Cousins look like the innocent guy that wanted to stay here, if a deal had gone through
Double-K
Starter
It's worse that he took it...
rainmaker
Hall of Famer
Yes but all this concentration on the leaks, Woj, Woj's credibility, PDA, agendas, etc, it's just noise, just a distraction.
Sift through it all and when you get down to it, it's Karl or Cuz. That's the issue. And all this crap will remain until that's fixed.
If Cuz does want out altogether, he's under contract. What I'd do is fire Karl, have Vlade hire a replacement and keep an open dialogue with Cuz/Fegan, then go into next year hoping things ultimately are smoothed over. I just see a snowball's chance in hell this Karl/Cuz issue somehow works itself out and I surely wouldn't risk it as we can't blow up two consecutive seasons right before moving into the new arena.
HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
Is this a challenge?
John Galt
Starter
As much as I hate him, so far we don't really have evidence that Woj is wrong on any point great or small. Yes he is being a dick to Vlade, but as far as I can see, Woj has yet to be debunked in this story. I hope he will be, but it hasn't happened yet.
What if this all turns out to be just the true story of how a silly, grandiose and naive owner created ugly scenario after ugly scenario with rash impulsive decision making? There is a non-zero chance that it is that simple.
The Hammer
All-Star
What I hope happens behind closed doors is the Vlade sits down with Cousins and just talks. No agenda. Not trying to "fix" anything. Just talks. And listens. Just get a feel for how your guy feels, and what he wants. Cousins is human. Hear his story. Begin to gain his trust, slowly. That's how any of this healing must begin. Once Cousins feels heard, and you know how he feels and what he wants, you can begin to build bridges where they need to be built.
Also, if there is any hope, Vivek must absolutely cede all power to Vlade, because I think that is where the real mistrust lies (Cousins to Vivek). It's not so much that Cousins' has personal mistrust of Vivek (although I'd bet there's some of that), but it's that he has professional mistrust of Vivek. Keep in mind Vivek is Cousins' "boss", and essentially has a large amount of control over how his career unfolds. I would understand if Vivek appeared to Cousins as not only almost completely incompetent, but also lacking the humbleness and self-awareness to recognize that. The owner-meddling-with-a-future HOFer's-career has got to scare the living crap out of Cousins. Vivek's not racist, but the Sterling example is always in players minds of how much power an owner has to **** up a franchise.
Say what you want about Cousins' behavior, but one thing he absolutely never lacked in was self-awareness, and knowing his strengths and weaknesses. My guess is that he despises people that don't share that skill/value.
Also, if there is any hope, Vivek must absolutely cede all power to Vlade, because I think that is where the real mistrust lies (Cousins to Vivek). It's not so much that Cousins' has personal mistrust of Vivek (although I'd bet there's some of that), but it's that he has professional mistrust of Vivek. Keep in mind Vivek is Cousins' "boss", and essentially has a large amount of control over how his career unfolds. I would understand if Vivek appeared to Cousins as not only almost completely incompetent, but also lacking the humbleness and self-awareness to recognize that. The owner-meddling-with-a-future HOFer's-career has got to scare the living crap out of Cousins. Vivek's not racist, but the Sterling example is always in players minds of how much power an owner has to **** up a franchise.
Say what you want about Cousins' behavior, but one thing he absolutely never lacked in was self-awareness, and knowing his strengths and weaknesses. My guess is that he despises people that don't share that skill/value.
Except that Dan Fegan (and, by his commission, DeMarcus Cousins) have put the Kings in an unwinnable situation. As someone who is anti-Karl, I feel like we're just about at the point where we can't fire George Karl. At this point, if we fire Karl now, we might as well fire Divac, too, and make Fegan the GM.
If Divac accedes to Fegan's demands, what the hell is going to stop from threatening to do this **** again, the next time Cousins is unhappy? Fegan's integrity?
Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
i somewhat agree, but if Karl is going behind managements back and trying to trade the Kings star player, you fire his ass. In that case he got himself fired, not Dan Fegan
Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
To a large degree that depends on whether Karl created this whole mess in the first place. If he "started it", then there's a clear line to be drawn. the this is retaliation for an overempowered coach trying to take advantage of organizational chaos to play dictator. If on the other hand Cuz just wanted to get a random coach removed because he didn't like his play calling or something, then the slope is covered in WD-40.
Really in the end, we are still paying for the Malone disaster. Such a catastrophic decision, and may well have broken Cuz's determination to work with us, because we obviously weren't working with him. You fire my coach who was working for me, I don't feel any compunction of firing this butthead you replaced him with.
The Hammer
All-Star
This.
I think this is what alllll of this goes back to.
Also interesting to note, all this started happening after Malone was hired by Denver, so maybe Cousins figured, well no re-hire chance now, let's go nuclear. The gloves came off.
Whether Divac can repair that trust is what remains to be seen.
I agree with you for the most part, but I don't think firing karl is all that bad for us.
It will look aweful and the kings will be once again crowned as a joke franchise, but in retrospect it won't be anything meaningful after a while, this kind of decisions look much worse ex-ante than ex-post.
If firing Karl will cause all of this to stop than this will justified a few weeks from now.
I get what you are saying about giving up to Fegan, but this situation is like a poker game- we already invested a lot in the pot and it will be pretty depressing to just fold and take the hit, but if you have a nothing hand it's the smarter than keep on going when you are clearly going to lose even more- you better just fold and hope in a few hands it won't matter...
So if what he wanted is to re-hire Malone, and that can't happen- why go nuclear? if you are right the sole purpose of all this from the Cousins front is to hurt the franchise.
Fegan does what he thinks is his best for his client. He may not always consult his client on this. What he does may not reflect his client's feelings. The client trusts the agent to do something that ultimately benefits them even if it doesn't reflect their current wishes.
At a certain point, Fegan may be harming his client.
The Calipari rumor was directly denounced by everyone involved. Whatever the next play in this bit of PR fencing will tell how things go down. It will be either so risky it costs someone dearly or it will back off a bit.
The question is whether the client wants to end it and would they exercise that power.
To me, Vlade wants the two people really involved to talk and sort it out. That's Karl and Cousins. This circumnavigates Fegan and the press.
As for Woj, he doesn't care if he burns bridges in Sacramento. He's living off people's adherence to the gospel of Woj. That's new media. Narrative > Truth.
At a certain point, Fegan may be harming his client.
The Calipari rumor was directly denounced by everyone involved. Whatever the next play in this bit of PR fencing will tell how things go down. It will be either so risky it costs someone dearly or it will back off a bit.
The question is whether the client wants to end it and would they exercise that power.
To me, Vlade wants the two people really involved to talk and sort it out. That's Karl and Cousins. This circumnavigates Fegan and the press.
As for Woj, he doesn't care if he burns bridges in Sacramento. He's living off people's adherence to the gospel of Woj. That's new media. Narrative > Truth.
The Hammer
All-Star
To get him traded.
Gary
All-Star
Yah I agree.. If all this stuff centers around Karl then get him out of here and have Cousins give input on the type of coach he would like to interview.
I liked bringing Karl in but it appears this relationship is toxic and Karl needs to go.
It will probably make it stop this time. What happens if Cousins doesn't like the next coach, either? What if the Kings' big offseason acquisition is a guy that Cousins doesn't get along with?
Gary
All-Star
Then you look at moving Cousins. First though have him give input on who he believes he would get along with best after Vlade interviews different candidates.
If he can't get along with the new coach then you did your due diligence. It will start looking like a trend if Cousins cant get along with ANYONE...
SacKings384
Starter
Our dysfunction (and we can all admit that there was a lot of dysfunction) has made it easy for people to believe these rumors with the Kings. We kind of laid in a bed of poop, and now when we're trying to get out of it Fegan and WOJ are just dumping more in.
LPKingsFan
All-Star
Look outside this forum, and to some, that trend is already apparent. Fegan is not doing his client any favors here.
