Cousins Cryptic Tweet

[Siranthony]

LOL, I get, that tweets are worrisome, but Karl's interview is worth watching to the end. Karl said: "We communicate with Demarcus on day-to-day basis, and are going to build our relationship, until it's where it needs to be", "We're 28-29 team, with Darren we would've been 35 win team, so I certainly see a lot of improvement next season", "Would like a stopper, who would embrace that role", "Demarcus and Rudy, when they played together, looked really good", "Would like 1 pick, 1 FA and improvement from guys on the roster".
There might be a problem, but Karl isn't it.

Thanks for saving me the trouble of typing this. Thumbs up!

 

[Kingsgurl]

Why would you paint anyone in a negative light who walks around the court scowling and arguing with the refs constantly? I love Cousins play. But short of a couple of weeks at the beginning of this season he has appeared to be difficult all the time. Gee, you mean after the FO pulled the rug out from under all of us? His expression pales in comparison to mine and most of the fans who sit around me as we watched a promising start dissolve into a circus of WTF? I hope he stays and becomes the best Center in the league.He already is But if he goes I couldn't say I didn't understand why. They just need to get a good deal for him.and what, pray tell, would be adequate compensation for a talent such as that? 'a good deal' is rather amorphous And Grant needs to STFU! AGREED

 

[PBNJ85]

I moved to Sac in 85 BECAUSE of the Kings. I moved to OKC in 2008 and while still supporting the Kings became a Thunder fan as well. Now back in Ca. If they trade BIG CUZ I AM OUT!

 

[PBNJ85]

[quoteis like"VF21, post: 1169779, member: 40"]I'm actually not disagreeing with you, as much as I'm doubting the import of anything Napear has to say at this point. It wouldn't be the first time he's tossed poopoo out just to get the fan base riled up.[/quote]

Grant Is like a red headed monkey with a machine gun. Loud, useless and needs to be taken out.

 

[PBNJ85]

If Boogie is traded, I am out. I'm tired of this incompetence.

If they want to copy GSW so much better be prepared to see a mass exodus of K fans turn to Steph and Co. If they trade Cuz.

 

[The Hammer]

So now we have to try and interpret body parts in tweets?

Not that hard.

 

[The Hammer]

But that isn't what he wants; someone on this forum said it perfectly, that he wants glory above all things.

That would have been me. And thank you!

 

[The Hammer]

So when Melo takes max to go back to NYK it's cause he doesn't care about winning but when Cousins does it, it's cause he wants glory over money. I'm not saying your not right but I don't think you can say 100% that that's true. At this point in Cousins life (I think he's 24) I assume he wanted the max money and we gave him a guarantee a year earlier than we had to as a sign of faith.

He was going to get and will get max money for a while. That was easy for him. Cousins isn't satisfied with easy. His personality needs the challenge of resurrecting a franchise.

And yes, the same action (taking max money) is absolutely coming from different motivations based on the individual. We're all different, and different things drive us. My read on Cousins was based on my subjective observations, it was my opinion, but I do believe it was an accurate read on what drives him.

Here's my original post on the matter:

I largely agree with bolded, for sure. He wants the challenge. He just needs to see some competence to give him a sense that people are respecting his loyalty. He's been extremely forgiving thus far. At a certain point, to maintain his dignity, he'll have to leave.

It's ALL about principles with this man. I've always maintained that he is a highly principled person, meaning money doesn't drive him, fame doesn't drive him, if you look closely, a set of core principles drives him. This is one reason I have such admiration for him. And anyone motivated by principles understands there are sacrifices that inevitable need to be made to stay true to those principles. When being in Sacramento and continuing to be loyal to the Kings violates his core principles, he'll be gone, and there will be virtually nothing anyone will be able to do to stop it. It'll never be about money, nor fame alone. But glory. True glory. The kind only people of high integrity deserve. That is what he wants, and I believe what he will end up deserving, and getting. I believe he will then give that glory to God. Sorry to get religious on you all, but I very much think this is the core driving principle in DMC's life.

 

[Sac.1989]

here's the Karl interview! found the video.

skip to 6:03 for the concerning comments i was talking about.

it goes from 6 mins to about 6:40

http://www.news10.net/videos/sports/2015/04/13/25746319/

thanks for posting - was Karl honestly championing Williams to start for us next season when discussing wins and losses ?

 

[IfAt1st]

Actually, watching the video and reading Karl's expressions, manner of speaking and the flow of the conversation:
* He was not concerned with not talking to Demarcus. He mentioned it light-heartedly, not like it was an issue at all.
* If anyone was in danger from his mention of "noone's untradeable", it would be Darren - that part of the discussion happened immediately after him saying the Kings likely would have been a 34 to 35 win team with Darren, and then he alluded to the Kings being even better and making advancement next season (insinuating with Darren).

He was going to get and will get max money for a while. That was easy for him. Cousins isn't satisfied with easy. His personality needs the challenge of resurrecting a franchise.

And yes, the same action (taking max money) is absolutely coming from different motivations based on the individual. We're all different, and different things drive us. My read on Cousins was based on my subjective observations, it was my opinion, but I do believe it was an accurate read on what drives him.

Here's my original post on the matter:

And this was my post you were replying to , which (re-)introduced the concept of Cousins' "loyalty" to Sac being tied to his desire to turn such a perennial loser into a winning franchise:

DMC's "loyalty" is also tapping into his bullheadedness and ego.
DMC wants to transform sad-sack Sacramento into a winning franchise. He wants it in a bad way.
It would validate so much of his personality and struggles. He doesn't like going the easy way and signing with a winner just to make it a bit more of a winner. He views those guys as cowards/pussies/punks for taking the easy way out. He feels it takes guts, fortitude, stamina, and strength to change around a horrible franchise like Sacramento.

Seriously, Sacramento being so hopeless the past 10 years is the thing keeping him here and "loyal" more than the fans, IMO.
But this deep-seated desire to turn this franchise around is reaching a frustration point as never before, because the team already worked to get where he wants to be and the front office deliberately blew it up, nullifying his efforts and setting the team back (who knows how far).

I can't think of something more stupid for the FO to do - hammering at the base motivation for Demarcus to stay here is the surest way for him to leave to a pasture that doesn't set fire to the fields.

 

[Gilles]

Actually, I didn't get that Karl will push for Darren to be traded - it was more in the sense "simply by getting Darren back Kings would be 6-7 wins better". Plus later in the interview he talks about needing more passing overall, and "more ballhandling, not nessessarily at PG spot". Lawson to Kings was either guess made by media right from the start, or it was initial suggestion, that he now doesn't stand firmly behind. Maybe George talks with Rudy and Boogie too much.

 

[Mr. S£im Citrus]

KHTK. We get it in the Bay Area.

Yes, I am aware that you get KHTK. My question was whether you listened to Napear's show? And the reason I asked was because I've found some of your comments in this thread to be incongruous:

I think Grant stirring **** up and laying blame for not playing at the feet of Cuz, if true, is much more of a red flag than that Karl interview.

idk but i can already tell they are trying to turn the tide and get fans against Boogie so that doesn't happen. Like Napier's show today insinuating that Boogie is the one who doesn't want to play tonight and the fans should take that as an insult.........

What? Grant said that?

I've said before what Grant says can be quite dangerous as he does have insight and is a mouthpiece.

To a certain extent, this organization doesn't deserve Cuz. Time and time again they've shown great examples of how not to treat your franchise player. Given Grant is handed talking points, this to me comes across as yet another leak painting Cuz in a negative light. Why is the question.

In Post #60, you made a comment that made it sound like you've heard these claims straight from the horse's mouth, but then, in Post #72, you made a comment which indicated that you hadn't. Between that, and your vague comment about Napear's "rhetoric" picking up "from what you've heard" in Post #92, it's hard for me to parse out the difference between what you've heard him say, and what you've read other people claim he's said. Especially when some of the stronger accusations are inconsistent with what I've actually heard him say.


And now, I hate every last one of you, for making me defend Grant ****ing Napear.

 

[Larry David]

I thought DMC would keep up a good face and the Kings could hold themselves together for another 12-18 months, and we would trade DMC at the 2017 trade deadline. This is already starting to melt down.

Karl: (1) has enough sway to save PDA, despite the fact that two our goals for this season are to upgrade shooting guard where we just spent back to back lottery picks and try to off load Landry's horrible contract, which are all PDA moves*; and (2) SHOCKINGLY is starting to grate / clash with both DMC and DMC's agents (man, who could have seen that coming?). Dave just confirmed as much at the end of his Sam Amick interview on the radio.

How are either of those things possible? Karl was a great coach a long time ago. He could still be a very good coach. He's always had a massive ego, prickly personality, and loose tongue with the media. This was true at every stop he's ever made. It makes no sense that a guy that's not a top 5 coach, has never been a GM, and would not be a GM candidate in 29 other cites is allowed to either pee off a top 10 player in the league and set up our front office where it's a collective of folks not qualified to hold the top job!!! DMC is more important that Karl. If there is friction, the owner needs to quash it now, side with DMC, and tell Karl "You coach the team however you want, and we want your input on the roster. But, you cannot push our star player out of this town. I will not allow that to happen what so ever. Are we clear?"

The problem is that Karl is smart. He knows that Vivek has utterly painted himself into a corner with coaches and cannot fire Karl for almost any reason for at least 2 years. Karl is also seeing the vacuum of leadership above and seizing control of personnel decisions both to help himself now and probably look to create a high power / paid job after coaching. He's in Vivek's ear, working the local media, and tied himself to Vlade.

And now we're going to see if our 63 year old good coach and 23 year old franchise player can "figure out" this summer? One of these things is not like the other. Karl needs to figure it out or else (which starts with taking away his voice in the front office, tighten leash, ect until he comes into line).

* I know the counter argument, "How do you know it's PDA. Maybe it was Vivek?" This was a classic during the late Maloofs era. The counter argument to the Maloofs or Petrie being horrible at their jobs was "maybe they are OK and the other person is the problem?" Since that plays with the last of the die hards, Vivek was probably smart to put 3-5 heads in the front office for blame wack-a-mole

 

[Hadlowe]

DMC is more important that Karl. If there is friction, the owner needs to quash it now, side with DMC, and tell Karl "You coach the team however you want, and we want your input on the roster. But, you cannot push our star player out of this town. I will not allow that to happen what so ever. Are we clear?"

Would you trade Cousins for a roster that could win a title?

 

[Larry David]

Would you trade Cousins for a roster that could win a title?

No offense, that's such a BS question. The fact that folks are even asking it shows where this is heading fast.

Other than DMC, this roster is garbage. Without DMC, we are missing 5-7 of the top 7 players for a title team (including the all important two best players) Rudy is a good stats bad team guy. I'm not sure he could even be the 3rd best player on a title team. And it doesn't matter because he's opting out in 13 months, and I can't see any situation where he resigns unless we pay him 150% of his market value. Collison is a borderline starter on a contender. Maybe Nik or Ben could develop into a serviceable starter at one point, but right now neither is ready to be a starter on a playoff team let alone a championship team.

Nobody is swinging a trade where we move DMC and use our pick this year to magically make the Kings a title contender. And our clown college front office certainly isn't doing it.

Generally, you need a franchise player to win a title. We actually have one of those. If he's unhappy with a good coach, I don't think the answer is to move the franchise player you still control for a SOLID TWO YEARS to hit the rest button yet again on the hope that we'll break up a $100 bill and net $250 in change within a season or two.

It's totally insane and will never happen, but if it comes down to Karl and DMC it would truly make more sense to fire Karl and hire another coach. That's insane. It's a much better plan than moving DMC two years before his walk year.

 

[Larry David]

The draft is a crapshoot, look at Nik, Ben, Jimmer, T Rob as examples.

If we aren't actively pissing off or shopping DMC, I'm good with the trade. But the draft is a crapshoot here, because we have incompetent front office people. In the other cities that have started and completed their rebuilds while we remain stuck, many teams took reasonable bets on picks 5-8, did very well, and became good.

There are no guarantees with picks 5-8, but if you have qualified people, take the proper amount of risk, and make smart choices the draft isn't a longshot bet. It's not a bad bet to at least get a quality starter and perhaps much much more. In this market, it our best hope of creating a playoff team. But history shows that if you don't have the right people, take too much risk, or don't make the smart bet, it does become a long shot crapshoot. If you remove the perpetually horrible teams moves from the lottery, the batting average for the other teams really isn't that bad.

But I can't support cashing out the value of our 2015 pick for "help now" if we think that we are staring over again without Cousins within 18 months. But I get why a 63 year old coach and PDA would push for that move.

 

[rhythmless]

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/1...-shut-demarcus-cousins-rudy-gay-final-3-games

Could it be that?

 

[Hadlowe]

No offense, that's such a BS question. The fact that folks are even asking it shows where this is heading fast.

It isn't a BS question. It is a way to frame the issue that shows that intelligent people might disagree. To paraphrase Churchill, we are just haggling over price.

If you can get better with a trade, then it is a good trade. Cousins is my favorite player in the league, and I would still happily trade him for a winning Kings team. Do I think that outcome is likely? No. It is rare to trade away superstars and come out ahead afterward. But, I also don't know what offers might be out there. If one of them is the starting five for the '96 Bulls, I would certainly consider it.

I also haven't seen anything that convinces me that Cousins is being shopped. Until I see credible sources saying that the Kings are fielding offers for Cousins, I don't think it's worth the time to worry about it.

 

[Spike]

It isn't a BS question. It is a way to frame the issue that shows that intelligent people might disagree. To paraphrase Churchill, we are just haggling over price.

If you can get better with a trade, then it is a good trade. Cousins is my favorite player in the league, and I would still happily trade him for a winning Kings team. Do I think that outcome is likely? No. It is rare to trade away superstars and come out ahead afterward. But, I also don't know what offers might be out there. If one of them is the starting five for the '96 Bulls, I would certainly consider it.

I also haven't seen anything that convinces me that Cousins is being shopped. Until I see credible sources saying that the Kings are fielding offers for Cousins, I don't think it's worth the time to worry about it.

They're a little old now, but I think that might get us to .500.

 

[Big Cuz 15]

Karl's ego is enormous.

He just wants to be sure we all know it's all about him, and not any particular player. Just as it was all about him as he stabbed a brother in the nba coaching ranks in the back in Corbin as he publicly campaigned for a job that was NOT available. Supposedly.

Remember this is a guy who got coach of the year and got promptly fired. There's a reason for that.

Expect more where this came from. Especially now that apparently Karl talked Vivek into keeping PDA, which can't be something Vlade wanted. Karl doesn't have long, 2 years and then a possible strike. There are no lines he won't cross to get immediate success. We knew that going in.

The circus continues. It's here to stay folks. A bad owner can ruin anything. Don't underestimate that fact.

don't forget, he had is accomplice in the stabbing in vivek. while vivek may try to paint he's the innocent owner here... he's done some really dumb s*** as a newb majority owner.

 

[Big Cuz 15]

That is a fair deal, we HAVE to win next year. Karl is not a long term coach, Gay and Cousins are 2 years away from being able to walk, ditto Collison, new arena. The draft is a crapshoot, look at Nik, Ben, Jimmer, T Rob as examples. If we can pry Lawson and Chandler from them for a first round pick plus a combination of Landry, Ben, Nik, Collison, Ray Mac. It's a fair trade in terms of what each club is trying to do.

swap nik for elfrid. would the future look brighter? the FO, i mean vivek did make the decision to draft nik so he wouldn't look stupid when mully beat the team in 3 point contests. i don't trust the idiotic FO & ownership to right this ship.

the only way s*** will right itself is if vivek removes himself from basketball decisions and remove that idiot gerbil & bring in a real GM like petrie to evaluate talent that will FIT the team.

 

[rhythmless]

It isn't a BS question. It is a way to frame the issue that shows that intelligent people might disagree. To paraphrase Churchill, we are just haggling over price.

If you can get better with a trade, then it is a good trade. Cousins is my favorite player in the league, and I would still happily trade him for a winning Kings team. Do I think that outcome is likely? No. It is rare to trade away superstars and come out ahead afterward. But, I also don't know what offers might be out there. If one of them is the starting five for the '96 Bulls, I would certainly consider it.

I also haven't seen anything that convinces me that Cousins is being shopped. Until I see credible sources saying that the Kings are fielding offers for Cousins, I don't think it's worth the time to worry about it.

I would think about these trades if it started with:
Durant
Westbrook
LBJ
Brow
Curry

But these guys are untouchable, like DMC should be.

 

[rainmaker]

Yes, I am aware that you get KHTK. My question was whether you listened to Napear's show? And the reason I asked was because I've found some of your comments in this thread to be incongruous:

I didn't hear what Grant said yesterday, hence I said "if true".

But Grant's general tone towards Cuz I've picked up on and the increased negativity towards him? Comes from listening to KHTK in rush hour traffic.

 

[Hadlowe]

They're a little old now, but I think that might get us to .500.

Heh, I should have said that time travel was part of the trade.

 

[Dime Dropper]

It isn't a BS question. It is a way to frame the issue that shows that intelligent people might disagree. To paraphrase Churchill, we are just haggling over price.

If you can get better with a trade, then it is a good trade. Cousins is my favorite player in the league, and I would still happily trade him for a winning Kings team. Do I think that outcome is likely? No. It is rare to trade away superstars and come out ahead afterward. But, I also don't know what offers might be out there. If one of them is the starting five for the '96 Bulls, I would certainly consider it.

I also haven't seen anything that convinces me that Cousins is being shopped. Until I see credible sources saying that the Kings are fielding offers for Cousins, I don't think it's worth the time to worry about it.

Nope, it's a way to transport the discussion into cuckoo land and pretend that complete fantasy could possibly be reality. Well, technically we could trade Cuz and win a championship the next year. Technically, yeah. But technically I could wake up next to Beyonce in the morning. That doesn't mean there's a smidgeons chance of it actually happening though. Let's not demote ourselves to delusion by pretending that this is even potentially a good idea in any scenario.

 

[Larry David]

I would suggest breaking our reaction Dave's story into it's own thread.

MOD NOTE: Done.

 

[Hadlowe]

Nope, it's a way to transport the discussion into cuckoo land and pretend that complete fantasy could possibly be reality. Well, technically we could trade Cuz and win a championship the next year. Technically, yeah. But technically I could wake up next to Beyonce in the morning. That doesn't mean there's a smidgeons chance of it actually happening though. Let's not demote ourselves to delusion by pretending that this is even potentially a good idea in any scenario.

I agree that it is unlikely to be a good idea to trade Cousins, but I can't categorically discount it.

I also don't think that this is likely to be under consideration. Why do we think Cousins and Karl aren't getting along? Cousins JUST got beast mode back-to-back triple doubles playing under Karl. He has been playing out of his mind under Karl recently.

So why are we threatening to boycott the team? A random tweet with no background context? Some unsubstantiated supposition from sports writers? It's not even a molehill that's being made into a mountain. It's a shadow of something that you have to squint at to resemble a molehill.

I'm not worried about Cousins being back next year. I am worried that all the rest of the Kings will be too.

 

[Chubbs]

So much for Vlade being in charge.

Two things seem to have happened that couldn't have been his idea. Keeping PDA, and burning yet another bridge with Boogie by Karl's declaration that no one is untradeable.

The best chance to win in the near short term is with an engaged happy Boogie.

I just don't believe Vlade is dumb enough to rile up Boogie.

Karl on the other hand just marked his territory. And Boogie didn't like it.

Game on.

 

[rainmaker]

for everybody, and karl surely appreciates the existing relationship he has with d'alessandro. that familiarity represents an alliance formed well before either arrived in sacramento, and, in my opinion, could very well represent yet another factional split in what appears to be a pattern of dysfunction within the halls of kings' management...

What's crazy is Vivek just made a similar mistake and it blew up in his face, hiring his coach before the GM and putting together a FO which worked in opposition to Malone.

And here we are again, hiring Karl, likely another GM coming on board while PDA apparently is retained/demoted but we have Karl and PDA forming an alliance based on the history between the two, then we have Vivek bringing in Vlade who I'd guess is part of the opposing faction and we still are waiting to see who the next guy will be who's brought in as our GM or working alongside Vlade.

There's been a few reports suggesting a few in the FO were against bringing in Vlade and it makes complete sense PDA is at the top of that list. So we've got our new coach forming his faction while the FO has yet to be filled out. What we're seeing right now is the foundation being laid for Vlade/YTBD hire going up against Karl/PDA and this sudden 180 on keeping/firing PDA suggests they're already not on the same page. This hardly appears like we're creating the best situation for Vlade to succeed.

The public message between the two is already quite different, with Vlade making clear how important Cuz is and that we need to get him help, have to build around him, while Karl is talking about essentially no one being untouchable, in reference to the best players he's ever coached, an implication it's Cuz who's not untouchable. Karl's smart, he knows there's a difference between the generic "we'll always look at offers to improve the team" and what he said yesterday.

Unbelievable. Then we've got Grant going on KHTK and telling the fan base Cuz can play and is choosing not to play while Karl is saying he hasn't talked to Cuz since he's been ruled out? It's constant dysfunction. ****ing amateur hour.

 

[kingsboi]

I'd like to know something....are your odds of winning a championship better with a star big man or a star guard/forward?