man... kings fans. sometimes i wonder just how little of the rest of the nba some of you pay attention to...
demarcus cousins has shown nothing but loyalty to the sacramento kings franchise after four straight losing seasons with the team, during which time he's been thrown under the bus by coaches, dragged through the mud by the radio stooge in chief, lambasted by the fans, and shown not an ounce of support by the team's dimwitted owners. now there's a new regime in town, and ya wanna know what demarcus expects for the commitment he has displayed?
loyalty in return. it's that simple. he knows his talent. the kings know his talent. so they have exactly two options. the kings either a) offer him a max extension before the deadline, or b) whisper sweet nothings in his ear all season long and grovel at his feet come season's end and hope that it's enough to get him to happily sign on the dotted line, because you
cannot be late to the party when more attractive teams come calling...
personally, i'm down with funkykingston's theory that the new regime wants to give demarcus cousins a test drive this offseason before they extend him, sortofa good faith gesture on behalf of both parties. but brick is
absolutely right about the lakers, the heat, and other potential suitors for DMC. the lakers are a franchise that has been called home by wilt chamberlain, kareem abdul jabbar, shaquille o'neal, and andrew bynum. their roster is currently home to a one-foot-in-the-grave steve nash, an on-his-last-legs kobe bryant, and an over-the-hill pau gasol. they will have considerable cap space next offseason, and ya don't think they'll target demarcus cousins? please.
every team will have a contingency plan in place should they miss out on lebron or carmelo, and demarcus cousins will be the most attractive young piece on the market that you can legitimately build a team around, should the kings be foolish enough not to extend him ASAP...
then there's pat riley, a legend among legends who has a historic big man fetish. as happy as he is with his back-to-back championship miami heat, does anybody seriously think he doesn't squirm every time he's asked a question about his team's lack of an interior presence? does anybody seriously think he's satisfied with the birdman down low, and isn't actively considering life-after-chris-bosh? you wanna talk about two, three, four moves ahead of the field? that's pat riley, the guy who waited
years to put his james-wade-bosh plan into action. if PDA has a supposed reputation for thinking several moves ahead, then he had better be thinking about pat riley, and whether or not it's worth the risk to wait until next offseason to offer demarcus cousins a new contract...
but here's the worst part: the kings have set themselves up for another losing season. if they don't offer demarcus cousins a max extension while they can, it's not like he doesn't have the
perfect excuse to willingly listen to other offers from the kinds of major market franchises who will commit to
winning now. if he listens to the lakers' pitch, and if he listens to the heat's pitch, and if he listens to pitches from half a dozen other teams with better franchise track records in the win/loss column than the sacramento kings, and
then you decide to match, how happy do you think he's gonna be to come back
here after he's seen what's out
there?
i'm sorta flabbergasted right now. for four seasons, all i've heard from a massive contingent of kings fans is that demarcus cousins is too immature to lead, too much of a hothead to build a team around, too much of a liability to keep. and now it's all sunshine and rainbows because vivek ranadive has arrived, as if that would be enough to convince a volatile once-in-a-generation center to remain content and professional on a team that was late to it's own goddamn party...
the team's rookie owner, rookie gm, and rookie head coach would be fools to think that they know better than kings fans just how much of a headache demarcus cousins can be when he's unhappy. you either lock him up
now, or you
pray that demarcus doesn't try to force his way outta town in a season or two after you've matched offers from teams like the los angeles lakers or the miami heat, teams that will undeniably look attractive to demarcus considering that he didn't receive loyalty enough from sacramento by way of an extension. if you extend DMC and you're unable to build a winner around him, he and dan fegan might flex those trade demand muscles
anyway, so why wait? so you can rest on your laurels? so kings fans can prop up their inferiority complex?
for the record, i don't care if demarcus hasn't "earned it" yet. none of that **** matters to me. this is small market basketball. rather, it's
losing basketball in an undesirable small market in the contemporary nba, where small market teams regularly overpay just to cling to the
potential of all-star talent. if you wait around, if you sit on your hands, if you're too ***** to pull the trigger on the potential of talent, then you're just gonna watch every tyreke evans, demarcus cousins, and andrew wiggins who walks through the door head right back out of it. the kings will become a farm team for the bigger markets who aren't afraid to take chances. again, i'm gonna assume that funkykingston's on the right track, and that the new regime has every intention of extending demarcus cousins after they've spent more time working with him this offseason. but if they don't, then they've made things considerably more difficult for themselves...
i will continue to maintain that's it's a hope-and-a-prayer strategy when you don't lock up young talent with all-star potential as soon as you possibly can. you're just hoping that you can retain that talent at a later date, or you're praying that you can replace it via free agency (not exactly a boon for a small market franchise in sacramento) or the draft (when was the last time the kings scored the #1 pick?) or on the trade block (who's sending back all-star potential for scraps)? i don't like gambling on those kinds of factors. that's betting against the house. i prefer to bet based on the cards in my hand, based on
what i can see. and what i saw was an elite slasher with all-star potential who was allowed to walk out the door, and what i see is an elite center with the potential to dominate his position for a decade who has yet to be extended. you whiffed on the former. fine, it's time to move on. but you'd better lock up the latter, because there will be plenty of teams salivating at the chance to coax him away from you, or to, at the very least, muck up your locker room by giving him second thoughts about his loyalty to a franchise that didn't extend him when it should have...
