Game -1: Sacramento Kings vs. Los Angeles Lakers, 10/24/14, 7 PM PST 10 PM EST

[Sac.Kings]

None. Nor Hollins. And yet both guys have had blatantly more impact than Landry/Williams out there.

If JT starts, Landry should be his backup and Hollins should be Cousin's. Williams should not come off the bench unless something happens to the rest of the roster and we are forced to play him. Casspi is clearly the SF backup. Ben... should not start. Quite simple. It's time we start playing the players that make good things happen.

I know many of you are high on Malone, but if he sticks with Ben (with his current level of play) and continues to throw out those ridiculous "frontlines" with Williams as a PF or even C, then I no longer support him. This ridiculousness has to stop. The NBA is not a playground. You put those players in that are consistent and make good things happen. I am tired of underachieving. Poor coaching thus far, definitely have not been super impressed with Malone so far.

 

[Bricklayer]

Yes. Gordon, Mayo, and knight should be above Martin. Why Afflalo isn't on our team is beyond me look at what Denver got to get him pennies to the dollar.

And for heavens sake I hope we really didn't offer jordan Crawford a contract earlier of we did I love lost hope in PDA.

Gordon and Mayo are selfish, fat, and don't know how to play. We've got those fronts covered.

What this team needs is one or two more major pieces who know how to play, aren't trying to prove anything, and give you consistent production every night. Scared kids and selfish twits need not apply. You'd like to have winners. But since those are expensive and hard to acquire, simply steady producers would do.

 

[Bricklayer]

If JT starts, Landry should be his backup and Hollins should be Cousin's. Williams should not come off the bench unless something happens to the rest of the roster and we are forced to play him. Casspi is clearly the SF backup. Ben... should not start. Quite simple. It's time we start playing the players that make good things happen.

I know many of you are high on Malone, but if he sticks with Ben (with his current level of play) and continues to throw out those ridiculous "frontlines" with Williams as a PF or even C, then I no longer support him. This ridiculousness has to stop. The NBA is not a playground. You put those players in that are consistent and make good things happen. I am tired of underachieving. Poor coaching thus far, definitely have not been super impressed with Malone so far.

Actually,. Reggie is the only one of our PFs who deserve any minutes. Somebody else will have to get some, but its nothing that they have remotely earned except as some sort of distant career memory. Any rotation knocking out our best/only producer outside of Cousins doesn't work. Best attitude guy too.

 

[Sac.Kings]

Actually,. Reggie is the only one of our PFs who deserve any minutes. Somebody else will have to get some, but its nothing that they have remotely earned except as some sort of distant career memory. Any rotation knocking out our best/only producer outside of Cousins doesn't work. Best attitude guy too.

I don't like JT as a starter, but with Reggie it allows team to freely double on Cousins in the post - def not a good idea. If you are referring to him coming off the bench, then that's fine with me too. I really don't have a preference (I want the more consistent player to play). I just don't think it will play out like that since PDA, Malone, and Vivek all love Landry. I hope PDA can see what we see in that we don't have a legit PF next to Cousins. We are going to get creamed the beginning of the season, with those rough 20 first games or so. It's going to be a slaughter. I would be amazed if won even 5.

 

[Kingster]

Pre-season means nothing. We could have went undefeated and won by an average of 20 and it still would
Be meaningless. Tdos is finally over wake me up opening day.

Mike Malone doesn't agree with you. He said this game was the dress rehersal for the regular season. It was important to him that the Kings play well.

 

[Kingster]

Orlando, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Phoenix, Toronto, Washington, Minnesota and Milwaukee were all in about the same position as the Kings when PDA was hired and I'd say pretty much every one of them now has a roster with more reason for optimism than the Kings.

That's depressing.

To add to the depression, don't forget Utah. They have a lot to be excited about in Salt Lake. Unfortunately, I agree with you. Maybe we can get a cut rate for some anti-depressants. I can easily see a doomsday scenario with this team, but for now I'd rather be in denial and hope that Malone and Co. know a big secret that I don't.

 

[VF21]

The sad thing is the Lakers got the worse end of it. With Price's knee injury and Ellington looking concussed they nearly plum out of guards.

Okay, but what's the "sad" part of that?

 

[kingsboi]

Speaking of Utah, they sure have a nice foundation over there with a proper direction and fitting players. Lots of youth no doubt, but they have good drafting capability and having Trey Burke sure would of been nice to have here...sigh.

 

[Sac.Kings]

I cringe at the thought of Cousins getting injured. We don't have a prayer without him.

 

[VF21]

I cringe at the thought of Cousins getting injured. We don't have a prayer without him.

Whoa. I mean WHOA. You do not EVER use the "I" word in conjunction with the name of one of our players. It's like spitting into the wind or tugging on Superman's cape. Kings fans have become extraordinarily superstitious and with good reason. We've had players trip on moving boxes and break their hands, damage thumb joints playing Nintendo, wrench an ankle going up for a ball wedged between the rim and the backboard, fracture a leg doing drills around a folding chair, etc. To blatantly throw out the "I" word like that is just ... wrong.

 

[rainmaker]

I'm curious as to whether or not Malone is having his hand forced, not only by the roster PDA has given him but more importantly, by PDA and Vivek telling him to play Ben/Carl/DWill over others. Those were three of their four first real acquisitions and it does appear there's a strong sense of them not wanting to admit they were mistakes.

What I can't get over is the complete change in Malone's tone from last year to this. Malone was all about defense, almost all he ever talked about. However with PDA/Vivek constantly talking about the offensive end and position-less basketball, Malone has switched gears.

We really didn't do a damn thing to improve defensively. Moreland was going to be a reach to contribute this year, Hollins has always been decent at best and Collison/Sessions aren't plus-defenders. But adding Carl to the rotation and playing Evans at backup center actually makes us a worse defensive team than last year, on top of our SGs not being able to defend and JT now getting pushed around and becoming a non-factor.

I can't tell where Malone falls into this mess though. If he's the one choosing to play Carl, he's the one choosing to play Evans over Hollins, he's the one choosing to bump Omri with DWill, that's a problem too. Bigger issue of course is the roster he's been handed and this Jordan Crawford crap tells me the issue going directly to our GM's desk. We'd actually have a worse roster than we have now if that fool didn't completely miscalculate his value and end up in China.

 

[VF21]

I'm going to wait and see the starting roster on opening night before I start to consider panic mode. I just get the sense that guys like D-Will, Carl, etc. are seeing playing time because their heads are on the block. If they do not show an ability to play how we need them to play, I'm blindly hoping they will, in fact, soon be gone in some part of magical trade that brings us something good in return. And yes, I'm fully aware that sounds delusional.

 

[funkykingston]

When it comes to Landry I've always assumed that Malone pushed for him to be signed and is likely his biggest supporter in the organization. I could be wrong, but given their history together that's what makes sense to me.

 

[HereWeBoogie]

Further fright for you: one of the few guys who really bothered Cousins last year? Andrew Bogut.

eek

 

[Chubbs]

Mike Malone doesn't agree with you. He said this game was the dress rehersal for the regular season. It was important to him that the Kings play well.

And this just makes me question Malone more. Why would he say things like that? To make us all go into full panic mode when they fail? Cause that's what happened.

If our rotation includes Dwill over Casspi, we are dead. I hope Hollins/Casspi were sitting cause they are veterans and it was a meaningless game (despite the consistent nonsense Malone spews, which, honestly, I don't get why anyone listens to any of them anymore). Or minor injuries. Vets have no need to be on the court in games like that, despite what Malone or fans might think. You didn't see Kobe or Boozer out there. Cousins was only risking injury, and it's pretty damn clear we cannot survive without him.

One problem seems clear, the front office swung and missed hard on Dwill, Ben and Landry. This past offseason seemed much better, but if they insist on playing last year's flops and let them keep being awful, it's not going to matter.

The front office has changed out almost the entire team and it appears to be just as bad as ever. And it's not losing IT. We were terrible with him, in case anyone has forgotten. Are we worse than last season? I don't think so. But I see a lot of the same. Just different players playing the same bad basketball, although Cousins looks like he's much improved. How long he can keep up a decent attitude surrounded by guys that flat out can't play, I don't know.

I think I've officially turned on the entire front office. At least on the basketball side of things. Everything else is fine and dandy (off the court), but they seem to have no clue what they're doing other than learning lots of buzz words and spewing them out every chance they get. Corporate nonsense that means nothing. Position-less basketball? We don't have the talent to do that. We just don't. And if they thought they got the right guys for that, they seem to be tragically wrong. If we had lebron, then sure, Lebron can do whatever you want him do. We don't have Lebron. We have cousins. Could we build a system around him and not try to be something we can't be?

 

[funkykingston]

To add to the depression, don't forget Utah. They have a lot to be excited about in Salt Lake. Unfortunately, I agree with you. Maybe we can get a cut rate for some anti-depressants. I can easily see a doomsday scenario with this team, but for now I'd rather be in denial and hope that Malone and Co. know a big secret that I don't.

I excluded Utah because 2 seasons ago they had 15 more wins than the Kings and were knocking on the playoff door with a collection of talented young players already. But yeah, they are in better shape than the Kings going forward too.

When Vivek and PDA took over the team the roster was:
Isaiah Thomas
Tyreke Evans
John Salmons
Jason Thompson
DeMarcus Cousins
Marcus Thornton
Patrick Peterson
James Johnson
Chuck Hayes
Jimmer Fredette
Cole Aldrich
Travis Outlaw
Toney Douglas

Aldrich, Douglas and Johnson were unrestricted free agents, Evans was a restricted free agent and the team had the 7th and 36th picks in the draft.

After two years can you say that the roster is significantly more talented and/or plays better as a team? Do you have more hope for the future of the team today than two years ago?

If you haven't significantly improved and you haven't upped the potential of the team then exactly what have you done besides spin your wheels?

I want to see the Kings win and I hope they have a massive turnaround and PDA's moves look genius in hindsight. But right now I'm frustrated with what I see.

 

[Chubbs]

There's no good place to put this, but Zach Lowe says genuinely good things about Cousins here. It's always a bit backhanded, but, eh. He also says very appropriate things about the front office, like the team isn't as good as they think. Which I think we can all agree with. Disaster looms, cause they seem to think this is a win now team, and it still looks like it was thrown together yesterday. Which, it kinda was.

"Lowe: He has made strides every season. This should be a monster year for him — a chance for his first All-Star appearance. They’re making noise about a breakneck pace and position-less basketball, but let’s see how much of that carries over. The juicier story line is what happens when ownership realizes this team is not nearly as good as they think. A panic trade? A coach firing? A way-too-big commitment to Rudy Gay?

Lowe: Hey, Boogie keeps getting better. He’s a beast. That contract is a steal. He mostly tries on defense now. I know it’s hard to believe, but trying helps! He’s also the new king of the one-man fast break that could end in disaster for literally every one of the 10 guys on the floor."

He sang a very different tune about the contract a year ago. At least we've moved to the point where Cousins isn't a problem. It's just everyone else still can't play as a team.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-annual-nba-league-pass-rankings-part-1/

 

[206Fan]

There's no good place to put this, but Zach Lowe says genuinely good things about Cousins here. It's always a bit backhanded, but, eh. He also says very appropriate things about the front office, like the team isn't as good as they think. Which I think we can all agree with. Disaster looms, cause they seem to think this is a win now team, and it still looks like it was thrown together yesterday. Which, it kinda was.

"Lowe: He has made strides every season. This should be a monster year for him — a chance for his first All-Star appearance. They’re making noise about a breakneck pace and position-less basketball, but let’s see how much of that carries over. The juicier story line is what happens when ownership realizes this team is not nearly as good as they think. A panic trade? A coach firing? A way-too-big commitment to Rudy Gay?

How can we improve the Kings? Do we need to add a legit PF/C? Do we need to add more shooters? Do we need to make a big trade? How can the Kings really improve this season? What does everyone think?

 

[Albatros]

Whatever they do Lowe will be there to offer his sarcasm, along with the other national guys.

 

[kingsboi]

I excluded Utah because 2 seasons ago they had 15 more wins than the Kings and were knocking on the playoff door with a collection of talented young players already. But yeah, they are in better shape than the Kings going forward too.

When Vivek and PDA took over the team the roster was:
Isaiah Thomas
Tyreke Evans
John Salmons
Jason Thompson
DeMarcus Cousins
Marcus Thornton
Patrick Peterson
James Johnson
Chuck Hayes
Jimmer Fredette
Cole Aldrich
Travis Outlaw
Toney Douglas

Aldrich, Douglas and Johnson were unrestricted free agents, Evans was a restricted free agent and the team had the 7th and 36th picks in the draft.

After two years can you say that the roster is significantly more talented and/or plays better as a team? Do you have more hope for the future of the team today than two years ago?

If you haven't significantly improved and you haven't upped the potential of the team then exactly what have you done besides spin your wheels?

I want to see the Kings win and I hope they have a massive turnaround and PDA's moves look genius in hindsight. But right now I'm frustrated with what I see.

What bugs me the most out of the players you mentioned above are Tyreke, Vasquez, Patterson, James Johnson, IT and most likely Marcus are all contributing to their new teams and/or will be, while we accumulate dead weight players with no talent or any real strengths.

 

[Chubbs]

What bugs me the most out of the players you mentioned above are Tyreke, Vasquez, Patterson, James Johnson, IT and most likely Marcus are all contributing to their new teams and/or will be, while we accumulate dead weight players with no talent or any real strengths.

But but, position less basketball... NBA 3.0...

 

[kingsboi]

But but, position less basketball... NBA 3.0...

I guess that's what happens when you let a tech owner dictate moves....

 

[rainmaker]

The juicier story line is what happens when ownership realizes this team is not nearly as good as they think. A panic trade?

We're going to find out soon enough. Malone may or may not be a real issue but canning the coach would only attempt to mask the larger issue within our FO. We hired a coach who used to preach defense around the clock while hiring a GM who wants up and down, position-less basketball, hasn't given Malone any defensive players to work with and has ignored our frontcourt issues while wasting what few assets we had and drafting SG's back to back.

My biggest concern, and it's been there since soon after the new regime took over is that the FO and our coach have differing philosophies. They're not on the same page. There's ample evidence of that.

Vivek is considered a pretty smart guy but we're going to find out, if this turns south, if that intelligence carries over from the tech world to NBA basketball. Will he scapegoat Malone or will he recognize the issue is more in his FO? There's a high risk factor here as if we don't come out well and are out of the playoff race by mid-season, we're more likely to lose Rudy, Cuz's frustration will be through the roof, the arena won't be selling out as support for the team stagnates and it's going to be even tougher to use our cap space next summer. If come July, we've lost Reke/IT/Rudy and received practically nothing in return, that is going to be a huge problem and that ain't on Malone. I'd put it at better than 50/50 that that's where we're heading though.

Rudy's expiring is a valuable carrot to offer around the league, but we won't be trading him unless this season blows up in our faces. If we get to the point we're seriously considering trading Rudy it means we're uncompetitive, yet again.

 

[upinsmoke]

We're going to find out soon enough. Malone may or may not be a real issue but canning the coach would only attempt to mask the larger issue within our FO. We hired a coach who used to preach defense around the clock while hiring a GM who wants up and down, position-less basketball, hasn't given Malone any defensive players to work with and has ignored our frontcourt issues while wasting what few assets we had and drafting SG's back to back.

My biggest concern, and it's been there since soon after the new regime took over is that the FO and our coach have differing philosophies. They're not on the same page. There's ample evidence of that.

Vivek is considered a pretty smart guy but we're going to find out, if this turns south, if that intelligence carries over from the tech world to NBA basketball. Will he scapegoat Malone or will he recognize the issue is more in his FO? There's a high risk factor here as if we don't come out well and are out of the playoff race by mid-season, we're more likely to lose Rudy, Cuz's frustration will be through the roof, the arena won't be selling out as support for the team stagnates and it's going to be even tougher to use our cap space next summer. If come July, we've lost Reke/IT/Rudy and received practically nothing in return, that is going to be a huge problem and that ain't on Malone. I'd put it at better than 50/50 that that's where we're heading though.

Rudy's expiring is a valuable carrot to offer around the league, but we won't be trading him unless this season blows up in our faces. If we get to the point we're seriously considering trading Rudy it means we're uncompetitive, yet again.

Sports is often one of those things were the same principles that can make you successful in the business world don't always translate into the sports world.

 

[pshn80]

After reading all the posts above, I sighed, and question came to me. What good things could come from our group so players starting on opening night and going forward for the next couple of weeks? I'm not talking about trades, those will take care of themselves. Could Cuz play better? Gay? Collison? Could we see improved performance from our SG corp? Could a PF combo start becoming more useful? Could the team start to function better? We certainly explore the other side of the coin here. It seems the upside hasn't.

 

[Mr. S£im Citrus]

After reading all the posts above, I sighed, and question came to me. What good things could come from our group so players starting on opening night and going forward for the next couple of weeks? I'm not talking about trades, those will take care of themselves. Could Cuz play better? Gay? Collison? Could we see improved performance from our SG corp? Could a PF combo start becoming more useful? Could the team start to function better?

Well, sure. In theory, familiarity begets cohesion so, yeah. In practice...?

 

[Bricklayer]

After reading all the posts above, I sighed, and question came to me. What good things could come from our group so players starting on opening night and going forward for the next couple of weeks? I'm not talking about trades, those will take care of themselves. Could Cuz play better? Gay? Collison? Could we see improved performance from our SG corp? Could a PF combo start becoming more useful? Could the team start to function better? We certainly explore the other side of the coin here. It seems the upside hasn't.

Its going to be trial by fire. We might have the toughest November schedule in the whole league. Almost no games off to work on things or build momentum. Either the team gets forged by fire and learns how to fight and overcome the numerous holes, or its going to start to get bounced like a squirrel bouncing underneath a car that just ran over it. There won't be any time to gather and pull it together until we are well and battered and sitting on a 4-15 record or some such if we don't close ranks in a bleeping hurry to start the season. We get to go Hello Warriors, Blazers, Clippers, Denver in Denver, Denver in Sac, Phoenix, OKC, Dallas, Memphis, Spurs...we're basically starting the season in the WC playoffs.

 

[randymoss1881]

Gordon and Mayo are selfish, fat, and don't know how to play. We've got those fronts covered.

What this team needs is one or two more major pieces who know how to play, aren't trying to prove anything, and give you consistent production every night. Scared kids and selfish twits need not apply. You'd like to have winners. But since those are expensive and hard to acquire, simply steady producers would do.

I'll give you that on Mayo who I'd still take over Martin but why wouldn't you want Gordon. He's a proven scorer and plays defense and wait for it he could shoot. How is he selfish? He's only shot more than 14 shot per game once in his career and he averaged 4.4 apg that year. He would come cheap with them wanting Evans to play more something like JT/DWill/Ray than we can package Ben with someone for a big. I'd say a defensive big bug knowing PDA that won't happen.

 

[funkykingston]

After reading all the posts above, I sighed, and question came to me. What good things could come from our group so players starting on opening night and going forward for the next couple of weeks? I'm not talking about trades, those will take care of themselves. Could Cuz play better? Gay? Collison? Could we see improved performance from our SG corp? Could a PF combo start becoming more useful? Could the team start to function better? We certainly explore the other side of the coin here. It seems the upside hasn't.

If the question is how COULD this Kings team (as presently constructed) win games and be successful, then I think it would mean a few things all happening:

(1) Cousins has to take the next step in being an absolute force in the NBA while having better shot selection and thus better shooting percentages.
(2) The Kings all need to move the ball including (maybe especially) Gay, resulting in open looks and easy baskets without big turnover numbers
(3) Team defense needs to be significantly better than last year both among the starters and the bench
(4) Rudy needs to score efficiently as he did last season
(5) Collison, McLemore, Stauskas and even Casspi need to knock down open threes at a reasonably high rate
(6) The team needs to continue being near the top of the league in rebounds
(7) The bench needs to regularly outplay most other teams second units

If all of those things happened the Kings could legitimately push for one of the final playoff spots.

 

[Prince_XY]

It's going to be hard to win with the worst SG in the nba starting for us. Not sure how getting another kid is supposed to fix that. Just an avg SG would make a tremendous difference.

You want a quick and very cheap fix?

Let us experiment on Terrence Williams again.

He is a 2-way player who plays his role very well.

We already know what he can do and the only drawback is his off-court issues. But to hell with those negatives we are going for an experiment only anyways. Sign him for a few days and see what happens. He is a 2-way player who plays within his role.