Jdbraver137
Bench
I’m worried this team is going to turn into a pound the ball and shoot a middy or layup, while other teams move the ball and hit 3s. To me bringing in Kuminga for Malik would be even worse. Thoughts, am I just a pessimist?
Game watchability
- Thread starter Jdbraver137
- Start date
I realized that analytics weenies have won the war in convincing people that spamming three-pointers was "smart" basketball, but I must have been elsewhere when that became synonymous with "watchable."
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
Yeah, and every trend gets old at some point. People definitely want this game of checkers to shift back to more chess.
whitechocolate
Bench
I like watching Kuminga.
Iso ball isn't so bad to watch when the shots go in and the team actually gets stops in between offensive sets. In fact, as I recall from the ancient past, it's pretty fun watching a team you root for dominate the league however they manage to do it. I'm sure you can get used to any play style if the team is winning.
Maybe for Steve Kerr it's annoying when someone like Kuminga doesn't want to use their driving ability to kick the ball out for Steph Curry threes every time #30 is open, but we don't have Steph Curry. In 5 playoff games against Minnesota without Steph a few months back Kuminga averaged 20.8 pts, 3 rebs, 1.2 asts, 0.6 stls, and 0.6 blks in 27 minutes per game with .543 / .421 / .741 shooting splits. This is inconvenient for Golden State because they can't afford to pay Kuminga like a star and now he's gotten a taste of what he could be averaging on a different squad. For a team like ours, that kind of production might make us a team worth watching again.
sono
Starter
The team will be more balanced. We haven't had a solid wing defender alongside Keegan for centuries, he's the only one out there!
I still carry scars from watching the Kings' butts kicked repeatedly by the Pelicans and Rockets. Poor lads were petrified, with deer eyes in headlights. I'm not saying Kuminga is a lockdown defender, but he's a solid wing defender and decent scorer. That's all we need.
When defense takes over, offense comes in naturally, and we have plenty of players to flourish in offense, making the game watchable.
Keegan goes to his natural position, and he can focus more on his offense. With the experience he had gained, this could be his breakout year.
I still carry scars from watching the Kings' butts kicked repeatedly by the Pelicans and Rockets. Poor lads were petrified, with deer eyes in headlights. I'm not saying Kuminga is a lockdown defender, but he's a solid wing defender and decent scorer. That's all we need.
When defense takes over, offense comes in naturally, and we have plenty of players to flourish in offense, making the game watchable.
Keegan goes to his natural position, and he can focus more on his offense. With the experience he had gained, this could be his breakout year.
MizzouKing
Starter
I would love to see Doug and Scott surprise us by featuring Keagan and getting Max/Nique in early for some fastball. Win or lose, investing in our future would make every game a lot more watchable than predicted.
when your team loses basketball games, it can be hard to watch but still watchable only because we are fanatical. This season, minus more roster changes, has a chance to implode early. Young players who play defense not getting minutes, vets who are playing for their next destination team, an inexperienced head coach who knows what it takes but may cater to vet egos, an owner who just can’t get out of his own way. What’s not to like?
iowamcnabb
Hall of Famer
I’d argue the game is already chess and some people want it to go back to checkers.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
In some ways perhaps but there is one viable strategy on both ends, pick and roll and switch on defense. The game is already fairly straight forward to begin and it was somewhat always those two things but back in the day you had to strategize for stars and teams. Players like Shaq meant you needed some type of utility bigs if for nothing more than strategic fouls. You had hand checking which made physical contact off and on the ball more important. Defense only role players had a spot in the league and in the rotation especially with defense first teams like the Pistons throughout the years. Post bigs, spot shooters, PG's, C's. Now every star basically plays like an on ball scoring guard. It's gotten better recently but the game built around that Euro style of ball where players like Steve Nash got pushed to the front of the pack is old. It was cool for awhile but with that Jordan special coming out a few years back I think people started to long for physical alpha ball again. Star vs. star, physicality, different styles and systems. The Triangle got forced out not because players can't play the freaking thing, it's because the rules don't make it necessary to run anything complicated anymore.
Kingster
Hall of Famer
I think it's going to be tough to watch for me.
The personnel is softer overall because of the loss of LaRavia, Val, and Lyles and it wasn't all that tough to begin with. Then there's the addition of LaVine, another softie. Overall, I don't see a lot of charges taken or floor burns from going after loose balls from this bunch, despite Christie imploring them to do otherwise. I don't like soft teams and this one looks embarrassingly so.
Then there is the clunkiness of the team with mismatched parts and no common theme for any sort of identity. DDR and LaVine like their iso possessions while Sabonis is great for passing to players moving without the ball. It's like they have their own separate games on the floor. Christie himself likes the motion offense but some of his key players like to dribble, dribble, dribble. I don't like iso ball. Nor do I like schizo-ball.
Raynaud, Clifford and Murray are watchable because we still don't know what they can become. It's always interesting watching the growth of younger players. But the two rookies could get minimal or even no playing time with the big club because of the veterans on the roster and Murray could be standing in the corner a lot looking at dribble, dribble, dribble. I don't like sabotaging the growth of younger players for a short-term box office fix with older vets.
Last but not least, the announcing crew. There's laugh-track Drapes, the babbling Katy, and Fish Grease. At least when Fish Grease calls the games Katy seems to dial back her non-stop babbling. I assume Fish Grease has given her instructions on when to talk. However, Drapes seems to have given Katy no such instructions. The more she talks, the better, I guess, and Drapes can intersperse it with HAHAHAHA when DDR takes a 3 point shot or LaVine takes a charge or some other uncommon event. It is probably going to be tough to watch this team, but it is going to be even more painful to listen.
The personnel is softer overall because of the loss of LaRavia, Val, and Lyles and it wasn't all that tough to begin with. Then there's the addition of LaVine, another softie. Overall, I don't see a lot of charges taken or floor burns from going after loose balls from this bunch, despite Christie imploring them to do otherwise. I don't like soft teams and this one looks embarrassingly so.
Then there is the clunkiness of the team with mismatched parts and no common theme for any sort of identity. DDR and LaVine like their iso possessions while Sabonis is great for passing to players moving without the ball. It's like they have their own separate games on the floor. Christie himself likes the motion offense but some of his key players like to dribble, dribble, dribble. I don't like iso ball. Nor do I like schizo-ball.
Raynaud, Clifford and Murray are watchable because we still don't know what they can become. It's always interesting watching the growth of younger players. But the two rookies could get minimal or even no playing time with the big club because of the veterans on the roster and Murray could be standing in the corner a lot looking at dribble, dribble, dribble. I don't like sabotaging the growth of younger players for a short-term box office fix with older vets.
Last but not least, the announcing crew. There's laugh-track Drapes, the babbling Katy, and Fish Grease. At least when Fish Grease calls the games Katy seems to dial back her non-stop babbling. I assume Fish Grease has given her instructions on when to talk. However, Drapes seems to have given Katy no such instructions. The more she talks, the better, I guess, and Drapes can intersperse it with HAHAHAHA when DDR takes a 3 point shot or LaVine takes a charge or some other uncommon event. It is probably going to be tough to watch this team, but it is going to be even more painful to listen.
Last edited:
Insomniacal Fan
Starter
It depends on what people get from watching games.
While the team is healthy, I don't expect that the Kings will get blown out regularly, as there is a reasonable amount of talent on the team. The Kings expected starting 5 is a respectable NBA starting 5. And there's depth (perhaps excessive depth) at guard and small wing.
The stakes the team is playing for, (a play-in spot) aren't particularly exciting.
While the team is healthy, I don't expect that the Kings will get blown out regularly, as there is a reasonable amount of talent on the team. The Kings expected starting 5 is a respectable NBA starting 5. And there's depth (perhaps excessive depth) at guard and small wing.
The stakes the team is playing for, (a play-in spot) aren't particularly exciting.
If every team running some slight variation of the same offense is chess, then it's "Chess for Beginners". But I don't think the analogy holds up. This is not a smarter brand of basketball, it's basketball with everything fun about the sport stripped out of it and replaced with group think. We used to have 5 different positions all of which had different roles, D'Antoni's 7 seconds or less offense coexisting with a Detroit Pistons squad that held opponents to under 90 ppg for a whole season, an All-Star game that still resembled basketball instead of a glorified game of horse.
Most NBA front offices have handed over decision-making power to an incredibly dubious set of metrics most of which assume their own conclusion and as a result one of the most entertaining sports of the previous few decades -- the league that Michael Jordan built -- has now become possibly the most boring sport to watch. Instead of showcasing these incredible athletes with abilities that most of us could only dream about by forcing them to use their ball handling skills and above the rim creativity to beat equally skilled defenders, the current NBA has pivoted so drastically in the direction of rules lawyering that it has become like watching a bunch of middle aged dudes in a local gym shooting jumpers and whining that every whiff of contact should put them on the free throw line. It's embarrassing. And it all started when Golden State was allowed to use illegal screens to get their shooters open. That completely broke the game.
Last edited:
TaxMan
Starter
Co-signed. It’s like you read my mind with this post.
iowamcnabb
Hall of Famer
there are certainly issues with today’s game but I don’t yearn for yesteryear. I spent some time last summer watching full basketball games from the 90s and early 2000s to refresh my memory and I didn’t find them any more enjoyable to watch. A 7 for 27 performance from AI wasn’t any more interesting than a bunch of jacked threes. The 15 turnaround mid range shots Kobe took didn’t do anything for me either. Nor the plodding center with no skill clogging the lane. I like fast pace. I like.ball movement. I like multi faceted skill at nearly every position. Fix the foul baiting and allow (and play) the defense we saw at the tail end of the 23/24 season and I’m a happy camper.
I feel like the notion of a lack of skilled big men "back in the day" is either ahistorical, or wildly distorted/informed by the fact that you rooted for a team that for most of its existence didn't have one. Because, as someone who has taken on the cause of showing love to the big men every night, the ratio of skilled-to-unskilled big men isn't any better in 2025 than it was in 1995, it's just that you didn't have League Pass, and nobody was putting Jon Koncack and Kevin Willis on TV four times a week. But you're not going to watch Nic Claxton scrap it out with Isaiah Stewart on a random Tuesday, and then look me in the eye tell me that there are more skilled big men now than before, you just have the option of not watching the crappy ones.
Last edited:
I was annoyed watching those types of performances too (Shaq drop-step dunking his way to 30 points per game wasn't particularly exciting to watch either) -- but in the midst of the bad there were also some really interesting strategic matchups in a league which allowed for such differing ideologies to play in the same sandbox. Whether NBA basketball is better or worse now is a matter of opinion but I really react negatively to the implication that it has become "smarter". Steve Kerr didn't revolutionize offense when he took over for Mark Jackson in Golden State, he exploited a rules loophole so effectively that the loophole has now become the rule. Everyone wants to point to the Splash Brothers as the root cause but the league had elite shooters before, they just had a harder time getting open before the rules changes forced defenders to essentially play with their hands tied behind their back.
The Kings teams that Rick Adelman coached from 1999 to 2006 had fast pace, ball movement, and multi-faceted skill at nearly every position. They also did all of that in an era where defense still existed and that's what made it so exciting to watch. They still give out a Defensive Player of the Year award but it's been awhile since I felt like anyone actually earned it. I agree with the overall sentiment you're expressing here but I also think you're over-estimating the overall skill of current NBA players relative to past eras and I hypothesize that if the NBA ever goes back to calling illegal screens and allowing physicality on defense, that this would become apparent rather quickly.
Last edited:
Insomniacal Fan
Starter
Tweaking the observation a bit; in the old days, when it was common to play two bigs at once, was it not almost universal for teams to have at least one big man in the starting lineup that wasn't really very skilled?
iowamcnabb
Hall of Famer
You don’t believe there are more bigs in the league now that can dribble pass shoot than there were 25 years ago?
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
Yeah, there has to be a balance. The 90's and 2000's went too far the other way at times. And of course it did, it was building it's brand around Shaq who at one point just pushed people around. That wasn't always entertaining but it's more interesting watching King Kong go toe to toe with Godzilla than everyone jacking 3's from half court. You still had Nellie ball and my two favs back in the early to mid 90's were the Suns and Knicks who were complete opposites. That Barkley, Thunder Dan, KJ team was pretty much a precursor to todays league, fun, up and down, 3's, etc. and the Knicks were just plain mean and nasty. The individuality has been taken out of the game for too long. Maybe Wemby and a healthy Zion can force the leagues hand, we'll see.
SacTownKid
Hall of Famer
There's part of the problem though. In a game not gimmicked by rules and singularity it makes less sense over time in a game with a goal 10 feet above the ground that a big doesn't use that size to their advantage. The greats back in the day could still do all of those things, but the last thing you wanted was some lower level big man doing anything other than his given role even though likely those skills did exist within them. The players really haven't changed at the top level, greatness is greatness, it's the game that's changed and just like in the mid 2000's when things got boring, things are stale and have been for awhile now. The last two seasons have been a little bit different and we'll have to see how far it goes.
I don't really think that "dribble pass shoot" are the indicators for "skill" as a big man. What's his footwork hitting on? What's that jump hook look like? How about that turnaround?
Depends on what kind of "skills" you are expecting big men to have; I guess, if you want bigs to play like guards, you can make the case that they're more skilled. Personally, I think that's dumb, but mileage obviously varies.
Insomniacal Fan
Starter
Well, let's use your definition of unskilled. Didn't most teams, (even good ones) play a version of Beef Stew or Nic Claxton in the 90s?
If teams were lucky they had an elite big, but my feeling is that almost every team started guys like that (sometimes 2 guys like that), even in the golden age of big men.
Jdbraver137
Bench
I don’t mind a tanking season but why are we always aiming to be middle of the pack. Vivek took lessons from a large market and is trying to apply them to the kings. It wo t work.
For the record, I didn't call Stewart or Claxton un-skilled. I said that they weren't more skilled, relative to the expectations of the position in the era they play in. It's mostly relative: those players were skilled for what "skill" was demanded at that time. Guys like Dale Davis and Charles Oakley look "unskilled' through the lens of the "modern" NBA, but they were expert in the skills they were expected to have.
Skilled just means they can shoot the 3, doesn't it? Maybe they have more speed and can dribble drive and penetrate with more ease but those guys are usually undersized compared to the bigs of the past who would not do that in a more physical league.
If the NBA expected the volume of 3 pointers in the 80s and 90s as it does today, wouldn't the best players add that to their arsenal? Perhaps Shaq would Shaq, but what about the other top centers and power forwards of these eras? The best PF certainly could get inside to score at will AND contend with the immobile tank defenders.
The closest thing we've seen to a mesh of the modern era and the past was maybe between 94-97 when they experimented with the short arc and 3pt attempts went way up. Unfortunately that coincided with league hyperexpansion but before Euros started making their way over in droves, so it probably wouldn't be very fun to watch that today.
If the NBA expected the volume of 3 pointers in the 80s and 90s as it does today, wouldn't the best players add that to their arsenal? Perhaps Shaq would Shaq, but what about the other top centers and power forwards of these eras? The best PF certainly could get inside to score at will AND contend with the immobile tank defenders.
The closest thing we've seen to a mesh of the modern era and the past was maybe between 94-97 when they experimented with the short arc and 3pt attempts went way up. Unfortunately that coincided with league hyperexpansion but before Euros started making their way over in droves, so it probably wouldn't be very fun to watch that today.
Insomniacal Fan
Starter
Whan I think of a player as "skilled" it's in relatively absolute terms. It's defined in terms of the "fundamental" basketball skills ( dribbling, passing, shooting, defending and rebounding) A player that is more skilled, is able to affect the game in more varied ways. By that definition, big men of today are significantly more skilled than those 30 years ago, at least for skills that generate statistical signal.
Yes, the skills that are valued do change from era to era. Yes, players from different eras would be able learn different skills to succeed in different eras if they were required to.
More skilled does not necessarily mean better; Ben Wallace dominated with very few NBA level skills, and the only reason anyone would call a play for him would be as a practical joke (I can almost imagine it "Why'd you pass me the ball?!... oh you guys")
Are we measuring how many substandard players there are at a given position in every era?
Yes, the skills that are valued do change from era to era. Yes, players from different eras would be able learn different skills to succeed in different eras if they were required to.
More skilled does not necessarily mean better; Ben Wallace dominated with very few NBA level skills, and the only reason anyone would call a play for him would be as a practical joke (I can almost imagine it "Why'd you pass me the ball?!... oh you guys")
Whether or not we want to use my definition of "skilled" If we're thinking about the ratio of skilled to unskilled bigs in various eras relative to those eras' expectations, wouldn't the era that had twice as many bigs be expected to have a diluted pool of skilled players?
Are we measuring how many substandard players there are at a given position in every era?
