[Grades] Grades v. Hornets 12/15/10

[Tetsujin]

I haven't seen this particular game but i saw all the last previous games. Like Evans, Beno Udrich is a very selfish player. As a PG he should get at least 10-15 assist per game and he hardly do 5. His points are coming on account of the 4 other players who are standing around and do nothing.

I guess Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Jason Kidd, Derrick Rose, Russell Westbrook, and Tony Parker are all very selfish PGs too since they fall below your quota. Noted ballhog (*ahem* sarcasm) Steve Nash barely manages to breach your desired assist level and Rajon Rondo is averaging 13.75 assists per game, which is a LUDICROUS amount of assists per game. In fact, Rondo's numbers per game put him on pace to have the 5th highest APG stat EVER to be recorded in the NBA. In case you were wondering, the most assists anyone has ever averaged per game in any given season is 14.54 apg (a number put up by John Stockton). So yeah, you may want to lower the apg bar just a tad bit.

 

[Capt. Factorial]

It's not that the Maloofs don't SEEM to not care, it's that, in fact they ACTUALLY do not care. I think there's something to that. Right now, the family's biggest concern is, 3/1/2011. That completely overshadows the day-to-days at Arco Arena.

If they continue on their current path, I can only believe that the Maloofs have stopped caring. We don't want that.

You've apparently never seen the Maloofs in their courtside seats. They care quite a lot.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

You've apparently never seen the Maloofs in their courtside seats. They care quite a lot.

I'm not certain but I think maybe they meant that the Maloofs no longer care about The Kings in Sacramento and are already thinking about relocation next year.

 

[Kingster]

I was scratching my head when Westphal decided to insert a line up of Pooh, Beno & Head when NO was making their run. He was better off playing Garcia to atleast attempt to contain Thornton. One time in the mid 3rd, I believe, it was Pooh/Beno/Head/Landry/Dalembert, Wtf?

No way. Garcia isn't quick enough. This team just doesn't have enough quickness and depth at the guard position, no matter how you slice it.

 

[Kingster]

Man, of all the players that had things go wrong last night, I'd say Beno Udrih is the very last one I'd blame for this. The Kings absolutely did not lose this game because of Beno Udrih.

They lost because they keep falling into old habits. This loss did not surprise me in the least. The last 20 minutes of that game was a coaching nightmare.

I am profoundly pissed off at this team. I don't think the owners care a bit. Geoff Petrie: The New Elgin Baylor.

The only way I'd buy tickets to a game in Arco is if it's deeply discounted -- at least 50% -- on craigslist. The scalpers need to go away so we can determine how much actual demand there is for season tickets. If scalpers regularly lose 50% of their investment, demand for season tickets will fall by about 75%.

As unpopular as you think this team is, it's even worse than that.

The first thing the Maloofs have to do, today, is fire Geoff Petrie. By keeping Petrie, they look like Donald Sterling to me. This might address the issue that the Maloofs seem to not care. In fact, though, we have another prospect: It's not that the Maloofs don't SEEM to not care, it's that, in fact they ACTUALLY do not care. I think there's something to that. Right now, the family's biggest concern is, 3/1/2011. That completely overshadows the day-to-days at Arco Arena.

If they continue on their current path, I can only believe that the Maloofs have stopped caring. We don't want that.

Geoff Petrie is a servant given $10 to spend for groceries to feed a family of four.

 

[Bricklayer]

Geoff Petrie is a servant given $10 to spend for groceries to feed a family of four.

Geoff Petrie was widely, and correctly, reviled for absolutely wasting money for years and years -- all this we need to spend more stuff is bunk. We need to spend if there is something that actually can help us. Otherwise financialy we have done this exactly right, and because we have finally done this right, we are in prime position to add contracts and free agents. We NEVER would have been able to do that if we were running around spending money on random vets who would have accomplished nothing mroe than screwing up our draft position these last couple of years.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

we are in prime position to add contracts and free agents. We NEVER would have been able to do that if we were running around spending money on random vets who would have accomplished nothing mroe than screwing up our draft position these last couple of years.

There's a serious problem with the logic there. The type of free agents we want, Carmelo, Chris Paul, etc. in all likelihood aren't going to come here no matter how much The Kings offer to pay them. It also is very unlikely that any superstar caliber player is coming here via trade. So basically that leaves "random vets" and draft picks as the only realistic options/hope for The Kings to spend money on. They've already got two top 5 picks and probably another one on the way, so I think we can say they've gotten enough from the draft at this point. Now it's time to add a "random vet" or two to the roster to go with the draft picks and hope for the best. That may not be what we ideally want, but this is Sacramento, that's the reality. You have to play the hand you're dealt.

 

[Tetsujin]

There's a serious problem with the logic there. The type of free agents we want, Carmelo, Chris Paul, etc. in all likely hood aren't going to come here no matter how much The Kings offer to pay them. It also is very unlikely that any superstar caliber player is coming here via trade. So basically that leaves "random vets" and draft picks as the only realistic options/hope for The Kings to spend money on. They've already got two top 5 picks and probably another one on the way, so I think we can say we've gotten all we can from the draft. Now it's time to add a "random vet" or two to the roster to go with the draft picks and hope for the best. That may not be what we ideally want, but this is Sacramento, that's the reality. You have to play the hand you're dealt.

The thing is we can't just go around signing "random vets" in order to try to build this team. We tried that with Mikki Moore and SAR and it didn't really work. (In SAR's case, it was because his knee diagnosis that allowed him to land here actually proved to be correct, while in Mikki's case it was because he sucks)

 

[Superman]

when a pg player is playing 40 minutes i expect him to get atleast 7 assists and thats not a lot ... beno's speacilty is shooting from the middle , something the kings dont need form ther main PG , evans should be the go to guy and not the ball leader /
our team i full of players who move good without the ball and having hard time to create for themselfs ( but tyreke) and we need a PG to connect all
and what udrih does is not what the kings need
and yes , for a PG his selfish
i again say : trade him and landry
both are not doing ther job well
and we dont really need landry , they sould both be traded for a good PG
who his a good passer

He's not selfish.

What the Kings need is scoring, and regardless what position you play, when you can consistently score, you should do so. Beno was 9-15 last night for 20 points. It's not like he was jacking up a ton of bad shots. He's the best shooter on the team, and there's no sense in telling your best shooter to stop shooting, particularly when your offense can't establish or maintain a rhythm.

It's also easy to misapply the traditional point guard principles to your guy in a game where you're watching possibly the best point guard in the league run a team that's built around him. Sure we all want a player like Chris Paul to run our offense, but so do 25 other teams in the NBA.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

The thing is we can't just go around signing "random vets" in order to try to build this team. We tried that with Mikki Moore and SAR and it didn't really work. (In SAR's case, it was because his knee diagnosis that allowed him to land here actually proved to be correct, while in Mikki's case it was because he sucks)

But since a franchise caliber player is out of the Kings' grasp, what other choice do they have but to gamble on random vets? Just because the last random vets didn't work out doesn't mean the next ones won't. Part of the problem with the last group of random vets was that the young nucleus of the team was pretty weak then. That young nucleus is better now, so we should expect better results this time.

 

[Superman]

But since a franchise caliber player is out of the Kings' grasp, what other choice do they have but to gamble on random vets? Just because the last random vets didn't work out doesn't mean the next ones won't. Part of the problem with the last group of random vets was that the young nucleus of the team was pretty weak then. That young nucleus is better now, so we should expect better results this time.

What do you mean by "random vets"? And what do you mean by "gamble"?

We've got two pretty good pieces in place already, with Tyreke and DMC, and until they settle in and find their groove, the team is going to struggle, bottom line. Doesn't matter who the auxiliary pieces are. Those two are the cornerstones, and we just have to wait until their ready. Trading for or siging "random vets" isn't going to make this team better, not right now.

The benefit to that is that, in a perfect world, our young core can grow together, and we can diagnose what needs fixing on the roster. It's kind of hard to do that when the coach's rotations suck and the players in general aren't playing at a consistent level. But after some time, we'll be able to project what kind of team we're going to have over the next few years, and then we can say "let's upgrade this, let's sacrifice that," and we can put together an actual team that has a chance of making some noise in the Western conference. Oh, and we can hire a new coach.

But to start making drastic roster moves at this point is premature, because we're not sure how our pieces fit together, and we're not sure what our strengths and weaknesses actually are. And even if we were, gambling on random vets isn't going to make the team appreciably better. Unfortunately, we just have to wait. Fortunately, the most difficult to find pieces are more than likely already in place.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

What do you mean by "random vets"? And what do you mean by "gamble"?

Well, Random vets wasn’t my term. I believe Brick introduced that term. I would consider it to be basically any quality player the Kings can get via trade of free agency that’s better than the vets they have now. Keep in mind, the Kings are not in any position to be to picky.

Doesn't matter who the auxiliary pieces are. Those two are the cornerstones, and we just have to wait until their ready. Trading for or siging "random vets" isn't going to make this team better, not right now.

I couldn’t disagree with that statement more. A good quality vet like Billups, Prince, etc. could help this team quite a bit. Especially in the short term (i.e. next 2-3 years).

It's kind of hard to do that when the coach's rotations suck and the players in general aren't playing at a consistent level.

That I agree with. I don’t think Westphal should be playing their mediocre vets as much as he has. But I think I understand why he’s been doing it. He was trying to get wins. If you’ve been paying attention though, you will have noticed that since the giving most of the minutes to the vets experiment didn’t get wins and was a failure, he’s gone to playing the young guys a lot more, so I don’t think you could say that Westphal is a guy who doesn’t learn from him mistakes.

But to start making drastic roster moves at this point is premature, because we're not sure how our pieces fit together

It’s never premature to try and do things to improve a team. I’m not talking about making “drastic moves”. I’m talking about unloading a few mediocre vets and maybe one of the young guys in exchange for vet or even a younger guy who would improve the team

I’ll give a few examples of the types of moves I’m talking about. Don’t take them too literally though, I’m just throwing out ideas.

Casspi and the 2011 first round pick to The 76ers for Andre Iguodala

Beno and Green to The Nuggets for Billups

Thompson and Landry to OKC for Jeff Greene

Daklembert and Landry to Detroit for Prince

None of those are drastic moves and any one of them would likely make The Kings a better team. Those are the type of moves I’m talking about.

 

[chief bromden]

I couldn’t disagree with that statement more. A good quality vet like Billups, Prince, etc. could help this team quite a bit. Especially in the short term (i.e. next 2-3 years).

I agree with your disagreement. In fact, a nice article was written a couple years ago regarding Billups and how the vets in Minnesota really helped his development and shaped the kind of basketball player he is today.

http://www.chaunceybillups.com/outsidethelines.html

All the comments on this site about Tyreke being a point guard or not, his IQ on the court, and involving teammates in his offensive game... are valid. He is young and needs to figure these things out. Having QUALITY vets around to help the learning process is tantamount to his success in the future, as a basketball player.

Rookie, you hold closely to your stance that the Kings struggles are purely due to personnel, and in this light, I agree. With a young team like this, we either need leadership from the vets on the team or the coaching staff. Neither one of them is providing anything useful towards progression as a basketball team. If the vets on this team consist of Dalembert, Beno, and Garcia then I am not sure that anyone can learn anything positive from them. No disrespect, but all three have never contributed to a 'successful' team in the pros, save for Beno in San Antonio in the beginning of his career.

In terms of coaching, I'm not sure someone like Jim Eyen can provide the leadership in at the NBA level, at least right now. I think that is what is so intriguing about Elie, that from the outside of things he appears to be the kind of leader that a young team could roll with and progress... but he is already part of the coaching staff that hasn't produced any noticeable progression, so it makes me wonder if it would be any different. So personnel might be the best avenue for the Kings, as a team, to acquire the leadership needed for their development.

If we can acquire someone like Billups to show the ropes to our young guys.. how to prepare for games on a day-to-day basis, how to approach opponents in the face of adversity, calmness during the storm, sticking to a game plan, etc., it can only do wonders.

If my memory serves correctly, Divac played that role for us in the late 90s and it worked out pretty well. The whole team benefited from his presence.

 

[Bricklayer]

Well, Random vets wasn’t my term. I believe Brick introduced that term. I would consider it to be basically any quality player the Kings can get via trade of free agency that’s better than the vets they have now. Keep in mind, the Kings are not in any position to be to picky.



I couldn’t disagree with that statement more. A good quality vet like Billups, Prince, etc. could help this team quite a bit. Especially in the short term (i.e. next 2-3 years).



That I agree with. I don’t think Westphal should be playing their mediocre vets as much as he has. But I think I understand why he’s been doing it. He was trying to get wins. If you’ve been paying attention though, you will have noticed that since the giving most of the minutes to the vets experiment didn’t get wins and was a failure, he’s gone to playing the young guys a lot more, so I don’t think you could say that Westphal is a guy who doesn’t learn from him mistakes.



It’s never premature to try and do things to improve a team. I’m not talking about making “drastic moves”. I’m talking about unloading a few mediocre vets and maybe one of the young guys in exchange for vet or even a younger guy who would improve the team

I’ll give a few examples of the types of moves I’m talking about. Don’t take them too literally though, I’m just throwing out ideas.

Casspi and the 2011 first round pick to The 76ers for Andre Iguodala

Beno and Green to The Nuggets for Billups

Thompson and Landry to OKC for Jeff Greene

Daklembert and Landry to Detroit for Prince

None of those are drastic moves and any one of them would likely make The Kings a better team. Those are the type of moves I’m talking about.

Those are not random vets. Those are very specific vbets that were not available. You have run around here screeching about signgin jsut anybody, and now you turn around and start naming names and they are the same names everybody else would name, but who may or may not be available. Very few players move in the NBA. Its not easy just to get the perfect guy you want.

First of all, ALL of those moves are only possible because we quit spending money. You just don't get it. All this financial flexiblity is a HUGE key to our future preceisely because ti lets us do things. And what you are suggesting is precisely hoiw it may be used...or at least the part of it we don't need to save to one day pay our own guys. When you are us your the best free agents you can buy are guys at Daly's level, but if you hold the finanicial cards, which we do now, you can buy expensive pieces in trade, using your cap room as the grease to make things happen.

Secondly most of those deals are idiotic. Jeff Greene is nobody -- a third option riding coattails. Tayshaun Prince would be handy, but is no better defender nor better of a leader than Daly. That would be dumb. He's also an ender. You notice how great n effect he has had on those kids in Detroit? Billups is done. You don't give up youth for done etc. But yes, you could pursue moves like that, FOR THE RIGHT PRICE, but only because you have the financial flexibility to take on the stupid contracts those guys have.

 

[Asaf]

girl basically suffered a mental breakdown for the world to see, but it started years before really when she clearly burned out by 21 and started desperately casting about for normalcy, the ridiculous marriages, children she was not ready to take care of, corresponding weight gain, partying, finally capped by the head shaving incident...just a complete mess. And the absolute worst star for it to happen to -- there was never much talent there. Nor brains or sophistication. It was all an illusion, once it got punctured and the airbrushed glam vixen was revealed as a chubby scared kid...

I know it's off topic, but as a professional musician, words can't express how strongly I disagree with this.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

You have run around here screeching about signgin jsut anybody

I never said a thing about “signing just anybody”. You either have some reading difficulties or a penchant for putting words in people’s mouths. I specifically said they need to sign vets that are better than the ones they have now.

First of all, ALL of those moves are only possible because we quit spending money. You just don't get it.

Not only do I get it, but that I mentioned those moves is a direct result of my getting it. Regardless of how complex it may seem to some, it’s not rocket science. Clear cap space......Use newly available cap space to improve team. Pretty elementary stuff, really.

Jeff Greene is nobody -- a third option riding coattails

And yet, he’s better than Thompson or Landry. What does that say about them? LOL

Tayshaun Prince would be handy, but is no better defender nor better of a leader than Daly

You forgot one thing, he’s also a far better offensive player than Dalembert. But then again, so is pretty much anyone.

You don't give up youth for done etc

You do if said youth is overrated/over-hyped and not as good as they’re cracked up to be, i.e., Greene and "done" player can help your team..

Like I said though, I was just throwing out ideas, nothing to take literally. Guess you must have missed that part.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

I know it's off topic, but as a professional musician, words can't express how strongly I disagree with this.

You have to wonder about a guy who seems to have more hatred for Britney Spears than for OJ Simpson.

 

[nickmcclure]

i was trying to make a point
maybe he played good and i finally see u guys here understand reke cant be a pg
and now i understand the udrih cant either
so we need a pg

Haha that's pretty funny. You should watch the games. In addition to Donte, Beno is our glue-guy. He had a good game as usual and when he's in our offense is so much more fluid. I think Beno is underrated...yeah I said it.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

Haha that's pretty funny. You should watch the games. In addition to Donte, Beno is our glue-guy. He had a good game as usual and when he's in our offense is so much more fluid. I think Beno is underrated...yeah I said it.

I don't know if I'd say Beno is underrated but I'd say that he's been the most consistent Kings' player this year. Which makes the Beno haters look pretty silly.

 

[nickmcclure]

I don't know if I'd say Beno is underrated but I'd say that he's been the most consistent Kings' player this year. Which makes the Beno haters look pretty silly.

Yeah well him being consistent automatically makes him one of our best players I think.

 

[nickmcclure]

Westphal = F-. Where was Greene at the end? WhY was Head getting so many minutes?!?!?!

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

Yeah well him being consistent automatically makes him one of our best players I think.

Agreed. I'd say he's their 3rd best player after Evans and Cousins.

 

[Bricklayer]

I know it's off topic, but as a professional musician, words can't express how strongly I disagree with this.

As a professional muscian you should not even have an opinion on it given that you have probably never heard a single note written or played by Ms. Spears. Maybe if you were a professional dancer.

She had talented people mangaing her though.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

As a professional muscian you should not even have an opinion on it given that you have probably never heard a single note written or played by Ms. Spears.

What would that have to do with her singing? She's still producing the sound you hear (i.e. vocals) and that's music. It doesn't cease being music because the words or melody weren't written by the performer. Performers that make music are still musicians even if they didn't write the material. If you're going to claim Spears isn't a musician, then you'd have to claim that Elvis Presley, Aretha Franklin, Patsy Cline, and George Strait aren't musicians. By the way, spears has written or co-written a few of her songs.

 

[nickmcclure]

sounds about right. I'm not a huge fan of the +/- stat... except in ridiculous situations like last night where it can be used to show the ineptitude of a coach in a devastating loss. Greene was removed with a huge lead and not replaced when our 2nd unit gave the game away...not to mention playing Landry (his personal favorite I thought?) only 20 minutes in a game where he was actually shooting well and playing decent defense. Here's the +/- and minutes played:

Greene +10 20:25
Jeter +3 9:38
Landry +2 20:49
Dalembert +1 18:37
Head +1 9:19
Udrih -4 39:53
JT -6 28:53
Casspi -6 22:16
Tyreke -7 42:40
Cousins -9 27:29

If there is a message to be derived from this it's that Westphal punishes those who play well on gameday with less PT.

 

[nickmcclure]

What would that have to do with her singing? She's still producing the sound you hear (i.e. vocals) and that's music. It doesn't cease being music because the words or melody weren't written by the performer. Performers that make music are still musicians. If you're going to claim Spears isn't a musician, then you'd have to claim that Elvis Presley, Aretha Franklin, Patsy Cline, and George Strait aren't musicians as well. By the way, spears has written or co-written a few of her songs.

It ceases to be music once it leaves her voicebox I believe. That is because she is a sugar-coated-pop-hack.

 

[Tetsujin]

You have to wonder about a guy who seems to have more hatred for Britney Spears than for OJ Simpson.

Let's try to keep personal shots out of the forum and in the mind, eh?

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

Let's try to keep personal shots out of the forum and in the mind, eh?

Well considering the roasting he gave Spears, what I said was pretty mild.

 

[RookieOfTheDay]

It ceases to be music once it leaves her voicebox I believe. That is because she is a sugar-coated-pop-hack.

Sorry, but your own biases aren't what determines whether something is music or not. There's some pretty specific, objective criteria for it and it has nothing to do with whether one is a "sugar-coated-pop-hack" or not.

 

[Tetsujin]

Well considering the roasting he gave Spears, what I said was pretty mild.

As far as I know, Britney Spears isn't a poster on these forums. Plus, having read both of the blurbs about both fallen stars, I would have to say that neither show much "hatred" towards either of the involved. He was merely indicating how OJ was literally king of the world before we found out that he liked to go Mr. Choppy on ex-wives and their boyfriends.