[Grades] Grades v. Klay Thompson 1/23/2015

[John Galt]

And that is a real danger if fans put that idea into practice. Once people become used to spending their entertainment dollars elsewhere, they may not come back.

Honestly, that's why I'm 90% likely to NOT renew my tickets. "preserving your priority in the new arena" does not look like it is something that is going to be a problem. You see all the guys on Craigslist trying to sell their 49er Seat Licenses? You see all the below face value fire sales on single game tickets? Those "new arena seat priority" chits are going to be like the "two free tacos at Jack in the Box coupons. By the way - in spite of my repeated requests they will not define what that 'priority' entails - certainly nothing compelling to me - as far as I'm concerned it is just empty hype, and believe me I have tried to make it very easy for them to satisfy me on this point! Their stubborn refusal to be pinned down on it has me very suspicious that many people are going to be "aut0-assigned" something they can't afford or does not resemble their current price/location point, and then given the chance to relocate to a nosebleed corner they CAN afford - only to find that someone else was defaulted into all the best nosebleed seats. Watch and don't say I didn't tell you so when it comes out like that.

They are blowing it. Or maybe more accurately, they HAVE blown it. They really really should have swallowed hard - given a small token rebate to last season's ticket holders - and held prices steady. That, along with the speeches about Family etc and the new arena hype would have held the good feelings together and I bet in the long run put more money in those guys' pockets.

Hubris baby. I got a fever, and the only prescription, is more hubris!!

 

[John Galt]

Please do not assume that everybody has thrown in the towel.

I am not happy with what's going on with the Kings, but I do know there's more to life (sorry) than continuing to beat a dead horse. And right now, the whole Kings situation is a dead horse. We keep Corbin, we're going to keep losing. The front office has said they're going to keep Corbin through the end of the season, so at this point I am somewhat resigned to not seeing a winning product on the court in the foreseeable future.

Being resigned to the inevitable is not the same as throwing in the towel and learning to like it.

I don't understand why you don't understand that I (speaking only of my perception) can be fed up that the Kings allowed Klay Thompson to basically take practice shots uncontested for the entire 3rd quarter and yet still appreciate (as a fan of the game itself for over 50 years) what Thompson did. It was special and the confidence he had in his shot was poetry. I'm truly sorry if you cannot feel that.

I think the way you feel about Klay's performance is completely find and appropriate. I don't have a beef with you personally over this - in fact I'm frankly thankful he didn't get an "any questions" thread. It's fine.

I thought Leslie Moore's tweets were the equivalent of an "any questions" thread - she seemed like someone who momentarily forgot whose side she was pretending to be on. That was the main source of my angst about it. Not you - and not the general population on kf.com

 

[whozit]

Honestly, that's why I'm 90% likely to NOT renew my tickets. "preserving your priority in the new arena" does not look like it is something that is going to be a problem. You see all the guys on Craigslist trying to sell their 49er Seat Licenses? You see all the below face value fire sales on single game tickets? Those "new arena seat priority" chits are going to be like the "two free tacos at Jack in the Box coupons. By the way - in spite of my repeated requests they will not define what that 'priority' entails - certainly nothing compelling to me - as far as I'm concerned it is just empty hype, and believe me I have tried to make it very easy for them to satisfy me on this point! Their stubborn refusal to be pinned down on it has me very suspicious that many people are going to be "aut0-assigned" something they can't afford or does not resemble their current price/location point, and then given the chance to relocate to a nosebleed corner they CAN afford - only to find that someone else was defaulted into all the best nosebleed seats. Watch and don't say I didn't tell you so when it comes out like that.

They are blowing it. Or maybe more accurately, they HAVE blown it. They really really should have swallowed hard - given a small token rebate to last season's ticket holders - and held prices steady. That, along with the speeches about Family etc and the new arena hype would have held the good feelings together and I bet in the long run put more money in those guys' pockets.

Hubris baby. I got a fever, and the only prescription, is more hubris!!

I don't believe for a minute that the way the season has gone down is the way they envisioned it. They appear to have a model to gradually bring prices up so there would not be such a sticker shock with the new prices coming with the new arena. They appear to be sticking to their plan, they seem to be stubborn in that regard. The concept is sound on the business side except for one itty-bitty detail.

THE BASKETBALL SIDE BLEW IT.

On a side note, the refusal to be pinned down on what 'priority' entails may simply be, they may not know themselves and want wiggle room depending on demand.

 

[dude12]

Do you have a statistics that says Cousins is getting significantly less touch on the ball inside the paint since Malone was fired?

Anyone?

It would be interesting to know if that has changed significantly and if that is significantly causing the losses under Corbin. My eye test says it is not significantly and Cousins still was able to score although his turn overs seems like have increased.

What are you talking about? You quoted me and I said nothing about Cousins getting less touches in the post.

 

[John Galt]

On a side note, the refusal to be pinned down on what 'priority' entails may simply be, they may not know themselves and want wiggle room depending on demand.

Sure. so..... what does that make it (priority) worth??? exactly.

 

[dude12]

If I am not mistaken we were 11-13 when Malone was fired and in the thread "The Fallacy of Hope" some fans complained that we were better than an 11-13 team with or without Cousins playing and we should have not lost some of the easy/winnable games.

Imagine what could have happened if the team had already mastered to play the faster fast pace offense at the start of the season and could have had augmented our offense (and complemented our awesome defense) when Cousins found it hard to score (against zone defense) and when Cousins was not playing.

Malone could have been here until the end of the season because we could have had won more!

I guess what I am saying is there is nothing wrong with PDA's vision. Maybe the timing of firing Malone was wrong, but there is nothing wrong with wanting to execute a faster pace offense because we have capable players (although some are not ready because of inexeprienced) and ALL very good teams play a faster pace offense from time to time.

There is just all kinds of things wrong with this post.....but start and end with this....."maybe the timing of firing Malone was wrong". There is no maybe about it. It destroyed this team this year. To think otherwise is just being stubborn.

 

[whozit]

Sure. so..... what does that make it (priority) worth??? exactly.

Probably depends on demand. Not much, probably more. Lots, not much. This is in regards to worth between you and the team.

In terms of the secondary market, probably the opposite. Right now, in terms of the secondary market, not worth the breath it's spoken with.

Promises for tomorrow don't hold much weight with me. I only have to decide if I want to purchase league pass to see my team which is nothing in comparison to you and the rest of the STH. You're getting the shaft.

 

[Big Cuz 15]

My personal opinion, but I think it's a damn shame and a reflection of the sad state of a perennial loser to have parts of our fan base convincing themselves that our current situation is in any way acceptable because they've started believing we just weren't that good to start the year under Malone, it was basically luck and what we're doing currently under Corbin is us regressing back to our true norm, essentially where we're supposed to be.

That's nonsense. I'd even say it's similar to a disease which has been inflicted on fans of this team who haven't won in so long that when we finally had success and had a good thing going, the winning brand and why we were winning/competitive is almost unrecognizable to them.

And a big, big part of this lies squarely at the feet of our weasel GM who along with Mullin, flew to Vegas with the purpose of convincing Vivek to fire our coach, in the middle of our successful start. Vivek deserves blame too, he hired PDA, brought it Mullin and gave Malone the job out of order but I highly doubt Vivek is intentionally attempting to blow this thing up. I just don't think he knows any better and is getting p*ss poor advice. PDA however has completely overstepped his job description. It's in no way the GM's job to decide whether we should be constantly tweaking our pace/tempo, making decisions on lineups and/or rotations and even worse, weighing in on and impacting the actual system we're running and it's clear as day since the game Corbin took over that our system has been altered, the most glaring change being putting Cuz on the perimeter or in the high-post and having him jack up jumpers or attack off the bounce rather than get in the post and go 1v1 or be in a better position to draw help/doubles, opening it up for everyone else. And the harping on pace from our GM immediately, and it was immediate after the firing, resulted in our pace going up while our defense suffered and also seeing a switch in our lineups/rotation and going small with DWill being the chief benefactor. PDA has a hand in this, maybe Mullin too but it flat out is not their place. You don't coach from or through your FO.

We don't just have an owner and GM who want to redefine the game and how it's played, we have an owner and GM who want to redefine the business/coaching structure of the NBA by essentially having multiple coaches, both Corbin along with those in our FO hiding behind a separate job description/label but wanting to impact decisions on the floor and "play" coach from behind the scenes. The job of a FO and GM is to collect talent and get the best and most fitting talent on a roster, then see what the coach can do with it. We had a coach who looked at our talent, altered his system to fit the talent he was given, then went on to have success. That is exactly what any organization should and would want. Now with the same roster Malone had, we have others attempting to force their views on what our system should be and how the team should be run and it's a complete and utter mess. What that tells me is Malone was the only person of power within our organization who had a clue about what the talent on our roster realistically is and how best to use it.

the truth

 

[VF21]

Sure. so..... what does that make it (priority) worth??? exactly.

"future cash considerations"???

 

[whozit]

"future cash considerations"???

Ouch!

 

[John Galt]

You're getting the shaft.

Well, an offer of the shaft is being extended. It is still up to all of us whether we take the shaft or not. I think based on the overall smugness prevalent in the organization - they probably believe everybody will fall into line as the deadline approaches, or that next year the Mullin-led Warriors ... oops I mean Kings ... will be so fast paced that people will beat a line to the ticket office door next year and the drop in STH will not hurt so bad.

 

[KingMilz]

My personal opinion, but I think it's a damn shame and a reflection of the sad state of a perennial loser to have parts of our fan base convincing themselves that our current situation is in any way acceptable because they've started believing we just weren't that good to start the year under Malone, it was basically luck and what we're doing currently under Corbin is us regressing back to our true norm, essentially where we're supposed to be.

That's nonsense. I'd even say it's similar to a disease which has been inflicted on fans of this team who haven't won in so long that when we finally had success and had a good thing going, the winning brand and why we were winning/competitive is almost unrecognizable to them.

It's not nonsense a 15 game sample is nothing plenty of bad teams in the past have started out hot during the first 20 or so games and faded away, the problem is that we DON'T KNOW

 

[Bricklayer]

It's not nonsense a 15 game sample is nothing plenty of bad teams in the past have started out hot during the first 20 or so games and faded away, the problem is that we DON'T KNOW

Sure we do. Sure everyone does. Self loathing Kings fans aside, there is a reason everyone from fans to media to coaches and GMs across the nation was taking note, and a reason why the condemnation has been so universal. If you know the game, you could see precisely what was going on here.

And here I'll spell it out. It was absolutely 100% a classic, boring, humdrum, NBA 1.0 tale. You got a young superstar, you designed a system around the young superstar's talents, you get a hard driving young coach preaching defense, you start competing, then you start winning. you drop a few out of inexperience, later in the year you won't so much. If you make the playoffs you'll probably get knocked out early by a more veteran experienced crew. But those are all lumps you need to take. You'll scrap and hang in the race until late in the season. People will talk about you, your national games will double next year, and the chatter will be how you're just one player, or a little experience, etc. away from being dangerous. In short it was a classic opening to a young team on its way.

Perhaps the cherry on top of the pathetic front office delusion is this: the one thing we were lacking? Talent. This was a solid, professional, well coached group out working and out grinding its opponents, but in the end, not wildly talented. Not setting the league on fire. Just a group with a big star learning to be tough minded and competitive. And then the dips in the suits not only ruined it, but they ruined it under the most idiotic delusion of all: that what we were was a wildly talented group that was poorly coached. I mean, I have nothing but raging contempt for the basketball acumen, or complete lack thereof, that could come to such a conclusion. That's pathetic.

 

[Padrino]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who didn't enjoy watching Klay Thompson humiliate the Kings the other day.

i'm reminded of the bad old days of kings basketball, when my father would participate in ticket pools at work so that he could take me to watch the rest of the nba's stars; it's how i saw michael jordan after he returned from his first retirement...

i think of all the discounted ticket packages that have been offered in the last decade, all of the "premiere" match-ups offered against lebron james, kevin durant, kobe bryant, whoever. and ya know what? there's nothing that sucks more than being a team whose highlights primarily include the other guy's accomplishments, especially when demarcus cousins is having such a special season...

anthony davis has just barely crested .500 with a mismatched roster and a lousy head coach and not the slightest doubt about being selected as an all-star, while big cuz is mired in yet another losing season with a mismatched roster and a lousy head coach and nothing but questions about whether he should be selected as an all-star. it didn't have to be this way, but since the malone firing, the kings have been on pace to win fewer than 30 games once again, so we get to put up with local media trumpeting the successes of everyone the kings play just to try and keep people interested in nba basketball, much less kings basketball...

 

[Padrino]

Sure we do. Sure everyone does. Self loathing Kings fans aside, there is a reason everyone from fans to media to coaches and GMs across the nation was taking note, and a reason why the condemnation has been so universal. If you know the game, you could see precisely what was going on here.

And here I'll spell it out. It was absolutely 100% a classic, boring, humdrum, NBA 1.0 tale. You got a young superstar, you designed a system around the young superstar's talents, you get a hard driving young coach preaching defense, you start competing, then you start winning. you drop a few out of inexperience, later in the year you won't so much. If you make the playoffs you'll probably get knocked out early by a more veteran experienced crew. But those are all lumps you need to take. You'll scrap and hang in the race until late in the season. People will talk about you, your national games will double next year, and the chatter will be how you're just one player, or a little experience, etc. away from being dangerous. In short it was a classic opening to a young team on its way.

Perhaps the cherry on top of the pathetic front office delusion is this: the one thing we were lacking? Talent. This was a solid, professional, well coached group out working and out grinding its opponents, but in the end, not wildly talented. Not setting the league on fire. Just a group with a big star learning to be tough minded and competitive. And then the dips in the suits not only ruined it, but they ruined it under the most idiotic delusion of all: that what we were was a wildly talented group that was poorly coached. I mean, I have nothing but raging contempt for the basketball acumen, or complete lack thereof, that could come to such a conclusion. That's pathetic.

what cracks me up about the new regime is just how little they seem to understand about what fans actually care about. it never matters how boring or humdrum a team may be when they're winning; games sell out, merchandise gets bought, the league takes notice, the media writes flattering puff pieces, the players and the coaches earn respect, and all of that represents a crucial element that appears to have gone overlooked in nba 3.0: inertia...

the kings were building forward momentum, the fans were starting to flock back to arco, opposing coaches were heaping praise on the kings (and on mike malone, specifically), national media members were preparing their "surprise team of the season" articles, and the kings were earning respect for their tough-mindedness. then vivek/PDA/mullin pulled the rug from underneath their own franchise's inertia. they destroyed their own forward momentum. now the fans are retreating from arco once again, opposing coaches are shaking their heads, whatever respect the players had earned has begun to wane, and national media members have returned to existing narratives about how terrible the kings are managed. i mean, i know that kings fans love a good ole inferiority complex, but personally, i was really hoping that #sacramentoproud could ring true on the court for the first time in a decade. from the moment vivek ranadive purchased the sacramento kings, he preached culture change as the chief priority, and he was certain that michael malone was the man for that particular job. then, just as the seed of a winning culture was beginning to take root during a promising start to malone's second year on the job, vivek decided that... there was nowhere for malone to go but down? i don't understand it; i'll probably never understand it...

oh, and for the record, a "winning culture" doesn't have to equate to a winning record, particularly in a brutally tough western conference. a "winning culture" is one in which a team acts like a team, even when the ball sticks or when it gets turned over in excess. a "winning culture" is one in which the players have the coach's back, and likewise the coach has his players' backs. a "winning culture" is one in which the defensive side of the ball is valued at least as highly as the offensive side of the ball. and, perhaps most importantly, a "winning culture" is one in which a team believes it can beat anyone on any given night. it wouldn't have mattered to me if the kings couldn't manage to finish at .500 this season under mike malone; establishing a winning culture was paramount, both for the sake of making a legitimate run at the playoffs by the time the new arena opens, and for the sake of attempting to justify all of that completely unearned loyalty that demarcus cousins has placed in this franchise...

 

[rexb_kings]

As I was watching the Klay Thompson historic highlight again, I just realized who was guarding him as he put up 37 points on the 3rd quarter. I see Collisson 6', Stauskas 6'6", McCallum 6'3", McClemore 6'5" against a 6'7" Klay with deadly quick release. Maybe it would have been a different result if Gay or Casspi was on Klay. You could imagine Klay's eyes lighting up when he saw those smaller guards defending him, easy as getting to his spot and hoist up the shot.

 

[Capt. Factorial]

Maybe it would have been a different result if Gay or Casspi was on Klay.

Well, we could have put Gay on him...except Gay decided to hit the showers early in the first quarter. There were some suggestions in the game thread that Casspi got in a shouting match with the coaches after being pulled in the first half, and he never got back into the game so he may have been benched for some sort of argument.

 

[Mr. S£im Citrus]

Maybe the argument was over how half-assed the defense was?

 

[Glenn]

I heard that while I was driving and it bummed me out. I like those guys and their show in general. But all the fawning over Klay, along with the serious talk about pro wrestling, and man the world just doesn't make sense to me right now. I'm trying to be a little bit less of a dick on twitter and here... but it isn't easy when I'm just feeling so strongly that everybody has thrown in the towel on the Kings and LEARNED TO LIKE IT - including the front office, the PR girl, the media - everybody is all "don't worry be happy - #chillmuch - don't worry be happy - don't take it seriously dude there is more to life.... etc".

I'm glad I'm not the only one who didn't enjoy watching Klay Thompson humiliate the Kings the other day.

 

[Glenn]

Well, we could have put Gay on him...except Gay decided to hit the showers early in the first quarter. There were some suggestions in the game thread that Casspi got in a shouting match with the coaches after being pulled in the first half, and he never got back into the game so he may have been benched for some sort of argument.

It seems that we are transitioning to where the insane are running the asylum.