Kingster
Hall of Famer
Or it could be that the FO wanted Malone to play D-Will and now they get what they wanted from Corbin.
[Grades] Grades v. Wolves 1/1/2015
- Thread starter Bricklayer
- Start date
Or it could be that the FO wanted Malone to play D-Will and now they get what they wanted from Corbin.
Kingster
Hall of Famer
Collison, McLemore, Stauskas and Landry.
CruzDude
Senior Member sharing a brew with bajaden
Been watching Ben in particular past 3 games and he's right. Ben gets very few touches, seems to have no plays run for him yet hustles his butt off and is their best run-out guy. while vastly improving his 3-pt shooting. ????
kupman
Starter
That video does not even cover the entire sequence. It started by him getting back late on defense and then giving a very poor effort on D. Once the Kings got the ball he walked up the court at a snails pace and promptly parked himself at the post with his hands on his knees the entire possession.
Bobby Jackson totally called him out for it on the post-show. Giving DMC the benefit of the doubt, it is also possible that he still does not feel well and totally hit the wall while out there.
Absolutely. And had Williams immediately moved into the starting lineup that's the conclusion I would have thought most likely.
But Corbin didn't immediately start Williams when he took over. And he didn't start Williams after Cousin's post game comments about knowing who the team could count on. He started Hollins the next game. So to me it seemed less about starting Williams as benching JT. Obviously I could be reading too much into that, but the timing is interesting.
Chicken Chaser
Bench
Reminds me when Kevin Durant did that when Westbrook was going iso and he knew he wasn't going to give up the ball.
ninjabiscuit
Bench
Crazy talk.
I remember watching that sequence and thinking, if he's that gassed Corbin should have yanked him and if he's not totally gassed then Boogie just totally gave up on those two possessions.
Either way it's a bad sign.
Here's what I don't think D'Alessandro and/or Ranadive get about this fiasco. Cousins has reverted. Gay has reverted. The team defense absolutely has reverted. ALL of the gains Malone made are apparently out the window. And when Tyrone Corbin is let go to make way for whatever new coach comes in the clock will be reset once again with any (if there are any?) of Corbin's gains thrown out.
Firing Malone was more than about this season and the full repercussions won't be known for quite some time.
If the team had finished the year under Malone and taken a big leap forward it would have been huge. Maybe they sneak in as the 8th seed or maybe they finish around .500 and just miss out. Either way it would have cemented in all the things he instilled as part of the formula for winning games. Then if you feel you need a new coach to take things to the next level at least you have a very strong foundation to work from and guys who have already bought into a lot of the things that will make them successful going forward.
Instead, we're back to me expecting the Kings to lose each game while just hoping they put up a decent fight and waiting for next season.
Hadlowe
Starter
One minor point here. Ben is the fourth option on offense for the team currently. The primary objective on the majority of possessions is to get Cousins the ball in the high or low post. Once he has the ball, he makes a read. If he has his man isolated, he will try to score. If he gets doubled, he looks first for Ben. Teams haven't been throwing doubles at him anywhere near as often lately compared to the start of the season. As a result, he is taking more shots (and still converting at a good rate, outside of the Boston game) while Ben's shots remain relatively static or slightly lower.
The plays for Rudy are largely similar, but defensive rotations are going to come off a big first for the most part, meaning the safety valve isn't going to be Ben every time like it is for Cousins.
A big part of the reason Ben has been shooting so much better this year is that he is getting his shots when wide, wide open because his man is either rotating down to cover for a double or actively doubling. Last year, Ben took lots of contested shots coming around screens or just pulling up over his defender. These are harder shots than the straightforward catch and shoot shots he is getting right now.
Ben is clicking because he has confidence in his shot and defense right now. I like the way the team is using him and would like for his teammates to find him slightly more often when he's open, but he absolutely needs to stay as the 4th option/safety valve behind Cousins/Gay/Collison.
As I said the other day, change the emphasis, get the ball to Cuz and Gay and have them, at a greatly increased rate, pass the ball out to whoever we have at the three point line and let them shoot and shoot to get the misses out of the way and let our long distance shooters get the shots, hit or miss. I think it would be good for the offense and everybody on the floor including Cuz and Gay
HereWeBoogie
Hall of Famer
Boogie standing around, Toronto Rudy chucking and playing 0 defense (as mandated by NBA3.Jazzball), JT just not even playing.
everyone has thrown the towel in. When a team sees their front office throw in the towel on their season, less than 25 games in, while they're playing above expectations, what do you expect?
everyone has thrown the towel in. When a team sees their front office throw in the towel on their season, less than 25 games in, while they're playing above expectations, what do you expect?
I understand your point. BUT I don't understand why there can't be a few plays run for Ben. Whenever they do, for a 3 or a quick shot based off an inbounds play he usually converts. Also, the commentators the other night made a good point about rebounding, basically saying when you shoot 3's the rebounds on misses are long and give a higher chance for an offensive rebound. I think it was a month or so ago but it seemed like Ben either made a 3 or the rebound went straight to Dwill for a slam or put back. Again, I agree with what you are saying but sometimes I would like to see Ben get 12-15 shots and Cuz and Rudy stay at 20ish than Rudy and Cuz having low 20s or 25 and Ben has 5 shots.
I do disagree a bit with the open shot thing. No one looked for Ben last night at all except on the run out. Ben created one of his own 3s, his pull up 20 footer and the rest were dunks. I think Cuz may have kicked one out when he was doubled but that was "1!" time. Ben has done a better job this year creating his own shot while staying under control. I also thought that he was fouled a couple of times when he decided to drive the ball but he wasn't rewarded by the refs.
I think Ben is a better shooter than Rudy but not as good as an offensive player overall. With that being said, I wouldn't mind Rudy's shot totals going down by 4 or 5 and those shots going Ben and DC's way. Just my .02
Hadlowe
Starter
I think the way the team is built, that it is very important to have a shot hierarchy where every time down the floor you go to the guys who draw fouls and convert at a good rate. That means DMC and Gay are first in the barrel. If the defense adjusts to take them away, that is when your third, fourth and fifth options come into play. Ben does not draw fouls well at all. He moves away from contact on his drives, partially because his handle is still a little shaky and partially because his touch at the rim is suspect (not all contact is a foul, not all fouls are called and Ben hasn't shown me the ability to finish through contact.) Ben isn't going to get opposing bigs in foul trouble. Rudy and Cousins do that, but only if you let them pound the ball inside. Better court awareness would certainly help and Ben could do with a few more shots, but I like the shots he is taking and more shots doesn't automatically mean better shots.
In any case, offense is a distant third to the major problems the team is facing right now, which is a commitment to defense in the starting five and a backup center to fill out the bench.
Would make for even more interesting talk radio at 8 am Monday!
Kingster
Hall of Famer
True enough. And maybe the FO is giving Corbin orders on a fairly regularly basis and Williams is the soup du jour. Hard to know. But I do feel safe in the assumption that if Malone were still the head coach JT would still be in the starting lineup and Williams would be coming off the bench with much fewer minutes. Malone rewarded guys who play D with minutes, not guys who don't.
Kingster
Hall of Famer
I'll have to disagree on this one, Hadlowe. This team is sooo ridiculously poor with turnovers that I don't want them to have a decision-tree for who to pass the ball to on offense. Just pass it to the guy who is open!
Livinthedream
All-Star
One minor point of my own. If you want to be a team with ball movement and passing, your PG should not be an "option." His points should come in flow of the game or as needed when we nees a spark. If the ball is not going into Cuz,the next two options are Gay and Ben. However, if you watch, whenever we are in half court, the PG immediately turns his back to Ben and waits for Gay and Cuz to post up. That leaves it up to Cuz and Gay to feed Ben. So in reality, Ben is not an option at all right now. Just a safety net, which is a waste.
I agree but would add others to the open 3 pointer list. Doing this successfully would open things up a bit for Cuz and Gay. It's what other teams do successfully. Folks here say, well, we don't have decent 3 point shooters. Well, we give Ben and Nik and Derrin and DWill a three pt chance a game. Let 'email shoot more and find out what we can do.
I just wish that people had the creativity to think of some way of describing how Gay is playing other than "Toronto Rudy." The way Gay has been playing here lately looks nothing like "Toronto Rudy." It's not even close. Even if you just count the games since Cousins got sick, Gay is averaging nearly 21 points, on close to 44 percent shooting, 41 percent from three, and has a 1.80 assist-to-turnover ratio, in the last seventeen games. That's not super efficient, but it's better than "Toronto Rudy" by an order of magnitude. "Toronto Rudy" shot forty-one percent from the field. "Toronto Rudy" shot thirty-five percent from three. "Toronto Rudy" had an assist-to-turnover ratio that was less than one (0.88).
Come up with something else, besides the same tired rhetoric, is all I'm saying. Some of you come off like iPods that are stuck on the same track.
Come up with something else, besides the same tired rhetoric, is all I'm saying. Some of you come off like iPods that are stuck on the same track.
As much as I like interesting radio, I can't root for a shellacking by Detroit in any way. I don't want to be angry and hopeless...
Oh, I'm not rooting for any losses at all. Just stating the ramification if such an event comes to pass.
To me it isn't about the numbers as much as the mindset, especially over the last five games starting with the Phoenix loss and then to the Knicks taking the Kings to OT in Sacramento. Yeah, Gay shot 44% vs the 38% he shot in Toronto (though he was just 3-13 on threes) and had an assist/TO ratio slightly over 1, but he also was taking nearly 18 shots per game (17.6) at that's WITH Boogie back in the lineup.
Yes, it's a lazy narrative, but it's also not that far off and very easy to convey. If I were to be more specific I'd say that under Corbin the offense is still overly ISO heavy as it was with Malone, but Gay is getting his first touch further from the basket and still attempting to go one on one as often, if not more. This means overdribbling, more time off the clock and having to work harder to ultimately get his shot.
Both Rudy and DeMarcus are clearly frustrated and trying to take more responsibility on their own shoulders which has resulted in less ball movement, more forced shots and more selfish play for the whole team since guys aren't touching it as much. The overwhelming feeling I get watching the Kings now is that they are all frustrated and the trust they developed to start the season is evaporating.
We agree that it is, in fact, lazy narrative, and not much else. I, obviously, would say that it's far enough off as to not be accurate, or else I wouldn't have brought it up.
Plus, I dislike the use of buzzwords and catchphrases to communicate with the intellectually lazy. And, it's perplexing: this is, like, the one and only time that Kings Fans don't like to think up a new nickname?
For your approval I then submit the following new nickname: "Lazier defensively, worse shot taking, higher usage rate Rudy"
Now we're getting somewhere.
rainmaker
Hall of Famer
That's what's scary. We know we're going to have to set the reset button yet again, either this season or this coming summer, and based on how poor our coaching search is going and Mullin being a possibility next year, having to do it multiple times of he next season or two.
And there's no guarantee it works, not with Mullin, not with a guy like Karl, not with anybody. You can't force chemistry. You can't force positive relationships. It's organic, sometimes it develops, sometimes it doesn't. Actually, the emphasis on changing styles and finding a coach to implement a different style is only a small part of this issue. A bigger issue is it could prove to be impossible to recreate the chemistry Malone had with Rudy and Cuz and in a locker room in pro sports, that's extremely important. It takes time. It takes patience. If it doesn't end up happening, well we've burned a season or more, maybe end up losing Cuz in the process and that's after we hit the reset button.
As far as Rudy and Cuz, they came into this season after a great stint with USA basketball, primed and geared to win, under a coach they had great amount of respect for and they went out and did just that, bought in, won games, were competitive every night. Then it was all taken out from under them and according to a number of reports, neither them or their teammates still understand why. So now we're in a situation where some fans expect us to see the same Rudy and Cuz we saw under Malone's system, even though that's not longer our system, even though the lineups and rotations are changing nightly, even though the emphasis on defense has been replaced by pushing the pace and more aggressively launching our first open look down the floor. Guys don't know our system now or what's expected, there's confusion. Then you add that to why even buy in if Corbin could be replaced next week, next month or this summer. It's completely unstable and expecting stable and consistent performances in an unstable environment is a long shot.
In general a team dynamic and chemistry are very fragile. There's a lot which goes into it from trust, to tendencies, to knowing which teammate will be where and when, to having a clear vision everyone is working towards and a backing from your coach and upper management to work towards that. When that's all been blown up, the issues and reasons for what we're seeing run far deeper than Cuz taking a possession off or Rudy appearing to be more selfish. It's symptom of a lack of trust, of confusion, of not knowing a new system which had been implemented over night which rarely works, to lineups and sub patterns changing as well as roles within the offense.
I don't see much evidence that our guys are buying into whatever vision it is our organization has for them, nor should they.
Big Cuz 15
All-Star
tanking. all part of the plan 5 steps ahead.
K
KingMilz
Guest
So not playing any form of defense and refusing to share the ball with 2 backcourt players shooting insane % for a backcourt recently is taking more responsibility? For all the talk of how competitive these guys are would a competitive player not fight through the adversity rather than quit?
There is nothing stopping our starting 5 from being the 9-6 team again, it's a matter of wanting it like they did at the start of the year. It's got zero to do with play style Darren Collison is not pushing the ball much he's smart enough to know what to do I think he's done a great job controlling tempo and aside from a few rushed Nik rookie jumpers on the break we actually don't look different on offense aside from the increased hogging of our two main guys.
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