Kings and free agency - part 2

K

KingMilz

Guest
Well with the boatload of contracts handed out lately. I think a $10M for Rondo is sensible enough.
Then, I'll go with salary dump of Gallo from Denver $11M.
And $5M to Big Baby to generate some offense down low when DMC sits.
I like the Gallo idea but Big Baby can generate zero offense atm far less than Carl Landry could have.
 
I'm just glad we finally did something proactive. Time's up. No more waiting to see what the draft brings us. No more waiting for unwanted contracts to run out. That's a losing game, quite literaly in our case. We've been waiting for over a decade for either some lotto luck or for bad contracts to end so we can replace them with more bad contracts. Seriously, this goes back a loooong time. Enough is enough! Conventional wisdom had its shot and left us at the alter. It's time to get creative. I don't think people realize what a huge relief it is to finally have no drags on the salary cap. What if we only sign 1 or 2 year deals from here on out unless somebody proves they're a vital piece? There's no rule about needing draft picks and max money deals to win. You need talent to win. We have some, we need more. We need to sign diamonds in the rough here and we need a system that allows players to succeed by being really good at one thing and willing to work their ass off on defense. It's worked before for Popovich and Sloan and Wooden. George Karl isva HOF coach, let's see him earn that paycheck.
And you truly believe, that we are able to find those diamonds in the rough?
I don't want to sound overly pessimistic, but I would guess our scouting department is not even close to the international competence needed to find those talents your are hoping for.
At some point we are going to get desperate and throw some big money at mediocre players just to give Vivek and Vlade the chance to justify the trade of Stauskas and picks.
And if we do so, we are stuck in the same situation once again.
Too much money bound to mediocre players and not enough talent.
 
K

KingMilz

Guest
Give me:
Cory Joseph
Rodney Stuckey
Kyle O'Quinn
Omri Casspi

and I'll call it a nice summer...
Yeap we won't make the playoff but at least with scrappers like those guys it will be a watchable team and one you can actually cheer for.
 
Wow! Too early to cry guys!

It was just Wesley "freakin" Matthews who declined a $16M offer from us. A guy we expect to be a 3rd option was almost about to get bigger money than our 1st and 2nd option players. The achilles stuff is dangerous bullet to bite with a $64M commitment. How many team did Wesley brought to the playoffs, by the way?

Well to be honest, he would a good pick-up. But the risk was just too high, in my opinion.
Let say, Vlade told him we give you $64M but we get your achilles checked thoroughly first. Then Wes said, "nah I'm going to Dallas."

End of story. And don't even bring back the AI story back. Rudy > AI....
 
Problem is not missed draft picks. It's giving up on the drafted players too early and not focusing on player development.
So now the reason this was a bad trade is because of STAUSKAS!??!

My god, you people are desperate to hate this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are grabbing on to the tiniest of minutiae and completely missing the benefit of the trade. It's completely irrational.
 
Wow! Too early to cry guys!

It was just Wesley "freakin" Matthews who declined a $16M offer from us. A guy we expect to be a 3rd option was almost about to get bigger money than our 1st and 2nd option players. The achilles stuff is dangerous bullet to bite with a $64M commitment. How many team did Wesley brought to the playoffs, by the way?

Well to be honest, he would a good pick-up. But the risk was just too high, in my opinion.
Let say, Vlade told him we give you $64M but we get your achilles checked thoroughly first. Then Wes said, "nah I'm going to Dallas."

End of story. And don't even bring back the AI story back. Rudy > AI....
In the 6 years that Wesley Matthews has been in the league, his team has made the playoffs 4 times (once with Jazz, 3 with Blazers).
 

hrdboild

Moloch in whom I dream Angels!
Staff member
And you truly believe, that we are able to find those diamonds in the rough?
I don't want to sound overly pessimistic, but I would guess our scouting department is not even close to the international competence needed to find those talents your are hoping for.
At some point we are going to get desperate and throw some big money at mediocre players just to give Vivek and Vlade the chance to justify the trade of Stauskas and picks.
And if we do so, we are stuck in the same situation once again.
Too much money bound to mediocre players and not enough talent.
I'm not saying what I think we will do, I'm saying what we should do. The Sacramento franchise that's a league punching bag would do exactly what you describe. Try to save face with a long term deal for a FA nobody else wanted. Cheap out on the scouting expenses, and shrug our shoulders and say "that's the best we can do". Do I honestly believe we're going to make a hard left turn into "revolutionize the league" territory and sneak up on people? The opportunity is there for whoever sees it first. I'd be happy to do my part and scout for the Kings if they pay me to. A team in our situation needs to have the best scouting department in the league. It's not a luxary, it's a necessity. That's the only thing keeping the Oakland A's afloat. If you can see talent where nobody else does you have an advantage that no amount of salary cap money or big city cache can buy you. If you have a coach who knows how to use that talent you can actually compete for pennies on the dollar. Then you flip that talent for players you couldn't get in free agency. This is hypothetical talk though. I just want to see the Kings succeed. I'll be appropriately pissed when we make moves I disagee with (ie passing up underappreciated talents like Stanley Johnson and Thomas Robinson) but zigging (stock piling cap space and trading away picks) when everyone else is zagging (spending like crazy and stock-piling picks) isn't in and of itself a mistake. Its what comes next that proves whether you're a genius or an idiot.
 
So now the reason this was a bad trade is because of STAUSKAS!??!

My god, you people are desperate to hate this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are grabbing on to the tiniest of minutiae and completely missing the benefit of the trade. It's completely irrational.
I was against the trade, because I think that adding Stauskas was too much.
From my point of view this is not desperation. It's just the experience I made while following the Kings over the years.
The benefit of this trade is purely hypothetical right now. It depends on how this cap space is used. And the pressure level for Vlade rises with every day without a major FA signing. This is when execs usually make the biggest mistakes. Under pressure, with their reputation on the line. The Landry signing was just that. We were desperate to make a move and overpaid a solid bench guy and because of that making him negative value in a trade two seasons later.
What really makes a team like the Spurs special is not their FA signings. It's how they value their players and help them to develop. There are actually very few players SA couldn't mold into something useful.
The Kings on the other hand literally do nothing to help their players succeed. JT never added to his game. Evans regressed instead of developing his skillset. TRob was shipped out, before he could even figure out how to use his physical gifts. And now Stauskas is added in a salary dump.
I believe, that every one of this players would be a very solid player for a franchise, that's capable to develop their skillsets. We never did that and if we use our cap space to overpay players like Stuckey, Koufos or Lin I call it a bad move.
It's not like these guys are top notch players.
 
So now the reason this was a bad trade is because of STAUSKAS!??!

My god, you people are desperate to hate this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are grabbing on to the tiniest of minutiae and completely missing the benefit of the trade. It's completely irrational.
The same could be said about you.

My god, you people are desperate to love this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are dismissing every single problem brought up about this trade and completely missing the risks and potential downfalls of the trade. It's completely irrational.

See what I did there ;)
 
The same could be said about you.

My god, you people are desperate to love this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are dismissing every single problem brought up about this trade and completely missing the risks and potential downfalls of the trade. It's completely irrational.

See what I did there ;)
Because what we are betting on (no puns intended) is the unknown. You are betting on a losing hand that might potentially be not as bad. Big difference.
 
I think what would best serve this franchise is to go for a brotherhood kind of hiring. Seems that's what's the NBA is all about now. Wes Waiting on DJ sign. Bron waiting for his other buddy in to sign with Cavs an all.
So it might make a positive impact to the team if we go the Kentucky + Rudy's friends kind of recruitment.
Because sometimes even people don't want to go to that place, they would take the courage to try if their good friends are there.

So?....dun dun dundudun.... Let's make a good push for Rondo (Kentucky alum + Rudy's buddy) and get Josh Smith's(Rudy's buddy) attention next.
Then fill the remaining of the roster with perimeter shooting.
 
I'm not saying what I think we will do, I'm saying what we should do. The Sacramento franchise that's a league punching bag would do exactly what you describe. Try to save face with a long term deal for a FA nobody else wanted. Cheap out on the scouting expenses, and shrug our shoulders and say "that's the best we can do". Do I honestly believe we're going to make a hard left turn into "revolutionize the league" territory and sneak up on people? The opportunity is there for whoever sees it first. I'd be happy to do my part and scout for the Kings if they pay me to. A team in our situation needs to have the best scouting department in the league. It's not a luxary, it's a necessity. That's the only thing keeping the Oakland A's afloat. If you can see talent where nobody else does you have an advantage that no amount of salary cap money or big city cache can buy you. If you have a coach who knows how to use that talent you can actually compete for pennies on the dollar. Then you flip that talent for players you couldn't get in free agency. This is hypothetical talk though. I just want to see the Kings succeed. I'll be appropriately pissed when we make moves I disagee with (ie passing up underappreciated talents like Stanley Johnson and Thomas Robinson) but zigging (stock piling cap space and trading away picks) when everyone else is zagging (spending like crazy and stock-piling picks) isn't in and of itself a mistake. Its what comes next that proves whether you're a genius or an idiot.
I agree. This is what the Kings should do. Sadly I believe that developing a scouting department that's capable of this will take several years. This is a great long term vision for the Kings. But this won't help us in the current situation or even in the remaining time of DMC in SAC.
 
K

KingMilz

Guest
Can I just ask a question?

How does the cap space work when it comes to a possible trade? Can we say trade someone worth say 3million for a person for 11million (or say 2 players worth 15million) now that we have cap space for it? Because normally during the season the salaries would have to match.

Say hypothetical if we wanted to trade Rudy Gay for Lawson/Chandler (roughly 19-20million) salary could we?
 
I think what would best serve this franchise is to go for a brotherhood kind of hiring. Seems that's what's the NBA is all about now. Wes Waiting on DJ sign. Bron waiting for his other buddy in to sign with Cavs an all.
So it might make a positive impact to the team if we go the Kentucky + Rudy's friends kind of recruitment.
Because sometimes even people don't want to go to that place, they would take the courage to try if their good friends are there.

So?....dun dun dundudun.... Let's make a good push for Rondo (Kentucky alum + Rudy's buddy) and get Josh Smith's(Rudy's buddy) attention next.
Then fill the remaining of the roster with perimeter shooting.
I wish Rudy Gay was best friends with Kevin durant
 
Can I just ask a question?

How does the cap space work when it comes to a possible trade? Can we say trade someone worth say 3million for a person for 11million (or say 2 players worth 15million) now that we have cap space for it? Because normally during the season the salaries would have to match.

Say hypothetical if we wanted to trade Rudy Gay for Lawson/Chandler (roughly 19-20million) salary could we?
I would suggest, you are very wrong on the merits of the trade, but yes, Kings can make that trade now.
 
Matthews =/= all FAs, oddly enough.
No I know. Maybe I should have said so called high level fa. The irony is if we'd built this team properly through the draft we'd only have to worry about bargain free agents right now.

Scrambling for anyone with a name to come here shows how far wrong we went with this "rebuild".

The trade will likely consign us to this decade old rebuild for another one too.
 
The same could be said about you.

My god, you people are desperate to love this trade.

I feel like a number of you out there are dismissing every single problem brought up about this trade and completely missing the risks and potential downfalls of the trade. It's completely irrational.

See what I did there ;)
I see what you tried to do. But the difference is the concerns the negative people bring up are minutiae. Seriously. A draft pick in 2018 is so irrelevant compared to signing a few impact players right now, because we have to go all in. HAVE to. Or we lose Boogie.
 
To a certain extent these players are saving us from ourself. Monta Ellis would have been a disaster next to Rudy and DeMarcus (not to mention Rondo if he comes). $64 million guaranteed to a player coming off achilles surgery is a huge risk. He might not be any good for the first two years of that deal. Murphy's Law says that was a huge no no for a team with our snakebit injury history. Especially since we're still playing in Indian Burial Grounds Arena. Does it suck that the last three big free agents we went after took less money to play somewhere else? Of course it does. But let's not be so excited at the possibility of anything at all happening that we settle for panic deals and the presumed "nobody likes your city" overpay.

The Thompson and Landry deals were bad deals for us. Always were. I thought we should have moved on from Thompson after he showed zero progress 4 years in. Landry never should have been brought back a second time. We currently have nobody under contract who isn't either an important part of the rotation or on a minimum deal. This is a very good thing! Stauskas had some potential but Landry and Thompson were not helping us win anything. It cost us a little to clear out the salary cap filler, but as a fan of this team watching everything that we've done closely for the last 15 years, it was a good deal for us regardless of whether or not we got Rondo and Matthews. The national media can shove it. They've been consistently wrong about our franchise every single year. A first round pick to erase almost 16 million in sunk cost for the next two years? Sold! I thought we'd have to buy out Landry to create cap space. The only way we F this up is by signing more mediocre vets we don't need just to reach the salary floor. Who cares about the salary floor? The most it could possibly cost us is what we would have to pay anyway. Why not give that extra money to the players who actually do want to be in Sacramento as a bonus? Who gets mad about that? If you look hard enough you'll find 6 good players somewhere in the world who would kill to be on an NBA roster. That's the real NBA 3.0!

But we're not there yet, there are still some good options available. Rondo would give us a potential big three. Team chemistry is everything. If those three guys fully invest in each other I think we're a playoff team. Count me as a believer in Ben McLemore's progress. I think he'll be a key player for us next year. Personally I really like Kyle O'Quinn and Moe Harkless on Orlando and I think both are obtainable. Make it a sign and trade and give them Ray McCallum to back up Elfrid Payton. He's never going to play anyway behind Rondo and Collison. Then wait. Don't fritter all that cap space away on journeyman filler like Petrie would do every freakin year. Somebody big will be available at the trade deadline just like every year. Point is, salary cap space is the only currency that matters in the NBA. 25 other franchises are in a race to cap themselves out before the revenue even goes up. Good! Let them realize together that they screwed themselves out of all flexibility for the next 4-5 years. We'll be one of the few teams left with any leverage left and we can pick and choose how to use it.
Great post.

I also believe JT should have been gone YEARS ago, and Landry never made sense
 
I was against the trade, because I think that adding Stauskas was too much.
From my point of view this is not desperation. It's just the experience I made while following the Kings over the years.
The benefit of this trade is purely hypothetical right now. It depends on how this cap space is used. And the pressure level for Vlade rises with every day without a major FA signing. This is when execs usually make the biggest mistakes. Under pressure, with their reputation on the line. The Landry signing was just that. We were desperate to make a move and overpaid a solid bench guy and because of that making him negative value in a trade two seasons later.
What really makes a team like the Spurs special is not their FA signings. It's how they value their players and help them to develop. There are actually very few players SA couldn't mold into something useful.
The Kings on the other hand literally do nothing to help their players succeed. JT never added to his game. Evans regressed instead of developing his skillset. TRob was shipped out, before he could even figure out how to use his physical gifts. And now Stauskas is added in a salary dump.
I believe, that every one of this players would be a very solid player for a franchise, that's capable to develop their skillsets. We never did that and if we use our cap space to overpay players like Stuckey, Koufos or Lin I call it a bad move.
It's not like these guys are top notch players.
You can't blame the Kings for JT simply not being good enough. He should have "added to his game" on his own in the freaking offseason. He had EVERY chance to improve and there's no excuse IMO. Robinson is a tweener with less skill than Landry ... and im sorry, i dont want another one of those.
 
No I know. Maybe I should have said so called high level fa. The irony is if we'd built this team properly through the draft we'd only have to worry about bargain free agents right now.

Scrambling for anyone with a name to come here shows how far wrong we went with this "rebuild".

The trade will likely consign us to this decade old rebuild for another one too.

I'll remind again: what went wrong is 100% directly attributable to sabotaging owners. Let's all keep that in mind. They were more or less deliberately running the team into the ground, ok? There was no sincere rebuild. We can't talk about it as though this organization has been trying to rebuild for years and simply failed. It has not. It was angling for a move. Then, the new owner was incompetent and meddling and hired an incompetent GM who put his personal office politics game and buddy system ahead of the team. We FINALLY get a guy, inexperienced: granted, but we get a guy who is actively and sincerely trying to act in the best interests of the organization. And it's just in time. And he made big trade that gives him ability to try to make things better in a big way. And still, we have people trying to claim we've been ****ing up for a while now and we're ****ed, and we can't do anything right... don't you all see the story arc here? Vivek has FINALLY, through sheer embarrassment, ceded power to someone who is trying to help! It's the first time in probably 10 years that we've had a situation like this. So, if you don't like the trade, fine, you're entitled to that, but at least take a cue from Vivek, give the guy time, and trust him to do his job. Don't dismiss it outright... or at least, if you do, offer a reasonable alternative plan. One that doesn't involve tanking in the 2018 draft!!!!
 
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I'll remind again: what went wrong is 100% directly attributable to sabotaging owners. Let's all keep that in mind. They were more or less deliberately running the team into the ground, ok? There was no sincere rebuild. We can't talk about it as though this organization has been trying to rebuild for years and simply failed. It has not. It was angling for a move. Then, the new owner was incompetent and meddling and hired an incompetent GM who put his personal office politics game and buddy system ahead of the team. We FINALLY get a guy, inexperienced: granted, but we get a guy who is actively and sincerely trying to act in the best interests of the organization. And it's just in time. And he made big trade that gives him ability to try to make things better in a big way. And still, we have people trying to claim we've been ****ing up for a while now and we're ****ed, and we can't do anything right... don't you all see the story arc here? Vivek has FINALLY, through sheer embarrassment, ceded power to someone who is trying to help! It's the first time in probably 10 years that we've had a situation like this. So, if you don't like the trade, fine, you're entitled to that, but at least take a cue from Vivek, give the guy time, and trust him to do his job. Don't dismiss it outright... or at least, if you do, offer a reasonable alternative plan. One that doesn't involve tanking in the 2018 draft!!!!
My judgement on Vlade as GM is still up in the air. You think he is a guy, that's trying to make things right. Well I would think every GM was trying to make things right and I still judge PDA less harsh than you. Wether Vlade is finally an upgrade over anyone running this franchise for the past decade remains to be seen.
I'm just trying to be as objective as possible and I won't give Vlade the benefit of the doubt, just because he is a former player and a fan favorite.
Once again - this trade can be a good thing, if we use the space properly. But given that every major FA tends to sign somewhere else, chances are getting bigger, that we bend to the pressure and overpay lesser talents, just to make the move. In this case the shipping of Stauskas and the Picks is a desaster waiting to happen.
 
I'll remind again: what went wrong is 100% directly attributable to sabotaging owners. Let's all keep that in mind. They were more or less deliberately running the team into the ground, ok? There was no sincere rebuild. We can't talk about it as though this organization has been trying to rebuild for years and simply failed. It has not. It was angling for a move. Then, the new owner was incompetent and meddling and hired an incompetent GM who put his personal office politics game and buddy system ahead of the team. We FINALLY get a guy, inexperienced: granted, but we get a guy who is actively and sincerely trying to act in the best interests of the organization. And it's just in time. And he made big trade that gives him ability to try to make things better in a big way. And still, we have people trying to claim we've been ****ing up for a while now and we're ****ed, and we can't do anything right... don't you all see the story arc here? Vivek has FINALLY, through sheer embarrassment, ceded power to someone who is trying to help! It's the first time in probably 10 years that we've had a situation like this. So, if you don't like the trade, fine, you're entitled to that, but at least take a cue from Vivek, give the guy time, and trust him to do his job. Don't dismiss it outright... or at least, if you do, offer a reasonable alternative plan. One that doesn't involve tanking in the 2018 draft!!!!
I've got no choice but to give him time.

If I was the GM I'd have blown the team up and started from scratch. Obviously vlade thinks we can win now.

I wish him the best obviously.
 
My judgement on Vlade as GM is still up in the air. You think he is a guy, that's trying to make things right. Well I would think every GM was trying to make things right and I still judge PDA less harsh than you. Wether Vlade is finally an upgrade over anyone running this franchise for the past decade remains to be seen.
I'm just trying to be as objective as possible and I won't give Vlade the benefit of the doubt, just because he is a former player and a fan favorite.
Once again - this trade can be a good thing, if we use the space properly. But given that every major FA tends to sign somewhere else, chances are getting bigger, that we bend to the pressure and overpay lesser talents, just to make the move. In this case the shipping of Stauskas and the Picks is a desaster waiting to happen.
I think a lot of us are giving him the benefit of the doubt because we were around when he was a player here, and we know how good his leadership skills are, and how sincere he is. PDA had none of those things, and frankly, even though I did give PDA a chance (famously rebuking Brick for calling him gerbil), I never thought those were his best qualities. Always came off as a bit fake to me. I can't imagine a more opposite public persona than PDA and Vlade.
 
You can't blame the Kings for JT simply not being good enough. He should have "added to his game" on his own in the freaking offseason. He had EVERY chance to improve and there's no excuse IMO. Robinson is a tweener with less skill than Landry ... and im sorry, i dont want another one of those.
Ok if you think it's all on the player.
I don't think so, because franchises like the Spurs or the Hawks (Carroll, Bazemore f.e.) are able to develop players in a certain way, that other franchises gave up on. There has to be a reason for it. And most likely the reason is the coaching staff and that they don't give up on players and set clear goals for development.
Take a look at Derrick Williams f.e. The guy got drafted to a franchise as a player without a clear position. He tried to bulk to be a PF. Than he was told to play SF and so on. There was no clear goal for his development, causing him to waste years of his career without finding a proper niche in the league, while he has all the tools.

JT has one post move after years and years in the league. He doesn't know how to defend or run the pick&roll. And this is all on the player?
And btw. in the contemporary NBA the term tweener is nothing bad.
 
I think a lot of us are giving him the benefit of the doubt because we were around when he was a player here, and we know how good his leadership skills are, and how sincere he is. PDA had none of those things, and frankly, even though I did give PDA a chance (famously rebuking Brick for calling him gerbil), I never thought those were his best qualities. Always came off as a bit fake to me. I can't imagine a more opposite public persona than PDA and Vlade.
Nothing wrong with it. I was around too, when Vlade was a player (ofc no on this board ;)).
And I'm not going to argue with you about PDA. I respect your opinion.
But it's not about the public appearance. It's about making the right moves. And I'm very nervous right now.
If Vlade makes the right moves, I'll be a very happy kings fan.
 
DIsgusting... sure, go for Ellis and fail badly, then you should make Wes an "offer you can't refuse to" just to watch him refuse.... and then! then you can pay up all you got for trading Stauskas for a PG who couldn't make it to the other side of the court in 8 seconds. during the playoffs. Oh and I forgot, he wants a 1 year deal so he can rebuild his status around the league, so don't build on him as a franchise PG for the future.

Sounds like a plan to me!