Rudy Gay to Sacramento!!!

[Chubbs]

Again, your blind spot for IT rears its ugly head. He is currently 13th in the NBA in Ast% at 33%. His Assist Opportunties per game is currently 25th in the NBA, despite playing significantly less minutes than everyone ahead of him. He also has one of the worst conversion rates of assists on the guys in the top 25. Basically, a product of having to play with Ppat, Salmons and Thornton for a majority of his minutes. This misguided notion that he's not a good passer and ball-distributor is exactly that... a misguided notion. APG are purely a product of who you get your minutes with. Throw Danny Green, Boris Diaw, and Manu Ginobli as IT's bench mates, and his APG is probably in the 6.5-7 APG range.

However, if IT-Gay-Cousins is to work, then he will have to dial back his shooting. In an ideal world where you can exactly dictate everyone's shots/game, you want Cousins around 17-20, (#1 option) Gay around 14-16 (#2 option), and IT around 10-12 (#3 option). And everyone else fills in around that. That also begs the question of what happens with McLemore? He has a much higher ceiling than becoming a Danny Green like spot-up shooter/defensive guy. So do we leave IT on the bench and let Ben fall smoothly into the #3 role with the starters?

Needless to say, it's going to be exciting to watch. There's so many directions this team can now go and I see many of which can and should result in a positive direction

I'm not talking about stats. He can't run a pick and roll well. He doesn't create. All he can do is kick out. He can't pass to cuz in the post cause he can't see the post. There is no stat that will change any of that. I don't see any reason to argue this anymore, do you? He's better on the bench. Any gains we get from gay may be negated by losing your only bench threat. Now you count on Thornton? Uh oh. IT is best when he's the man. I don't know how he'll be that starting.

He's not missing assists cause guys are missing dunks. He's mostly setting guys up for low percentage shots. Sure, the shooters aren't great on this team, but the great pgs get layups for guys, not late shot clock desperation heaves.

Until we get a pg and get It on the bench, I kinda wonder if this trade may make us worse. The bench becomes so awful.

It will be exciting, we agree there.

 

[Glenn]

Again, your blind spot for IT rears its ugly head. He is currently 13th in the NBA in Ast% at 33%. His Assist Opportunties per game is currently 25th in the NBA, despite playing significantly less minutes than everyone ahead of him. He also has one of the worst conversion rates of assists on the guys in the top 25. Basically, a product of having to play with Ppat, Salmons and Thornton for a majority of his minutes. This misguided notion that he's not a good passer and ball-distributor is exactly that... a misguided notion. APG are purely a product of who you get your minutes with. Throw Danny Green, Boris Diaw, and Manu Ginobli as IT's bench mates, and his APG is probably in the 6.5-7 APG range.

However, if IT-Gay-Cousins is to work, then he will have to dial back his shooting. In an ideal world where you can exactly dictate everyone's shots/game, you want Cousins around 17-20, (#1 option) Gay around 14-16 (#2 option), and IT around 10-12 (#3 option). And everyone else fills in around that. That also begs the question of what happens with McLemore? He has a much higher ceiling than becoming a Danny Green like spot-up shooter/defensive guy. So do we leave IT on the bench and let Ben fall smoothly into the #3 role with the starters?

Needless to say, it's going to be exciting to watch. There's so many directions this team can now go and I see many of which can and should result in a positive direction

I think we wait and see. I still wonder who the backup PG will be. Our bench is going to be a directionless mess.

 

[rainmaker]

gay's only 27 years old, so i suppose all hope isn't lost that he can be reformed into a productive player who knows when to pick his spots. but it's unlikely; bad habits are hard to eradicate from a pro in his eighth year. he's had a couple seasons of solid efficiency from the field, but mostly he's been a chucker who the defense can very easily force into a bad shot. again, it doesn't bother me, because i expect the losses to keep piling up, i expect a high draft pick, and i expect the kings' front office to either flip the asset of gay's enormous expiring contract for better-fitting pieces next season, or allow it to expire so they can become major players in the '15 free agent class. i just see a lotta kings fans attempting to rationalize gay into a player he is not. an inefficient chucker doesn't cease to be an inefficient chucker just because he puts on a kings uni. purple-colored glasses, and all that...

The hope for me is Malone is able to set a hierarchy similar to what has been done in GS which he was a major part of. Our system would have to be different as our main guy is Cuz while GS's is Steph, but to make this work the roles would have to follow as:

Cuz fills the Steph role as the clear #1 option who the ball goes through on most possessions. Touches are maximized.

Gay fills to Lee role, the second fulcrum so to speak of the offense that we'd play through. Lee offers the post presence next to Steph's perimeter oriented game. Here we'd need Gay to be more of the wing/iso threat next to Cuz's role as the post threat. Basically the other guy we can play through in different spots on the floor.

Then MLM fills the Klay role. Now I don't think MLM is ready for as big a role as Klay has and until then more of those touches go to Cuz/Gay. But it'd be the idea the 3rd option is an off the ball player who plays off our top two options.

Of course, that doesn't leave much offense for IT, he'd seriously have to take a huge step back and be a facilitator, and that doesn't mean a ball dominant PG who racks up assists but rather a PG who comes down and feeds it to our top options and steps back into an off the ball role. Something similar to the role Iggy filled when healthy where he'd be the secondary ball handler and come down and facilitate the offense, getting it into the key guys. The roles wouldn't be identical obviously, IT wouldn't be the secondary ball handler but the same idea as being the 4th option who doesn't look for his shot all that often unless the ball is swung and he attacks off the attention Cuz/Gay draw, and Iggy would generally attack or shoot the open jumper off the attention Steph/Lee/and sometimes Klay would draw.

But anyone pointing to IT's assist numbers is missing the point. To get assists you need the ball. IT has a high usage rate. Assists aren't the issue it's the usage rate. With Cuz/Gay we can't have a ball dominant PG. Assists don't matter, it's getting the ball to our top two options early in the shotclock and playing through them. Can't do that if IT is dancing up top for half the shotclock, whether that ends in an assist or not.

Not perfect. Not ideal. But it can be done. Malone does have his work cut out for him though and I don't think this is a longterm solution either, just a way to make this work in the interim.

 

[Mr. S£im Citrus]

Actually, I'm still holding out hope that we pull a Drew Gooden/Rasheed Wallace with Gay, and roll him over immediately for a point guard, and/or a shot blocker. The only negative would be that we can't throw in anybody else for, what is it, ninety days? And, would that take us past the deadline?

 

[hrdboild]

Here's the story so far, since PDA and Vivek took over operations (approx. 5 months ago):

PLAYERS LEAVING:
C. Aldrich
T. Douglas
J. Johnson
T. Evans
J. Salmons
C. Hayes
P. Patterson

PLAYERS ARRIVING:
B. McLemore (3 years remaining)
C. Landry (3 years remaining)
R. McCallum (2 years remaining)
D. Williams (1 year remaining)
R. Gay (1 year remaining)
Q. Acy (1 year remaining)
H. N'Diaye (expiring)
A. Gray (expiring)
L. Richard Mbah A Moute (swapped for D. Williams)
G. Vasquez (swapped for Rudy Gay)

HOLDOVERS:
D. Cousins (4 years remaining)
J. Thompson (3 years remaining)
T. Outlaw (1 year remaining)
M. Thornton (1 year remaining)
I. Thomas (expiring)
J. Fredette (expiring)

That's pretty substantial roster turnover in a very short period of time. At the end of a year, no more than 4 players will remain from the team they took over. It would already qualify as the most active season Petrie had as GM I think and we're not even halfway through the season yet. I really like how aggressive this front office has been. Changes needed to happen and they're making them. Maybe not the specific changes everyone wants, but you can't say they're just sitting on their hands waiting.

Mbah A Moute and Vasquez were acquired for meaningless assets essentially (Evans was leaving anyway, LRMAM cost us only 2nd round picks) and already they've been used to acquire some better assets in Williams and Gay. The only players we are currently committed to beyond the 2014/2015 season are Cousins, McLemore, McCallum, Landry, and Thompson. That hasn't really changed much since most of the pieces that got shipped out were short-term deals, but look at what has changed: in 5 months the roster has been completely rebuilt without over-committing any long-term salary. Williams and Gay will be expiring contracts next season as will Outlaw and Thornton, if they can't be moved sooner.

Say what you will about defense and ideal PGs and PFs, I think what we've seen here is the first step in a multi-year process and while it leaves the current roster with a lot of position-related question marks, it also gives us a reason to be excited about the future. McLemore isn't rotting on the bench behind Thornton this season. We just cleared out some playing time for McCallum after giving Vasquez, Jimmer and IT a chance to prove themselves. Cousins has already established himself as a legitimate franchise player. Williams is getting a chance to prove he's starting material and we have a legit shot-creator on the wing for once in Rudy Gay who gets a year and a half to see if he's part of the future or not.

The start of the 2015 season in the new arena is still the goal and we're set up pretty well for that right now. If we do win big in the draft we add another key piece to our lineup. We absolutely can pick the best player available right now knowing that we're not a black hole at any one position anymore. Regardless we'll have loads of cap space to work with to fill the remaining holes. In the meantime PDA is shuffling assets trying to make the chip pile a little bigger before we go all in. I was skeptical over the summer, but at this point I'm happy with the way this is going.

 

[Kingster]

Really? No evidence? I think most agree if IT ain't scoring, he ain't playing d either.

If that's all you've got for evidence, it's a very thin reed indeed. First, I doubt most agree. Second, it's a common phenomena in the NBA for players to play less defense when their offense suffers. That's a far cry from supposedly IT crying because he's not getting enough shots.

 

[Chubbs]

If that's all you've got for evidence, it's a very thin reed indeed. First, I doubt most agree. Second, it's a common phenomena in the NBA for players to play less defense when their offense suffers. That's a far cry from supposedly IT crying because he's not getting enough shots.

Perhaps.

So many people are so sensitive over IT. It's rather amusing.

 

[GoSACtown]

Here's the story so far, since PDA and Vivek took over operations (approx. 5 months ago):

PLAYERS LEAVING:
C. Aldrich
T. Douglas
J. Johnson
T. Evans
J. Salmons
C. Hayes
P. Patterson

PLAYERS ARRIVING:
B. McLemore (3 years remaining)
C. Landry (3 years remaining)
R. McCallum (2 years remaining)
D. Williams (1 year remaining)
R. Gay (1 year remaining)
Q. Acy (1 year remaining)
H. N'Diaye (expiring)
A. Gray (expiring)
L. Richard Mbah A Moute (swapped for D. Williams)
G. Vasquez (swapped for Rudy Gay)

HOLDOVERS:
D. Cousins (4 years remaining)
J. Thompson (3 years remaining)
T. Outlaw (1 year remaining)
M. Thornton (1 year remaining)
I. Thomas (expiring)
J. Fredette (expiring)

That's pretty substantial roster turnover in a very short period of time. At the end of a year, no more than 4 players will remain from the team they took over. It would already qualify as the most active season Petrie had as GM I think and we're not even halfway through the season yet. I really like how aggressive this front office has been. Changes needed to happen and they're making them. Maybe not the specific changes everyone wants, but you can't say they're just sitting on their hands waiting.

Mbah A Moute and Vasquez were acquired for meaningless assets essentially (Evans was leaving anyway, LRMAM cost us only 2nd round picks) and already they've been used to acquire some better assets in Williams and Gay. The only players we are currently committed to beyond the 2014/2015 season are Cousins, McLemore, McCallum, Landry, and Thompson. That hasn't really changed much since most of the pieces that got shipped out were short-term deals, but look at what has changed: in 5 months the roster has been completely rebuilt without over-committing any long-term salary. Williams and Gay will be expiring contracts next season as will Outlaw and Thornton, if they can't be moved sooner.
Say what you will about defense and ideal PGs and PFs, I think what we've seen here is the first step in a multi-year process and while it leaves the current roster with a lot of position-related question marks, it also gives us a reason to be excited about the future. McLemore isn't rotting on the bench behind Thornton this season. We just cleared out some playing time for McCallum after giving Vasquez, Jimmer and IT a chance to prove themselves. Cousins has already established himself as a legitimate franchise player. Williams is getting a chance to prove he's starting material and we have a legit shot-creator on the wing for once in Rudy Gay who gets a year and a half to see if he's part of the future or not.

The start of the 2015 season in the new arena is still the goal and we're set up pretty well for that right now. If we do win big in the draft we add another key piece to our lineup. We absolutely can pick the best player available right now knowing that we're not a black hole at any one position anymore. Regardless we'll have loads of cap space to work with to fill the remaining holes. In the meantime PDA is shuffling assets trying to make the chip pile a little bigger before we go all in. I was skeptical over the summer, but at this point I'm happy with the way this is going.

Excellent post, thanks for the breakdown.

 

[Kingster]

This is where the stats fall apart. It doesn't matter nearly as much how many assist opportunity passes IT makes as where he makes them and who he makes them to. When you are talking great assist point guards, guys like Stockton, Nash, Kidd, Magic, you have to look closely at who they passed to and where their recipient got the ball. The really great passing point guards got the vast majority of their assists off of passes from mid-range to big men standing underneath the rim. That gets you very high conversion rates from your recipient, 50-70%.

The kind of passes IT makes, the ones that lead to his high assist opportunity numbers are drive and kick passes. That means passes to the high post and guys along the perimeter. Why? Because IT is already under the basket. Those passes will result in assists 40% of the time with the best shooters on the planet on your team.

Mostly I'm okay with how IT plays. He is a very good scoring point guard. He is a phenomenal sparkplug/sixth man. He is not a good, natural fit with Cousins. Slotting him into the starting lineup messes up the two good things this team has going so far this year: 1) Cousins is THE man in the starting unit; and 2) Thomas can freelance as much as he likes when he's in off the bench.

What you're failing to point out is in the NBA of today, the NBA with a 3 point line, those passes that result in assists 40% of the time, is equivalent to 60% for two point production. I'll leave the Cousins'/IT fit issue for another day, but IT's value is signifantly higher than what you are conveying in those stats.

 

[Section 101]

Actually, I'm still holding out hope that we pull a Drew Gooden/Rasheed Wallace with Gay, and roll him over immediately for a point guard, and/or a shot blocker. The only negative would be that we can't throw in anybody else for, what is it, ninety days? And, would that take us past the deadline?

60 days, we will have about 2 weeks before the deadline where he can be packaged.

 

[The_Jamal]

For those not too familiar with Acy, this is the kind of game he plays. Loves to play physical basketball, will bang bodies in the post, great athlete, can get out in the open court, can contest shots on defense. He's a fairly effective on the glass as well. Not sure if that jumper is for real in the summer league video, but it looks like it could be a useful weapon

Very curious to see if he can find minutes for us (I hope so). With minutes, feel like he can be a 6pts 6 rebounds kind of guy on good efficiency, good defense, and physical play.

 

[Hadlowe]

What you're failing to point out is in the NBA of today, the NBA with a 3 point line, those passes that result in assists 40% of the time, is equivalent to 60% for two point production. I'll leave the Cousins'/IT fit issue for another day, but IT's value is signifantly higher than what you are conveying in those stats.

Except that's kind of the point, right? If IT is the primary facilitator and his game doesn't mesh with Cousins', then you are sacrificing one of them in favor of the other. I would rather find a solution where both of them play to their maximum potential, and that means keeping IT as the primary bench guy and Cousins as the #1 option in the starting five. If IT can't handle that, then PDA needs to ship him out because he is only going to hurt his trade value if he insists on playing in the starting five.

 

[Hadlowe]

For those not too familiar with Acy, this is the kind of game he plays. Loves to play physical basketball, will bang bodies in the post, great athlete, can get out in the open court, can contest shots on defense. He's a fairly effective on the glass as well. Not sure if that jumper is for real in the summer league video, but it looks like it could be a useful weapon as well.

Very curious to see if he can find minutes for us (I hope so). With minutes, feel like he can be a 6pts 6 rebounds kind of guy on good efficiency, good defense, and physical play.

I'm intrigued by Acy. He is an undersized tweener forward, no doubt, and it worries me that we are collecting these guys, but I like his physicality in a way that we just didn't see from Patterson. His advanced metrics show a block and rebound rate in the Josh Smith range with shooting range out to the three point line. If you are going to play an undersized tweener forward next to Cousins, and it certainly seems that we are going to try to do that, might as well have a defensive-minded, rebounding, shot blocking undersized tweener forward.

 

[KingMilz]

For those not too familiar with Acy, this is the kind of game he plays. Loves to play physical basketball, will bang bodies in the post, great athlete, can get out in the open court, can contest shots on defense. He's a fairly effective on the glass as well. Not sure if that jumper is for real in the summer league video, but it looks like it could be a useful weapon as well.

Very curious to see if he can find minutes for us (I hope so). With minutes, feel like he can be a 6pts 6 rebounds kind of guy on good efficiency, good defense, and physical play.

I agree he's got dog in him imo he will find playing time like I said in the other thread this year's Tony Douglas

 

[ShastaKingsFan]

I agree he's got dog in him imo he will find playing time like I said in the other thread this year's Tony Douglas

A junkyard dog enforcer type. Nice. What an interesting 6 months this has been

 

[rainmaker]

#newbeginnigs
By Rudy Gay @rudygay22

 

[Widowmaker2k]

Here is an excellent breakdown of the trade....
http://www.philly.com/philly/sports...dy_Gay_traded_again__A_tale_of_two_deals.html

(also look for the cool article on IT linked there)

This is a good article for those who haven't read it. Summary: Gay's efficiency dropped when Toronto upped his usage over 30% and made him the guy on offense. He won't be the main gun in Sacramento and his efficiency should get better.

 

[sdballer]

This is a good article for those who haven't read it. Summary: Gay's efficiency dropped when Toronto upped his usage over 30% and made him the guy on offense. He won't be the main gun in Sacramento and his efficiency should get better.

Only problem with this logic is that many in Toronto feel that Gay "made" himself the guy. Broken plays. Overdribbling. Refusing to pass. His usage climbing was in large part due to selfish play more than a purposeful intent to give him more shots.

Doesn't mean Malone can't fix it but it was player more so than system.

 

[Kingster]

Except that's kind of the point, right? If IT is the primary facilitator and his game doesn't mesh with Cousins', then you are sacrificing one of them in favor of the other. I would rather find a solution where both of them play to their maximum potential, and that means keeping IT as the primary bench guy and Cousins as the #1 option in the starting five. If IT can't handle that, then PDA needs to ship him out because he is only going to hurt his trade value if he insists on playing in the starting five.

If having IT on the floor makes it impossible to get Cousins the ball, then yes, you have a major problem. I don't buy into that thinking, however. At least not yet. And if IT and Cousins can't coexist on the floor together for some reason, I don't see IT having a problem coming off the bench. It's not like he's had a problem so far, so why do we want to borrow trouble and posit such a thing to begin with?

 

[KingMilz]

Only problem with this logic is that many in Toronto feel that Gay "made" himself the guy. Broken plays. Overdribbling. Refusing to pass. His usage climbing was in large part due to selfish play more than a purposeful intent to give him more shots.

Doesn't mean Malone can't fix it but it was player more so than system.

No one in Toronto would have the balls to call him out on it either, you better believe Cousins will be screaming at him if he does that here. It's not like outside of DeMar they had anyone capable anyway plus Dwyane Casey sounds like Keith Smart 2.0.

 

[Chubbs]

No one in Toronto would have the balls to call him out on it either, you better believe Cousins will be screaming at him if he does that here. It's not like outside of DeMar they had anyone capable anyway.

I think Malone has more job security than gay. He can win this battle.

It's entirely different situations, gay in Toronto vs sacramento.

 

[Gary]

Only problem with this logic is that many in Toronto feel that Gay "made" himself the guy. Broken plays. Overdribbling. Refusing to pass. His usage climbing was in large part due to selfish play more than a purposeful intent to give him more shots.

Doesn't mean Malone can't fix it but it was player more so than system.

Well hopefully we have people here that will quell his over dribbling in Cousins and IT. I think we'll be fine.

 

[Bricklayer]

This is a good article for those who haven't read it. Summary: Gay's efficiency dropped when Toronto upped his usage over 30% and made him the guy on offense. He won't be the main gun in Sacramento and his efficiency should get better.

He doesn't have dominant goto guy stuff really. He's slick and smooth, not nasty and impossible to stop as a rule. Much of his inefficiency in Toronto has been him getting the ball, standing there dribbling aimlessly left and right for 5 seconds, and then throwing up a semi-contested midrange brick. In other words its looked a lot like John Salmons/Travis Outlaw stuff. Hopefully we can cut most of that out of his game just by reducing him to clear #2 option status. If he hits quickly, in mismatches, in space, on the move etc. we all of a sudden have the second most talented SF in the West.

 

[HereWeBoogie]

This Draft pick issue is the only thing i don't like about this trade (other than the potential of Gay taking the ball out of Cousins hands)

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   Food for thought on Kings' side of deal: if they improve too much -like being .500 from here on out- they run risk of losing '14 draft pick

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   As part of JJ Hickson trade, pick goes to Cleveland but is top 12 protected. With standings how they are now,breaking even is danger zone.
   

 

[VF21]

#newbeginnigs
By Rudy Gay @rudygay22

Sweet ride. Looks like Vivek may have sent his private jet to pick them up.

 

[Bricklayer]

This Draft pick issue is the only thing i don't like about this trade (other than the potential of Gay taking the ball out of Cousins hands)

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   Food for thought on Kings' side of deal: if they improve too much -like being .500 from here on out- they run risk of losing '14 draft pick

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   As part of JJ Hickson trade, pick goes to Cleveland but is top 12 protected. With standings how they are now,breaking even is danger zone.
   

Look, we are going to lose a draft pick from that trade eventually. This year. Next year. Sometime. This isn't the draft to do it in, but in a lot of ways it would be a relief just to get that over with. If we make a playoff run, and as a cost have to give up the #14 pick in the draft or whatever, so be it. The top 3-4 guys in this draft might be better than Rudy Gay. Its not likely the #14 guy will be. And after the pick is swapped to them, we are free from that encumbrance going forward.

 

[VF21]

A junkyard dog enforcer type. Nice. What an interesting 6 months this has been

I like that a lot.

 

[Mass]

This Draft pick issue is the only thing i don't like about this trade (other than the potential of Gay taking the ball out of Cousins hands)

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   Food for thought on Kings' side of deal: if they improve too much -like being .500 from here on out- they run risk of losing '14 draft pick

1. Sam Amick ‏@sam_amick 3h
   As part of JJ Hickson trade, pick goes to Cleveland but is top 12 protected. With standings how they are now,breaking even is danger zone.

I don't think we have to worry about it...

 

[ShastaKingsFan]

There's absolutely no reason at all, to think that Gay doesn't have a great chance to get back at the top of his game, if he's playing with the right players in a positive situation that he's motivated by. I think it happens right here with us

 

[HereWeBoogie]

This isn't the draft to do it in

this is my point