[SI] De'Aaron Fox and the Kings Are Building for the Future

[kb02]

So we have a two way star and yet somehow our defense was worst in the league? Funny how all the guys who make the all defense team somehow are on teams that aren't historically bad defensively, except Fox who is already a great defender according to you.

Where did I say he was overpaid? Or that we should be placing our hope in Buddy Hield as our franchise player over Fox?

Learn to read, or stop putting words in my mouth. My "criticism" of Fox is far, far more objective and less personal than anything you've ever said about Hield.

What is it about Fox and Young that is "not even close"? Their stats? Their team success? Their individual accolades?

Fox has a two way game while Young will only play offense. While both can get marginally better on offense, Fox’s defense has levels to go. That = not even close now and especially in the future.

As for Young making this year’s team a fringe play off team, again, how would he have done that when the issue last year was defense and in particular perimeter defense. Young is and always will be a liability on defense.

There is a salary floor. The money has to go somewhere. Better to bet on a 22 year old, who has ascended each year than a 29 year old, who thinks he is more than what he is.

And how about that pre-season promise of yours where you were planning to remind me of how wrong I was about Hali and Buddy?

 

[SLAB]

Ah yes, the "his defense is bad and he sucks at shooting" argument that magically doesn't apply to any other young star that is bad at defense and/or free throw shooting (Luka/Ja/Trae)

Playoffs, All NBA First Team

Playoffs

Playoffs, Second Round

I spy a small difference between D’Fox and those other guys. Until that small difference is remedied, criticism applies and should be talked about.

 

[LPKingsFan]

Playoffs, All NBA First Team

Playoffs

Playoffs, Second Round

I spy a small difference between D’Fox and those other guys. Until that small difference is remedied, criticism applies and should be talked about.

I think with Luka and possibly Trae, most metrics would show that their offensive contributions are so significant to easily outweigh their defensive liabilities. I think Fox's do as well, but not by as significant of a margin.

As for Ja, I think the metrics show that the difference with Fox is more due to the players around him. I think if you put Fox on Memphis they still make the playoffs. He should not get a pass the way Luke and Tae do.

 

[steelevt]

How am I Fox bashing? Name one thing I've said about Fox that you can concretely refute. Please don't confuse me with the guys who come here saying Fox is trash, or Fox doesn't give Bogi the ball enough and that's why we suck, or saying Fox will never be great. I also didn't see you not tolerating hating Kings players when the very guy you quoted calls Buddy mentally retarded on a regular basis. Or does it only apply to guys you like, i.e. Fox?

Let me ask you - how do most fans think of KAT today, and do you think Wolves fans would want to trade him at year 4/5 if they could turn back time?

You are in no way a troll like some recent posters popping up, but you far, far more critical of fox than any other player recently. I’m just stating most of your posts used to be about defending buddy and now it’s mostly just criticizing fox. Honestly it’s just easier to type the word “bashing” or “hating” instead of having to type “overly negative constructive criticism” every time you post something negative about fox. It’s fine to call me out on my laziness. Again I never considered you a troll but when a high percentage of your post is all about attacking fox, people will see you on the anti-fox group as opposed to the pro-fox. Just like I always considered you a pro-buddy member.

I don’t think I ever stated I tolerate kings player hate. Overly defending buddy in my eyes wasn’t a problem to me as some. Hence much more tolerable. I actually like buddy unlike some on this board. I saw him as one of our core. Yes he has his warts but he’s a f’n 3 point champion and a great shooter. If we just use him correctly, his accomplishments would shine brighter than his failures.

I do apologize if you took my quote as a attack on you as it was meant more in jest based on your history of constantly defending buddy and recently being more criticizing fox.

 

[Section 101]

I think with Luka and possibly Trae, most metrics would show that their offensive contributions are so significant to easily outweigh their defensive liabilities. I think Fox's do as well, but not by as significant of a margin.

As for Ja, I think the metrics show that the difference with Fox is more due to the players around him. I think if you put Fox on Memphis they still make the playoffs. He should not get a pass the way Luke and Tae do.

You might want to revisit Fox's numbers. The offensive are above Youngs in many categories.

 

[mac]

You are in no way a troll like some recent posters popping up, but you far, far more critical of fox than any other player recently. I’m just stating most of your posts used to be about defending buddy and now it’s mostly just criticizing fox. Honestly it’s just easier to type the word “bashing” or “hating” instead of having to type “overly negative constructive criticism” every time you post something negative about fox. It’s fine to call me out on my laziness. Again I never considered you a troll but when a high percentage of your post is all about attacking fox, people will see you on the anti-fox group as opposed to the pro-fox. Just like I always considered you a pro-buddy member.

I don’t think I ever stated I tolerate kings player hate. Overly defending buddy in my eyes wasn’t a problem to me as some. Hence much more tolerable. I actually like buddy unlike some on this board. I saw him as one of our core. Yes he has his warts but he’s a f’n 3 point champion and a great shooter. If we just use him correctly, his accomplishments would shine brighter than his failures.

I do apologize if you took my quote as a attack on you as it was meant more in jest based on your history of constantly defending buddy and recently being more criticizing fox.

Well in all fairness to me, the reason I've been "criticizing Fox" recently has a lot to do with a) the recent performance of his contemporaries and b) the recent existence of a thread titled DeAaron Fox and the Kings are building for the future.

Put it this way - I'm being shoved a narrative that Fox is my team superstar, he is THE WAY, and especially because I'm seeing some of his contemporaries lead their teams to playoff runs, do well etc, I'm just saying "is he really though? Can I have a different superstar instead?"

 

[KingsFanSince85]

I think with Luka and possibly Trae, most metrics would show that their offensive contributions are so significant to easily outweigh their defensive liabilities. I think Fox's do as well, but not by as significant of a margin.

You don’t want to think, you want to know. Otherwise it’s just suppostion.

The difference the likes of Ball and Trae enjoy over Swipa is being in the East and playing an East loaded schedule.

Trae Young’s team was a lottery team his first couple seasons in the East and would still be that playing a West loaded schedule like the KINGS have to play. So would Charlotte.

Don’t let the fact that their teams qualified for the playoffs in the East confuse you. Their defensive liabilities are just as real. Trae Young stands out to me among the worst.

As for #77, his and his teams defense is going to have to improve if the Mavs are going to advance further than they have.

 

[LPKingsFan]

You don’t want to think, you want to know. Otherwise it’s just suppostion.

The difference the likes of Ball and Trae enjoy over Swipa is being in the East and playing an East loaded schedule.

Trae Young’s team was a lottery team his first couple seasons in the East and would still be that playing a West loaded schedule like the KINGS have to play. So would Charlotte.

Don’t let the fact that their teams qualified for the playoffs in the East confuse you. Their defensive liabilities are just as real. Trae Young stands out to me among the worst.

As for #77, his and his teams defense is going to have to improve if the Mavs are going to advance further than they have.

I know enough to know what I do, and what I don’t know, and I know I didn’t do an exhaustive review of the metrics. Feel free, though!

 

[Turgenev]

I’ve only loosely followed the tail of this thread, so no doubt am missing some nuance – but – am confused by the ‘yes this is constructive’ and the ‘he isn’t Trae young’ or ‘he hasn’t played in the playoffs’ lines I see. I would have thought constructive would have been like – ‘Fox can realistically make marginal improvements on offence and substantial improvements on defence’.

If the crux of the discussion is – is Fox good enough to become an All-NBA player, to lead the Kings to the playoffs, and to build a team around? – I am probably in the not on his own/ not without change camp. I think there is a good chance he will be an All-Star player within the next 2-3 years, although selection for the all-star game is both competitive and subjective. I think to be an All-NBA player, he, and the team, would need to improve defensively and win more than half its games. For that to happen we would need roster and coaching change. I think he would do better with a bit more internal competition with the Kings – like – if we had someone else on the team who was a little bit more impactful than Fox then that would really push him to dial in on D and chase wins. Don’t get me wrong – I like Fox. He gets to the rim and finishes as well as anyone else. I also like that Monte commented that Fox and Tyrese should be better defensively, because I don’t think Fox makes that next step without expectation from others (and lord knows it’s not going to come from his friend Luke).

 

[steelevt]

Well in all fairness to me, the reason I've been "criticizing Fox" recently has a lot to do with a) the recent performance of his contemporaries and b) the recent existence of a thread titled DeAaron Fox and the Kings are building for the future.

Put it this way - I'm being shoved a narrative that Fox is my team superstar, he is THE WAY, and especially because I'm seeing some of his contemporaries lead their teams to playoff runs, do well etc, I'm just saying "is he really though? Can I have a different superstar instead?"

You could have had Luka…but vlade was like nah.
Maybe the basketball gods will give you cade to make up for it.

 

[mac]

You could have had Luka…but vlade was like nah.
Maybe the basketball gods will give you cade to make up for it.

Cries in sadness

 

[KingsFanSince85]

I know enough to know what I do, and what I don’t know, and I know I didn’t do an exhaustive review of the metrics. Feel free, though!

Just giving you a hard time bro.

At least you preface and admit that your opinion may be missing some needed context/info. Many others can’t seem to do that.

 

[mac]

You could have had Luka…but vlade was like nah.
Maybe the basketball gods will give you cade to make up for it.

On this note, if we do get a chance to draft Cade and Monte goes "ah we already have a superstar PG/backcourt of the future, PASS" you have my 100% permission to officially add me to the anti-Fox/Fox basher list because hooboy I am not gonna stop.

 

[steelevt]

On this note, if we do get a chance to draft Cade and Monte goes "ah we already have a superstar PG/backcourt of the future, PASS" you have my 100% permission to officially add me to the anti-Fox/Fox basher list because hooboy I am not gonna stop.

Is that before or after we go to monte’s house with pitchforks demanding he gets fired/let go/part ways or whatever they call it now?

 

[mac]

Is that before or after we go to monte’s house with pitchforks demanding he gets fired/let go/part ways or whatever they call it now?

Philosophical disagreement

 

[ApolloDaGod]

Holding on to a coach that never wins just because he has a good relationship with players sounds like an oddball decision. Maybe the front office is trying to show some stability after over a decade of instability, but holding on to Walton is not the answer. The defense is horrible.

 

[Tetsujin]

Holding on to a coach that never wins just because he has a good relationship with players sounds like an oddball decision. Maybe the front office is trying to show some stability after over a decade of instability, but holding on to Walton is not the answer. The defense is horrible.

*Looks at Dallas and New Orleans rapidly spiraling into chaos because their stars have conflicts with personnel.*
Is it though?

 

[mac]

*Looks at Dallas and New Orleans rapidly spiraling into chaos because their stars have conflicts with personnel.*
Is it though?

All that "chaos" aside, if you had to bet on which team makes the playoffs next year, or which team makes the western semis first, who would you pick between the Kings, Mavs and Pelicans? How bout two teams?

 

[Tetsujin]

All that "chaos" aside, if you had to bet on which team makes the playoffs next year, or which team makes the western semis first, who would you pick between the Kings, Mavs and Pelicans? How bout two teams?

Two teams? Kings and Mavs though the Mavs have serious work to do in the offseason (they have tons of cap space but are also losing their third best player in THJ and are still saddled with Porzingis and no draft picks).

The Pels have Zion and BI but are also on their third coach in three years, have an increasingly unhappy star player, have surrounded said star players with guys that can't shoot, and don't really have a huge amount of money to play with. They do have a crapload of draft picks to work with but I'm not quite sure David Griffin is as good a talent evaluator as he is a deal maker.

The Kings actually might be coming into next season with the most roster stability of the three teams you mentioned. Sure they may lose Holmes in free agency but they've also got (on paper) the best draft pick of the three teams and a surprising amount of depth (now whether or not that's top line depth is another issue). Terence Davis is a restricted free agent but judging off of comments from all the parties involved, he's coming back and Delon is still under contract for another season. With Moe probably gone (though it's still a real possibility the Kings re-sign him), the Kings depth on the wings s probably their biggest question mark aside from Luke Walton, though it stands to really improve via a potential addition via the draft/ I'm just gonna assume Justin Jackson is gonna score 30 points every night now. The Kings could be thin at big without Holmes but Damian Jones is solid and Metu has flashed potential and provides a lot of the pick and roll finishing ability Holmes does with the addition of a solid perimeter shot. I also think Tyrese is going to make a leap after a full offseason with an NBA training facility and more time to process tape/work with Rico Hines. The big issue remains Luke but this roster even with the potential losses it could suffer in the offseason is more than capable of getting into the postseason.

 

[SacTownKid]

Two teams? Kings and Mavs though the Mavs have serious work to do in the offseason (they have tons of cap space but are also losing their third best player in THJ and are still saddled with Porzingis and no draft picks).

The Pels have Zion and BI but are also on their third coach in three years, have an increasingly unhappy star player, have surrounded said star players with guys that can't shoot, and don't really have a huge amount of money to play with. They do have a crapload of draft picks to work with but I'm not quite sure David Griffin is as good a talent evaluator as he is a deal maker.

The Kings actually might be coming into next season with the most roster stability of the three teams you mentioned. Sure they may lose Holmes in free agency but they've also got (on paper) the best draft pick of the three teams and a surprising amount of depth (now whether or not that's top line depth is another issue). Terence Davis is a restricted free agent but judging off of comments from all the parties involved, he's coming back and Delon is still under contract for another season. With Moe probably gone (though it's still a real possibility the Kings re-sign him), the Kings depth on the wings s probably their biggest question mark aside from Luke Walton, though it stands to really improve via a potential addition via the draft/ I'm just gonna assume Justin Jackson is gonna score 30 points every night now. The Kings could be thin at big without Holmes but Damian Jones is solid and Metu has flashed potential and provides a lot of the pick and roll finishing ability Holmes does with the addition of a solid perimeter shot. I also think Tyrese is going to make a leap after a full offseason with an NBA training facility and more time to process tape/work with Rico Hines. The big issue remains Luke but this roster even with the potential losses it could suffer in the offseason is more than capable of getting into the postseason.

While there is a good Luke in there somewhere, is it much of a question at this point that this is the only question mark that matters? ha ha.

 

[Tetsujin]

While there is a good Luke in there somewhere, is it much of a question at this point that this is the only question mark that matters? ha ha.

Really if we had almost any coach but Luke slotted in, I'd be pretty confident in this team making the playoffs (or at least the play-ins) next season. As it is, we already almost made the play-ins despite missing our three best players over the last three or so weeks of the season and going on three nearly double digit losing streaks in a shortened season.

 

[SacTownKid]

Really if we had almost any coach but Luke slotted in, I'd be pretty confident in this team making the playoffs (or at least the play-ins) next season. As it is, we already almost made the play-ins despite missing our three best players over the last three or so weeks of the season and going on three nearly double digit losing streaks in a shortened season.

And I would think other than decent political acumen that's what the Kings are looking at. The issue is when he had a fully healthy team for the most part in the area of the season that really matters he put up around a mid 30's win percentage, then as predicted, he cleaned up the back end. I think it was something to the effect of a .500 win percentage in back to back years and this year after the deadline he actually did worse than the first. His two seasons were almost identical which is concerning. It's also concerning in terms of blasting certain players with consecutive minutes and then watching as the injuries piled up. Not that his story is entirely written, and yes, the light bulb could come on, but this is a pattern of almost every team he's coached in some way being better the more he relies on role players. That is the type of thing that if a franchise buys in will cost you big talent and long term gains if they don't prove to be a HOF level coach since the Harkless type will find his way in front of a ROY candidate under this coach. This summer will be interesting.

 

[Joshoua]

Not trying to start a deep debate around who is best on that list and where fox sits, but it does make you wonder what would have been. How much really does team culture and coaching go into the success of these players. If Sac had drafted Luka and traded fox for Porzingis, do we see the same Luka ascension to super stardom and two trips to the playoffs, or are we talking about Luka being a great building block but he needs more help and hasn't proven anything in Sac yet. There has GOT to be more to our 15 years of suck other than bad player acquisition (and even bad coaching). Is everything about this team just so toxic when players walk in the door? Vlade really was trying to change the "culture" and I think to an extent he did (sad as that sounds when you think of where we are now), but does winning bring order to our culture or does culture breed winning? Are some players so great (Lebron) that it immediately changes culture going forward, or are there other circumstances at play? If fox had been drafted by the suns one spot ahead of us, how much does that really change his career?

Im late to this but no Luka would still be a star here as long as he was allowed to have the ball which anybody with a brain would allow. Generational players aren’t affected by where they go I believe, let’s say we did draft him trade fox for Porzingis. What we’d have is Luka surrounded by shooters in Buddy/Bogi/Porzingis now add in he’d have to be the lead creator so he’d be doing his thing with more shooting here

 

[Joshoua]

I would take Fox over Young all day, any day. Young is the better shooter and the more natural passer. Fox is the better two way player. It's not even close and the gap will be astronomical in two years. You question Fox's defense and say the Kings would be a fringe play off team with Young. Did you forget the biggest issue last year was the Kings defense? Young on the Kings last year and opposing teams would've been scoring even more.

You say Fox is overpaid, but I'd rather bet on a 22 year old, who has taken a leap each year in the league than a 29 year old, turnover machine, who should be a 6th man and has the ego of a star.

You’d get fired soon after that decision lol 100 percent of GM’s are taking the 25/9 guy who runs the team like chris Paul over fox.

 

[kb02]

You’d get fired soon after that decision lol 100 percent of GM’s are taking the 25/9 guy who runs the team like chris Paul over fox.

Lolzzz.

 

[steelevt]

You’d get fired soon after that decision lol 100 percent of GM’s are taking the 25/9 guy who runs the team like chris Paul over fox.

Lolzzz.

You forgot to bold this too. But I got ya

 

[twslam07]

Just to interject some info into this Fox vs. Morant vs. Young vs. Doncic discussion, below are some percentiles in various advanced impact metrics. The bottom table simply averages the percentiles across the 5 metrics to try and condense it a bit;



No surprise that Doncic is the top dog here, but we actually are seeing that Doncic & Young are being ranked similarly on the offensive end.

Fox & Morant seem comparable with Fox having a slight edge as of today. However, I tend to favor LEBRON & LA-RAPM a lot more than the others. If we just look at those two metrics, this is how it shakes out:



This shows Fox below the others. His main path to become a very high impact player is to improve defensively. He has the tools & the smarts to do it. Just comes down to if he dedicates himself to that side of the ball and puts in the work.

 

[SLAB]

Lmao Fox over Trae Young. That’s borderline comical.

 

[Joshoua]

Lmao Fox over Trae Young. That’s borderline comical.

It’s not borderline it’s absolutely asinine, clown talk really

 

[SacTownKid]

Whoa, careful on those defensive impact stats when your coaching staff just unleashed one of the worst defensive schemes in the history of basketball on the world, ha ha.