The Kings' future
- Thread starter SacTownGrantFan
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FaStRmAn
Starter
I don't want this team to tank. Let the ping pong balls fall where they may. I still think Stern has that system rigged to benefit big market teams. The Kings need to win and make the team looked competitive. A young up and coming team is appealing to free agents. The Kings need to convince a good Free Agent Center to come to Sacramento. The Draft will bring a good player, but it will take 2-3 years for that player to develop. If we can get a good Center in free agency or by trade, it would accelerate the rebuilding process. We haven't made the playoffs in a long time. It would be nice to get a good rebounding center that will mix it up in the paint. Kaman would be a good example of the type of player the Kings need. We just need to convince a free agent to come to Sacktown and help the Kings get better. A good record would look better to a free agent. There will be players who will want to play with Tyreke. He is that good. So let Geoff Petrie do his job and let him bring in the talent we need to compete for a playoff spot next year and maybe even win some playoff games. We are making the steps necessary to achieve the goals PW set of winning playoff games. The Kings are a coupla pieces away from being competitive in the playoffs. And our young players are improving. Go Kings! Evans IS ROY!
Sean Elliott was perhaps my first favorite college player. And I was elated when we got the #1 pick and my heart sunk when we picked some other dude instead. And Sean Elliott had a nice career, but if he had been the #1 pick he would have been considered disappointing as well so I'm willing to accept that we just had bad luck by winning the lotto in a down year. Not the worst draft class ever, but in the bottom 3 or 5 since I've been following which is less than you. The 4 picks was the real shame, seemed so promising on draft day.
It does appear that teams that stockpile first rounders in any given year seem to blow it big time. Is that my imagination? I remember the Knicks having 3 in the 90s and missing on all of them (though the C's fan in me will always love Walter).
I was going to give them a year or two but it sure seems that way.
Other than the last 2 years (Clippers and Bulls), the previous several years were teams like Portland, Cleveland, and Toronto. Not all typical "big-market" teams.
It hasn't taken Tyreke or other top players 2-3 years to develop, has it?
Reke looks like a star, the best player in the draft. For every good player in recent drafts that was a hit from the beginning, I can point to one who needed a couple of years before he got it together. James Harden was regaled as the most complete player in the draft, and he hasn't done much to help his team, but everyone still expects him to be a really good player. He went one pick before Tyreke. There's been discussion on this board about bringing in Thabeet, who is currently in the NBDL. The Lakers expected a lot out of Bynum, but he was practically a redshirt in his first season. The truth is that because most draftees don't play four years in college, they are considered projects who still need a couple of years to continue developing once they come to the NBA. If you're expecting a draft pick to turn your team around in one season, you're expecting too much. That player doesn't come around all that often.
LPKingsFan
All-Star
There are still moves to be made. Take on a Okafor or Dalembert with the cap space, try to condense some of the big man talent. There's no point in trying to move forward with all of Landry/Thompson/Hawes/draft pick. At some point, we're best served condensing/packaging a big or two to get a better player.
Kingster
Hall of Famer
Westphal Holds the Draft in His Rotation
It's up to Westphal whether he wants to go very young, which means very little Noc, Garcia, and Udoka or whether he wants to aim for winning every game, which means playing those guys a lot more. If he plays more of Noc, Garcia, and Udoka, he's going to have a good chance to knock the Kings out of the top 5 or so in ping pong balls. He doesn't explain his rotation as it is, and nobody can predict his rotation, so it wouldn't be tough for him to skew that rotation to the young side for the benefit of a higher draft pick. Barring injury to someone like Tyreke, the Kings aren't going to back in this position for quite a while. I hope he plays the young guys down the stretch.
It's up to Westphal whether he wants to go very young, which means very little Noc, Garcia, and Udoka or whether he wants to aim for winning every game, which means playing those guys a lot more. If he plays more of Noc, Garcia, and Udoka, he's going to have a good chance to knock the Kings out of the top 5 or so in ping pong balls. He doesn't explain his rotation as it is, and nobody can predict his rotation, so it wouldn't be tough for him to skew that rotation to the young side for the benefit of a higher draft pick. Barring injury to someone like Tyreke, the Kings aren't going to back in this position for quite a while. I hope he plays the young guys down the stretch.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
I actually think if we're looking to bomb, we should play Udoka and Nocioni more.
Mrs. Petrie, I think we are kind of having a delusion of grandeur here by your bolded statement.
Please read post #27 and #28.
And again I would ask, where were we the past several years and currently in the win/loss column?
This is all Petrie's fault for assembling a dysfunctional team. I hope coach Westphal turns out to be the genius that can make this very unbalanced team work for the best.
Top 5! We'll be lucky to get the 8th worst record, even if we try (to lose that is)!
The Hammer
All-Star
Mrs. Petrie, I think we are kind of having a delusion of grandeur here by your bolded statement.
Please read post #27 and #28.
And again I would ask, where were we the past several years and currently in the win/loss column?
This is all Petrie's fault for assembling a dysfunctional team. I hope coach Westphal turns out to be the genius that can make this very unbalanced team work for the best.
THIS current team is not all that unbalanced, and not all that dysfunctional. Young, yes. Mistake prone, yes. But **** man look at the future. Listen, Mrs. Levin, I know you think a certain someone could've done better, but there is no better mid to late first round drafter in the NBA. Oh, I left Wallace off the list. Sure you can always find players that a GM misses. But that is arguing the wrong point, and a very pathetic and weak argument. What you have to look at is the record of all the other drafters and their draft positions. Petrie hits stars in the 15-30 range like nobody's business, and that's where we had been drafting for like 8 years. Our slide in to the basement was not the result of Petrie's bad drafting. Perhaps the owner's reluctance to bite the bullet and their meddling had something to do with it?
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It's still Petrie's team. Either he didn't get that signing Reef and Mikki Moore and others to five year MLE contracts wasn't going to keep/get us in contention, or he couldn't convince the Maloofs that it was time to strip down and rebuild, in which case, what good was he actually doing just bowing to their wishes? Keeping his job? I don't care about that. I care about the product on the floor.
Anyways, you're point is well taken. He did a good job drafting at the end of the first round for years, but that usually isn't enough to stay good. The trades, free agent acquisitions and overall influx of talent stopped in 2003, and all we had to rely on was late round picks. And now, we're a sub .500 team for the fourth year in a row.
The Hammer
All-Star
Points well taken. It was a little frustrating waiting around while we tried to shoot the gap and avoid a full rebuild. Petrie made some bad signings. I was, actually, specifically arguing Petrie's drafting. Can anyone name me a better drafting GM in the last 12 years?
And then when he does get a high pick, well, you can finish that sentence.
No, I get you there. I'm just saying that being stuck in the back end of the draft and having meddling owners doesn't absolve Petrie of the mess that he put together from 2005-onward. He's a good talent evaluator, but he's sort of stubborn in that he likes his shooters and Euro-guys, and he has never had a good defensive team or a particularly athletic team, and in fact he let the best athlete he's ever had get whisked away in an expansion draft. Those faults in particular contributed to Rick Adelman's dismissal, assuming the "we want a defensive-minded team" reasoning from the Maloofs was more than just a pretense.
Anyway, I'm just saying that, for all his strengths, he has his faults also, and if you're the GM, you can't say "well the owners wanted this, and the owners wanted that," because anyone can be a Yes Man. I could have done what the owners wanted. A GM should be building the team based on what he thinks is best, and if the owners won't let him do what he thinks needs to be done -- within reason -- then he should leave. I'd have rather seen Petrie building a winner for someone else than building a loser for us. But you can't put a team together and then lay all the blame at the owners' feet. You are the person responsible for the talent on the floor. The buck stops with you.
I agree about his faults but he does seem to be moving away from them slightly. We will see what happens this year in the draft if we wind up outside the obvious choice/sure thing range and have to choose between guys with obvious tradeoffs.
I think that what he does with the cap space is even more vital - will he be willing to sit on it an extra year if an impact player isn't available, or will temptation for a second or third tier guy get the better of him?
I think that what he does with the cap space is even more vital - will he be willing to sit on it an extra year if an impact player isn't available, or will temptation for a second or third tier guy get the better of him?
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