The Stubborn Refusal to Address Defense in the Sacto Era

beb0p said:
I think it's time to acknowledge that defensive players are not easy to get. For wing defenders to be useful, they need to be able to knock down the open threes - the Bowen/Thebo/Christie/ model. Problem is, those guys are almost always on reasonable contracts, great in the locker room, and model team players; so teams have no reason to trade them. When they become FAs, they almost always sign with contending teams. Good perimeter defenders who can't shoot (James Johnson, Donte Greene, Jamario Moon, etc) ultimately almost always play their way to the bench, it's simply very difficult to overcome their offensive deficiencies. So yes, for wing defenders to be useful, they need to be able to shoot; and those guys are hard to get.

Regarding shot-blockers, they are even harder to get than good wing defenders, and we have already talked about that at length. Yes, the Kings could have had Lopez or Whithey, but let's remember that Lopez was a mediocre player at the time of the trade; yes Lopez blew up in Portland but that was after the fact. Whithey was a sleeper passed over by a GM who was new to the team and didn't have sufficient time to prepare for the draft.... so for now I'm willing to give our GM a pass on both of those players.

Our team also seems to be set on Cousins at the center, so I think his future frontcourt partner is going to be a mobile PF rather than a big slow C. We'll see.

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Tony Allen cannot shoot a wide side of the barn yet he is a darn good defender!
 
You know at some point someone just needs to say, "It is what it is."

When the pedigree of the ownership and front office is Golden State and Denver you get offense first. Malone and Crew are tasked with training the team to play team defense at a level to remain competitive.

Lets let them get some of these offensive weapons firing on all cylinders and see how it works out.

KB
 
King Baller said:
I do! MBah's knees must be in bad shape. Do you remember the 2nd round picks we traded for MBah? Pete took those instead of Robin Lopez. Jeff Withey was also in that deal. Two defensive centers, a Vet and a Rookie. Pete did not want either apparently.

Some food for thought:

2012-13 Season Strengths

Interior Defense

Lopez was a solid contributor as a paint protector this season both as a help defender and in the post. When opponents posted him up, he held them to .73 points per play (per MySynergy Sports), which is not elite, but certainly above average. In addition, he posted a career high block rate, swatting 5% of opponents' field goal attempts while he was on the floor. Many of these blocks were a result of strong post D, but he picked up a decent number of them through help defense as well. The Hornets' team stats back up Lopez's defensive ability as well, as opponents scored 2.2 points per 100 possessions less with him on the court.

Link --> http://www.blazersedge.com/2013/7/4...icans-kings-verbally-agree-to-three-way-trade
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would you rather have robin or landry? he made 5.1m last season and 5.3 this season :) carl makes 6.5m/yr
 
beb0p said:
If it was up to me I'd put Cousins at the four, but I'm merely saying I don't think the higher ups on the team sees him as a four.

Besides, Cousins himself wanted to be a point guard when he was in college. So take what he says with a grain of salt.
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LOL. I remember that. And that was with John Wall and Eric Bledsoe on the team too. Boogie's crazy.
 
Brickie I feel like I've seen this post from you before haha.

I'll say a couple of things: first off, I 100% agree that we need better defenders on this team. However, the best immediate impact player we could get on the defensive end is someone in the mold of Ibaka, Chandler, or Ben Wallace- guys that are very hard to come by. On the other hand, I like the boldness of adding Rudy Gay, and Stauskas seems like a good fit for P&R and 3's (if he pans out). On a team full of garbage, ANY efforts to get better, on either end of the court, should be welcomed.

I'd also add that Vivek & Co. joined the Warriors with Lacob, part of a team that has moved the Dubs in the right direction- specifically, the Ellis for Bogut swap which, Bogut health aside, is a great step to getting more efficient and adding a defensive anchor. They also signed Iggy, who I still wish we could've gotten, but it does make more sense for him to be on a playoff team at this point in his career, so he may never have come, anyways. That's a good direction, right?

Short-term, it makes sense to add some immediate firepower to get more fan interest in the team. Yeah, it's a shallow move, but the Kings NEED to be exciting again for the Downtown Arena opening. I'm fine with adding a bunch of scorers are facilitators now, and then giving the team 2-3 years to add defensive players while allowing Malone to fully develop a defensive system and culture with the roster.
 
captain bill said:
Brickie I feel like I've seen this post from you before haha.

I'll say a couple of things: first off, I 100% agree that we need better defenders on this team. However, the best immediate impact player we could get on the defensive end is someone in the mold of Ibaka, Chandler, or Ben Wallace- guys that are very hard to come by. On the other hand, I like the boldness of adding Rudy Gay, and Stauskas seems like a good fit for P&R and 3's (if he pans out). On a team full of garbage, ANY efforts to get better, on either end of the court, should be welcomed.

I'd also add that Vivek & Co. joined the Warriors with Lacob, part of a team that has moved the Dubs in the right direction- specifically, the Ellis for Bogut swap which, Bogut health aside, is a great step to getting more efficient and adding a defensive anchor. They also signed Iggy, who I still wish we could've gotten, but it does make more sense for him to be on a playoff team at this point in his career, so he may never have come, anyways. That's a good direction, right?

Short-term, it makes sense to add some immediate firepower to get more fan interest in the team. Yeah, it's a shallow move, but the Kings NEED to be exciting again for the Downtown Arena opening. I'm fine with adding a bunch of scorers are facilitators now, and then giving the team 2-3 years to add defensive players while allowing Malone to fully develop a defensive system and culture with the roster.
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I don't think we have a team full of garbage, PDA did a nice job of clearing most of the selfish chuckers off the roster early in the season. I think right now we have a team full of players who don't play well together. We've seen flashes of potential from a lot of different guys but they can't seem to all put it together at once. As much as I harp on the need for individual defensive talent, I think we could actually improve quite a bit with the players we already have if they commit to Malone's team defense concept and play hard every game. Cousins was mostly a good defender this year. McLemore is getting better. McCallum has been average or better when he's played big minutes. Williams is quite capable when his head is in the game. We really need to lose IT though, in my opinion. Even starting Ray would be an upgrade this year in terms of keeping everyone involved in the offense and making life a little bit difficult for the other team's PGs. We can start adding individual defenders into the rotation at a later point but the foundation has to be there with our core players leading by example.
 
hrdboild said:
McLemore is getting better. McCallum has been average or better when he's played big minutes. Williams is quite capable when his head is in the game. We really need to lose IT though, in my opinion. Even starting Ray would be an upgrade this year in terms of keeping everyone involved in the offense and making life a little bit difficult for the other team's PGs. We can start adding individual defenders into the rotation at a later point but the foundation has to be there with our core players leading by example.
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One simple move that I want to see the FO do to completely change the culture of the team, especially with regards to defense.

Sign and trade the midget IT (plus filler) while he still has value FOR a full-sized shot blocker BIG.

No more defensive nightmare mismatch at the backcourt, no more small-ball play, and there will be less me-first mentality on the team.
 
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beb0p said:
If it was up to me I'd put Cousins at the four, but I'm merely saying I don't think the higher ups on the team sees him as a four.

Besides, Cousins himself wanted to be a point guard when he was in college. So take what he says with a grain of salt.
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Playing Cousins @ the 4 or 5 makes no difference, end of the day the best defender will guard him and he will guard the bigger/stronger and most often less talented player on defence to save his energy on offence.
 
A quote from Coach Malone in his interview with Cowbell Kingdom posted 1 July:

The one thing I’m very proud about is that we traded four players in the middle of December for Rudy (Gay), Quincy (Acy) and Aaron (Gray) and we didn’t have a lot of practice time, but if you look at our numbers from Jan. 1 through the end of the season, we were 12th in the NBA in field goal percentage defense. That is a great improvement from where this team has been the last few years.

So naysayers, some facts to support the defensive improvements without the benefit of training camp for the 3 newbies. This year Coach will go into Summer League with 5 or 6 contributors and possibly 1 or 2 starters then a full training camp with PDA/Malone roster. So be patient KF, slowly coming along.

See more of the interview at: http://cowbellkingdom.com/michael-m...-summer-league/#sthash.rBvpAw36.ikxA2N6L.dpuf
 
Look, it is obvioius Vivek is trying to build a Warriors 2.0 with the Kings. From day one he hired staff from the warriors and kept wanting to sign players with links to or played for the warriors.

Though I'm content with the Staukas pick, it is obvious that one of the reasons the FO wanted him was because he can fill that Klay Thompson role. So defense is always going to be talked about as being a priority just like the warriors, but they won't actually do it.
 
I absolutely adore the fact that a comparison to the Warriors is looked down upon with such a horrible stigma. The Warriors were one of the best defensive teams in the NBA last season. Bogut, Iggy, Draymond Green all play some SERIOUS defense and are amongst the best individual defenders in the entire NBA. Klay Thompson has also emerged as very good defensive perimeter player (just go watch his defense on Cp3 if you don't believe me) If Bogut is healthy in the playoffs, that series looks hell of a lot different.
 
CurseOfTheSalmons said:
never mind that GS got bogut, iguodala, draymond green, festus ezeli, jermaine o'neal, and now shaun livingston.
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Their defense improved from last season, but by very little. Their emergence has more to do with the rise of Curry and Thompson's offensive game the last few years.
What I mean is, you can talk about defense being your #1 priority all you want and sign better defensive players. But it is up to the team as a whole to change that identity and put defense before offense. No matter how much you tell the franchise Curry and Thompson to put defense first, they will still be offensive oriented players. Very few teams really hold true to that D first identity.

Also, I'm referring to Vivek wanting to copy the Warriors offense more specifically.
 
lack of defense comes from.. people who dnt know b ball.. soft owners who try to impress with talent then grit and toughness
 
Keep the faith, the defense will improve as the offense does. They both need it. But I'm afraid the current group can't do anything about the past 27 years.
 
andremiller07 said:
He made the MVP look like a average role player without the refs there to bail him out.
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Not sure what you are getting at. Even with that performance in mind Allen still lost the starting job to Courtney Lee.

Again, that just proves my point doesn't it?
 
andremiller07 said:
Playing Cousins @ the 4 or 5 makes no difference, end of the day the best defender will guard him and he will guard the bigger/stronger and most often less talented player on defence to save his energy on offence.
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Disagree completely. Even with the dilution of the 4/5 there is STILL a clear difference between the PF and the C. It's why the Dwight/Asik duo didn't work out. It's why Gasol struggled next to Bynum. By saying, "he will guard the bigger/stronger and most often less talented player on defence" you are in fact saying Cousins will guard other teams' centers (because that description most often applies to C). So basically you agree with me.
.
 
Okay random thought: the best Kings teams on defense were the early 2000 teams. Those teams had some stiffs on D (thinking specifically Peja and especially Bibby). The idea that if you want a better team on D means you have to get rid of every player who is bad on D is wrong. You can have a couple guys who aren't great individual defenders, as long as they play within the system, and you have other, better defenders to make up for it, both by guarding the better offensive players and by acting as a back-stop when guys blow by and get to the rim.

We need two things, IMO: (1) a versatile athletic defender in the 6'5-6'8 range who can guard multiple positions, and (2) a tenacious big man to guard the basket.

Getting rid of IT won't clear room for either of those guys. Also, if Bibby could be the PG on the best Kings defensive teams ever, there's no reason to think IT couldn't run the point for a good defensive team, either.
 
captain bill said:
Okay random thought: the best Kings teams on defense were the early 2000 teams. Those teams had some stiffs on D (thinking specifically Peja and especially Bibby). The idea that if you want a better team on D means you have to get rid of every player who is bad on D is wrong. You can have a couple guys who aren't great individual defenders, as long as they play within the system, and you have other, better defenders to make up for it, both by guarding the better offensive players and by acting as a back-stop when guys blow by and get to the rim.

We need two things, IMO: (1) a versatile athletic defender in the 6'5-6'8 range who can guard multiple positions, and (2) a tenacious big man to guard the basket.

Getting rid of IT won't clear room for either of those guys. Also, if Bibby could be the PG on the best Kings defensive teams ever, there's no reason to think IT couldn't run the point for a good defensive team, either.
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Well said and finally a post with some history and perspective that actually makes sense.

The best Kings run in Sacramento was an offensive juggernaut that for a time was also very solid defensively. They had a couple poor defensive players in the starting lineup, a couple mediocre defenders in the starting lineup, and one excellent defender in the starting lineup with a couple pretty good defenders off the bench. What that team did have was a very solid TEAM DEFENSE that worked well as a unit (especially the 2nd unit) and they were so efficient and prolific on offense that it in turned help their defense.

Teams tend to be built in the image of who their best players are. If your absolute best players are offensive players you build the image in that first. The Webber/Vlade team was built around offense and they worked on and improved the defense as they went. Right now Cousins and Gay are known for being offensive players, neither one of them is ever going to be known as a great defender. As such you build around their strengths (try to assemble an offensive powerhouse) and work on the defense as you go. Cousins and Gay are never going to be great defensive players with a focus on defense so as long as those are the #1 and #2 guys on the team you aren't going to have a team BUILT ON DEFENSE.

That's not to say that the defense doesn't need a lot of work (what they really need is that versatile "wing defender" that can guard multiple positions).

Good GM's build teams on the strengths of their best players and work on the weaknesses of the team as a whole (i.e. team defense). That's just how it works. You can't and won't have a "defensive oriented" team when guys like Cousins and Gay are your best players.
 
Swaze said:
Good GM's build teams on the strengths of their best players and work on the weaknesses of the team as a whole (i.e. team defense). That's just how it works. You can't and won't have a "defensive oriented" team when guys like Cousins and Gay are your best players.
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Cousins is not a poor defender. He had the best Drtg on the team by far last year (17th in the league) and he finished the year tied for 17th in blocks per game and tied for 19th in steals per game. That makes him the only player in the league to make both top 20 lists. Put a stellar shotblocker/rebounder next to him and that's a very intimidating front line. I don't know about Rudy at the 3, but Cousins is not holding us back at all defensively.
 
hrdboild said:
Cousins is not a poor defender. He had the best Drtg on the team by far last year (17th in the league) and he finished the year tied for 17th in blocks per game and tied for 19th in steals per game. That makes him the only player in the league to make both top 20 lists. Put a stellar shotblocker/rebounder next to him and that's a very intimidating front line. I don't know about Rudy at the 3, but Cousins is not holding us back at all defensively.
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He's worked some and is no longer a poor defensive player but he's not a great defensive player either. He doesn't do anything defensively (except maybe taking charges) to put him in an elite class on the defensive end. Cousins strength is on the offensive end it's as simple as that.
 
Swaze said:
He's worked some and is no longer a poor defensive player but he's not a great defensive player either. He doesn't do anything defensively (except maybe taking charges) to put him in an elite class on the defensive end. Cousins strength is on the offensive end it's as simple as that.
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Doesn't do anything defensively to make him elite...except the stats disagree with you.

-- he led the league in charges taken
-- he led all centers in steals
-- he is one of the best defensive rebounders in the league
-- he blocked nearly as many shots as Marc Gasol and Joakim Noah, and more than Tyson Chandler (names may sound familiar because last 3 DPOY)
-- led his team in DRTG by a mile
 
Bricklayer said:
Doesn't do anything defensively to make him elite...except the stats disagree with you.

-- he led the league in charges taken
-- he led all centers in steals
-- he is one of the best defensive rebounders in the league
-- he blocked nearly as many shots as Marc Gasol and Joakim Noah, and more than Tyson Chandler (names may sound familiar because last 3 DPOY)
-- led his team in DRTG by a mile
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You really think he is an elite defender? If he was that would mean he didn't have much room left for growth on the defensive end and I think even you would agree that he still has room to grow there.

I already admitted he's elite at taking charges. The steals stat is nice but big men don't make their name or reputation defensively by getting steals. He is a great rebounder but then again so is Kevin Love. Does anybody think Kevin Love is an elite defender because he gets a lot of rebounds?

When one thinks of the word DEFENSE and BIG MEN you think of a few things.......

How well does he guard his man in the low-post?
How well does he defend the paint, rotating over from the weak side?
How well does he defend the pick-n-roll?

Can you honestly say that Demarcus is at the same level in doing the above 3 things as guys like Tim Duncan, Marc Gasol, DeAndre Jordan, Joakim Noah, etc?

You can give me all the cute stats you want like steals and taking charges but events that happen (by him) 2 or 3 times a game are not at the core of what makes an elite defensive player. You know that or at least you should.

Tim Duncan hasn't been an elite defender for so many years because he takes charges and gets 1.5 steals per game.

I'm not saying Demarcus is a bad defender, he's actually above average overall and elite in a couple of fringe categories but c'mon man to suggest he is elite (as a whole) as a defender is just laughable.

God help this team if he is because if the Sacramento Kings had a truly elite defensive center and they are still this bad (last year) defensively then they'd have no hope. Demarcus has room to improve as a defender and you know it.
 
captain bill said:
Okay random thought: the best Kings teams on defense were the early 2000 teams. Those teams had some stiffs on D (thinking specifically Peja and especially Bibby). The idea that if you want a better team on D means you have to get rid of every player who is bad on D is wrong. You can have a couple guys who aren't great individual defenders, as long as they play within the system, and you have other, better defenders to make up for it, both by guarding the better offensive players and by acting as a back-stop when guys blow by and get to the rim.

We need two things, IMO: (1) a versatile athletic defender in the 6'5-6'8 range who can guard multiple positions, and (2) a tenacious big man to guard the basket.
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I wouldn't be surprised if they try to get Moute back on the team at some point
 
captain bill said:
Okay random thought: the best Kings teams on defense were the early 2000 teams. Those teams had some stiffs on D (thinking specifically Peja and especially Bibby). The idea that if you want a better team on D means you have to get rid of every player who is bad on D is wrong. You can have a couple guys who aren't great individual defenders, as long as they play within the system, and you have other, better defenders to make up for it, both by guarding the better offensive players and by acting as a back-stop when guys blow by and get to the rim.

We need two things, IMO: (1) a versatile athletic defender in the 6'5-6'8 range who can guard multiple positions, and (2) a tenacious big man to guard the basket.

Getting rid of IT won't clear room for either of those guys. Also, if Bibby could be the PG on the best Kings defensive teams ever, there's no reason to think IT couldn't run the point for a good defensive team, either.
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image.jpg
 
rainmaker said:
Well, the only guy who seems the least bit concerned with defense within our organization is our coach, who appears heavily outnumbered on that topic while everyone else gets all hot and bothered by these sexy shooters and fun-loving smallball.

An issue is that to have a good defensive team, you've got to make quite an effort to get that defensive team in place. It's acquiring the right defensive players at the right positions, having clear roles and having a coach who preaches defense, along with a sound strategy. Just as being a run and gun team take quite a bit of effort. You need to make a concerted effort to put together a roster which resembles GS/Den/Pho of old.

None of it happens by accident.

We're of course putting more effort into the latter than we are the former.

Outgoing defenders under PDA:
Reke
Douglas
Aldrich
Passed on Robin Lopez who was sent to us, instead sent him to Portland where his defense was key
Mbah a Moute
Salmons-yeah, he'd be our best backcourt defender right now

Incoming poor defenders:
Vasquez
Landry
DWill
Ben
Acy-scrappy, physical, but poor defender
Evans-maybe the one incoming plus defender under PDA's reign
Stauskas

We can sit here and hope it changes in the coming weeks, and yes, some of these moves were about clearing out bad contracts/getting Rudy, but there's a clear as day pattern here.

Offense first, worry about defense later, whenever later arrives.
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I can't argue with any of this, unfortunately.
 
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