Vivek's concerning (or not) Rudy Gay press conference

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You mean you think in Pete's interview Vivek said "if you can't get me Rudy Gay, you'll be fired"

righttt.

No, but if you express a certain philosophy in an interview and your potential boss is immediately impressed and then you get the job and they say "make it happen", or something along those lines, there is certainly an assumed mandate that you should make an effort to deliver on what you promised. Having a relationship already with Masai Ujiri probably gave Pete extra incentive to make that particular move a reality.

I think it's pretty obvious that Vivek has done as well as he has not just because he's a smart guy, but because he's enthusiastic and hands-on and likes working with other people. Those are essential skills in business. A lot of really smart people fail because they can't handle the "people-management" aspect of running a business. Of course you want an owner who's excited and engaged and generates enthusiasm in everyone around them. But Vivek is also an admitted basketball neophyte. The only thing that worries me about this front office dynamic is that the search for the "next big thing" whether that be position-less basketball or crowd-sourcing the draft or an increased emphasis on advanced stats and bio-metrics seems somewhat at odds with the slow it down, fundamental philosophy of Coach Malone. We're succeeding to the extant that we are this season not because we've cooked up some magic formula nobody else has, but because we got a traditional PG, our starting unit committed to playing high-effort team defense, and we pound the ball inside all game long which is as old-fashioned as it gets. Whenever we go away from that, loading up with shooters and a diminutive front-line, we struggle. If can they stick with that grind-it-out philosophy as the guide for further personnel moves, I think we'll be fine.
 
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I don't for a minute believe Rudy came up in any interview (may have, I'm just speculating) more likely they started looking round the league for players they could take flyers on and try and revitalise, Derrick was one, Rudy was one. Collison is another in many respects, Josh Smith is someone they obviously looked at, I think the pattern is pretty clear, I don't think Rudy was a special case by any means, but like I say, may have been who knows.

but getting all this from an off the cuff, try and make a player feel special at a press conference remark is a reach of epic proportions.
 
#1 After years and years of rumors and threats about the Kings leaving Sactown, Vivek bought the team and vowed to keep them here.

#2 After years and years of failed new arena attempts, Vivek came here and promptly helped get one done.

#3 After year and years of having well below average SF's bounce in and out of here, Vivek promptly helped bring one the better ones in the league to this team and then signs him for another - more reasonable - contract.

I am not about to complain. :)
 
What's with all the Vivek hate? He kept the team in Sac and improved the team. And opened up his wallet to do it....honestly I don't care who is calling the shots or the word coming out of his mouth. The team seems to care about each other, sactown, and winning...Go Vivek! Go Kings! They are winning folks find something else to complain about.
You have a very inaccurate working definition of 'hate'. Since when does 'taking the p***' out of one of Ranadive's comments, or not being willing to give him a lifetime free pass for keeping the team in Sacramento equal hate?
 
#1 After years and years of rumors and threats about the Kings leaving Sactown, Vivek bought the team and vowed to keep them here.

#2 After years and years of failed new arena attempts, Vivek came here and promptly helped get one done.

#3 After year and years of having well below average SF's bounce in and out of here, Vivek promptly helped bring one the better ones in the league to this team and then signs him for another - more reasonable - contract.

I am not about to complain. :)

Btw I totally agree... the end game is .... there is no team without Vivek, also its almost impossible to be worse than the Maloofs.

Overall the roster moves are clearly more good than bad and we are absolutely heading in the right direction.
 
LOL! analytics power house Rudy Gay! obviously a Petey move! at that point Rudy Gay was a Petey nightmare. anyway I'm not worried. I posted it because its funny... The vote for Nic on draft day was funny too. or odd... whatever tho ... I'm pleased with how the team is turning around overall.

Wrong. There were a ton of posts around here and elsewhere analyzing Rudy statistically and showing that he is a good, efficient player but that his efficiency tanked when he was misused (ie, when teams tried to make him a Kobe-style chucker).

Advanced analytics is a lot deeper than looking up his FG% on espn.com. The team recognized his strengths and built a system that emphasizes those strengths in a way that compliments Boogie.

Similarly I think were the moves to dump both Tyreke and IT- slashers who require Boogie to play around the FT line to give them space to operate, when the offense should more naturally be inside-out. Rudy is a great player and shooter from midrange, and has size as well which pulls bigger players away from the basket and gives Cuz more space to operate down low
 
You have a very inaccurate working definition of 'hate'. Since when does 'taking the p***' out of one of Ranadive's comments, or not being willing to give him a lifetime free pass for keeping the team in Sacramento equal hate?
When did I say lifetime pass? If you haven't noticed we currently have a winning record and the morale is at an all time high.
 
You have a very inaccurate working definition of 'hate'. Since when does 'taking the p***' out of one of Ranadive's comments, or not being willing to give him a lifetime free pass for keeping the team in Sacramento equal hate?


Like all CEO's, Ranadive is a salesman. He is a very good one at that. We continue to hear the same stuff pour out of his mouth just like his executive staff would because we are paying attention. The national media may only hear it a couple times before it get's relayed. That is what good salesmen do, their spiel is always the same. He's getting his message out.

Personally I am getting tired of hearing it, just like I get tired of hearing other sales speeches over and over. But I hear them a lot.
 
Wrong. There were a ton of posts around here and elsewhere analyzing Rudy statistically and showing that he is a good, efficient player but that his efficiency tanked when he was misused (ie, when teams tried to make him a Kobe-style chucker).

Advanced analytics is a lot deeper than looking up his FG% on espn.com. The team recognized his strengths and built a system that emphasizes those strengths in a way that compliments Boogie.

WRONG??? LOL!!! look there is no statistics that would make the argument that Rudy was good in TOR or the year before with TOR/MEM ...He was just soo awful!

anyway I love the Rudy Gay move. I agree he is great and fits well. But lets be honest about the fact he is an anomaly.
 
http://www.nba.com/kings/kings-livestream-coverage

Well if anyone watched the press conference for Rudy Gay today things got really interesting pretty quick. 3 secs into the clip Vivek says "When I hired Petey the first thing I DID... was tell him to get Rudy Gay".

LOL!!!!!! ohhhhh man...... good to know that our owner is the reason this happened at all in the first place... So the first thing our owner did after hiring a GM was tell the GM what to do... well alright!

Now this wouldn't be as concerning if not for that Grantland piece that followed our front office during the last draft. Now famously (mocked by Bill Simmons) Vivek did something unusual... He had everyone in the room vote on who we should take with.......non other than Vivek ...THE BOSS AKA THE WRITER OF ALL YOUR CHECKS leading the way with HIS vote "STAUSKAS!" ...What followed was a shocking unanimous "STAUSKAS!!!" chant.....

Now Stauskas could end up being a good player. Its just waaaaaaaay too early to tell... but..... Vivek's influence is starting to worry me .... OR IS PETEY MORE WORRISOME? LOL! hard to tell who we want running the team. LOL!

I don't take this charade on face value.

Meaning, I don't automatically believe it was Vivek and Vivek alone who controlled Rudy being here. But that narrative serves two purposes: 1) it allows Rudy to feel like the most powerful man in the org has his back (positive) and 2) it says Vivek is taking personal responsibility for our success or failure. He's getting right out in front of it.

Do I think he himself used his math skills or whatever to play GM and decide he wanted Rudy? Ahh, no. I'm not that naive. Do I think he and PDA mutually agreed, through an in-depth conversation during PDA's hiring process that Rudy was a top priority for rebuilding this team, and that PDA had and inside track on getting him from his buddy Masai? Yes.

The main thing though is making Rudy feel wanted and appreciated, from the top down. Same goes for the whole Stauskas production. This is a subtle but very powerful skill of leadership and a way of attracting and retaining top talent, and getting them to give you their all: you make it DAMN CLEAR that they are personally valued and wanted, and they'll give you everything they've got.
 
Like all CEO's, Ranadive is a salesman. He is a very good one at that. We continue to hear the same stuff pour out of his mouth just like his executive staff would because we are paying attention. The national media may only hear it a couple times before it get's relayed. That is what good salesmen do, their spiel is always the same. He's getting his message out.

Personally I am getting tired of hearing it, just like I get tired of hearing other sales speeches over and over. But I hear them a lot.
Perhaps you preferred the Maloofs and their silence. I heard they may get a hockey team you could go follow should you decide Vivek is too much.
 
I know it's kind of popular to worry about whether Vivek has his nose too deep in personnel decisions, but like Brick said, this is perfectly consistent with the following:

PDA (during interview): "Here is my philosophy about getting talent into small markets by going after overpaid contracts...(stuff)...For instance, I think Rudy Gay is a perfect target..."
Vivek (later): "Pete, you're hired! Now go get us Rudy Gay!"

What bothers me more is Vivek's insistence on kissing up to everybody. Seems like every time he appears in front of cameras with somebody - "Before we bought the team we knew that Pete was the guy we really wanted"; "Before we bought the team we knew Malone was the guy we really wanted"; "We always wanted Rudy to be here"; "I always surround myself with people smarter than me. Everybody at this table is smarter than me." ... It just goes on and on. After a while, it stops sounding sincere, you know?

Some of it is sincere, some of it is cultural.

Depending on where you are or where you are from, it is real easy to pick things up as being different when you travel, but it is often hard to know for 100% that your intent matches your perception if you are in another place, regardless if you are 100% fluent.
 
Vivek took credit for getting Rudy. Regardless of when and how the conversation came about with Petey/PDA. Make of it what you will, but to me it sounds like an owner who feels like he's part of the process of evaluating players and making personnel decisions. He could have just as easily said that PDA and he discussed getting Rudy and he was on board.

I'm not being critical of Vivek. I'm not calling for his head. He's a new owner and we are all trying to figure out what type of owner he will be. These are the things that are shaping his reputation.
 
Vivek is an interesting guy. I don't hate him by any means, I'm extremely appreciative and like him a great deal.

On the big moves, he likes to be front and center, perhaps to take the credit, perhaps to take some of the blame later if things don't work. He's never been one to shy away from the spotlight. And that makes him fair game to pick on. He can handle it.

I think it's ok to question some of the myth making stuff he does and the stories he tells over and over again. It might be more the culture of Silicon Valley, which he is very much a part of. You can't have a company without the "Founder" story, the guys in the garage making computers, that kind of stuff. Vivek has his own version. All of them do. It's just "how to run a corporation" 101. His job is to provide the vision, the NBA 3.0 stuff, goal setting, etc. It's also to make sure his top guys KNOW they are the top guys. He did that immediately with Boogie, and now with Rudy. Are there some white lies along the way? Probably. But if it makes Rudy happy, then so be it. It's just business. It's not how I would do things, but I'm not mega rich. To be mega rich, this is the game that is played.

As for Rudy, the "advanced" stats fans look at and the advanced advanced stats GMs look at may not be the same thing. . We all get Rudy was inefficient in Toronto (and possibly the anti-christ). The key was why, and not to put him in those spots. The Kings have largely done a brilliant job of it. Now some media types still insist Rudy is in decline physically. And maybe they are right. Career best numbers say otherwise, but the achilles is a concern. What isn't a concern is Rudy being some idiot chucker. There was a smallish sample size that said that's what he was, and a much longer career saying otherwise. Many here said as a #2, he could excel. They were right. They saw the clear difference in Rudy depending on usage percentage.

From PDA:
“We look at him differently than maybe others do. I feel like a lot of times with certain players, it’s where they’re getting the ball, it’s where they’re scoring, it’s the position they’re put in. And I think we have a good idea, we’re talking as a staff a little bit, we have a good idea of what positions that we’d like to put him in.”
 
I am firm believer that success in a sports franchise starts with the owner. How each owner goes about his business is probably different. I get the impression Vivek is a hands on personality.

Ahem:

MaloofBuggin.gif
 
Vivek has some strange interviews/press conferences where he always repeats the same things that are pretty corny. i knew as soon as he took the mic yesterday he was going to say "Rudy Gay is here to stay" haha. But he saved the franchise and he has it heading in the right direction so who cares.
But its just funny, like how many times did we hear him tell the story about telling Nik Stauskas he needs to beat Mullin in the 3pt contest in training camp, lol.
 
:rolleyes:

Okay, fine. You never actually said 'lifetime pass', I'll stipulate that. Nobody else said they 'hated' Vivek Ranadive, either. So, why are you the only one who gets to put words in other people's mouths?
I said hate on, not hated. Two different meanings.
 
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