What can the Kings do to fix this thing?

ockingsfan

ockingsfan

Starter
Watching the Kings broadcast, Doug Christie makes such good points on how the Kings can get over the hump. DC would make a damn good coach or at least a good assistant coach.

The Kings need to do the simple things like full court press to get the opponents out of rhythm coming up the court, so the opposing PG can't survey the court to set up their play. Putting maximum pressure in the back court will also lead to more turnovers and easy baskets for the Kings. These 3-4 extra turnovers or contests can be the difference between winning and losing every night.

Also, stopping the ball and not allowing the other team to waltz right into the lane for easy layups would also help the Kings get over the hump. Someone needs to step in the lane and contest and if not get the stop, foul them hard. Yesterday during the fourth quarter, Charlotte just made layup after layup, it was disgusting. If Dedmon can't do anything, we should just get him in there for his 6 fouls. If he can't get the block, get the hard foul.

Another major issue is learning to box out and secure the rebound. It's all about effort and positioning and the Kings are not getting it done. Last night, after a missed Hornets shot, there was 4 Kings around the rebound and they almost got it stolen by the one Hornet making an effort to get the ball. Pure disgusting effort from a team on a losing streak.

All of these are fixable issues. Luke needs to lay down the law and if the players don't put forth the effort and energy, then he needs to sit them at the end of the bench. No more Mr. Nice Guy coach, he needs to motivate these players to play. If they don't play the right way, he needs to sit them, period.

Lastly, replace the Gatorade with Red Bull in the locker room at half time!

What suggestions do you guys have to fix this Kings team, because most likely Luke and Vlade won't be fired 5 games into the season?
 
1. Offensively spread the court as much as you can, keep the middle clear, and set up SPOT shooters at the highest percentage areas. They are taking too many top the key 3's right now. If defenses run out, swing the ball, or drive then dish back out. They've been doing more of that lately but they don't stick with it even when it's working. Also, run a few post up plays for Barnes should the other team adjust the defense to keep driving lanes stuffed. Also, give Buddy Hield a few looks off pick and roll in the middle mid-range area. If he hits a few of those the 3's will fall.

2. Defensively is where things are going off the rails every single game and things have to start out like they do for any other team that means anything these days, from the outside in. Pressure. Switch if you have to and run lineups that make it work if you have to. The good thing is if the Kings put out a potential switch lineup of Fox, Buddy, Barnes, Ariza, and Holmes you should in theory still have plenty of shooting as long as Ariza is used as a spot up shooter. The big has to show up once the other team really starts hammering them in middle pick and roll. Just like last year the Kings are relying on help in the paint from the corners and using a guard to do it so they have to be even more aware on help. You designate one help defender in the paint depending on who they're helping off of. Walton could even go back to some defensive schemes the Warriors used. They were almost always in a tight-ish zone off the ball. The Kings have the size on the wing to pull that off. The Kings are playing really handsy defense, and the wrong kind. They need to use their length and hands to defend passing lanes, not restrict player movement. Also, icing some pick and roll might be useful since Holmes appears to have the ability to both move his feet and block shots from behind.
 
I wonder if this team is just soft. Fox and Bagley abruptly quitting on team USA was not a good look. Now we have problems with the team not playing hard in the 3rd quarter under pressure.
 
I think the only thing to do at this point is run and gun. Increase the pace to at least the level of last year. Also I would insert Yogi as the first guard off the bench.
 
Walton needs to be fired. It's that simple. His offense is non existent and only works if you have a Harden or LeBron type player that can break down defenses at will. If that first screen doesn't work, it's 1 on 1 after that. There's no 2nd or 3rd read. There's no back up plan. It's just "oh crap, the pick and roll didn't work so I need to do something". Which is why it seems like everyone and their brother is playing hero ball. The offensive system in place forces these guys to play hero ball.

Why does everyone keep blaming Ariza? He hasn't been good but he hasn't been as bad as you guys are making him out to be. His defense is still better than most of the guys on this team and he's taking the 2nd least shots per36 so he's really not hurting the team all that badly. Dedmon, Bogie and Hield have been much much worse so far.
 
ESP47 said:
Walton needs to be fired. It's that simple. His offense is non existent and only works if you have a Harden or LeBron type player that can break down defenses at will. If that first screen doesn't work, it's 1 on 1 after that. There's no 2nd or 3rd read. There's no back up plan. It's just "oh crap, the pick and roll didn't work so I need to do something". Which is why it seems like everyone and their brother is playing hero ball. The offensive system in place forces these guys to play hero ball.

Why does everyone keep blaming Ariza? He hasn't been good but he hasn't been as bad as you guys are making him out to be. His defense is still better than most of the guys on this team and he's taking the 2nd least shots per36 so he's really not hurting the team all that badly. Dedmon, Bogie and Hield have been much much worse so far.
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5 games-oldest first
Pts - 7,0,0,9,3
3pts 1of3,0of3,0of2,3of4,1of4

in my book thats just one game out of 5 was good game, other 4 games not so good
 
I'm not sure about a full court press. Most of the times I've seen a team do it, the opposing team beats it easily. the defense gets too streched out and out of place.
 
Jkbiker said:
5 games-oldest first
Pts - 7,0,0,9,3
3pts 1of3,0of3,0of2,3of4,1of4

in my book thats just one game out of 5 was good game, other 4 games not so good
Click to expand...

That's 5 for 16 on the year. Hield and Bogie are doing that much damage almost every night. Ariza is shooting as poorly as them but at least he plays better defense and isn't taking a ton of shots per night. He's way down the list of reasons why the Kings aren't winning if you ask me.
 
It starts with defense and toughness. (See follow paragraph). If you have some confidence in your D, your shooting is going to improve. Right now on offense my bet is that they are thinking too much with the new offense; hence they are missing wide open shots. This premise fits especially with Buddy Hield, who said last year that his game opened up with the running and gunning and Fox. He feels comfortable in running and letting it fly. It involves very little thinking. Well, if the Kings ever want to be in the playoffs and thrive in the playoffs the running and gunning has got to hit the junk pile in favor of a legit offense that runs when it can but also has the brains and discipline for a half court offense. The run & gun worked last year until about the mid-point, and then it didn't work. The Kings are obviously not navigating this transition very well. Could anyone navigate it without major pain? I have my doubts. Could someone navigate it better than Walton? Probably. Could others navigate it worse? Probably.

By the way, Christie made sense last year when he said the Kings should pick up guys in the back court. They did not do it last year. He still makes sense when he says they should do it this year. They still are not doing it. The furniture has been changed but it's the same lousy floor plan. When you have Fox and Joseph and Buddy and Barnes and Holmes (and eventually Giles and Bagley) on the same team you just have to put pressure on the opposing teams' guards by picking them up in the back court. What have you got to lose?
 
burekijogurt said:
I'm not sure about a full court press. Most of the times I've seen a team do it, the opposing team beats it easily. the defense gets too streched out and out of place.
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Well, Charlotte picked us up full court, wasn’t necessarily a press but it took off seconds off the shot clock. I think Christie was alluding to that. In the last, what minute or minute 30, Kings applied pressure and it caused some problems. I mean, are we not capable of doing this? We gave up 32 3 point shot attempts of which most, and I mean most everyone was fairly wide open.
 
dude12 said:
Well, Charlotte picked us up full court, wasn’t necessarily a press but it took off seconds off the shot clock. I think Christie was alluding to that. In the last, what minute or minute 30, Kings applied pressure and it caused some problems. I mean, are we not capable of doing this? We gave up 32 3 point shot attempts of which most, and I mean most everyone was fairly wide open.
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yeah they did have a couple of turnovers, and I was listening to Christie, but Im not sure it works over a long term. maybe set up a bit higher. a lot of those 3 pointers were like 5 feet behind the line. so its not that they were open, they just shot it from way out..
 
Walton has a 4 yeat deal. The chances of Vivek eatting that contract is zero. Season tickets are down this year. The three year contracts for the lower level preferred seats ended last year. Right now I bet the renewal rate would be super low. Some predicting a slow economy will hurt sales even more.

The only way its going to change is if another accusation comes out or the current one shows some evidence. Then they could void his contract.

Never liked the walton signing and so far its worse than I imagined.
 
burekijogurt said:
yeah they did have a couple of turnovers, and I was listening to Christie, but Im not sure it works over a long term. maybe set up a bit higher. a lot of those 3 pointers were like 5 feet behind the line. so its not that they were open, they just shot it from way out..
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Maybe the Kings don't need to full court press on every possession, since the players may get too tired, but once the momentum is changing against us or we get down by 2 or more possessions, then the full court press should be mandated.

We should be treating every possession to be the last, since we can't seem to get the urgency any other way.
 
dude12 said:
Well, Charlotte picked us up full court, wasn’t necessarily a press but it took off seconds off the shot clock. I think Christie was alluding to that. In the last, what minute or minute 30, Kings applied pressure and it caused some problems. I mean, are we not capable of doing this? We gave up 32 3 point shot attempts of which most, and I mean most everyone was fairly wide open.
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Exactly. Obviously you can't do it for 48 minutes but why wait until there's only 2 minutes left in the game to do it? At that point you basically need to get a turnover and hit a 3 on every possession from there on out to win the game. Extremely unlikely. If they would have started it with 5 minutes left, they could have closed the gap and then managed the game normally from the 3 minute mark on and possibly won it. Waiting until there's only enough time on the clock for a miracle to happen is just poor coaching.
 
sactowndog said:
I wonder if this team is just soft. Fox and Bagley abruptly quitting on team USA was not a good look. Now we have problems with the team not playing hard in the 3rd quarter under pressure.
Click to expand...

This team is soft as hell.

I will give Fox props for playing injured a lot, as well as attacking the basket and getting beat to hell while the refs swallow their whistles. ......

BUT.... he does play super passive for quarters at a time. And despite the occasional highlight block or steal, the dude gets lit up on the regular.

The rest of the team I won't even get into. Mentally soft. If the opponents make a run, everyone defaults to jacking dumb shots on offense and not trying on defense.

Holmes is the man though.
 
ESP47 said:
That's 5 for 16 on the year. Hield and Bogie are doing that much damage almost every night. Ariza is shooting as poorly as them but at least he plays better defense and isn't taking a ton of shots per night. He's way down the list of reasons why the Kings aren't winning if you ask me.
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yeah, by nba.com’s stat, Ariza is still having a better impact (in terms of net rating), than all of the regular rotation players except Holmes, Fox, and Bjelica (and he’s essentially tied with Fox and Bjelica). He’s done some glaringly bad things, but we might be overreacting to them (at least compared to all of the other bad things that are going on).
 
i watched bunch of postgame interviews and I do agree with the players: we got a lot of open shots we just missed them. retracement towards normal shooting percentages will help the situation a lot.
 
LPKingsFan said:
yeah, by nba.com’s stat, Ariza is still having a better impact (in terms of net rating), than all of the regular rotation players except Holmes, Fox, and Bjelica (and he’s essentially tied with Fox and Bjelica). He’s done some glaringly bad things, but we might be overreacting to them (at least compared to all of the other bad things that are going on).
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Jeeze, no wonder we suck. Ariza is one of our best players?!

I'm not surprised though. The players you listed are the only ones who really pass the eye test (and I still want more from Fox, but he's already playing banged up).

Buddy has been horrible. Barnes is solid, albiet rather invisible. Dedmon, laughing all the way to the bank. Bogi's playing up to the level of a rancid pile of a sick dog's ****....
 
gunks said:
Jeeze, no wonder we suck. Ariza is one of our best players?!

I'm not surprised though. The players you listed are the only ones who really pass the eye test (and I still want more from Fox, but he's already playing banged up).

Buddy has been horrible. Barnes is solid, albiet rather invisible. Dedmon, laughing all the way to the bank. Bogi's playing up to the level of a rancid pile of a sick dog's ****....
Click to expand...

here’s the full net rating breakdown, if you can stomach it: https://on.nba.com/2Wt8IK4
 
Full court press works fine against teams with weak or average ball handling. That is almost no team in the NBA. Putting some pressure on the ball in the half court can work against some teams, but it involves risk. It also takes additional energy. You have to change horses a lot to play pressure defense and be a fast breaking team at the same time.

Defense creates fast break opporutinites. Last year the Kings would break on a made basket.
 
ppine said:
Full court press works fine against teams with weak or average ball handling. That is almost no team in the NBA. Putting some pressure on the ball in the half court can work against some teams, but it involves risk. It also takes additional energy. You have to change horses a lot to play pressure defense and be a fast breaking team at the same time.

Defense creates fast break opporutinites. Last year the Kings would break on a made basket.
Click to expand...

That's not it. Putting pressure on teams in the back court and pull up your wings is not the same thing as a full court press. Make the opposing ball handler turn with the ball. Other teams pick up in the back court all the freaking time. It's time to see it from the Kings! This passive BS defense we've been seeing makes me puke. The only guy I've seen lately putting out the effort is Barnes, who has put pressure on from the wing and gotten steals because of it. But he can't be a one-man band. In fact, if he does it and nobody else does it, that's a problem. Also, one of the by-products of picking up the D in the half court is you get to see who is putting out the effort on D. It exposes laziness.
 
I never said fcp was the same as half court pressure. Every NBA team in the league can beat a full court press.
 
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