What is our biggest need?

What is the Kings single biggest need?


  • Total voters
    41
1)New Head Coach
2)Vets
3)New, Young, Passsionate Head Coach(Elie!! Elie!! Elie!! Elie!! Elie!!...and I personally volunteer to be his designated driver!:D...along with any other players/coaches/Maloofs that aren't fit to drive)
 
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I voted PG, but really its any guard who can (1) execute plays in the offense, (2) be a reliable shooter with a good 3, and (3) hit clutch shots. I'm really praying that we get this through the draft, who knows though.

Obviously an arena is key.

Coach has been frustrating but I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt (for now) given how many awful boneheaded plays can be attributed to the players right now.

A vet would be nice, but I don't think its essential. If, for example, Ray Allen joined the Kings tomorrow, we'd look a lot better instantly. I just don't think that's going to happen. We're going to have a great pick this year and we need to make it count.
 
About the "need a new coach" option:

Did anyone else here Grant last night when he talked about this issue. He maintains that PW is a good coach and he is not the issue. he went on with a bit of teaser and said something to the effect of "I see this team every day on and off the court and if people could see what I see they would say - oh wow."

He did not go on while I listened to him, but it was teaser. It makes it sound like there is something very troublesome going on with the team and it ain't PW.
 
About the "need a new coach" option:

Did anyone else here Grant last night when he talked about this issue. He maintains that PW is a good coach and he is not the issue. he went on with a bit of teaser and said something to the effect of "I see this team every day on and off the court and if people could see what I see they would say - oh wow."

He did not go on while I listened to him, but it was teaser. It makes it sound like there is something very troublesome going on with the team and it ain't PW.

I can't imagine what it could be. If it's not the coach, that means that pretty much every player on our roster is extremely stupid and unable to execute simple plays, in which case it is puzzling how they made it this far in their career. Like I said, statistically this is a highly unlikely scenario. If it's discipline or lazyness issues, well that's also the coach's responsibility to handle. If players aren't working hard enough or are not disciplined, the coach has the authority and duty to punish them and get this under control, and he's not doing that. The most likely reason I can think of for Grant's comments is that he and Westphal are buddies (although I don't know that, it's pure speculation) and he is trying to defend him from taking the heat for this mess.
 
About the "need a new coach" option:

Did anyone else here Grant last night when he talked about this issue. He maintains that PW is a good coach and he is not the issue. he went on with a bit of teaser and said something to the effect of "I see this team every day on and off the court and if people could see what I see they would say - oh wow."

He did not go on while I listened to him, but it was teaser. It makes it sound like there is something very troublesome going on with the team and it ain't PW.

It was mentioned in another thread, though not much followed up on. I'm very worried that the "problem" with the team is either Tyreke or DeMarcus. That's the very last thing we need, for one of our building block future star pieces to be the "problem".
 
I voted New Coach, but what I mean by that is that the Kings NEED to get the kinds of plays that most pther teams run.

* Their pick and roll is so pathetic as to be nonexistent.

* Their screens ARE non-existent -they don't even run them seriously, it's so bad.

How can the Kings, unique amongst any team I can remember in the NBA, be immune to understanding the importance of those 2 plays in an NBA offense?
 
damn I can only imagine how GREAT G-Wall will be with us if we somehow get him back...

lol i get the tone.

Just mentioning names.

I'm probably alone but i'd just like to see a positive move somewhere... even something as seemingly small as sticking with a line up, a positive trade (someone people can learn from, or glean inspiration), consistent minutes for our young (cousins) players, maybe some time for hassan. The season needs to be about developing the players now. IMO.
 
A vet would be nice, but I don't think its essential. If, for example, Ray Allen joined the Kings tomorrow, we'd look a lot better instantly. I just don't think that's going to happen. We're going to have a great pick this year and we need to make it count.
I've got this feeling that chemistry, maybe even respect, went to hell. Maybe some of that left with Ime, Noc, and even Martin. Not that I'd want those guys back necessarily.
 
Yeah, and the more mistakes he can learn from now, the better we will be in the future. Go sign Horace Grant and shove him in front of our "franchise" players, see how that works for this team in 2 years. Notice how this team somehow seems to have a chance to win when Cousins is playing well. Which he has for the most part despite a mistake here and there BTW. Hmmm, go figure.

I was specifically talking about going out and signing vets that will only take time away from these young guys and give Westphal more bodies to yank in and out of the lineup.

And I'm referring to the fact that your assumption doesn't correspond with the facts. The Kings signed a vet, Dalembert, but Cousins is still getting tons of minutes, despite the mistakes he's making. So the presumption that Westphal isn't going to give these young guys minutes if we sign a vet is absurd. You're operating under some old paradigm that is no longer relevant.
 
About the "need a new coach" option:

Did anyone else here Grant last night when he talked about this issue. He maintains that PW is a good coach and he is not the issue. he went on with a bit of teaser and said something to the effect of "I see this team every day on and off the court and if people could see what I see they would say - oh wow."

He did not go on while I listened to him, but it was teaser. It makes it sound like there is something very troublesome going on with the team and it ain't PW.

Grant has alluded to this in the past. He can only imply what's going on. He can't get into specifics. But from all the inferences it seems like these young guys have a lot to learn, not just on the court, but how to be a professional, work ethic, coachability, being team oriented, etc.

If these guys have any pride, then the pain of losing game after game has got to make them bear down and pay attention to the details the coach is trying to make them understand. If not, then it's just not going to work, no matter what. Here's a basic question: How many of these guys want to win? That's not: How many of these guys want to shine individually?
When I see the body language of some of these players on the court I get the distinct impression they could care less whether the team wins or loses, they just want the stats for their upcoming contracts.
 
When I see the body language of some of these players on the court I get the distinct impression they could care less whether the team wins or loses, they just want the stats for their upcoming contracts.

I have absolutely no idea how you could divine that in our situation. How exactly do you go about telling if a guy is frustrated he's not putting up numbers vs. a guy being frustrated he's not able to help us win? How do you tell the difference between depressed/confused/exasperated, and quitting because he's not putting up his numbers?

I've got a short list of suspects that way -- Landry being an obvious one concerened about his upcoming deal. But the frustration/motives with the rest?
 
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Your question brings a broader scope into the equaiton; how do you build a franchise? Not a team, mind you, but a franchise. How do you establish a winning franchise? The Jazz are a winning franchise. They lost their two cornerstones to age, but are here yet again w/Deron, Al, et al. The Spurs' identity is now a rickety old man who can still light you up, and a system that forces players to mold to the team, regardless of who you are. What is the trick? You have the chicken and egg syndrome here of good coach or good player. What comes first?

I would argue that players make coaches look good. Rivers was not considered with the amount of clout he has now before his big 3 rolled into town. I believe that Rondo would not have been this good had it not for the fact that he at once had to grow up to play w/the big 3 while at the same time having the big 3 take the burden of wins away from him.

Pop is a mainstay, but without the legacy of the twin towers, I am not sure he would be where he is now. Ditto for Sloan.

We are not going to have star power like Lakers or Cs. We have to accept that. We have no banners of mention save the misguided ones of our rookie and second year. What has management done? Promoted the players over the team. What does this do? Implies that we value the individual over the team. This sells tickets, because casual fans don't know the team, they know players. Casual fans, ones that are marketed to, identify with stars, not the team.

So I propose that we stop all this nonsense of 20-5-5, which was tacky and embarrassing. Posters marketing someone who didn't even play an NBA game yet...
If you guys watch Jazz and Spurs, their plays are very simple.

Take the post entry pass. If defender overplays, post player screens, ball swings back to top of key, and post entry pass is made. Help defender has to come, make the pass. Why do we not do this? When have we ever sealed the post defender, then swung it around for the top of key pass? Is this "too advanced?"

No, it's just not implemented with force. You can tell that a Kings players call for balls much more often than other teams. No oen shares the ball, and when a ball is passed, these guys are so starved of the ball that they just shoot it because who knows when the ball will come back to them? Can you blame them? Can you blame these young guys who have to sit at 1-4 flat over and over? or when bigs come for screens and never see the ball? Or the oft called for play of "watch Tyreke dribble for 7 seconds while the defense creeps in so he can take a hesitation dribble then drive into the lane?"

An outsider vet can only do so much, and that's assuming he WANTS to come in and play babysitter. You run into the issue of, "if he's good enough, he'll want to paly for a ring. If he's not that great of a vet, the kids won't value him anyways." Your successful vets are ones that are franchise players who have seen it and done it, and are loyal to the team. You guys forget that part of the reason Billups came to the Nuggs was because he was there before, and he liked it there. You can't just throw any old vet in Sac and expect the same calming results.

Establish a system, adhere to the system, make every player know his role in the system, and enforce the system the same way for everyone. That's our biggest need. Everything else will fall into place.
 
Where's the option for "growth"

Tha's what I would pick as well I see this team this year especially just struggling, but we as fans have to realize in this rebuild this is what has to happen. For the last couple years we've been met with stop gaps and hold overs from current teams, but this is the rebuild. We are actually rebuilding and it's gonna be long and very PAINFUL to watch. Let these young players grow together, add a vet here or there and tinker a little bit but Reke and Cousins are our new cornerstones let's just watch this unfold a bit. This in a way is what we all wanted and it's gonna suck to watch, but it has to happen. Like I've said before it just sucks that this team is going through arena and relocation issues because I don't think they can afford to rebuild in the current situation they are in.
 
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