What doesn’t kill You makes You stronger until it eventually kills You.
On November 6th 2001 Kings won in Cleveland 115-99 to improve 4-0 for the season at that point. It was a typical Kings game with 30 assists, almost 50% and balanced scoring. Kings didn’t play defense ( Cavs shot over 52%) – made no difference.
Pedja lead the Kings with 32/10/3, Bibby had 18/6a, DC had 15/6/3 and Vlade had 8/10/6/2. Bench was strong again lead by Bobby who played a great game contributing 17/8/4/1/1, Hedo had 8/4/6/2 and Funderburke had 8/5.
Kings finished a first road trip of the season with a mediocre but not horrible 1-2 with the loss to the Bucks last night. The 1-2 is much, much better than the performances itself. It could have been 0-3 and it probably should have been. Now, we get some home games where we can either catch up or dig a bottomless hole. Only bright spot was Kevin Martin who has shown that we can count on him on the road too. It is still very early in the season and if You look at Mavs, Heat or Suns – things don’t look too bad just yet. The question is – where do we go from here ?
4 home games coming up with a chance for us to build some momentum by actually winning let’s say ¾ of the games. Would it be too much to ask to score 100 pts in a game or shoot at least 40% before garbage time. Asking for a good play trough out 4 quarters isn’t realistic but maybe 3 quarters could be possible, please. 2 of the 4 games are going to be on national TV (BSPN). Plenty of time for the “experts” to tell us how much we suck. We could ask for some health too but it wouldn’t do us any good.
After 3 games we already have 2 of the “core” players not healthy and since we are Kings – they play the 2 positions that we can not replace. On the bright side – all 6-8 tweeners are in great health and ready to suck if called upon. Mo Taylor is one injury away from starting and Corliss is one away from playing his favorite position as center. In fact Corliss has better chances of getting minutes as a center than as SF which is his natural position. The whole world seems to be “inside-out”
There is a “joke” about an optimist and a pessimist that fits in our situation perfectly. The “pessimist” says – “ It can’t get any worse” and the “optimist” says “yes, it can” Probably, not funny considering our situation. Some of You thought – it can’t get worse when we traded Webber and then when the last season started and we were 10 games below .500 and even now. It can get worse. The rock bottom will be hit when Kings leave Sacramento. At this moment in time which is same as the moment of the Webber trade, Kings are middle of the nowhere. Not horrible enough to start over and not good enough to contend. Only one player that looks promising in his development, several solid players in their prime years and bunch of garbage and toxic waste. This has been going on for 2 + seasons now. It looks like a never-ending story. I am not sure what is the base on the optimism that some of You expressed during the summer. Lot’s of teams did something to improve. We did nothing. But there is always another summer.
I still remember the Maloofs – clowns saying in 2002 how we are going to be good for many years to come. We stopped being good in 2004 and I have yet to find a definition of the word “many” that includes “2”. So, it wasn’t that many. Bottom-line – it is their money and if they don’t choose to spend it – we have to live with it. The fact is that the “product” is nowhere near as good as it was in the past and even worse – there doesn’t seem to be a plan or a goal. We aren’t rebuilding or contending – hence we are wasting time and prime years of some pretty good players. We might end up like Wolves did in the last 2 years. Obviously, we missed “the train” at some points
SAR or KT – the question is - Why us ??? I don’t know either.
SAR is without a doubt better player who should be starting but can’t because he is the “bench” that we have right now. He would be a great bench player playing behind a legitimate PF. That would give SAR plenty of playing time because if we had a really good PF – he would be injured by now. I have no complaints about his performances in general. He just isn’t what we really need as a starting PF. Very good bench player.
KT – wasn’t really supposed to play for us at this point in time. I sure didn’t sigh up for it. He was supposed to be “in transition” as a one of the flexible pieces. Meanwhile – he has gotten permanent as they come. To ensure that - we brought in Mo Taylor and Brad is hurting too. KT should not be starter on any NBA team and he is even worse off the bench. I just hope that we don’t trade his expiring contract for some more flexible pieces of that kind. I mean – we let Bonzi go. KT should be no brainer.
My point – any discussion where Your choices are such that it really makes no difference in a big picture – is waste of time.
I didn’t want to bring this so early in the season but now that it has become obvious that scoring 100 pts will not be a regular occurrence – makes really no difference. Over the years we took many things for granted. High scoring offense, great flow of the game, lost of assists, not too many turnovers, high percentage shooting etc. RA has managed to accomplish that over 8 years despite all changes, injuries etc. Muss is not that good of an offensive coach. He is more defensively oriented. Isn’t that what we wanted ?
The saying that defense wins championships is not exactly true. A good defense leads to good offense and that leads to winning. Even the best defensive teams won’t win many games shooting below 40%. Key is the balance.
This is probably not funny at all but here are some things that will let You know that You are currently a Kings fan
-when You don’t know what it feels like to score 100+ points or shoot + 40%
-when You are shocked that Your team has out rebounded the opponent
-when You hoped that Your team would land Jalen Rose
-when You are considering signing the “Kandiman”
-when You are asking Yourself what Tony Massenburg is doing these days
-when Mo Taylor is on the verge of being a starter on Your team
-when 80% players are 6’8 tall
-when You are reluctant to any trades involving “flexible pieces”
-when Your starting PF has more fouls than field goals this season
-when at least 2 of Your starters are hurting
-when an injury that happened in the 3rd game of the season is already considered midseason injury.
-when You wasted a thought on trying Jason Hart again.
So – Bucks needed one quarter to take us apart. They abused our front line like Webber used to abuse Mavs. We sank quicker that Titanic. They were able to get what they wanted and they made us pay. We panicked again and since we weren’t really good swimmers to begin with – we drowned. The first half was solid but we had nothing after the break. To ad insult to injury – Brad is hurting and it looks like this one will take a while. As for Bucks – their front line has a field trip.
AWARD TIME
TDM goes to Mo Williams who had an easy game. Villanueva and Bogut were also worthy of that award. Michael Redd is way past it.
LW- VC award goes to C Bell mostly because he won TDM award last season and couldn’t do anything last night.
No JHA tonight.
Wolves are in town and it is time for payback. They are beatable but it will be hard if Brad can’t go. ARCO will help but Wolves have done great at ARCO over the years. We won’t stop Garnett. Their bench will cause some problems but they are not any good. We shoud be able to win it.
Mike – still playing one handed. Hope the injury doesn’t get worse
Ron – shooting about 25% for the season. Has got to get better and soon
Brad- get well man as soon as possible
Kevin – plays well at home and we need that
SAR – been good off the bench as we need more
The rest – needs to do something before I waste my thought on them
Muss – will se what kind of rabbits he has in his hat. I guess – non of them is taller than 6’8
Wolves lost to Portland last night. They are really nothing except KG. Unfortunately we are not much better either. We had a shot to win in Minnesota last week. Maybe with the ARCO crowd we can get back to .500
Can Troy Hudson defend hid TDM award or will it this time be someone else like Griffin, Jaric
LW-VC award will go to a Wolves player. And I could care less which one it will be
Can someone please beat LA !!!
On November 6th 2001 Kings won in Cleveland 115-99 to improve 4-0 for the season at that point. It was a typical Kings game with 30 assists, almost 50% and balanced scoring. Kings didn’t play defense ( Cavs shot over 52%) – made no difference.
Pedja lead the Kings with 32/10/3, Bibby had 18/6a, DC had 15/6/3 and Vlade had 8/10/6/2. Bench was strong again lead by Bobby who played a great game contributing 17/8/4/1/1, Hedo had 8/4/6/2 and Funderburke had 8/5.
Kings finished a first road trip of the season with a mediocre but not horrible 1-2 with the loss to the Bucks last night. The 1-2 is much, much better than the performances itself. It could have been 0-3 and it probably should have been. Now, we get some home games where we can either catch up or dig a bottomless hole. Only bright spot was Kevin Martin who has shown that we can count on him on the road too. It is still very early in the season and if You look at Mavs, Heat or Suns – things don’t look too bad just yet. The question is – where do we go from here ?
4 home games coming up with a chance for us to build some momentum by actually winning let’s say ¾ of the games. Would it be too much to ask to score 100 pts in a game or shoot at least 40% before garbage time. Asking for a good play trough out 4 quarters isn’t realistic but maybe 3 quarters could be possible, please. 2 of the 4 games are going to be on national TV (BSPN). Plenty of time for the “experts” to tell us how much we suck. We could ask for some health too but it wouldn’t do us any good.
After 3 games we already have 2 of the “core” players not healthy and since we are Kings – they play the 2 positions that we can not replace. On the bright side – all 6-8 tweeners are in great health and ready to suck if called upon. Mo Taylor is one injury away from starting and Corliss is one away from playing his favorite position as center. In fact Corliss has better chances of getting minutes as a center than as SF which is his natural position. The whole world seems to be “inside-out”
There is a “joke” about an optimist and a pessimist that fits in our situation perfectly. The “pessimist” says – “ It can’t get any worse” and the “optimist” says “yes, it can” Probably, not funny considering our situation. Some of You thought – it can’t get worse when we traded Webber and then when the last season started and we were 10 games below .500 and even now. It can get worse. The rock bottom will be hit when Kings leave Sacramento. At this moment in time which is same as the moment of the Webber trade, Kings are middle of the nowhere. Not horrible enough to start over and not good enough to contend. Only one player that looks promising in his development, several solid players in their prime years and bunch of garbage and toxic waste. This has been going on for 2 + seasons now. It looks like a never-ending story. I am not sure what is the base on the optimism that some of You expressed during the summer. Lot’s of teams did something to improve. We did nothing. But there is always another summer.
I still remember the Maloofs – clowns saying in 2002 how we are going to be good for many years to come. We stopped being good in 2004 and I have yet to find a definition of the word “many” that includes “2”. So, it wasn’t that many. Bottom-line – it is their money and if they don’t choose to spend it – we have to live with it. The fact is that the “product” is nowhere near as good as it was in the past and even worse – there doesn’t seem to be a plan or a goal. We aren’t rebuilding or contending – hence we are wasting time and prime years of some pretty good players. We might end up like Wolves did in the last 2 years. Obviously, we missed “the train” at some points
SAR or KT – the question is - Why us ??? I don’t know either.
SAR is without a doubt better player who should be starting but can’t because he is the “bench” that we have right now. He would be a great bench player playing behind a legitimate PF. That would give SAR plenty of playing time because if we had a really good PF – he would be injured by now. I have no complaints about his performances in general. He just isn’t what we really need as a starting PF. Very good bench player.
KT – wasn’t really supposed to play for us at this point in time. I sure didn’t sigh up for it. He was supposed to be “in transition” as a one of the flexible pieces. Meanwhile – he has gotten permanent as they come. To ensure that - we brought in Mo Taylor and Brad is hurting too. KT should not be starter on any NBA team and he is even worse off the bench. I just hope that we don’t trade his expiring contract for some more flexible pieces of that kind. I mean – we let Bonzi go. KT should be no brainer.
My point – any discussion where Your choices are such that it really makes no difference in a big picture – is waste of time.
I didn’t want to bring this so early in the season but now that it has become obvious that scoring 100 pts will not be a regular occurrence – makes really no difference. Over the years we took many things for granted. High scoring offense, great flow of the game, lost of assists, not too many turnovers, high percentage shooting etc. RA has managed to accomplish that over 8 years despite all changes, injuries etc. Muss is not that good of an offensive coach. He is more defensively oriented. Isn’t that what we wanted ?
The saying that defense wins championships is not exactly true. A good defense leads to good offense and that leads to winning. Even the best defensive teams won’t win many games shooting below 40%. Key is the balance.
This is probably not funny at all but here are some things that will let You know that You are currently a Kings fan
-when You don’t know what it feels like to score 100+ points or shoot + 40%
-when You are shocked that Your team has out rebounded the opponent
-when You hoped that Your team would land Jalen Rose
-when You are considering signing the “Kandiman”
-when You are asking Yourself what Tony Massenburg is doing these days
-when Mo Taylor is on the verge of being a starter on Your team
-when 80% players are 6’8 tall
-when You are reluctant to any trades involving “flexible pieces”
-when Your starting PF has more fouls than field goals this season
-when at least 2 of Your starters are hurting
-when an injury that happened in the 3rd game of the season is already considered midseason injury.
-when You wasted a thought on trying Jason Hart again.
So – Bucks needed one quarter to take us apart. They abused our front line like Webber used to abuse Mavs. We sank quicker that Titanic. They were able to get what they wanted and they made us pay. We panicked again and since we weren’t really good swimmers to begin with – we drowned. The first half was solid but we had nothing after the break. To ad insult to injury – Brad is hurting and it looks like this one will take a while. As for Bucks – their front line has a field trip.
AWARD TIME
TDM goes to Mo Williams who had an easy game. Villanueva and Bogut were also worthy of that award. Michael Redd is way past it.
LW- VC award goes to C Bell mostly because he won TDM award last season and couldn’t do anything last night.
No JHA tonight.
Wolves are in town and it is time for payback. They are beatable but it will be hard if Brad can’t go. ARCO will help but Wolves have done great at ARCO over the years. We won’t stop Garnett. Their bench will cause some problems but they are not any good. We shoud be able to win it.
Mike – still playing one handed. Hope the injury doesn’t get worse
Ron – shooting about 25% for the season. Has got to get better and soon
Brad- get well man as soon as possible
Kevin – plays well at home and we need that
SAR – been good off the bench as we need more
The rest – needs to do something before I waste my thought on them
Muss – will se what kind of rabbits he has in his hat. I guess – non of them is taller than 6’8
Wolves lost to Portland last night. They are really nothing except KG. Unfortunately we are not much better either. We had a shot to win in Minnesota last week. Maybe with the ARCO crowd we can get back to .500
Can Troy Hudson defend hid TDM award or will it this time be someone else like Griffin, Jaric
LW-VC award will go to a Wolves player. And I could care less which one it will be
Can someone please beat LA !!!
