LeBron was horrible defensively before Mike Brown
Brown wasn’t a great offensive mind and relied heavily on assistants for that, but he’s an undeniably great defensive coach and turned LeBron into the high IQ defensive savant he is. Pre-Brown LeBron chased for highlight plays and got caught out of position all the time
Unfortunately, this might be the peak for them
It's hard to see where they improve a ton with this roster.
They're all offense, no defense, their stars are in their prime, and they benefited a ton from health relative to the rest of the league
Despite popular belief Huerter is not a big time playoff role player. Outside of Game 7 vs Philly he was mostly a ghost for us as he was this series. We really needed him to take and make shots vs Miami last year and he was a timid brick layer to say the least.
But, he’s still a very heady, skilled player who will continue be a plus starter for the Kings but he’s not explosive enough to really go off in the playoffs. He’s almost too smart a player for the playoffs, he plays within himself to a fault and playoff defenses don’t allow that, sometimes you got to improvise.
Sure, if we just magically make a bunch of awful defenders better on defense, they're better
But that's probably not going to happen.
It's like saying "man, if only those Dame/CJ teams has been moderately better on defense"
I feel like the best defenders of a losing playoff team is always the team that beat them. But I agree, no reason this team doesn't take a leap and make a deep run next year. Then you can start assessing what changes need to be made to win it all
Being a 3 seed and going to the wire with the defending champs is their peak? Is this supposed to be a bad thing?
Edit: Their core is all under 30 aside from Barnes with only really "one" year under their belt, and defensively they can only improve. If they get a more favorable playoff bracket with this exact team then it's not unreasonable for them to make a conference final or even further.
fox is 25 and just had his first taste of the playoffs, keegan and davion are young, sabonis is 26, the only declining player on the roster is useless barnes
Bro, all of their roster is pretty young. Keegan has looked incredible for a rookie and has a ton of room to improve. Fox and Sabonis are both young to compete for years to come.
They're young, just age + experience is going to be good for em. Sabonis and Fox are 25 & 26. Heurter/Monk/Mitchell are 24, and Murray is 22.
Their only player on the decline age-wise is Harrison Barnes, but he's on the last year of his contract so he's probably going to get cheaper.
No need to freak out though. The roster is still pretty young so no blow up needed. Maybe can just add some a solid vet player or two and they will be fine.
their entire team is basically 23-26 y/o. they don’t have to improve the roster the players might just improve lol. either way they played well enough to get through prob 80% of the first round teams. they were a team with 0 experience going against the most experienced team in the league lol
Their players are mostly near their primes man. They'll make small improvements, but guys at 25-26 tend to be pretty close to as good as they'll ever be
And the kings need big changes to be contenders, not small ones
1. Fox is 25, Sabonis is 26. They are just at the start of their prime and just gained a lot of valuable playoff experience. Vast majority of the supporting cast is also relatively young: Murray 22, Huerter 24, Davion 24, Monk 25
2. Keegan Murray is the X-factor with regards to this core's ceiling. He had a strong rookie season and actually contributed on a playoff team. Broke the rookie 3 point record on 41% shooting. If he can improve his handle and sharpen up on the defensive end, I'd be really excited about where he could help take this team.
3. I think with Sabonis at C there will always be a cap on this team's defense. However, Fox has the tools to be a great defender (and showed this at points in the series). Murray has potential on the defensive end, and Davion is a nice defensive option off the bench. Not to mention that Mike Brown is touted as a defensive coach and has schemed up some great defensive teams. I wouldn't write off at least some level of defensive improvement next year, especially if that is a point of emphasis with roster moves this offseason.
4. We benefited from our health, but only to a certain extent. Sabonis has been playing with a broken hand since December, and I am going to go out on a limb and guess he might have been a little more effective going to his right if he was healthy. Fox got injured in Game 4 and since that moment his handle was never the same. Probably changed the trajectory of the series at least a little bit.
5. We've got cap space this year. This will be the Kings best year to look for opportunities to add talent to the team.
Such a weak take:
"Your team sucks so you can't have opinions on other teams"
Just say you think I'm right and that makes you insecure lol
Hint: maybe I know a thing or two about teams that are elite offensively and play no defense?
A perfect example of a non-championship season that shouldn't be called a failure. The series loss can't invalidate the ride the Kings and their fans just went on. From an entertainment standpoint it was a success. Getting the 3rd seed is absolutely a successful regular season. A fantastic season to continue building on. They have a tremendous offensive core and proved they can stack up with the best in the league.
This debate is all semantics and perspective. But if the Warriors had lost it would be considered a failure like many would say of the Bucks because they have both won it before so that’s the standard.
Yea, when your superstar is 35 that means your window can close any moment. Every year lowers your chance to win the title, so you gotta make every year count.
Kings dont really have a superstar yet but they are growing Fox makes another jump and grows into one. It is just different trajectory teams are on.
They need to have a celebration in Sac for everything that team has accomplished and light the beam one last time this season. Best series of the playoffs so far and just insane heart.
They sat their starters their last regular season - or second to last game - when they played a full Warriors team. A Kings win would have let the Lakers move to 6th cause they owned the tiebreaker. So they kind of chose this matchup imo.
The regular season sounds like a long time ago but it's hard to manipulate the standings. At least for this season. Who knows what the Clippers would have done on their end too
what did everyone do? all the lakers/clips/warriors win the last 6 games or so. The seeding was determine largely by Memphis/Denver and Kings. These teams decided to sit a lot of starters at the end of the season and get their picking of match up... this is all on them.
I would agree except the top 4 seeds rested their starters for most of the last 2 weeks or so since their seeds were locked. I think the only team that played their starters were Phoenix but only because they wanted some reps in with KD. It was less of manipulating standings and more avoiding of injuries.
Lakers/Clippers/Warriors have to win as many games as they can to avoid the play-in. Clippers and Warriors have been knocked out of the play-in before and know the danger.
Assuming Warriors lost against Kings in the regular season, it would have been 5. Clippers 6. Lakers 7. Warriors. But since Clippers have the tie-breaker over both, they could have tanked the Lakers game, making it 5. Lakers 6 Clippers 7 Warriors.
Honestly, it's a lot of what-ifs and no one could have predicted the standings. If Pelicans won over the Timberwolves in the final day and Clippers tanked, it would have been something like. 5. Warriors 6. Clippers 7. Lakers 8. Pelicans
That's true! At the end of the day they took the Warriors to 7 and almost won on the Barnes shot so they were onto something. AD was doing shit against the DPOY so against Sabonis... woof.
It definitely can be, Sabonis isn’t a stereotypical rim protector but he’s an alright team defender, if you surround him with good wing defenders to keep folks out of the paint then he’d be a lot better but this team didn’t have that so it was free run to the paint
Okay, but what makes Jokic’s mediocre defense acceptable is that he’s a legitimately generational offensive player. Sabonis is really good, but I don’t see it as a top 2 player on a title team
Do you watch Rudy play? They don’t need a slow lumbering center like Rudy but a switch everything defense for 1-5. Part of it comes with experience and part of it are a couple decent defenders
Their pace and spacing would be destroyed if Rudy was there
I don’t think it’s that, he’s actually just pretty inconsistent. He had a stretch during the regular season right before the allstar break where he shot terribly, and it lasted for an entire month. He needs to be more consistent at hitting 3-4 3s a game and his finishing leaves a lot to be desired as well as his defense
To be fair, Huerter was an absolute menace defensively. Hard for guys to play both ends of the floor these days. The few that have done it recently are at least all star caliber players (KD, Kawhi, Klay, Butler, Tatum come to mind - and Klay's the worst one on this list)
If there's one thing Reddit absolutely excels at, it's repeating something that was clever until it sounds dumber than a sack of rocks.
And then repeat it some more.
They need draymond green or somthing very similar. A guy who can guard 1-5, being great defensive communicator and can do some of sabonisis playmaking. Not sure there is a guy like that in the league.
Or sabonis hits his jump shots and the series would be completly diiferant. Loony cant just stay under the basket and get both good rebounding position and preventing any kind of backdoor attempt.
The beam was proven fraudulent. Couldn't get them to beat the Warriors at home SMH
Serious answer I think it's better left as a nice reminder of the season they broke out if they sustain success, no need to risk it getting turned on its head if they underperform
It's just a really cool schtick because there's nothing like it anywhere else in the league. That individuality makes it just sing. Hope it becomes a permanent feature for the team.
Now comes the ultimate litmus test. Do they make a dumb trade that guts the team's core other than the big two (Wolves) or do they just stay the course and hope to improve as it I'd?
monk and fox are good enough to win big games. they had 0 experience and went to 7 against gsw. they got fucked with their first round matchup everybody knew the warriors were a sleeping giant.
+ the level of shotmaking and basketball was just really high in this series, a lot for the kings to takeaway and learn from way more confident in them being back and better than a lot of other teams..
They probably would have lost to the Nuggets, suns, Lakers in the first round too. They might have beat the Grizzlies. Prob would have beat the clippers and the twolves
I think AD would have eaten Sabonis alive. If Looney could dominate him, AD absolutely could - and he'd do it at both ends because of how much bigger a scoring threat AD is.
Respectfully, it would have been much closer than you think. The Kings lost to a middle of the pack defense. Imagine going against one of the better defensive teams in the league since the All Star Break.
The one nice takeaway from Sacramento's playoff drought is that there's not going to be anywhere near as much pressure to make a "win now" move to try and go for a championship off the back of this season. Not suggesting that they're going to sit back and say "fuck it, we've done enough", but they don't have the expectations most other top seeds historically do because making it this far was already massive for the fanbase and team. Maybe that enters the equation in a few years of sustained success, but for now, I imagine just making the playoffs as a respectable seed a couple seasons in a row takes priority.
They need some 3-4 wing defenders who can hit an occasional shot. Those guys are hard to hit in but are often cheap to acquire if you get them early like McDaniel, Vanderbilt, shoot even a 2-3 like Josh Hart.
Problem is if the shot is below average when the playoffs ramp up those guys often fall off hard and can get played out of the rotation
If anything Monte McNaire has proven to be an awesome. Great drafting, contracts that don't hold the team hostage, and good hiring's in the front office and coaching staff. They will be back barring injury. I have a feeling Keegan is going to pop off next year with a whole offseason of NBA level training. His work ethic is insane.
1. Davion really needs to up his offense repertoire going into next season. I thought it was a bad idea to play TD instead of Davion. He played bad defense on Curry when he was his main assignment. If Davion is even passable on offense, he would have gave Curry a harder time while still keeping defenders honest on offense.
2. Fox cannot shy away from these moments. He seemed to lose interests when his shots weren’t falling. You’re CPOY for a reason, keep the offense moving and score when ur team cannot. I hope he learns to take over in these situations and set the tone for his team, reminded me A LOT like Webber in late game situations.
3. Keegan needs to develop a better handle and finish stronger at the rim. I think he has Tatum potential, but if he doesn’t develop a good handle he’ll be similar to Buddy Hield. Still has a lot of potential, 41% from three on several attempts is a very good skill to have, sky is the limit for him!
4. The Kings need ANY center they can get. Sabonis has proved that he struggles against true big men like Looney, and Len and Lyles will not help in the slightest.
5. Sabonis has to improve his shot. There were times he legit looked like Ben Simmons out there with all the space they were giving him. If he can just consistently sink mid range shots then it will really open his game up. He worked with a shooting coach over the summer so it’s a good start.
I believe in the Kings and that they’ll get better next season, they have a bright future ahead. They need to take the time to realize the flaws the players and roster has and I look forward to seeing what they do next season!
I don’t think Fox necessarily “shied away from the moment.” I mean he had 19 field goal attempts, the most on the team. Like you said, his shot just wasn’t falling. After basically carrying this whole series, he’s allowed to have one bad game, just unfortunately that it happened on game 7. I agree with everything else you said tho
Way more turnovers after the injury. His handle seemed compromised. I thought if he gave more juice on the defensive end and played decoy on offense that may have been more effective
Honestly great comment, very similar to the thoughts I've had. I think our future rests on Keegan and Davion filling up the gaps in their game. They have major flaws, but at the things they are good at they excel.
Our bench, while not elite or playoff-level, might be as good as it's gonna get. Sacramento is not a free agent destination. Monk and Lyles becoming flamethrowers from time to time and stealing games for us is all we could ask for.
And then there's Sabonis. In the regular season, he was our best player most of the time, even better than Fox. He was doing marvelous stuff on a nightly basis. While he had some good moments this series, I feel like Looney completely blanked him. Tough stuff, but I would run it back because I don't see anyone better at the center position walking through that door.
You definitely didn’t watch the games if you say fox shied away from the moment lol. Dude was playing his heart out with a broken finger and no one else stepped up.
>5. Sabonis has to improve his shot
I think that's because basically all regular season he has been playmaker first, scorer second. He does most of his damage in the paint, so whenever he gets the ball mid-range, his first instinct is to look for a pass.
So yeah, if he can get a decent mid-range shot, he will be able to dominate. Especially together with his rebounding skills.
As for Keegan. I think a lot of it can be put down to it being his rookie year. If he works together with Fox/Monk, he could easily develop a similar game to them which would be very exciting.
Take nothing away from them. Amazing future. They just lacked the experience and it showed in game 7. Nightmare game for the clutch player of the year.
Really great season for them considering everyone was clowning them when they traded for sabonis. Still took the defending champions to a game 7, respect for that
The only thing that could stop them was a game 7. They're young and this was good experience for them, they'll be better for it next year if they all stay together.
Your team literally chose that match-up by tanking their game against Golden State near the end of the regular season.
If they won, they would have sent Golden State to the play-in.
The Kings were ready for the moment at every step of the way. Made the Playoffs for the first time in 16 years and were legitimately one of the best teams in the league. They had an amazing season.
What a season for the kings
Mike Brown is a hell of a coach. Patch up this roster and the Kings will be contending for years.
Will always have love for Mike. He’s a great coach and I’m so glad he’s doing well these days. Didn’t seem that long ago he was guiding a young Bron
You mean a young Bron was guiding him.
I still remember the 'sekrit plays' memes. Its so nice to see him so validated now
Had to look these up LMAO. Can we restart this meme
LeBron was horrible defensively before Mike Brown Brown wasn’t a great offensive mind and relied heavily on assistants for that, but he’s an undeniably great defensive coach and turned LeBron into the high IQ defensive savant he is. Pre-Brown LeBron chased for highlight plays and got caught out of position all the time
They need a top shelf defensive player amd they are set, their offense is disgusting
They should try and trade for OG. I have no clue what package they could put together for him, but it would be a cool fit.
Yo, just let us have him and Siakam. We'll make sure you get a spot of honor in the parade(s).
> They need a top shelf defensive player they basically need a better version of Aaron Gordon
A center who doesn't seem so lost could help a good bit.
I don't think Sabonis is the problem, tbh he elevates the team with his passing play he needs to work on his J
I've heard some people say Sabonis is overrated, but I think he has a high ceiling. He needs some help inside, for sure.
[удалено]
I see the bots have adapted to only copy half of a separate comment
Terrific opponent for real. Shout out to them.
Unfortunately, this might be the peak for them It's hard to see where they improve a ton with this roster. They're all offense, no defense, their stars are in their prime, and they benefited a ton from health relative to the rest of the league
Keegan takes a big step in year 2 and Huerter doesn’t disappear in the playoffs is a start.
Despite popular belief Huerter is not a big time playoff role player. Outside of Game 7 vs Philly he was mostly a ghost for us as he was this series. We really needed him to take and make shots vs Miami last year and he was a timid brick layer to say the least. But, he’s still a very heady, skilled player who will continue be a plus starter for the Kings but he’s not explosive enough to really go off in the playoffs. He’s almost too smart a player for the playoffs, he plays within himself to a fault and playoff defenses don’t allow that, sometimes you got to improvise.
Are you serious? A moderate improvement on defense will then insanely better
Or even a moderate improvement on offense. Sabonis and Huerter were MIA relative to their usual offense during this series.
They are not improving on defense with this roster, not with Sabonis as your center
Yeah that's why we try and get defensive pieces? Why does everything think you have to not change anything lol
Sure, if we just magically make a bunch of awful defenders better on defense, they're better But that's probably not going to happen. It's like saying "man, if only those Dame/CJ teams has been moderately better on defense"
Getting experience against playoff defense is massive for them. Also having Fox not break his hand can only help
I feel like the best defenders of a losing playoff team is always the team that beat them. But I agree, no reason this team doesn't take a leap and make a deep run next year. Then you can start assessing what changes need to be made to win it all
You know teams are allowed to try and improve their team in the off-season right?
TIL coaching is magic
Sabonis is garbage on defence, if he's your 5 you aren't doing much to improve defensively.
Its easier to from garbage to bad than it is to go from mediocre to good. I dont think its out of the question that he improves on defence.
He's been awful his entire career defensively. Why do you think he'll suddenly get better?
I mean yeah; but a moderate improvement on defense for an NBA squad is insanely difficult to make happen. It’s possible but very difficult.
Being a 3 seed and going to the wire with the defending champs is their peak? Is this supposed to be a bad thing? Edit: Their core is all under 30 aside from Barnes with only really "one" year under their belt, and defensively they can only improve. If they get a more favorable playoff bracket with this exact team then it's not unreasonable for them to make a conference final or even further.
lolwut They have the best young core in the league, it's hard to see how they DON'T improve
[удалено]
25 isn't prime fam
They have all their picks and young, moveable contracts. It's not hard at all to see
fox is 25 and just had his first taste of the playoffs, keegan and davion are young, sabonis is 26, the only declining player on the roster is useless barnes
Bro, all of their roster is pretty young. Keegan has looked incredible for a rookie and has a ton of room to improve. Fox and Sabonis are both young to compete for years to come.
Sabonis has a broken thumb. Fox has a broken finger. Keegan is a rookie. Upgrade Barnes and this team is much better.
Switch Barnes for KD. This should help.
They're young, just age + experience is going to be good for em. Sabonis and Fox are 25 & 26. Heurter/Monk/Mitchell are 24, and Murray is 22. Their only player on the decline age-wise is Harrison Barnes, but he's on the last year of his contract so he's probably going to get cheaper.
They took the champs to 7 games and only lost because of Stephs (maybe) best game ever. They just need a little bit more experience.
No need to freak out though. The roster is still pretty young so no blow up needed. Maybe can just add some a solid vet player or two and they will be fine.
their entire team is basically 23-26 y/o. they don’t have to improve the roster the players might just improve lol. either way they played well enough to get through prob 80% of the first round teams. they were a team with 0 experience going against the most experienced team in the league lol
Their players are mostly near their primes man. They'll make small improvements, but guys at 25-26 tend to be pretty close to as good as they'll ever be And the kings need big changes to be contenders, not small ones
jordan didn’t get ring 1 until 28, neither did curry …
MJ was also averaging 33/8/8 at 25 lol Let's not pretend him getting better is what led to a ring
blazers fan
Specific blazers fan. This guy is a known idiot.
their offense was just as big of an issue as the defense lol there’s plenty to improve upon
1. Fox is 25, Sabonis is 26. They are just at the start of their prime and just gained a lot of valuable playoff experience. Vast majority of the supporting cast is also relatively young: Murray 22, Huerter 24, Davion 24, Monk 25 2. Keegan Murray is the X-factor with regards to this core's ceiling. He had a strong rookie season and actually contributed on a playoff team. Broke the rookie 3 point record on 41% shooting. If he can improve his handle and sharpen up on the defensive end, I'd be really excited about where he could help take this team. 3. I think with Sabonis at C there will always be a cap on this team's defense. However, Fox has the tools to be a great defender (and showed this at points in the series). Murray has potential on the defensive end, and Davion is a nice defensive option off the bench. Not to mention that Mike Brown is touted as a defensive coach and has schemed up some great defensive teams. I wouldn't write off at least some level of defensive improvement next year, especially if that is a point of emphasis with roster moves this offseason. 4. We benefited from our health, but only to a certain extent. Sabonis has been playing with a broken hand since December, and I am going to go out on a limb and guess he might have been a little more effective going to his right if he was healthy. Fox got injured in Game 4 and since that moment his handle was never the same. Probably changed the trajectory of the series at least a little bit. 5. We've got cap space this year. This will be the Kings best year to look for opportunities to add talent to the team.
It’s okay, this guys takes in r/ripcity are hot garbage too…
My takes are usually pretty spot on for Blazers players though. Been a hot minute since I was really wrong on a prediction for a Blazers player
Stars are entering their prime with a long runway. They have younger guys developing too
[удалено]
Such a weak take: "Your team sucks so you can't have opinions on other teams" Just say you think I'm right and that makes you insecure lol Hint: maybe I know a thing or two about teams that are elite offensively and play no defense?
A perfect example of a non-championship season that shouldn't be called a failure. The series loss can't invalidate the ride the Kings and their fans just went on. From an entertainment standpoint it was a success. Getting the 3rd seed is absolutely a successful regular season. A fantastic season to continue building on. They have a tremendous offensive core and proved they can stack up with the best in the league.
This debate is all semantics and perspective. But if the Warriors had lost it would be considered a failure like many would say of the Bucks because they have both won it before so that’s the standard.
And it wasn't considered a failure when they lost to the Spurs in '13
Yea, when your superstar is 35 that means your window can close any moment. Every year lowers your chance to win the title, so you gotta make every year count. Kings dont really have a superstar yet but they are growing Fox makes another jump and grows into one. It is just different trajectory teams are on.
Went from 12th in the West to a 3 seed and taking the defending champs to 7 games. If that's not hot stuff, then I don't know what is.
Tough when you go up against a hot little slut like Steve Kerr
That sexy slut Steve Kerr keeps getting away with it.
Damn I miss that meme
This series essentially came down to experience. The Kings will be strong contenders from here on out.
I'm proud of them boys 💜
The Beam will always live in our hearts ❤️
They need to have a celebration in Sac for everything that team has accomplished and light the beam one last time this season. Best series of the playoffs so far and just insane heart.
Nah, the beam is earned. There'll be plenty of it next year
The Beam is very much alive
Great team, got unlucky matching with the defending champs in round 1 but they’ll be back
They sat their starters their last regular season - or second to last game - when they played a full Warriors team. A Kings win would have let the Lakers move to 6th cause they owned the tiebreaker. So they kind of chose this matchup imo.
The regular season sounds like a long time ago but it's hard to manipulate the standings. At least for this season. Who knows what the Clippers would have done on their end too
what did everyone do? all the lakers/clips/warriors win the last 6 games or so. The seeding was determine largely by Memphis/Denver and Kings. These teams decided to sit a lot of starters at the end of the season and get their picking of match up... this is all on them.
I would agree except the top 4 seeds rested their starters for most of the last 2 weeks or so since their seeds were locked. I think the only team that played their starters were Phoenix but only because they wanted some reps in with KD. It was less of manipulating standings and more avoiding of injuries. Lakers/Clippers/Warriors have to win as many games as they can to avoid the play-in. Clippers and Warriors have been knocked out of the play-in before and know the danger. Assuming Warriors lost against Kings in the regular season, it would have been 5. Clippers 6. Lakers 7. Warriors. But since Clippers have the tie-breaker over both, they could have tanked the Lakers game, making it 5. Lakers 6 Clippers 7 Warriors. Honestly, it's a lot of what-ifs and no one could have predicted the standings. If Pelicans won over the Timberwolves in the final day and Clippers tanked, it would have been something like. 5. Warriors 6. Clippers 7. Lakers 8. Pelicans
I think the Lakers would have been an even worse match up for them. AD would bully Sabonis even easier than Looney did, and he'd do it at both ends.
That's true! At the end of the day they took the Warriors to 7 and almost won on the Barnes shot so they were onto something. AD was doing shit against the DPOY so against Sabonis... woof.
Not sure the lakers were much of a better matchup.
This team reminds me of the 2013 warriors. A little bit better defense and they could win it all
Nah. Sabonis will always be the center
Sabonis = Sac's version of David Lee?
Who is their Draymond then? Or Bogut? Or Iggy?
That’s where the magic happens.
Their draymond could be… draymond if he declines the player option.
Idk, but I know exactly who their Harrison Barnes is.
Who said anything about another center?
The defense will never be what it needs to be
Kings could have easily won this series with their current roster.
It definitely can be, Sabonis isn’t a stereotypical rim protector but he’s an alright team defender, if you surround him with good wing defenders to keep folks out of the paint then he’d be a lot better but this team didn’t have that so it was free run to the paint
Wait is this a Jokic thread?
Exactly, I’d argue Sabonis is even better defender than Jokic, he just needs the right guys around him
Eh, he might be quicker laterally, but nobody is backing Jokic down. But agreed, Sabonis is basically Jokic lite
Nobody backs Jokic down, but Jokic doesn't do much at all to stop guards, and not much more to stop wings who like to drive.
Okay, but what makes Jokic’s mediocre defense acceptable is that he’s a legitimately generational offensive player. Sabonis is really good, but I don’t see it as a top 2 player on a title team
they unironically need gobert
Do you watch Rudy play? They don’t need a slow lumbering center like Rudy but a switch everything defense for 1-5. Part of it comes with experience and part of it are a couple decent defenders Their pace and spacing would be destroyed if Rudy was there
Yeah they need somebody more in the mold of Draymond or Bam. OG would also be an awesome fit if they can put together a package for him.
What they actually need is for Kevin Huerter to not suck.
Fr. He has been terrible all series, even tho he's doing the usual Sabonis screen pass to 3 all season long. Beam's too bright in the playoffs I guess
I don’t think it’s that, he’s actually just pretty inconsistent. He had a stretch during the regular season right before the allstar break where he shot terribly, and it lasted for an entire month. He needs to be more consistent at hitting 3-4 3s a game and his finishing leaves a lot to be desired as well as his defense
To be fair, Huerter was an absolute menace defensively. Hard for guys to play both ends of the floor these days. The few that have done it recently are at least all star caliber players (KD, Kawhi, Klay, Butler, Tatum come to mind - and Klay's the worst one on this list)
He seemed to give a lot of his energy chasing around Klay on screens/didnt have lift on his shots. Id expect him to be more conditioned next year
they have a better center than gobert
Both are 82 game players unfortunately
This phrase is gonna be super overused this summer isn't it
Leave it to Reddit
If there's one thing Reddit absolutely excels at, it's repeating something that was clever until it sounds dumber than a sack of rocks. And then repeat it some more.
Well It’s easier than saying that they can both get schemed around in a full playoff series due to their weaknesses
Oh god please no
Rather than Gobert, Bam would work wonders in this team. He's not leaving Heat though
They need draymond green or somthing very similar. A guy who can guard 1-5, being great defensive communicator and can do some of sabonisis playmaking. Not sure there is a guy like that in the league. Or sabonis hits his jump shots and the series would be completly diiferant. Loony cant just stay under the basket and get both good rebounding position and preventing any kind of backdoor attempt.
So do they bring back the beam next year?
The Empire brought back the Death Star
Somehow the beam returned.
The beam was proven fraudulent. Couldn't get them to beat the Warriors at home SMH Serious answer I think it's better left as a nice reminder of the season they broke out if they sustain success, no need to risk it getting turned on its head if they underperform
Fuck yes. The city of Sacramento was united under the beam.
It's just a really cool schtick because there's nothing like it anywhere else in the league. That individuality makes it just sing. Hope it becomes a permanent feature for the team.
I hope so
Is this a non troll post from statmuse?
Kings had a great season. They’ll be back. Especially shout out Fox and Coach Brown
Now comes the ultimate litmus test. Do they make a dumb trade that guts the team's core other than the big two (Wolves) or do they just stay the course and hope to improve as it I'd?
Only thing left to do is improve on the foundation already there and run it back
monk and fox are good enough to win big games. they had 0 experience and went to 7 against gsw. they got fucked with their first round matchup everybody knew the warriors were a sleeping giant. + the level of shotmaking and basketball was just really high in this series, a lot for the kings to takeaway and learn from way more confident in them being back and better than a lot of other teams..
They probably would have lost to the Nuggets, suns, Lakers in the first round too. They might have beat the Grizzlies. Prob would have beat the clippers and the twolves
We would’ve smoked the Lakers, Suns and Nuggets have our number though for sure.
Smoked is a strong word, feel like it equally could’ve gone the distance and then it just would’ve been lebron dropping 50 in game 7
I think AD would have eaten Sabonis alive. If Looney could dominate him, AD absolutely could - and he'd do it at both ends because of how much bigger a scoring threat AD is.
Respectfully, it would have been much closer than you think. The Kings lost to a middle of the pack defense. Imagine going against one of the better defensive teams in the league since the All Star Break.
Trade 4 picks, Monk and Keegan Murray for Dame you say?
Nah that’s some vlade shit 😂😂😂
The one nice takeaway from Sacramento's playoff drought is that there's not going to be anywhere near as much pressure to make a "win now" move to try and go for a championship off the back of this season. Not suggesting that they're going to sit back and say "fuck it, we've done enough", but they don't have the expectations most other top seeds historically do because making it this far was already massive for the fanbase and team. Maybe that enters the equation in a few years of sustained success, but for now, I imagine just making the playoffs as a respectable seed a couple seasons in a row takes priority.
They need some 3-4 wing defenders who can hit an occasional shot. Those guys are hard to hit in but are often cheap to acquire if you get them early like McDaniel, Vanderbilt, shoot even a 2-3 like Josh Hart. Problem is if the shot is below average when the playoffs ramp up those guys often fall off hard and can get played out of the rotation
If anything Monte McNaire has proven to be an awesome. Great drafting, contracts that don't hold the team hostage, and good hiring's in the front office and coaching staff. They will be back barring injury. I have a feeling Keegan is going to pop off next year with a whole offseason of NBA level training. His work ethic is insane.
Anybody who wants to tap dance all over the Kings after this real needs to check their priorities in life
1. Davion really needs to up his offense repertoire going into next season. I thought it was a bad idea to play TD instead of Davion. He played bad defense on Curry when he was his main assignment. If Davion is even passable on offense, he would have gave Curry a harder time while still keeping defenders honest on offense. 2. Fox cannot shy away from these moments. He seemed to lose interests when his shots weren’t falling. You’re CPOY for a reason, keep the offense moving and score when ur team cannot. I hope he learns to take over in these situations and set the tone for his team, reminded me A LOT like Webber in late game situations. 3. Keegan needs to develop a better handle and finish stronger at the rim. I think he has Tatum potential, but if he doesn’t develop a good handle he’ll be similar to Buddy Hield. Still has a lot of potential, 41% from three on several attempts is a very good skill to have, sky is the limit for him! 4. The Kings need ANY center they can get. Sabonis has proved that he struggles against true big men like Looney, and Len and Lyles will not help in the slightest. 5. Sabonis has to improve his shot. There were times he legit looked like Ben Simmons out there with all the space they were giving him. If he can just consistently sink mid range shots then it will really open his game up. He worked with a shooting coach over the summer so it’s a good start. I believe in the Kings and that they’ll get better next season, they have a bright future ahead. They need to take the time to realize the flaws the players and roster has and I look forward to seeing what they do next season!
Sabonis needs a little ft line jumper, or some David West midrange game.
I don’t think Fox necessarily “shied away from the moment.” I mean he had 19 field goal attempts, the most on the team. Like you said, his shot just wasn’t falling. After basically carrying this whole series, he’s allowed to have one bad game, just unfortunately that it happened on game 7. I agree with everything else you said tho
Also doesn't he have a fractured fingertip on his shooting hand? I mean that's gotta hurt right
Yeah true, that injury probably got to to him
Way more turnovers after the injury. His handle seemed compromised. I thought if he gave more juice on the defensive end and played decoy on offense that may have been more effective
Honestly great comment, very similar to the thoughts I've had. I think our future rests on Keegan and Davion filling up the gaps in their game. They have major flaws, but at the things they are good at they excel. Our bench, while not elite or playoff-level, might be as good as it's gonna get. Sacramento is not a free agent destination. Monk and Lyles becoming flamethrowers from time to time and stealing games for us is all we could ask for. And then there's Sabonis. In the regular season, he was our best player most of the time, even better than Fox. He was doing marvelous stuff on a nightly basis. While he had some good moments this series, I feel like Looney completely blanked him. Tough stuff, but I would run it back because I don't see anyone better at the center position walking through that door.
The fact that you called Looney an true big man is just insane in any other setting. But Looney is really that good.
You definitely didn’t watch the games if you say fox shied away from the moment lol. Dude was playing his heart out with a broken finger and no one else stepped up.
>5. Sabonis has to improve his shot I think that's because basically all regular season he has been playmaker first, scorer second. He does most of his damage in the paint, so whenever he gets the ball mid-range, his first instinct is to look for a pass. So yeah, if he can get a decent mid-range shot, he will be able to dominate. Especially together with his rebounding skills. As for Keegan. I think a lot of it can be put down to it being his rookie year. If he works together with Fox/Monk, he could easily develop a similar game to them which would be very exciting.
Big shout out to the Kings, the beam was legendary
Ain’t no shame in losing to a 50pt Steph Curry game.
Top 3 team in the west. Don’t care. Absolutely insane team. Had me shaking half the time.
Great year for the Kings. Tough to run into the defending champs in round 1 but they did themselves and their city proud
2007 Raptors vibes. Got the 3 seed and the Coach of the Year, lost to a more experienced team in Round 1.
This season is just the beginning. Good luck in the future Kings!
Kevin huerter couldn't hit a shot to save his life man
Gotta get rid of Barnes and Huerter. Hope Keegan takes the next leap. Get better 3-D players.
Huerter's only 24 - he's probably going to get better.
Phenomenal year from the Kings. Much love to Mike Brown and the whole squad. Happy to see our neighbors packin up that stadium MAKIN NOISE.
What a season for the kings, something to be proud of.
Hold your head high Kings! It's a learning experience and you'll only get better from here!
future is bright!
Kings put up a hell of a fight and they have something great building. GG Kings
Take nothing away from them. Amazing future. They just lacked the experience and it showed in game 7. Nightmare game for the clutch player of the year.
They need to get Sabonis an enforcer next to him, plus another 3 and D wing
Great season kings bros - don’t get down on your squad.
They could have won if steph wasn't so great.
Really great season for them considering everyone was clowning them when they traded for sabonis. Still took the defending champions to a game 7, respect for that
The only thing that could stop them was a game 7. They're young and this was good experience for them, they'll be better for it next year if they all stay together.
You were amazing Beam team. Im sorry we met first round...
The Beam, CotY, 3rd seed, playoffs and went to 7. Love this team.
I’m a warriors fan and i think the kings had a great year 👍
And all that to be rewarded by playing against the defending champs
Your team literally chose that match-up by tanking their game against Golden State near the end of the regular season. If they won, they would have sent Golden State to the play-in.
They were trying to get the Clips actually
That was a highly unlikely scenario. Clippers would have had to either lose to the tanking Blazers or the Suns bench.
We’re rivals in a couple days, but I just wanna thank you now. What a great day.
First playoff series lost since 2006, just an incredible run
Ran into an all time run from a top 5 player of all time
Yeah Kevon Looney was too much for them
Chill
Lol “top 5”
They didn’t play Lebron this series
Great team but as long as they have Sabonis they will never win anything beyond the regular season
Sad day today. Did not want the Warriors first round. Gotta move on to next year.
The Kings were ready for the moment at every step of the way. Made the Playoffs for the first time in 16 years and were legitimately one of the best teams in the league. They had an amazing season.
….and one first round exit LIGHT THE BEAM
And cancun
and couldn't make it outta the first round
2
Cook that bozo
And Kirk cousins
Roasted.
Not everyone has the luxury of going against the Timbersheep in the first round
Not everyone can trade their first round picks for ineffective Frenchman and live in the gutter of the nba for half a decade
Loser franchise
personally I love how we went to the laughing stock, to the darlings, to now everyone on here saying how trash we are within 6 months lol
Also the Seattle Supersonics has won a playoff series more recently than the Sacramento Kings