Update: 9:30 pm
The Sacramento Kings won again Sunday by beating the Utah Jazz 116-111.
DeMar DeRozan played 38 minutes and scored 41 points……….Precious Achiuwa scored 20 points and had 11 rebounds. Killian Hayes started and finished with 16 points and 8 assists.
The tank has taken a lot of hits recently. It’s fun how when the Kings are trying to win they unintentionally tank and when they are trying to lose, they unintentionally win.
From Earlier Preview:
The Kings have gone 5-5 over their last 10 games, and have rocketed up the standings considerably. After spending months with the worst record in the NBA, Sacramento now sits at 17-51, 3rd worst in the NBA, and only a half game behind the 4th-worst Nets. And face the Jazz tonight, another team with every incentive to lose.
Hey, at least DeMar DeRozan and Russell Westbrook are getting their shots up.
Who: Sacramento Kings (17-51) vs. Utah Jazz (20-47)
Where: Golden 1 Center, Sacramento, CA
When: 7:00 PM PT / 10:00 PM ET
Watch: NBCSCA / League Pass
If you’re going to have a brutally unwatchable season like the Sacramento Kings are having, you’ve got to maximize the payoff. Winning meaningless games down the stretch this year is akin to pushing hard for a play-in appearance only to get knocked out if the postseason after one game. Until the NBA incentivizes winning, that is our reality.
And I might feel differently if other teams weren’t tanking harder. I might feel differently if the Kings had already shut down their veterans, or at least limited their opportunities. But that isn’t what’s happening in Sacramento– at least not to the extent necessary. Last night in the Kings’ win over the Clippers, 37-year-old Russell Westbrook played nearly 37 minutes. 36-year old DeMar DeRozan played 36 minutes. Even 34-year-old Doug McDermott played 13 minutes for some reason. The aforementioned DeRozan and Westbrook also led the team in shot attempts. This organization can’t even lose right.
The Jazz are in town tonight. Utah has already been fined for tanking this season, so you know exactly where they stand.
It’s the second night of a back-to-back for Sacramento, giving the organization a perfectly timed reason to rest Westbrook and DeRozan after playing heavy minutes vs. the Clippers last night. Will the Kings do the obvious thing here? Tune in and find out.
Prediction: Kings 115, Jazz 109.
Utah paid Silver’s tanking fines;
I don’t think Danny Ainge really minds.
He’s made no excuses
For tactics he uses.
Let’s flash Vivek more SELL THE TEAM signs!
+1 Hey, Vivek, why isn’t the team doing a better job at tanking?
And the Jazz franchise is totally fine with that because they know their efforts (or lack thereof) raises the chances of them landing a franchise altering star that will make them gobs of money. That is something that Vivek and co. have failed to recognize for years. They prefer more short sighted efforts like bringing in aging vets at the twilights of their careers for short term monetary gains.
Kangz are the Temu franchise of the NBA. Just a cheap knockoff of what real teams try to accomplish. They already have a personal injury attorney as their jersey sponsor. I now expect Golden Once Center to be renamed Harbor Freight Pavilion
Just trash owner. If they don’t land a top three pick there is no hope going forward. Not with this piece of shit owner around. And I just don’t see how we can get rid of him.
they obviously don’t give a shit about winning at all. Otherwise, how could they be so stupid as to play all these veterans and not just tank? Every other team in the NBA, literally, knows that tanking is the way to go. And how could they be so stupid as to think that the team they brought in at the beginning of the season was anything but garbage?
Just not our idiot owner. I hate him.
Players, coaches, careers, fanbases. All ruined by this ownership. Not worried at all about the pick because the future is clearly laid out for us all.
That’s the reality. Even if they get the first pick they’ll undoubtedly screw it up. When your ownership is this bad, your franchise is just rotten to the core. Nothing is changing it save Vivek selling or being lobotomized. All of this flows directly from him.
Doug is still gonna be gunning for the win. Move over Bam, DDR to take all of the shots tonight. ALL OF THEM!
If you have been, stop spending money on this team. Boycott Vivwreck!
Yeah haven’t been to a game in over 2 years and even stopped buying merch for a couple years too. I don’t even want to wear the merch at this point and I rarely do.
I actually randomly stumbled on a FB post by Vivek that I guess was a suggested post. Lots of people were commenting sell the team haha, I added a dork to my sell the team comment because he looked like such a loser in the pic.
Soo, we really might fall all the way to 5th in draft order. F this franchise
i think 5th is the lowest they will finish, no chance they out tank Utah. If they aren’t careful they could end up #7 or so.
And that’s only if teams don’t leapfrog them in the lottery. Imagine finishing with the 5th worst record and then sliding back to like 8th in a very good draft. Just pure KANGZ.
i don’t know what is going on here but I have an idea. IMO which isn’t much I believe the Kings are looking for a point guard this draft.We need one for sure and their are 2 or 3 that could handle the position for the Kings. My first pick would be Kingston Flemings but their are others. If the Kings move up to the top 3 then IMO Cam Boozer would be the one to get. Either way the Kings will get a good one
I also read where the Kings might trade Sabonis to the Pistons for Stewart, Holland, Lavert and their #22 pick this draft. This trade looks like a good trade to me. What say some of you?
IMO that isn’t that bad. #5 would probably get you Kingston Flemings the best point guard in the draft. The Kings need a franchise future point guard and Flemings might just be the ticket. For what it’s worth Flemings comparison is Fox. Go figure.
42 years of this shit for me…I have never had such contempt for a group of people I do not know. The irresponsibility and sheer stupidity it takes to play Derozen 38 minutes can’t even be described.
15 games ago I thought they were actually doing it. I thought they got it and had a direction, at least for the last 30 games of the season.
Shame on me…fucking shame on me. Oh and as someone who has generally tried to look on the bright side and be optimistic about the future year after year… FUCK YOU VIVEK!!!
There’s a possible silver lining here:
If the Kings drop to 7 or 8, Vivek dumped a lot of money into those horrible contracts he wanted, just to be screwed over by those same contracts winning games at the end of the season. Hope Vivek, the village idiot, feels it enough to sell the team.
I am losing the energy to deal with the stupidity and incompetence of this franchise. I believe you have to want to be this dumb, it can’t be by accident (though there is nothing that is idiot proof, they keep producing better idiots).
The only dates that matter:
May 10 Sunday (lottery day)
Draft Day – Not yet announced
I am almost at the point where I am begging for apathy.
The NBA is having a Governors Meeting next week to vote on the expansion of the Association to specifically add franchises in Seattle and Las Vegas. Maybe it will be enough to have me springboard to a new club to carry on about.
I feel it will be interesting to know how Vivek votes on expansion. If he is a “no” then I may be convinced he is wanting to relocate, or even sell to a relocater.
Gotta figure he’ll vote yes, as it will be tens (perhaps hundreds) of millions in his pocket via the $15-$20 billion in franchise fees that will be levied on these two new teams.
What I could see happen…
He pockets the expansion money and lets these two teams set the price for the Kings. He sells the team and jumps completely into bed with Fisher / A’s, either here or in Vegas.
From our mouth to God’s ears. Make it so.
I wonder if he would go in on expansion of MLB to Sac? I don’t follow baseball much but have often wondered what’s in if for Vivek for housing the A’s for a few years.
Strikes me as a person where optics are the number one concern so I would guess he goes along with everyone else.
I read in more than a few places that expansion isn’t a sure thing. Sure, the current 30 teams get a nice expansion fee, but that money dwindles over the years with thinner revenue sharing and less chance for playoffs (assuming they keep the current schedule). It’s why Silver has been toying so much with an NBA Europe league. There is potentially more long term money to be made there.
Also, something that continually nags at me is Seattle and Vegas are always looming threats for relocation. Any team currently thinking of wanting public funds for a new arena (or gambling in their state) has that leverage with those open markets.
Good point, but I think it would be a matter of next man up. Tampa/St. Pete is a huge market with no real NBA team. Raleigh/Durham, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Nashville, Baltimore, San Diego. None of these are, to your point, Seattle or Vegas, but there are enough open markets that if an owner was seeking leverage, they could eventually find it.
I will be an Sonics fan immediately.
This is where I am at. I was seriously considering getting League Pass and becoming a Blazers fan. Gotta be West Coast for time ease. If Kings don’t land some stud in the draft and at least become interesting next couple years I see no reason not to become a Seattle fan in 2028. I have a second half of fandom life ahead…can’t waste it on the Kings.
The Las Vegas …
Vegans
Casino
Draft_Kings
Jacks (they could trade for DeAndre Hunter! what!? too soon? Not you Jack, the one eyed one)
Dice
Dams
Strips
Spheres
Silicones
Silver (Nevada – and Hi (not High) HO! and the Commish. This is my favorite)
This was the Kings plan forever, they’d suck then starting winning dumb games like this at the years end to end up in the 6-9 range and get the jetsam of players they normally get.
When the wheels finally fall of the wagon for this season, I thought they had finally figured it out, sadly no. When Doug and the front office give the meaningless press conference answers sadly they actually meant what they said about winning
I’m just waiting for draft day and with the 8th pick the Sacramento Kings select………………………
Winning 4 out 5 is not good for tanking… ugh! 1 out of five is the goal..
Fuck Doug Christie too – stubbornly saying how he refuses to tank because it hurts young players development. Which is the opposite of the truth.
and even if you think Doug of course wants to win to save his job, there should be somebody higher up telling him he needs to tank.
So because of Doug’s ego and his stubborn nature, they may very well not get a top five pic.
Ego is what’s killed this team. The owner in particular.
This organization is so horrible
Hate that we won but shoutout for the almost spot on score prediction
Badge Legend