For the second time in three days, the Sacramento Kings were completed outplayed and out-hustled by the Houston Rockets, losing in Texas 122 to 97. Sacramento’s league-leading offense from last season has vanished without De’Aaron Fox, who sat on the bench in his hometown nursing his ankle sprain and watching his squad struggle to create any offense without him. This Rockets team is just 6 games into their time with new head coach Ime Udoka and starts three players – Jalen Green, Jabari Smith Jr., and Alperen Sengun – as young as anyone on the Kings roster. But across these last two games, they’ve looked like the composed, coherent, and experienced squad in this matchup, while the Beam Team failed to do anything consistently on either end of the court. This was one of the more disappointing and embarrassing Kings losses since Mike Brown took over a season ago.
Brown dove deep into his reserves as the game got out of hand in the second half, and the Kings were actually led in scoring by Keon Ellis, who scored 15 points on 5-7 shooting and 4-6 from three in just 14 minutes of playing time. Rookie Colby Jones also had a promising run in garbage time, finishing with 10 points and 5 rebounds. Keegan Murray had 12 points while grabbing 5 rebounds and shooting 5-11 from the floor. He had a promising start for the Kings, scoring their first 5 points of the game on a powerful dribble-drive and a three, but he once again struggled with his deep shot across the whole contest and went just 2-6 from three.
Davion Mitchell once again didn’t live up to the opportunity presented him in Fox’s absence, finishing with only 5 points and two assists on 2-11 shooting, along with some uncharacteristic defensive miscues. Kevin Huerter quietly had a solid outing, scoring 13 points on 5-10 shooting with 3 threes. Harrison Barnes had only one buzzer-beating bucket, one free-throw, and one assist in 22 minutes.
Domantas Sabonis finished with 8 points, 8 boards, and 5 assists, but most importantly went just 3-4 from the floor. He started the game by immediately attacking and muscling Sengun out of the way for a dunk that was called a defensive foul and didn’t result in free throws. That seemed a good sign for the big man, but the early aggression by Domas wasn’t sustained. We all know that Sabonis is a player optimized by having confident, capable scorers around him, but when the team’s offense completely vanished without Fox, they needed their All-NBA center to do far more than he did. 8 Kings had more shot attempts than Sabonis did, including Ellis, Colby, and JaVale McGee (4-5 in 10 minutes). Domas’ night ended mid-way through the 4th quarter when he banged knees with Rockets reserve Jermaine Samuels Jr. and hobbled a bit on his way back to the bench, but it didn’t seem to be a serious injury.
The offensive issues for Sacramento wasn’t just that the shots weren’t falling; absent their superstar, the Kings seemingly lacked anyone who could reliably try and create offense off the bounce, and for the second game in a row they resorted to a combination of frantic ball movement and little player movement. Malik Monk (5 points on 2-6 shooting) was the only King who seemed poised to explode offensively early in the contest, but he picked up three quick fouls in the 2nd quarter and forced Mike Brown to dig deeper into the bench unit.
Houston was led by 23 points by Jalen Green, who did most of his damage by attacking and getting to the free throw line (10-12 from the stripe). Sengun once again significantly out-dueled Sabonis, finishing with 17 points, 12 assists, and 8 rebounds. The Rockets continued what worked in the first match up, blasting past the Kings perimeter defense and continually attacking the paint. When it didn’t pay off in layups, it paid off for in trips to the line, as the Rockets went 21-27 from the free throw stripe, while the Kings finished just 11-20.
The Kings fell to 2-4 on the season and return to Sacramento for a Wednesday match-up with the Portland Trail Blazers. Whether or not Fox plays on Wednesday, it will be key to see if the Kings will be ready to go from the jump against another young squad that, even just a week ago, would have seemed like a predictable victory for Sacramento. But these last two losses against the Rockets should teach the Kings that they can’t take anyone for granted at this point. As Kayte Christensen emphasized on the Kings broadcast, they can’t just be motivated and focused when it’s time to play the Golden State Warriors.
For all you Brooks haters. He’s exactly what the Kings should have gone after. Instead let’s resign Ghost Barnes and One trick pony, Huerter. Who’s Defense is absolute comedy.
Call Brooks Toxic, poison, whatever. Your statement holds very very little actual truth. Too worried about continuity, team chemistry? Blah, Blah. blah.
Brooks has more
mental toughness and tenacity in his pinky than the entire Kings team.
For those who question his talent. Let’s see: He’s averaging 18-5-5. On 60
percent shooting for the season. Not just playing the Kings.
Kings got bullied in the playoffs last year. This year same story.
I also thought Brooks would’ve been a nice signing but what’s the point of this now? He’s a Rocket. It is what it is.
Nevermind the fact that the Kings didn’t have the ability to sign him to a $22M per year deal, but hey…facts don’t matter anymore.
With that logic, what’s the point of anything? Everything discussed here is in the past.
Bibby over Davion…why did they start Davion?
huh? We didn’t re-sign Huerter…..LOL
He may also be the last guy to complain about tonight, and his defense wasn’t bad.
He seems to have put up the most complete game tonight based on the box score.
He’s also given great effort on the defensive end this year, despite things not going well offensively. Will he ever be a lockdown guy? No. However, defense has a lot to do with hustle and effort, both of which he’s provided a lot of in almost every game. There’s a lot to complain about wrt this season’s start, but aside from his shooting slump there’s not much to complain about with Kevin.
Agreed. If there were 5 players I could point a finger at this season for the team’s current issues, Huerter wouldn’t be among them.
I’d rather lose than root for Dillon Brooks.
are you saying winning is not everything?
Brooks is a modern version of Matt Barnes who brings grit and hustle to every play.
Ghost Barnes, exactly.
Kangz…
Sabonis had 4 FGA in 30 minutes. That is a problem. Barnes had his good game for the season and apparently decided not to participate anymore.
Just an embarrassing two game stretch. Fox being, the team can still hustle and play defense. Instead they just rolled over amd took it from the rockets.
Truth is, if Fox were playing, I still think they go 0-2 in Houston.
Agreed. I’m beginning to think this team is more along the line of where I thought they’d finish in wins last year @ around .500 w/last year being a crazy but fun outlier.
The West is much improved. It’s going to be a dog fight to make the playoffs.
Definitely. Especially considering that the Rockets, Thunder, and Spurs have leapfrogged us.
Scary, right? They also have a ton of picks to build with.
Thankfully our pick is lottery protected this year and top 12 next year. Otherwise it could be worse.
Really? We are 6 games in. All 3 have leapfrogged the Kings for the season? Kings were 0-4 to start last season. Any bets on whether the Rockets or Spurs end up with more wins than the Kings?
Barring significantly more injuries to Fox or Sabonis I will be shocked if those teams end up ahead of the Kings.
We were also 2-4 at this point last year. We lost those 4 games by a total of 29 points. Outside of the Utah game, our offense has looked average to sub-par, with our defense once again looking not very good as a whole.
I think the Rockets have a shot at being this year’s Kings, coming from nowhere to catch everyone by surprise. I also think this year’s Kings have a decent shot at the lottery. Will either happen…who knows. However, I’m fairly confident we will finish with a worse record this year, than last year….barring some combination of wild trades.
Truth is, this team may not have done anything to improve. I certainly question the lack of a Barnes upgrade, Huerter upgrade-defensively and defensive minded players in general.
They added O and not even much of that apparently with the way Vez looks.
The Kings needed a 3 amd 4 defender and shooter. They got none of the above. And Sabonis not taking over at all is more than a bit disconcerting.
So, at what point can we not only say the Davion shouldn’t be starting in Fox’s place, but he may not even be apart of the heavy rotation? I’m saddened to say, there hasn’t been a worse King on the court this season with his kind of minutes. Might as well give Keon Ellis his minutes at this point.
I know it’s only six games into the season, but yikes:
Yikes indeed. It’s gone from bad to worse.
And to think we had Segun right there waiting for us to pick.
Yup. He was high on my list and above Davion, but so were Bouknight, Moody, and Kai Jones… so what do I know??!!
Moody would have also been a better get. He’s only 21.
The time to trade Davion was in the offseason, when a team could squint and see a potential starting PG. Whoops.
Like they say, it’s a long season…a long, painful season.
And I thought Saturday’s game was embarrassing, to think that we’d have an even worse outcome to the same team…man.
We were expecting a sweep…just not the one we got!
The Stockton Kings under Lindsey Harding looked good. Good ball movement. Dane Goodwin, Deonte Burton and Jeremy Lamb can put the ball in the hoop. Skal was Skal.
Good to know
well, this is awkward
I think this team is in its own head. They are playing tight, putting too much pressure on themselves. What made them so unexpectedly good last season, besides the massive talent increase from prior years, was their devil-may-care, let’s-f’ing-go mindset. That’s missing now.
I think the problem is something along these lines. They need to get out of their own heads and get that offense flowing.
I agree, instead of having nothing to lose, they are expected to be really good. Besides Fox and (maybe) Monk, are squad isn’t really great under pressure.
It also doesn’t help that Fox and Monk are the only two legitimate scorers we have. The rest of the roster is ancillary.
Murray has not stepped up to fill the void yet….can he?
Keegan is expected to be the 3rd player and maybe 2nd scorer. He looks like Keegan the rookie essentially thus far but I’d imagine he’ll find his scoring? He’s not aggressive and doesn’t look in synch with the O.
In the 2.5 season before being traded to Sacramento, Sabonis averaged more than 19 points.
We designed outr offense completely around him as a screener and facilitator, and I think the team/Brown/Sabonis is caught halfway between sticking with it and abandoning it, leading to a whole bunch of nothing.
My point is, you can make Domas be a scorer, but it will come at the expense of a lot of things.
Sometimes he is deep in the paint with a relatively easy shot for him and he kicks it out to a shooter for a 3. I get the scheme, but sometimes just take the easy bucket and move on, especially when the team is struggling to hit 3s.
Sabonis isn’t the kind of guy you count on to get those “must have” baskets, the way you can with Monk and Fox though. He’s a guy who’s points come within the ebb and flow of a game. That was what I meant, maybe just worded it poorly.
Domas only taking four shots is laughable, especially with Fox out.
Dude needs to grow a pair and take charge and show leadership and initiative. This extreme passiveness is getting old.
Really no excuse forDomas not making a bigger impact.
He hasn’t recovered from the stomp.
His issues seem all mental.
This team got flat out embarrassed by the same mediocre team twice in a row! Rockets might push .500 but they are not a playoff team. Lots of problems:
1) Sabonis cannot get 4 FGA in a game, what a disaster
2) Mitchell is too short/ineffective to play rotation minutes
3) We had Jordan Ford playing 1st quarter minutes, bad sign
4) Very little cutting, our offense looks like it’s been scouted out
This continuity/defensive focus business looks to have been a flop. Our roster is clearly short 2 rotation players. Where is Mr Continuity Harrison Barnes? 3pts 0 reb 1ast 1-6 FG.
I was thinking the same. The O is figured out, especially Domas. If he can’t shoot nothing will work. No one’s buying the DHO anymore. This was the playoff Sabonis we saw.
It’s still early and we started 0-4 last year but damn. Barnes blew his wad in game one, Keegan is sophomore slumpin’, I can almost hear Huerter thinking out there, Davion still can’t shoot and his defense seems lesser this year, Sabonis is getting bottled up… ouch.
We have the same record now as we did at this time last year. The only difference is we look objectively worse as a team this year.
Huerter looked alright last night.
Davion is trying to follow the Teen Wolf script, thinking he’s good as a human being, but, really, we need the wolf. I should have seen this coming over the summer during an interview with Deuce & Mo when he was fondling his new braids …
This was sadly predictable. This team looks a shell of itself right now and I don’t expect that to change with Fox out. They looked terrible in the preseason and for the most part have looked terrible to start the year. If they continue to look terrible they’ll be right back in the lottery in the West with OKC and San Antonio coming on quickly.
I really thought they needed to upgrade the roster in the off-season to really compete and they didn’t so here we are. Hoping for a turn around but I was really worried they might not look quite so good this year and all my nostradumass predictions thus far have reflected that.
Listen, we have to look on the bright side: the Kings are 0-4 against the Warriors and Rockets but 2-0 against the whole rest of the league.
It is time.
Hey, that’s not nice.
You are not of sugar made he?
Dunglish?!
Are you trying to hunt me on the cupboard?
Only watched the first quarter because I’ve got to get to work, but the third/fourth defensive possession of the game made me cringe
Even my grandma plays better defense than all players in black jersey……..
Easy blow-by…and easy basket by Brooks….
While, those black jersey players NEVER get any easy basket in this game…
Can she play SF?
maybe the “no middle” defense should be modified to “no middle and no blow-by’s”. or was that already implied?
Wow last year is suddenly feeling a long ways away really quick. Starting to sweat and eyeing panic button. Going to give us 10 games and see how we are with Fox back but there is no excuse for how bad they just played back to back.
Sabonis and Co. need to at least put up some offense damn…we already know they can’t defend.
Logged in for my once a year post to say…the last few games have clearly demonstrated who the leaders of this team are, and who is not.
Im about 2 games away from reverting back to my default “Kangz” fan mode.
Disgusting (lack) of effort
Hello Darkness my Old Friend…
A must win really quickly turned into a mustn’t watch.
Off Night had an off night at the helm. The rookie should start instead.
Zero defense combined with a middle school offense.
This is a middle of the pack team that didn’t get better. Not athletic enough to deal with young teams like the Rockets. Not tough enough to deal with teams like the Warriors or Nuggets. Fox and probably Monk can be relied upon to nail shots when it matters, no one else on the team can be relied upon to do ANYTHING when it matters. And they lack what it takes to stop runs and change the trajectory of a game.
Mitchell is a 12-15min per game defensive specialist. Sabonis is an auxiliary piece. Huerter should just be a shooter off the bench. They should probably start Monk and trade for a legit defensive rebounder to replace Barnes. Then they might be a second round playoff team. They’re several pieces from being any real playoff challenger.
Per my previous comments, Kings offensive sets have become very predictable to defenses. Davion “runs the point” but basically his role is to set up the first pass, then stand around on the perimeter as the last option, only occasionally cutting in a perfunctory manner. It takes 10 seconds to do the same sequence of passes that basically get the ball from one side to the very high post on the other side, with little off-ball movement then a series of cuts that the defenders know is coming. Last year it worked but opposing coaches aren’t stupid and do their homework. Alot of this falls on Coach Brown’s shoulders. I know and am confident he is sharp enough to see this and mix things up. The defense is another story. Perimeter defense means moving one’s feet and being smart about deciding to go over high pick and rolls, vs getting caught and allowing one’s man to go downhill and force a spread out defense to collapse. Again, same thing over and over and over, with the same expected outcome.
The good news is that if this keeps up the head coach will be canned for Jodi Fernandez, who is probably a better and more inspiring coach, a natural at firing up the troops, better able to maximize our talent. Our guys will play harder for Jodi, blood sweat and tears, body mind and soul, than a guy who is good at what he does but not extraordinary.
More losses like last night, Brown will be gone by X-Mas. Or he responds and proves his unanimous COY award was no fluke. He can start by recognizing the obvious and that is there is not enough athletic POP in positions 2-5 among our starters.
He knows this, but if he keeps fiddling his thumbs on the sideline, exhibiting eternal patience, to his own detriment, while the season unravels, he may as well be oblivious.
Say what you will, I am convinced Duarte would have been the starter on Opening Night had he not experienced the bone bruise. I like his play thus far; except he fouls too much. This is prohibitive to his ascension. Stop hacking then we have something.
If we are convinced Monk is best off the bench, and it is hard to argue with his electric impact as a 6th man, then you narrow down your options RE: lineup changes.
Even with Fox, we need more dynamic and substantive motion in starting position 2-5. Domas is average athletically. So is the case with Barnes, Keegan and Red Diva. It is not a recipe to rise to an elite status. You rely too much on execution versus just force and speed.
Fox elevates the group, but it is still a limiting factor. Before a major trade, we need Duarte Ellis or Kessler as a NEW starter if they can bring the execution with the athleticism. Then the opponent is chasing instead of locked in and locking down.
It does NOT matter than HB or Huerter may be better overall player. It is about serving and catering to the Big Three. Holmes is a better push shot paint scorer and rebounder than Lively. But Lively complements Luka in the P N R as a formidable lob threat. This is how we MUST think about whom to surround with Fox, Ox, and Keegan.
I will be generous and add Keegan to our illustrious duo, though his passive play and bricklaying has done nothing to garner this deference.
Look at the teams we beat: UTA and LAL. They are not super athletic. HOU and GSW are more fleet of foot. We are going to have problem with length and speed over the long haul until we swap out a starter or two. Huerter and HB are not all of the sudden going to get better at lateral mobility or toughness.
I wrote 1000+ words on this, the futility of hoping for improvement through “trying harder”. It is laughable that significant improvement will result from “wanting it more” when competitive pride is always prevalent.
Here is a quick assessment of rotational players who are culpable over the last two games and deserve consequences, to be held accountable, as this coach likes to say:
(Player / Performance / Potential Replacement)
Davion / TRASH / Jordan Ford or Colby
McGee / PURE COMICAL TRASH / Tres or Len
Red Diva / SAD TRASH / Keon or Duarte
Sasha / EURO TRASH / Kessler
Barnes / INVISBLE TRASH / Kessler or Tres
That’s five rotational guys, half our playable players, too comfortable in their minute allocation, who unequivocally and indubitably deserve a DNP-CD versus Portland to sit and ruminate on their failure while other guys replace them and could do NO worse.
I am not saying they should be permanently banished to the Doghouse, just let them know “they suck” and their performance is unacceptable. Why should they not take a day off when they effectively already took the last two games off? Why should we reward failure with more chance to fail, thereby reinforcing that failure is acceptable?
Would it be SO wrong for Huerter, HB, Davion, McGee and Sasha to sit ONE game (minimum) and chew on some humble pie, while the backups, the third team, get their chance to grit and grind and shine against a team that should be beatable regardless?
I am intrigued because we get to see if this “COY” coach has the fortitude and foresight to bring a little constructive chaos to the proceedings.
Anything less than bold experimentation with the 1st and 2nd team is a choke move. It is cowardice not to go big with changes in the next game. I hope Fox takes one more game off. If he returns and bails out his teammates, our team will be worse off in our evolution to greatness.
I know this is a what have you done for me lately league and world, but even so, this is a bit too hot.
I have warned for the COY curse, but come on.
I don’t know what you are referring to. I didn’t say Brown would or should be fired, I said “if this keeps up..” then his viable replacement is waiting in the wings. Reading is fundamental.
What is more pertinent to me is how sweeping the changes vs POR. If you don’t do something radical and substantial, IMO, you are all bluster no bite, condoning incompetence. There needs to be some teeth to your rhetoric.
Specifically, I would not bench HB. He stays. I would start Keon over Huerter. I would play Len behind McGee, unless Lyles is ready. NO WAY should Sasha play over Kessler. And no reason for Davion to play over Colby and Duarte.
There is an advantage to do a mass shakeup versus targeting one player, you avoid unfairly targeting when there are numerous guilty participants.
I’ll be honest, I had to stop reading after “The”.
Your loss, you would probably learn something.
Nah, fool me once…
I’ve been a garbage collector for years, and I really don’t like the way you throw trash around.
… [Trackback]
[…] Read More on on that Topic: kingsherald.com/articles/kings-97-rockets-122-failure-to-launch-deja-vu/ […]
… [Trackback]
[…] Here you can find 8227 additional Information on that Topic: kingsherald.com/articles/kings-97-rockets-122-failure-to-launch-deja-vu/ […]
… [Trackback]
[…] Find More on that Topic: kingsherald.com/articles/kings-97-rockets-122-failure-to-launch-deja-vu/ […]
… [Trackback]
[…] Find More here on that Topic: kingsherald.com/articles/kings-97-rockets-122-failure-to-launch-deja-vu/ […]
… [Trackback]
[…] Info on that Topic: kingsherald.com/articles/kings-97-rockets-122-failure-to-launch-deja-vu/ […]
Badge Legend