If the NBA hiatus has taught me anything it’s that I could really benefit from some new hobbies. Nothing has been able to fill the basketball shaped void in my free time over the last several weeks, so I’ve often turned to YouTube to reminisce about simpler times.
I found that I’m less interested in game highlights and more interested in revisiting those special moments in Kings history that helped shape the reputation of this organization over the last decade. Kings fans have lived through some wild moments.
A real guilty pleasure of mine is Gavin Maloof’s WWF style promo after the Sacramento Kings drafted Tyreke Evans over Ricky Rubio, Jonny Flynn, and Stephen Curry back in 2009.
Kings fans are never in total agreement over anything, but Ricky Rubio had cultivated a ton of support among the Sacramento faithful leading up to the draft. When Geoff Petrie drafted Tyreke Evans with the 4th overall pick, a majority of the fan base was not happy.
Thinking back on that entire draft process now, it’s not totally dissimilar to how a healthy portion of the fan base reacted to the Marvin Bagley pick, but I’m not interested in reliving that decision right now back to 2009.
The Kings held their annual draft party inside Arco Arena, and when the team revealed their selection, a lot of fans in attendance were not happy. Gavin Maloof snapped.
The other guards have a potential to be good. This guy will be great. Mark my words, this guy is the real deal. This guy will be great. He’s 6-6, 220, is the fastest on the court sprint, his wingspan is 7-foot. Great kid. He loves Sacramento. His agent wanted him to be here. He wanted to be here. We wanted him to be here. We can’t go wrong. This guy will turn this franchise around. I’m sorry I get a little excited, but I’m tired of all the negatives. I’m tired about the negatives. I’m tired about everybody taking shots at Sacramento and the Kings. Well it’s changing! It’s changing! It’s changing today!
And so all of you can be excited. I want to congratulate Geoff Petrie, Coach Westphal, our entire scouting staff, for this wonderful pick. You’re going to love this guy. Wait until you see him. Wait until you see, he’s going to turn our whole franchise around. We got a great team, a young team, it’s going to take him some time. Give him some time. Give him some time. But this guy is a beast, and could be the best player in the draft, with Blake Griffin in it. This guy could be the best player in the draft. Mark my words. Thank you.
Gavin Maloof was ultimately wrong, but so were a lot of angry Kings fans. Tyreke Evans went on to win Rookie of the Year, but never reached his full potential thanks to brutal injury luck and bad off-court decisions.
Ricky Rubio never really developed into the franchise player I thought he could be at the time, either. As is turned out, passing on Stephen Curry was the real sin here.
For reasons I’m not sure I can properly explain, I look back at this footage fondly. Gavin Maloof’s passion was legit, and while the acts of his family on the way out of Sacramento will likely never be forgiven, enough time has passed that I can sit back and watch a video like this with a smile on my face. What a ridiculous moment in time.
And anytime someone asks you why Kings fans are so negative, please remind them that we were told Tyreke Evans was going to turn this franchise around 11 years ago. Eleven! And we’re still waiting.
Who is that in the plaid shorts on the walkoff?
Ahh the memories. Just realized that Steph was being picked on the board behind him while he gave that speech. ð
Fail
Well, at least we’ll always (somebody post it!) have 1) the comic of ‘Reke-Bot treating defenders like cones and locking in with robot red eyes on the rim and 2) 20-5-5
ð
I didn’t have an issue with the Evans selection, but it is amazing to note some of the players taken after him: Curry, DeRozan, and Jrue Holiday are the most notable, but the list of guys that could lay claim to having a better career speaks to the talent in that class: Rubio, Lawson, Teague, Gibson, Beverley, Danny Green, Patty Mills, and of course, Jon Brockman.
How many NBA owners would deliver a speech on a player in a similar vein, I wonder? Serious question; it might be a common occurence, but just looks weird to me.
Maybe it’s only weird because he’s…uh…not the most eloquent guy in the world.
That shirt is in a landfill somewhere. Still moist.
Macrosoft
Totally didn’t realize that Pat Beverly was drafted in 2009. Of course he was! Just goes to show how long it takes to untangle these drafts.
If Curry went anywhere other than GSW (and especially to Sacramento unfortunately), his career, the relative value of the guards & wings in this draft and the entire NBA would be very different. In 2009, a player launching 8+ 3PA/game over a season was laughably ridiculous outside of Grinnell system Division 3 schools. In the timeline where the Maloofs take Curry there’s probably some version of this article lamenting that selection over guys like DeRozan and Evans.
Maybe he wouldn’t have reached the levels he’s reached in GS if he went elsewhere, but I think he still would’ve been at least an All-Star player anywhere.
Unlikely the team would have been winning any titles, but Curry would still be a superstar level player.
Agreed.
Yeah, Curry is one of the 10 best players of the last decade (arguably top 3-5) and is probably top 50 all time, he was gonna be a star anywhere health permitting.
At the time, Curry was from a small school with big scoring numbers. Had injury problems to start his career and looked to be the next Greg Oden. Glass ankles. Having the superior physical gifts makes the best basketball player. I mean, who would take Larry Bird.
Oddly, Oden never really had issues with his ankles. Just one way he and Curry didn’t really have anything in common. Curry really had one major injury that kept him out early in his career. Aside from that one season where he played 23 games, he didn’t play fewer than 74 games in any of his first 8 seasons, averaging 78 game per season in those 7 seasons. Long story short, Steph’s early career injuries-proneness is WAY overstated.
Oh, and nice to see you richie!
Thanks!
“Great kid. He loves Sacramento. His agent wanted him to be here. He wanted to be here. We wanted him to be here. We can’t go wrong. ”
Well, things have definitely changed under new ownership, right?
Right?
But at least the GM was competent.
I remember feeling so excited and hopeful around December of that season, and even at the end of the season. I truly felt that Tyreke was then one to lead us out of the losing-drought. It’s a shame that he couldn’t get to where we all thought he could get.
My most notable memory was checking the score during the Bulls 35 point come back game in the middle of the second quarter. I assumed they were going to lose and then had to go out to dinner with my family. I come back home to check the score out of curiosity and was in total shock to see they won. I watched the highlight reel of that game for days.
That was the first year that I ever bought a pair of full season tickets that I didn’t share with a group. It was an exciting year and by the end of it, I too bought into the hype. I was a Rubio backer, and Steph wasn’t on my Radar, and that first year with all his injuries, it didn’t register, to me at least, how good he was going to be.
Minor update on the site just FYI: Comments with 8 or more upvotes will now be shaded green, eventually this will be changed to purple. We are also working on a system to highlight new comments for ease of reading. I also highly recommend that you guys clear your browser cache on mobile and desktop in order to see the changes. Especially on mobile, we had a few major issues on launch including links not working on the front page. Those are fixed now but it still requires a cache wipe for you to see them.
FWIW I can now see live updates on my tablet.
How does a clueless doofus clear his browser cache on mobile? Asking for a friend.
On my iphone, I went to Settings, Safari, Clear History & Website Data. Disclaimer: I am old and should generally not be trusted, especially as it pertains to tech.
I hope he didn’t have a file on his desktop labeled “Linda”.
Thanks! Eh, I will pass it on, I mean.
It’s refreshing to access the mobile version of a Kings site and not play russian roulette with the low-rent advertising.
Go to history. Then clear browsing history. That’s how you do it on Chrome anyway.
Your parents didn’t teach you how to wipe your cache when you were a kid?
Yeah but I ran out of toilet paper and there hasn’t been any in the stores for the past 2 months.
Save your receipts!
I’ve found that I can also use the site on my phone if I use incognito mode. However, it was more convenient for me just to clear my cache on my phone (it hasn’t been necessary to do that for my computer).
I’m seeing new comments appear, and they are yellow!!!
This was yellow
We all live in a yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine, we all live in a yellow submarine……
This is why I don’t drink 8 glasses of water a day.
Nice! I think Blake just implemented that fix.
I can see replies on my tablet, too. Previously I only could on my laptop. Thanks!
I’ve been seeing them too!
All because Ricky couldn’t cut his own steak…
Just stopped by to say FTM
You bring up a good point
via GIPHY
“enough time has passed that I can sit back and watch a video like this with a smile on my face.”
Oh dang, site is live! Glad to see it. Just in time too, cuz StR sucks now.
Look forward to conversing with you all here about this ridiculous franchise.
OT, but Barkley comes up with some gems every now and then –
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EWoWdmfWAAAUhaU?format=jpg&name=small
“…drive-by panties.” Epic.
Sadly in the end, Tyreke may not even be a top 15 player from that draft. I had really high hopes for him. I was caught up in the ROY season and really thought we had something with him. In all honesty I feel DeMar DeRozan went on to have the kind of career I thought Tyreke would have had. If Tyreke had a gifted PG next him instead of playing PG himself, he might have had a much better career as on off guard.
Eh, I wouldn’t beat yourself up much. Tyreke was a good player. Injuries suck. If he had DeRozan’s health, I think would have had the better career.
That’s true, but I do think the game changed in a way that didn’t favor Tyreke’s skill set. The Tyreke vs. Curry trajectory of the league s style and play didn’t help.
Figured I’d add in that I don’t think Curry is “the” Curry we saw from 2015-2019 if he lands practically anywhere else due to his ankles, and the specific focus GSW spent on fixing that in addition to embracing his play style. Sacramento wasn’t going to make that happen as an organization.
I think Curry would’ve been a star anywhere he went. However, he wouldn’t necessarily have been as good elsewhere as he’s been in GS.
I think that’s fair. But that change didn’t suit DeRozan any more than it did Tyreke became a passable 3pt shooter by the time he was 26. DeRozan still hasn’t put up a 3pt percentage anywhere near average. His best season, he shot 33.8%. And that was nearly 3% higher than his second best season (31%). And, of course, Tyreke was always a better defender and passer than DeRozan.
Good thing we upgraded to Nik rocks!
Are you referring to –
Tyreke probably still ranks high on the list of Sacramento Kings draft picks, even though his career ended up being a disappointment.
It would be an interesting exercise to rank the 1st round picks of the Sacramento Kings, using some sort of formula that included performance, quality of player relative the draft class, draft slot used to select the player, etc. The #1 player might wind up being Peja Stojakovic and then Kevin Martin when factoring all of that in. Maybe Billy Owens, who didn’t come here as the #3 pick but fetched Mitch Richmond in trade?
And if you expand it to the 2nd round, Isaiah Thomas certainly enters the conversation.
Here’s the list of 1st rounders, starting from most recent for anyone that wants to delve into it! Including if the draft pick was traded and what that trade led to:
1. Marvin Bagley
2. De’Aaron Fox
3. Zach Collins (which led to Justin Jackson and Harry Giles)
4. Marquese Chriss (which led to Georgios Papagiannis, Skal Labissiere, and the trade for Bogdan Bogdanovic)
5. Willie Cauley-Stein
6. Nik Stauskas
7. Ben McLemore
8. Thomas Robinson
9. Bismack Biyombo (which led to Jimmer Fredette and the trade for John Salmons)
10. DeMarcus Cousins
11. Tyreke Evans
12. Omri Casspi
13. Jason Thompson
14. Spencer Hawes
15. Quincy Douby
16. Francisco Garcia
17. Kevin Martin
18. Gerald Wallace
19. Hedo Turkoglu
20. Jason Williams
21. Tariq Abdul-Wahad
22. Peja Stojakovic
23. Corliss Williamson
24. Brian Grant
25. Bobby Hurley
26. Walt Williams
27. Billy Owens (which led to the trade for Mitch Richmond)
28. Pete Chilcutt
29. Lionel Simmons
30. Travis Mays
31. Duane Causwell
32. Anthony Bonner
33. Pervis Ellison
34. Ricky Berry
35. Kenny Smith
36. Harold Pressley
I think you need to exclude Chriss, Collins, and Biyombo since the Kong’s didn’t choose them. They were chosen by the Suns, Blazers, etc.
Well…hence why I put in parenthesis what the pick ended up being on the Kings’ end.
I’m sure there will be debate as to placement, but hey if we’re all playing with the same rules it should be fair. “Dream Team” should probably be changed to “DREAM DRAFT TEAM”.
Woops! Can’t believe I forgot about Kenny Smith. ….Welp, try this one instead:
Who are LF & Randy?
Lawrence Funderburke and Randy Brown. “Funderburke” wouldn’t fit in the space.
Here’s something humorous to listen to for background noise, if you haven’t seen already. 😀
Idea for Kings Herald powers that be:
How about a video just like this, but starring the Kings Herald staff as the GM’s. Bradley should take Ernie Johnson’s place as MC, otherwise he’d probably select Francisco Garcia with the number one pick. Do it on Zoom or perhaps a safer app. Screen record it and post it!
Then let us commenters vote on the winner.
Hm. I don’t remember Funderburke being bald.
He’s not bald. He has a close-cut top, but it’s probably tough to see because the pic is small 🙂
?fit=692%2C543&ssl=1
One thing that makes me chuckle (guffaw?) is Tyreke’s best season (2017-2018) immediately proceeded the second time the Kings decided not to re-sign him. He made a little more than $3 million that season.
I wonder if the “First!” guy at StR will switch over to “Last!”?
I used to own a t-shirt that read: “Oscar. Michael. LeBron. Tyreke.” WHY DID I GET RID OF THAT?
Never forget the 20-5-5 campaign.
Never forget. Larry Hughes.
Badge Legend