The Sacramento Kings look awful.
Their record may not indicate how poorly they’ve played, sitting at a completely salvageable 13-15, and even their net rating (+2.8, 12th in the league) suggests a good team buried somewhere in their layers of ineptitude, but right now, the Kings are embarrassing to watch and embarrassing to root for. They’ve lost 12 of their last 20 games, they’ve posted a losing record at home, have lost 7 of 10 at home, and they’ve gone down by double-digits at the Golden 1 Center in 8 of those 10 games.
They are too soft, too small, and rarely impose their will on opposing teams.
Many factors have contributed to the mess that is the 2024-2025 season, from a GM who hibernates 90% of the season and who has yet to build a competent roster after the Tyrese Haliburton-Domantas Sabonis swap, to a few ill-timed injuries, to players who are simply performing well below their abilities. There’s a lot of bad and very little good happening anywhere across the organization, but no one has been quite as bad as Mike Brown this year.
Inefficient Defensive Strategy
It should come as no surprise that the Kings aren’t a particularly effective defensive team with the lack of effort and execution shown by their General Manager since he was hired, but Mike Brown has done nothing to mitigate the holes that exist in his rotation.
Sacramento’s basic, two-option philosophy of an all-out blitz of the ball-handler or dropping to protect the rim might work with a team full of quick, long players who can quickly recover to the perimeter, but the Kings aren’t exactly stacked with a coterie of OG Anunoby clones. Instead, the Kings and their fans get to watch them obliterated from three-point range in game after game after game, and Mike Brown refuses to recognize that fact.
On the season, the Kings are surrendering 14.7 three-point makes per game, which ranks 28th in the league. And many of those makes are coming from a wide-open opponent, as Sacramento allows 16.5 wide-open three-pointers per game (nearest defender 4-6 feet away), also 28th in the league. Overall, opposing teams are sinking 37.6% of their three-point attempts versus Sacramento, 1.8% better than their average, which is also 28th-best in the league.
Mike Brown has deployed a bad, inefficient, ineffective defensive strategy that welcomes opposing teams to catch fire from beyond the arc and smoke the Kings over 48 minutes.
It’ s simply unsustainable for a winning team.
Offensive Schemes
When Monte McNair added DeMar DeRozan this offseason, the Kings were supposed to accelerate to the top of the league in offense, and to a certain extent, that’s happened, as the Kings currently sit 7th in the league in offensive rating, but much of that success has been found in spite of Mike Brown’s execution, not due to it.
The most significant gap in Brown’s offensive philosophy has been his integration, or lack thereof, of DeMar DeRozan.
Last season, and in every season of his career, DeMar DeRozan has been a master of drives and the mid-range game, but the Kings have relegated him to only one of those aspects on the offensive end of the floor.
In the 2023-2024 season, DeMar DeRozan was involved as the pick-and-roll ball-handler in 37% of his offensive possessions, and he absolutely killed opponents in that situation, scoring 53% of the time and at a rate of 1.06 points per possession, ranking 6th in the NBA among players who ran at least 5 pick-and-rolls per game. In his career, DeRozan has never finished worse than 78th percentile in pick-and-roll efficiency, and in the last 5 years, he’s never finished at a frequency lower than 37%.
Mike Brown has DeRozan running the pick-and-roll 24% of the time, even though he’s sitting in the 91st percentile in efficiency at 1.13 points per possession. And this can’t be blamed on DeRozan handling the ball less frequently, as his usage rate has dropped by less than one percent in his transition from Chicago to Sacramento.
In another indication the DeRozan isn’t being used to his maximum ability, his drives are way down alongside his pick-and-roll responsibilities. He’s attempting 8.1 drives per game in 2024-2025, a dramatic, dramatic shift from last season, in which he averaged 14.8 drives. And in both cases, he’s been incredibly efficient, shooting 55.5% from the field in those situations last year and 52.4% currently.
Those shots on the move within the flow of the offense have been replaced with an unhealthy diet of mid-range jumpers. Although he has a well-earned reputation as one of the best mid-range shooters in the game, relegating DeRozan to that role and that role only is as simplistic as it is stupid, and once again, the numbers prove the inability of Mike Brown to successfully and seamlessly integrate one of the more efficient scorers in the league.
Last year, DeRozan led the league in mid-range attempts at 6.9 per game. He once again leads the league in 2024-25 – at 9.2 per game, an increase of around 33% year-over-year. For comparison’s sake, Brandon Ingram is second in the league this year at 5.6 attempts. The gap between first and second place is the same gap as second and forty-eighth place.
Those DeRozan numbers speak to a larger issue with Mike Brown. He finds something he likes and never moves away from it. In a surprise to no human being on the planet earth, the Kings continue to lead the league in dribble hand-offs. They account for just under 10% of Sacramento’s offensive possessions, even though the Kings are actually below-average in execution, averaging 0.93 point per possession in those situations. They score just 41.2% of the time in dribble hand-offs.
Conversely, and in a point that speaks to DeMar DeRozan’s, De’Aaron Fox’s, and Malik Monk’s mastery, the Kings are the best team in the league by a significant margin in the pick-and-roll, averaging 1.1 points per possession and scoring 51.3% of the time. Despite that critical (and very easy to find) fact, the Kings run the pick-and-roll only 14.8% of the time, hardly more often than the much less efficient dribble hand-off, with that frequency ranking 25th in the league. The Cleveland Cavaliers, the second-best team in pick-and-roll, runs that play the second-most times in the league.
Add in the lack of three-point attempts for Sacramento (24th in the league), and a picture begins to emerge of an old-school, ineffective offensive philosophy that doesn’t highlight the strengths or cover for the weaknesses of an extremely flawed roster.
Inconsistent Rotations
Outside of the overall offensive and defensive strategies employed by the Kings, Mike Brown’s third massive issue has been his inconsistent rotations and accountability. The best example is that of Keon Ellis, although plenty others can be found simply by checking basketball reference’s game logs.
This year, Ellis has either been the 5th or 6th best Kings player, and sometimes he’s moved up even further in that ranking. He’s Sacramento’s only option who can both defend at a high level and knock down three-pointers. Despite that, Ellis has been in and out of Brown’s doghouse all season.
As an example, from 11/18 to 11/29, Ellis played in 7 games and averaged 23.3 minutes per game. During that span, Ellis scored 10.4 points per game on 52.8% three-point shooting on 5.1 attempts per game. He also put up 0.7 steals and one block per game: quality numbers from a quality role player.
In the very next game, Ellis was a DNP-CD with no real explanation. The starters played a whole bunch of minutes, Kevin Huerter had an okay game (13 points on 4/9 FG) and Jae Crowder played around 12 minutes for reasons yet to be understood, but despite the win, Ellis fading from playing half of every game to being benched was without cause and without explanation was worrisome.
Two days later, against the Memphis Grizzlies, Ellis was once again benched, playing for two minutes. Kevin Huerter did not have an okay game (6 points on 3/10 shooting), Jae Crowder once again played 12 minutes for reasons yet to be understood (0/4 FG), leaving Ellis to disappear on the bench. The Kings lost by five, and by the next day, Ellis was back! Against the Spurs, Keon played 21 minutes, and he’s averaged 22 minutes in the five games since the Rockets and Grizzlies benching.
That’s an unacceptably chaotic approach to rotations, especially considering Ellis’ status as the only three-and-D player on the roster. Another smaller example can be found in Doug McDermott over the past four games.
In the win against the Jazz on 12/8, McDermott was a beast off the bench. He scored 18 points on 6/7 shooting in just 8 minutes. He didn’t appear in the next game against the New Orleans Pelicans, and that DNP-CD was followed by a 16-point performance against Denver in which he sunk 6 of 9 shots and 4 of 7 of his three-point attempts. That impressive outing was again followed by a benching on Thursday night against the Los Angeles Lakers.
Yet, Kevin Huerter, who has been awful for the majority of the season, continues to find regular minutes in Mike Brown’s rotation. Some players can do no wrong and some players can do no right.
When Mike Brown first joined the organization, he did some kooky, high school-level things that helped to change some of the culture of the team. He introduced the commitment form that all players had to sign, he sprinted with the players on the court at practice, and he brought in the defensive player of the game reward. All those things were important in year one of a shifting roster, but more is required as teams find little bits of success, and Mike Brown doesn’t seem ready or capable of stepping into that next level of coaching. His defensive philosophy is vanilla and doesn’t fit the roster, nor does it fit the modern NBA. The Kings have found success on the offensive end of the floor despite his strategies, not due to them, and Brown’s “throw spaghetti at the wall” rotational decisions have been both atrocious and significantly harmful to the success of the team.
It’s true that Monte McNair has not set Mike Brown up for success, but Mike Brown also hasn’t set Mike Brown up for success.
He’s been downright terrible.
Thank you.
I’ve been murmuring about the COY award curse and shouting about him worsening since the chatter began last season about giving him his premature extension and his bag.
Somewhere else someone wrote accurately that Monte is to blame for not having a top 4 roster in the West, but Brown and to an extent the players are to blame that they are playing as a bottom 4 team in the West.
MB = Mark Jackson
Jordi = the next Hardy, Mazz, Mosley?
Wil Hardy has never had a winning season and is coaching one of the worst teams in the league. I get there are greater circumstances around that, but a little early to crown him some type of up and comer.
The Jazz also are not trying to win. Makes it difficult to judge a coach when the organization actively wants to lose.
Hardy has been well renowned by those who cover the NBA. Yes, hard to judge on W/L win they’re intentionally tanking.
Luke Walton was well renowned once upon a time, too.
Mike Brown is a drill sergeant. He’s hardworking, organized, a teacher, a motivator. He has a good rapport with players, holds them accountable. He is an excellent coach to hand a blueprint to and expect him and his team to execute.
But… he cant make a blueprint himself. He struggles with rotations, matchups, tactics, systems, and in game adjustments. When the ganeplan isnt working in any given game, the team goes off the rails and he never has an answer in the moment.
The best coaches, the ones that win titles, are visionaries. They are on the cutting edge of league leading strategies. Pop, Kerr, Riley, Jackson, Spoelstra. These guys see through the matrix both in the minutia of a single game and where the league is heading overall. They are always a step ahead.
Mike Brown won a title as Steve Kerr’s right hand man because every visionary needs someone who can help them execute day to day. Mike Brown is that guy. A perfect Robin to someone else’s Batman on the bench. But you can’t except Robin to beat Batman in a fight.
Unfortunately, its looking like Jordi shouldve been the HC and MB the assistant. Jordi’s departure has started to become an overlooked aspect of why this team looks as shit as it does.
I have lots of respect and appreciation for MB for who he is and what he’s done for the Kings and in his career. Even now, I don’t necessarily want to fire him because can we really do better? Spoelstra ain’t walking through that door, folks. If we reach back into the grab bag of promising young assistant coaches, theres a 95-99% chance we pull out a worse head coach than MB. But nonetheless, it’s becoming clear that we’ve gone as far as MB can take us.
No offense, but this is such a defeatist attitude, IMO.
Agreed. Horrible way to run a franchise.
I’m not against moving on from Brown. Before the Hali-Sabonis trade, I was actually a member of the pro-tanking faction. A full teardown is the only way you can hopefully build something better.
But I just want people to understand that a full teardown can also be the first step to becoming the Pistons. There are no guarantees young talent pans out, that the new HC will be the visionary we’ve been waiting for.
More often than not, a full teardown means years of WAY worse basketball than we’ve been treated to under MB. People think they want Mike Brown gone, but then they’ll see what that looks like and they won’t be happy either. I’m just trying to set expectations on what the Kings options look like (none of them are good).
I think this fanbase is fully aware of what a bad team looks like. We won’t become the Pistons, we will become the Kings of old. The difference will be if we will actually commnit to a real tank and a purposeful rebuild, I think may fans will be open to that.
And I think most of us are aware that there are no guarantee, and that for every OKC there is a Detroit.
But to me, the no-mans land of perpetual mediocrity, with attempts to be a play-in team while squandering (late) picks with safe choices or short-term trades, is worse than the process and glimmers of hope an actual tanking strategy would bring.
And I understand that some people are just happy that we are playing around .500 basketball. Kudo’s to them. I just can’t.
There’s an interesting philosophical conversation to be had on whether it’d be good enough for this team to just be a perpetual First/Second round exit – I take it you might not think so. I’d personally be more reluctant to blow up a good thing.
But this team failed to make the playoffs last year. It’s on track to miss them again this year. There’s nothing really to celebrate here. I am fully willing to turn my key and hit the big red button on this team along with you.
If they were in the 2nd round/WCF conversation for several years, then sure, stay the course and see if you catch lightning in a bottle and get a title.
This current team is not that. Whether it is bad roster management, coaching, or player execution. Could a different coach get more out of the roster? Maybe…
No matter, sitting with a team that has high expectations to make some noise in the playoffs, yet they continue to struggle, is frustrating to me. It’s a matter of how long do they keep going this road before the plug is pulled and they try something different. I don’t have the answer to that.
We got rid of the play-off drought, but we are now the team with the second longest drought of seasons without a play-off series win (since 2003-2004), trailing only the Hornets.
I don’t want to be the embarassment of the league again if Charlotte wins a series in a few years.
And Charlotte might have better building blocks with LaMelo and Miller.
LaMelo will never be a winning basketball player. Jury’s out on Miller.
LaMelo just hasn’t played enough to be assessed properly.
Yea the whole goal is to do better.
Firing Brown isn’t going to meaningfully change anything. There needs to be rebuild, with a new GM.
*whispers* I’d like to see Monte get to do a true teardown and rebuild.
*ducks bottle from crowd*
The FO had Jordi sitting there on the bench for quite sometime but didn’t have the stones to pivot from MB to Jordi, especially during those MB contentious contract negotiations.
Pivoting to Jordi was an obvious move Mm and Vivek didn’t make, not to mention the countless roster bludners.
I have no faith in this FO.
It definitely was not an obvious move. Everyone would’ve criticize firing Mike Brown and compared it to firing Malone. When the contract extension look like it wasn’t going to happen, there was already murmurs in the media about how the kings were messing this up.
Hindsight is great but there’s no way that they could’ve reasonably fired Brown around in the off-season. They would’ve gotten crushed for it, and if the team struggled this season, everyone would be blaming Vivek for causing turmoil.
Agreed, that’s why I call it a big boy decision. Would have been a difficult decision to make, but one that should have been made.
Well said.
Could have just not extended him, though.
Everything about this year has sucked and ticket prices are stupid expensive. I’m starting to get jaded and its not even all-star break. WTF happened?
I agree. I went to the Hawks game and took the family. It was fun to be there live, sucks they lost but still had a good time. Not a cheap night though.
We have our lame owner and front office, questionable coach and team and it seems like it is very overpriced.
And this is the Suns owner, look what he did. I used to live in Phoenix, makes me want to switch just on principle.
Yeah I have tickets to the Pacers game for the family on Sunday. $210 for four upper-level seats. Maybe if we weren’t playing like crap at home I’d be more jazzed about spending the money.
That is amazing. Lovely owner!!
This would be a perfect time to have a lame duck coach and not a coach that just signed a multi-year extension over the summer.
Great write-up BTW.
Great stuff, Tim. Summarized what I have been thinking about most of the season, except I was unable to put it in to words that well.
I think this roster should be about 5 games better than they currently are. 13-15 currently, should be like 18-10, even with the roster issues. Coach’s job is to put his players in the best possible position to succeed. As you have outlines, it does not appear that Mike Brown has been doing that enough this season.
Run the PnR and make defenders try to guard Monk/DeRozan/Sabonis. It is the multi-head attack I was envisioning when they traded for DeRozan. But now we get just standard, bland, mid-range ISO plays that kill the offensive flow.
Defensively, this team needs to be picking up ball handlers 3/4 or full court more often. We know they don’t have the length and structure to defend that well in the half-court, so at least make the other team take more time getting in to a set and/or make them do something off-script, instead of just waiting for the drive and kick to a wide-open 3 nearly every possession.
True, take as much time off the clock as possible.
They need to apply pressure on the perimeter before the ball get behind Sabonis.
And that also mean starting Keon Ellis instead of Malik Monk.
As much as I agree with all of you you don’r replace Monk with Keon. I would play Keon more but not to the extent of taking Monk out of the starting 5. Since he starts the Kings have been playing much better due to his energy, passing ability, 3 point shooting, working with Sabonis and more. Yes play Keon more especially if other starters. even Monk , aren’t cutting it.
Agreed, Jack. Keon needs to play more but that doesn’t mean Monk needs to play less/have his role changed.
I watched the 1st half last night, and then the 4th quarter this morning (already knowing the outcome). I came away thinking “Why the hell is Huerter in the game?” Keon was the better player last night, didn’t make stupid turnovers like Huerter, etc.
Brown has some kind of issue with Keon, and it is clearly affecting the outcome of some of these games. He won’t play Keon more. Bottom line. 20-25 minutes, then games where he doesn’t play or gets a few minutes. It is the Mike Brown way with Keon.
Same with Isaac. The few minutes I saw of Isaac Jones were solid. YANK!, back to the bench. 4 minutes total last night. Gotta get the chuckers and turnovers back in the lineup!
Brown is weird with young guys. I think he believes that vets have some type of tenure which means they get the benefit of the doubt on their mistakes, and that being quick to replace them with a young, hungry kid can rock the boat in the locker room. Conversely, young guys do not receive the benefit of the doubt and are yanked from games quickly for mistakes that would get a shoulder shrug from a vet.
But this is bad for the team in the short and long term – you need your best players on the floor regardless of who that may be and you need young guys to have opportunities to work through their mistakes.
I didn’t realize until now that Colby played 1 minute last night. 18 the prior game, although Huerter out was out that game.
Huerter has not been good this season, yet he keeps getting every chance to work his way back to having a good season. He got beat like crazy last night on drives, yet he was able to stay in there. Not that Colby would have been better, but to your point that a vet gets a hand wave for poor play.
For a coach that screams defense all the freaking time, he leaves poor defenders on the court way too often.
Bingo!
AND…Keon is 2nd on the team with a 3.2 +/- for the season. Huerter is 12th at 0.1
100
Did you notice in last nights game with 8 minutes left in the 4th quarter he subbed out both Murray and Ellis. I watched them go off the court together. Not a lot of defenders on the floor. And he preaches defense? Wow!
THIS 100%
Mistakes from vets like:
Those kind of ‘vet’ mistakes? That is the guy who wants a supermax BTW
Yeah! I noticed all the above last night. I wouldn’t make a good NBA coach because of most of the above on my team he would be on the pine for awhile until he figures it out.
For sure. Where did you coach?
They made a little run with that group with Isaac Jones and Keon.
It is baffling how inconsistent their roles are. I would think with young guys it would make more sense to keep their rotations very consistent so they know what to expect and just focus on their play. Mindfuckery
I don’t care who you are as a player 4 minutes doesn’t do it. How can you get comfortable or even get a feel for the game in 4 minutes. The only way you are going to get better is to play the game. Practice just doesn’t do it. And I like Issac Jones. As an old coach I feel there is some talent there.
Totally agree. I like Isaac Jones too, not sure if he will turn into a rotation player or not but I think he has earned the consistent minutes for us to find out.
That makes trading Fox seem like a good idea
Why do some fans always speculate we should be a lot better than the record suggests. This is a ridiculous narrative. 18-10?! So they are Elite. You have a 35 year old as part of a core. lol!!! 35! A stat filler. Fox for all his accolades. In his 8th season. Has accomplished less than Brad Beal. Sabonis is a great regular season player. 9th Season. But by no means can he put a team on his back. And by no means is he any kind of good in the playoffs where his deficiencies are exposed. 12-pts 7 boards time in 5 playoff appearances.
So your core three players are in their 8, 9, and 15 season respectively.
They can’t shoot 3s. Hello 28 games. They can’t defend 3s. As long as those 2 facts remain, I could care less about having this ultra spectacular core of Fox, Monk, Demar and Boner. Kings are no better than the Bulls.
They are what they are. Mediocre. When they win 6 out of the next 7 or put some semblance of a winning streak together get back to me.
Brown isn’t great. But using him as the scapegoat for a poorly built roster is quite amusing
At some point you need to point fingers at the money makers.
Just keep up your fantasy of trading Fox to the Rockets.
Brown hasn’t been great, but to emphasize him as the person most responsible for how poorly the team is playing instead of Monte comes across, frankly, as trying to excuse Monte.
The roster isn’t capable of competing beyond a play-in level, regardless of the coach, and that should be today’s article, instead of this.
To refer to Domas as Boner is disrespectful and disappointing. . Also, I assume you are aware that Brown’s salary is almost 4 times that of McNair .
Excellent post. Imagine hearing from your coach “you’re not executing the little details” and thinking “your offensive and defensive strategies are doomed to failure, regardless of our execution of the little details!”.
To me the defense is limited by the roster. The offense needs more orchestration, period. We need to run more play sets, guard/guard pick and rolls, Monk/Domas pick and rolls, running DeRozan around screens to create driving lanes, and other components of a modern offense. Stop letting Fox dictate the actions; it’s not working, particularly down the stretch when he and DeRozan trade off playing hero ball.
‘Stop letting Fox dictate the actions; it’s not working, particularly down the stretch when he and DeRozan trade off playing hero ball.’
I have said the same thing almost word for word. IMO, make Monk the PG and get the best package possible for Fox. Packaged with Huerter and whoever else if it helps. This could possibly shore up some shortcomings and save the season.
I think a lot of this has to do with rim protection. Sabonis literally just guards opponents with 1 hand up, letting offenses blow by while standing there or barely making an effort to hop up to defend the basket. That creates a situation where Sabonis often needs help, guards collapse the paint and that leaves open shooters at the 3 point line. This team needs a 3 and D to complement Sabonis in the worst way possible. It would be great if we could get a Patrick Williams type player or a Mo Bamba band-aid, but McNair seems to be ignoring that. A trade needs to happen. Huerter isn’t salvageable – a trade could have been done this off-season, but nope. Now one of Ellis, Monk or even Carter needs to be packaged up in a trade for someone, like what I mentioned above. I’m not holding my breath, because we hardly see McNair make any moves.
One hundred percent! I had a post a while back saying how the 3pt defense issues are a symptom of no rim protection. The perimeter defenders have to sag to the paint too much, then the close out is not great due to lack of length.
I have thought for a long time pairing Sabonis with a 4 who could rim protect would help a lot.
Everyone who watches NBA basketball agrees with you except for the Kings front office. They’re rolling with tripling down on ISO guards.
It’s honestly almost impressive how much they (obviously?) ignore simple ways to find players that fit. Drafting point guards back to back years when we seemed to hit the lotto on hali, and drafting davion when Sengun was right there, who is a younger, soon to be better version of the player we traded hali for
Preach!
Thanks for bringing the objective evidence (receipts!) to support the premise that Brown’s been sucky this year. I’m sure there’s ample evidence of his suckiness last year, too. Bottom line, as you say, this is a coach stuck in his ways, even though those ways are obsolete and detrimental to team success.
And FWIW:
Coterie noun
co·te·rie, kō-tə-ˈrē
: an intimate and often exclusive group of persons with a unifying common interest or purpose
https://www.merriam-webster.com/
Thanks, but I’ve read the Assasin series by Robin Hobb.
I couldn’t finish the series. Book 2 started to just drag on. Did you enjoy the entire series?
Yes. I read them a long, long time ago. They have a fond place in my heart.
The Lifeship series was the best one IMO, but I can understand the criticism of her writing.
I have no rhyme or reason for this, but I feel like 6 games below .500 is the threshold. If they get there, my gut tells me Brown, McNair, or both are getting fired. Just a gut feeling.
It’s crazy that even with how bad they have been this season, they’re still in the hunt. Hell – worst case scenario you’ll probably spend the entire season a couple games away from the play-in, and then it’s just two wins from there to the playoffs. This season still could turn around rather quickly. But it’s looking less likely with each passing day.
I think McNair gets the ax the day after we miss the playoffs. Unfortunately Brown and his shiny new contract will get at least one more season.
I think Vivek should use the Revenue sharing from the tax paying teams to pay Brown’s contract for the next 2 years after he is fired. Just call it a bad mistake and learn from it.
Also, Vivek should look at selling his stake in the Kings. Go enjoy his kids and family, and never come back to Sac. Also, take Vlade with you. Since he has come back as “Ambassador” for the Kings, things have gone downhill.
That may be the solution. Can Vlade again!
Looking at the Jan schedule very possible
So, we need someone to puke tomorrow?
It’s time for a Hero to rise…and then bend over to puke.
What makes me even more angry is, if I was Keon, why the hell would I resign here when my contract is up? This is one of the best building blocks this team has, being run out of town and likely thriving with another team, very soon. We basically have to trade him now, cause he will never resign, and it is entirely Mike Brown’s fault.
Great stuff, Tim! It makes me wonder that if us armchair GM bloggers can see what is happening, have the data the proves it, and have possible fixes to address things, but the coaching staff cannot, then what good is the coaching staff? Is Brown just too stuck in his ways to and doesn’t use data to help make his decisions?
Monte is in a conundrum. If he does nothing, the Kings are looking like a lottery team again and he runs the risk of Fox wanting out. If he fires Brown, the season is a wash and he runs the risk of Fox wanting out. If he makes some impactful trades by leveraging the future and the team still flounders under Brown’s leadership, he runs the risk of Fox wanting out.
Monte has the thinnest needles to thread. How does he make impactful roster changes without leveraging the future, while getting Brown to change his coaching strategy to get this team into the playoffs and beyond, all while keeping Fox happy to sign an extension? I don’t envy his position right now. Like others have said, the best strategy may just be to blow it all up.
Who cares about the future (picks)?
Because if loading up doesn’t work out then Fox, Sabonis, Keegan are all valuable enough to restore the pick stockpile.
Then you are just replacing what you lost in bad judgement. The Kings are already down a pick in the Huerter deal and have a pick swap with the Spurs, so if they give up another pick or two more to try and make this core work, but fail, then they would just be getting back to even by evetually trading everyone away.
Monte would have to be pretty darn sure that if giving up future picks gets this currently sub .500 team deep into the playoffs, because if it doesn’t, he’s got quite a hole to climb out of.
Of course, it really doesn’t matter what Monte my try to do if Brown continues to coach like he has.
Go get Collins and Walker Kessler, for example.
size issues solved and Utah is looking to the future.
That likely gets you back into the playoff picture.
If not, you have a lot of worthwhile assets that can be converted into draft capital.
A move like that would really be doubling down on the Kings current core is it’s gonna cost the Kings depth and picks to get marginally better depth. It would take the contracts of Huerter, Lyles, and one more, plush picks to pull that off. Is it worth giving up that much for two bench players, one of which (Kessler) would only get around 15 mpg because he’s backing up Sabonis.
I get that it’s an example of what might improve the team, but unless you are making a major move that fundamentally changes the course of this team, I think you are just rearranging the deck chairs. By major move I’m implying the coach and/or one or more of the starters.
Unfortunately Monte has put the franchise in a tough spot, and won’t do a tear down as it will cost him his job. So even if a tear down is in the best interest of the Kings, it’s not on the table. This was the downside risk of the Sabonis trade: being all-in with a middling hand.
True, a blow up my Monte would be admittance of his failure and a likely firing by Vivek, which is why it probably won’t happen.
I will say this, the only Kings player/coach that predates Monte is Fox. Everyone else he is responsible for. Should he decide to move Fox, maybe it could be rationalized by Vivek and keep Monte running the show.
Trade Fox and quit walking on egg shells with him, he is not worth it.
Shoulda thought of that two years ago. This is a situation entirely of his own making, or at least as a result of his inaction.
It’s not all on Brown. Team has no length, no shooting, doesn’t want to play 3pt D.
Demar is a ball stopper that provides no spacing.
I proposed this earlier. Jalen Green is not the answer in Hou. They did extend him. But either they are going to move him at some point or relocate him to the the 2. They are already regretting the extension. Green is not a consistent scorer.
Rockets are in desperate need of offense. In case you didn’t notice.
Fox to Houston makes a ton a sense. They will get a consistent 25 pt a game scorer.
Houston has loads of picks and young assets to throw at Sac.
Eason, Whitmore, Sheppard, Smith, Brooks, First rounders.
Kings could literally rebuild on fly.
Doubt it will happen. Because it makes too much sense.
instead, sign Finney Smith, thinking he’s the missing piece to the 4th seed. More deck chairs.
“There’s a lot of bad and very little good happening anywhere across the organization, but no one has been quite as bad as Mike Brown this year.”
Uh, let’s start with Monte McNair, maybe? He’s the one responsible for failing to improve the roster over the last 2 years. I’d start with firing him, and then, the new GM would bring in a new coach, which would make everyone happy.
But Brown? Replacing him with Monte still around is like, as they said, “rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic”.
I am fully aware that this might make me an idiot, or at least prove that I already am, but I still think the Kings are a really good team. Last night was incredibly painful to watch. We weren’t injured, or coming off the second night of a back-to-back, or adjusting to new players. We were rested and ready, and we just plain stunk. No way to excuse it.
But . . . I don’t believe Brown is a terrible coach, and I think that our current roster is much, much better than they are showing. I don’t believe in Huerter anymore at all. But I think DD, Keegan, and Ellis, are way-y-y-y better than they are playing. And I also believe that Fox, Sabonis, and Monk are two pieces of a championship starting five.
Yeah, yeah, call me naive or tell me I have rose-colored glasses, or that I have Stockholm Syndrome, but I still believe we are a second round playoff team. Especially if we trade Huerter and pieces for a quality big man/men.
This does NOT mean that I think Brown is coaching well right now. I’m just as confused as everyone else by his strange decisions. Just like some of our players not playing up to their potential, he’s not coaching up to his potential. But I still believe he can. We shall see.
Happy holidays fellow fans. Hope we get something good in our Kings stocking.
This is amazing.
One of MB’s more obvious failings has been an inability to adjust within games and even within the season. It’s been obvious for several games now that DDR has been pushed out in the 16-20 foot range for shots, and not the 10-14 foot range he was able to get to earlier in the season. This means opposing teams have adjusted defensively to take away an important scoring option. The same is true with Keegan. Making him guard the toughest people on the opposing roster is likely impacting his offensive game, so why not adjusting the lineup to ease that burden and let him re-find his range? I also think the current roster has options that cure some of the issues and has not been utilized yet. Go big (or as big as they can). When Lyles comes back (or Issac Jones), play him at the 4, Keegan at the 3 and DDR at the 2. That’s a much bigger (if not very athletic) lineup and creates defensive matchup problems for other teams. Keegan is a tougher guard for most 3s with his added bulk and size and I pity any 2 trying to hold their own as DDR backs them down for a midrange turnaround. Lyles/Jones can give Sabonis some help under the basket and maybe hit the open corner three at a reasonable rate. All this will require teams to double team someone, giving Fox or Monk the ability to use their speed to penetrate and drive to the basket or hand off to Domas. This isn’t to say don’t start Monk or play Ellis less. This is only to say use what roster you have in different ways. Switch it up. Make your opponent adjust to you. Certainly this makes more sense than playing Dougie, Colby or even Kevin. It’s unlikely we can trade to find a player for a next-level improvement like John Collins (my choice for a while), so just do better with what you have. The Bench Mob was so good in the past because they put an absolutely different team on the floor than the starters and teams had to adjust in real time on how to guard them. We have high-energy guys like that on the team now who seem to take pride in diving for loose balls and playing aggressively. Put Issac, Keon, Huerter (who makes mistakes and has lost his stroke but is a better option than Dougie), Jordan, and Domas, who can get fired up, and you have another group capable of giving starters a rest and making teams adjust. We don’t make anyone adjust to different styles and can’t seem to overcome adjustments other teams make against the Kings. And one final question I’ve wondered about for a long time. Is Rik Smits the real Rik Smits?? If so, I vote for him to get a seat on the bench and do some coaching (or maybe bring him in for size?). He’s not that much older than LeBron.
One of the best analyses I’ve ever read. A Master’s thesis on Kangz.
Too bad we never hear from the GM or the assistant coaches.
Appreciate all the hard work that went into this. Great read and nice job simplifying and sharing complex data.
No better demonstration of Brown’s lack of offensive sets than late in forth quarter. Kings have a fast break 4 on 5. Rather than attack rim, they pull up for 3 point shot. Not only miss but none of the Kings are near the paint and the rebound goes to Lakers. King’s offense has no direction, just a mixed up of players trying to get their offensive shot. Some shots so forced a real coach would bench the shooter (including Fox).
Badge Legend