The tanking discourse has dominated the headlines all season with a decent chunk of teams seemingly doing their all to avoid winning as many games as possible in order to secure a top pick in a loaded draft. Up until now, the Kings have largely avoided being in that conversation despite their terrible record, mostly because they’ve just been bad, and also because they’ve probably done the most to harm their prospects of a top pick of any of the worst teams, going 9-15 since the All-Star break.
The focus quickly turned to the Kings however on Tuesday against the Warriors, when the Kings intentionally fouled Seth Curry away from the ball with 3:15 to go despite being up by 1. The Kings were already in the penalty at the time, so that foul resulted in two free throws for the Warriors. The Kings would go on to lose the game 110 to 105, and after the game, clips of the foul began circling social media without any further context. Draymond Green even got into the fun in the post game, saying in reference to tanking this season that he “I saw a team tonight foul Seth Curry with three minutes to go in a game for no reason”.
Now, the NBA is reportedly investigating the Kings and the foul according to ESPN’s Shams Charania, with the Kings claiming it was simply a strategic mistake by head coach Doug Christie. The NBA has already levied hefty fines this season for intentional tanking to both the Utah Jazz and the Indiana Pacers, but that was regarding player availability, not an action done by a player late in the game.
The truth of the matter is, the Kings weren’t fouling Seth Curry for “no reason”. As broken down in an expertly done video of the situation by Rob Perez, the Kings likely fouled Curry at that time because Doug Christie wanted to call a timeout. At the time, the Kings had three timeouts, but if the clock had gotten to 3 minutes, they would have lost the timeout. Perez showed several situations in recent games where the Kings have called that same timeout in various situations on dead balls in order to get some use out of it, showing this is something Coach Christie likes to do. The mistake on Christie’s part however was not remembering or failing to notice that the Kings were in the penalty. But even after the foul, he proceeded to use the timeout, and what he drew up after the time out was a three pointer for McDermott to put the Kings up ahead by three. Their eventual loss had nothing to do with that previous intentional foul.
Also just for Draymond, Perez brings up the great fact that since the All-Star break, the Kings actually have a better record than the Warriors themselves (9-15 vs. 8-16). Compare that to the other NBA’s tanking teams:
- Brooklyn (5-21)
- Indiana (3-21)
- Utah (3-21)
- Washington (3-23)
Thanks to that, the Kings have dropped from the NBA’s worst record and a guaranteed shot at a top 5 pick to now having a 52.2% chance to pick between 6-8 (and an outside shot at 9). Those odds could manage to get even worse if they manage to pass up the Utah Jazz in the standings over these final two games, and if I was a betting man, I’d bet they end up doing just that (I’m guessing the Kings beat these exact same Warriors on Friday). If the Kings are truly tanking, they’re doing a terrible job of it.
The NBA is set to vote on some new proposals to hopefully reduce the need for teams to tank, and I do agree that something needs to be done. It doesn’t feel good to be upset when your team wins a game, which has been the case for myself for most of these games since the All-Star break.
The Kings have as many post-all star break wins than Indy, Utah and Washington…combined! If the NBA is going to launch an investigation, it should be how an organization can be this freakin’ dumb.
Kawhi gonna Aspiration, Giannis gonna Kalshi, and other teams win 1/3 the number of the Kings down the stretch, but it is the coaching of Doug Christie that calls for an NBA investigation. Got it.
Great points. Silver is turning the NbA into a joke.
He still reminds me of an older Paul Brogan. I can never get that out of my head.
“The league has concluded its investigation and determined Doug is a bad coach.” 😉
Translation: “The Kings aren’t tanking, they’re just dumb.”
This “tanking” investigation might clear the Kings but it puts a spotlight on DC’s coaching acumen and its just so embarrassing that it might just be the thing that gets him fired…and all because he really wanted to win that game.
Vivek checked with Matina (who hired Discount Doug) and she said it’s ok, and that he should be here next season and coach their FRP. So it’s ok.
So now the Kings have a Dougie McBuckets and a Dougie McF#%kits
LOL
No worries 50 cent will front row next game!
The Doug Christie inverted tank.
I doubt it. I saw somewhere mentioning that people around. The kings are suggesting it’s hard to truly evaluate Doug because of all the injuries.
Ha. It’s easy to evaluate Doug. He’s not very good. So, they will reassign him.
Vivek’s new “advisor”. Hell, at this point I’d rather see Doug go back to the broadcast and get Kayte out of there.
The season wouldn’t be a total loss if Doug did take Kayte’s place . Improved Coach and broadcast . Win-Win
Please lord, no. Doug is worse as a broadcaster than he is as a coach. He is way, way worse than Kayte.
It’s fun to put this somewhere else on the floor.
“The NBA is investigating the Sacramento Kings equipment manager for cheating because the balls were partially deflated. The NBA determined they weren’t smart enough to inflate the balls. No fine.”
This team is definitely no fine.
No class, flat balls.
First class flat balls.
FIFY
This entire franchise is a mistake.
You mean…a Ranadiverror?
Probably the worst part of this, is that the Great Virtual Signaler Vivek will push to have the Kings try and win the last two games.
“we aren’t tanking”
May 10th – either blessed relief or harsh comeuppance. I am a Kangz fan – you know which one I expect
virtue not virtual (Sheesh!)
Ranosedive
Wrongadive
This whole organization smells Rankadive
The liklihood of expansion happening isn’t very high given the percentage of owners that would have to vote yes. LV makes no sense anyways.
May as well move the Kangz to SEA. I don’t think Sacramento would care half as much as they did back when the Here We Stay movement occurred.
I’d be fine becoming a Sonics fan.
Already am, shirt came last week.
I’m buffering.
Rattle Seattle!
If you know, you know.
You and Vivek deserve each other. What a disgusting disgrace you are.
After 18 years without a team, I don’t know if Seattle area cares as passionately about the NBA as it used to. And there is no latent demand for Vivek here after seeing what he has done with the Kings over the past 13 years.
Expansion team, yes – Puget Sound will be very excited.
Kings moving to
Key ArenaClimate Pledge – I don’t think Seattle will give a crap unless a sale happens as part of the deal. I certainly wouldn’t hop on the newly opened light rail #2 line to go watch the team if they move here and Vivek is still a part of the ownership group.As an aside to all this, DC is not an NBA HC. Put it like this, if he’s fired at season’s end, no other team will have interest in him as HC.
Brown should still be the HC.
I’m not sure he’d even get an assistant coaching job. Not every ex-player can or should be a coach, see Steve Nash.
HC/DC
Your low voltage, low wins option.
Nets get blown out by the Pacers today. At this point, the best we’ll be able to do is tie them in the loss column (don’t see ourselves moving ahead), but I have a funny feeling that the Dubs will rest players tomorrow and we are gonna pick up a win.
The Dubs are resting Steph tonight and will reportedly play him tomorrow. I can’t imagine that they will risk putting him on the court without some competent players to protect him.
I’ve never been more tempted to walk away from the Sacramento Kings. I’m not going to…I don’t think, but it’s never been more appealing. The mere thought, after all we’ve been through (ie., the stupid pointless wins where DDR takes 20 shots, the crap-ass talk about culture, the coach who slams the “haters,” the FAILURE to actually tank, Perry’s trainwreck moves and inspirational tweets), that the Kings are guilty of tanking, and being investigated for doing so, makes me want to stick a sharp pencil right though my eyeball and straight into my brain. The Kings should be investigated for other things, like for example, the fact that they have one of the worst, if not the worst, front office in all of professional sports.
I often think “what’s the point?” when it comes to my Kings fandom. It’s a one-sided relationship, and I always get the short end of the stick.
TKH is the probably the only reason I am still mildly following the team.
I understand your frustration but my position is simply that I live in Sacramento and will always pull for the hometown team ( silly to some degree ) and enjoy NBA basketball . I still remember the early 2000’s and how great it was ( again silly to some degree ) . That’s it !
I on the other hand…might be done.
Not just with the Kings.
With all of it.
When you’ve been an A’s and Raiders fan for nearly 50 years, and a Kings fan for over 40 years, the decades of incompetence, worthless ownership for the vast majority of it, combined with the endless creep of betting/gambling into all the major sports…
As a historian, I know how that last part in particular ends.
And I don’t think I want to be around for it.
More than ever before, money rules and determines everything. And also more so than ever before, those with the most of it seem to have the least amount of common sense and/or impulse control.
Increasingly, I think I’m done with the world in general.
Sports used to be my outlet from life. Now it just mirrors life in all of its ugly, shallow emptiness.
Sigh…I’m going to go somewhere and be sad now.
Once i heard that they used some sort of anal beads device to cheat with chess, I knew it was game over, or checkmate, if you wish.
Don’t forget the television broadcast team.
A lot of people would actually like to forget about them.
Mark Jones leaving ESPN
To become the next Kings coach?
No.
Head of Concessions.
All stalls will be hotter than fish grease!!!
If his employees don’t do their job correctly, he might put them in the weight room!
Ok, the baseline problem with tanking isn’t the wins and losses. It’s uncompetitive and uninteresting games. If every game was a nailbiter and your team just couldn’t do it, the league wouldn’t care about tanking because the product would be interesting.
So. How to fix tanking? Reward staying competitive.
If you subtract the point differential from a team’s wins, you’d get a composite number that would look like this:
Indiana Pacers — 26.4
Washington Wizards — 28.8
Brooklyn Nets — 29.4
Utah Jazz — 30.0
New Orleans Pelicans — 30.2
Memphis Grizzlies — 30.2
Dallas Mavericks — 30.7
Sacramento Kings — 31.2
Chicago Bulls — 35.0
Golden State Warriors — 37.2
Milwaukee Bucks — 37.3
Charlotte Hornets — 38.0
Miami Heat — 39.1
Portland Trail Blazers — 40.7
I think it’s fair to say that the Pelicans have zero reason to tank and have been sadly playing their hardest all year. They’re a good example of a team that is trying to win games (-4.2 diff) but sucks at it (26 wins). Their low score reflects that their games are (probably) more interesting than, say Brooklyn’s or Utah’s or Indiana’s who are unquestionably tanking.
The Kings are being hurt by their own ineptitude. They’ve put a trash product on the floor all year, and are winning games sometimes when it doesn’t matter. But if you knew that by blowing out another crappy opponent would help you get a better draft pick, you’d probably want the team to play harder, right? Then if you came up with a formula that included a -.5 for close losses and +.5 for blowout losses (15+ points) you’d reward teams trying to be competitive who might accidentally win sometimes and hurt those who don’t.
The other thought is this: If your team can’t win 21 games you’re lottery ineligible. . . . The worst team with less than 21 wins gets to pick at #5, etc. And if teams can clear that bar you move it up until you get to 25 games (30%).
I like the proposal in the last paragraph.
Or you could just say the 4 worst teams pick 6-9. Random draw maybe.
Lottery would be for the other 10 non-playoff teams 1-5 and then 10-14 is by record. The lottery could be weighted or flat odds.
I liked Jerry Reynolds idea that playoff teams get 1 lottery ball, non-playoff teams get 2 lottery balls.
I feel like Doug Christie is going to screw up and win at least once before the season is over. That’s why I put $10 on the Kings to win against the Warriors. If the Kings lose, I win! If the Kings win, I win. Win win situation.
And I just won $50 lmfao! Called it!
Badge Legend