There is difficulty in returning after a long time away. After a period of transformation and refinement, after a disappointing, somewhat surprising early exit, to find yourself thrust back out in front of it all again with expectations so far outside of your control that all outcomes, save for perfection, present themselves as failure. This team, the city, our fanbase, hell, yours truly: we’ve all run out of precious blank calendar spaces from which the season and all the expectations that follow can be ignored. The countdown timers have dwindled to oblivion, our speculation and prognostication and prediction have been wrung all the way out. All that’s left to fall from our dry and twisted conversations is the dust of apprehensive, anticipatory silence. All that’s left for the Kings, is to play.
This franchise celebrates their fortieth year in Sacramento, with the better part of those four decades spent disappointing us, hurting us, finally rising to our expectations and then dashing our hopes in ways we couldn’t have fathomed even moments prior to it happening, inventing new ways to force ourselves to interrogate our reflections with a wholehearted “Why do I do this to myself??” If Rudy Gay’s “basketball hell” really does exist here in Sacramento, it’s populated mostly by those whose gravest sin was loving a team more than it respected itself.
And still, here we are again – returning. With levels of hope reserved only for death cults and Kings fans, we return to our team, to this fandom, to every corner of the world and world wide web to discuss, to debate, to scream when necessary at those who dare say, that this city, this team, doesn’t have what it takes to reach new, previously unscalable heights. Keon Ellis is an All-Defense First Team candidate. The Kings do have three All-Stars. Keegan Murray is somewhere between Paul George, Peja Stojakovic and Kawhi Leonard. Last season was a fluke. This can be a championship level team.
Yes, it’s true that basketball, like our fight against the endless ignorance of talking heads and “content creators”, never really stops. But, it does idle. And just as true is that today, your support, your excitement, your fear, goes some place familiar and yet totally new and unknown because today –
The time for idling is done.
The time for doing something – for showing this dramatic, idiotic, all-encompassing, ever-maddening community of tweet thieves, and superfans, play-the-right-way-ers and burn-it-all-downers just what the hell we’ve all been talking about – has come.
So, shake off whatever lint you find from the jerseys in your closet or from the pinned shirsey on your wall or whatever is in that newly delivered bag, currently resting in your dresser. Rip your posters from their taped security, your signed photos from their frames. Blow the earth from that Kings cap on your hall tree. Unretire that foam finger, that polyester purple wig, the plastic crown you stole from the photobooth of your friends wedding. Grab that cowbell off your desk, give it a shake, just to be sure its still clangs loud enough to be heard by all those wishing to avoid it. And, when you’re finally finished taking account of what you’re bringing to the game or to the bar or to your buddies house for the game tonight, when you’ve finished cleaning every piece of memorabilia, every memento of love for this team, for this city, don’t forget finally to brush off the accumulated ash and cinder left piled haphazardly on your soul in the abrupt exodus that was the end of last season.
The only thing left in the dust after today are all the preconceptions this world has about how far Sacramento can go.
When: Thursday, October 23rd, 7:00 PM PST
Where: Golden 1 Center, Sacramento, CA
TV: NBCSCA – Mark Jones (play-by-play)
Radio: Sactown Sports 1140 AM
For Your Consideration
Two Words, Nice Trade: I’m not going to do much in the way of transitioning last season into this one. It was what it was. They were two injuries away from making the playoffs and they were a half dozen losses to terrible teams away from making the playoffs and they were one victory against the Pelicans away from making the playoffs. They did not make the playoffs. Call it hubris, call it bad luck, call it a cab and get it the hell out of here because I’m done with it.
To the task at hand: the Kings find themselves improved, not necessarily remade or new, but undoubtedly improved in a Western Conference that is closer to resembling a sixteen team BattleBots competition than it is a professional basketball conference. There are 12-14 teams out here that are all hoping to make it to the playoffs, with exactly that many teams that wouldn’t surprise me if they did. Each team, designed to wreck a decent number of other teams, with fatal weaknesses bound to be exploited by a good number more. Your robot is fast? It’s defense is light. Your robot can pound the crap out of everything within reach of its three hammers? It’s top heavy and dead in the water if a few of those hammers malfunction. Your robot is 7’6, can handle, hit threes, post up, block shots and run the floor? The guy driving it belongs in a Sun City with an around-the-clock fall-risk plan… but enough about Chris Paul.
Tonight, the Kings will face off against the suddenly new look Timberwolves, who just weeks ago swapped their second best player, the lone sail in the storm for a near decade now, Karl-Anthony Towns, for Julius Randle and the oft-pined after, quickly forgotten, little Ragu himself, Donte DiVincenzo. This marks a monumental shift for the Wolves, who were considered contenders to come out of the West just before the start of training camp and are now considered… I’m not really sure here… weirder, more wild-cardy contenders to maybe come out of the West. I’m not trying to be sarcastic or facetious here – they’re just a lot clunkier, less sexy than they were a month ago. Randle and the newly extended Gobert might be a Zach Randolph-Marc Gasol for a new generation, while Anthony Edwards dabbles in being Michael Jordan reincarnate from time to time. The aforementioned DiVincenzo fashions himself a Gary Payton level shit-stirrer, but depending on the night he can swing wildly into Patrick Beverley territory. Doesn’t mean he won’t be on the heels of Malik Monk for Sixth Man of the Year consideration, but 3-11 on opening night against the Lakers won’t make an offensive heavy Sacramento team fear you, much less the rest of the Nova Boys miss you. Jaden McDaniels is a first-team All-Defense level guy if he can learn not to foul, Naz Reid is going to be incredibly important to this iteration of the Wolves, maybe to the point of earning the award he won by starting at the end of last season. I love the Wolves, I root for the Wolves on any night they aren’t playing the Kings (or Thunder). This is just one of those things that we’re going to have to come back to 30 games into the season for a clear pictures.
All that to say: the Wolves are dangerous. They are deep, they are incredibly well coached, they have the single best offensive talent and the single best defensive talent on the floor and regardless of all the shenanigans around the KAT trade, the team with those three things more often than not wins the game. Sacramento cannot afford to come in loose and lax – if they’re going to make the playoffs this season, they cannot start this season with early, regrettable losses that come back to kill them late in the year. A shooting night even remotely resembling what they did in the pre-season and this game will get out of hand by half time.
We have 81 more games after this one to discuss the Kings, their expectations, how soon we should freakout if the worst comes to pass, but tonight is tabula rasa. I don’t care how they do, who gets the shots or how they get hit… just get a W and we’ll build from there.
The Small Stuff
Huerter vs. Keon: It won’t surprise me if Mike Brown uses Kevin Huerter in the same way that he used KZ Okpala starting during the first few games of Keegan Murray’s career. Sure, Brown mentioned that he doesn’t like players to lose a spot due to injury, but Kevin was well on his way down the road to losing that spot when Desmond Bane smacked his wing into a drumstick. My totally buttpulled prediction here is that Brown give Kevin 3-10 games in the starting lineup, allowing for some time to be told he’s got to play better defense to continue to start while simultaneously motivating Keon to lock in on shooting better than he did in preseason, and giving Kevin motivation to play better defense in the eventual move to the bench. Brown gets his legit reason to start Keon, Kevin gets the fire underneath him to raise his play on both ends when he’s off the bench and Keon can know he earned it over an ever widening sample size of data that says he should be there already.
Behind Enemy Lines: I’ll be at the game tonight, in the lower bowl, with two Wolves fans, a Raptors fan and a fellow Kings fan. If you’re rocking Kings Herald gear and a guy who looks like he’d sell you molly at a discothèque in Prague compliments you on it, it’s… well… it’s probably me. If he offers to sell you molly, seek out security (or buy it, I don’t care) but it’s definitely NOT me. The only thing I’ll try to sell you is the idea that a certain metallic color would look good on a Kings jersey, and for that, you may also want to call security.
Prediction
82-0, baby. Sabonis MVP. Monk, 6MOTY. Fox, $345 million. Gold jerseys, in the pipeline.
Kings: 122, Wolves: 116
Lord Give Me The Strength ????
Thanks, Will.
Enjoy the game.
Let’s go!
Can’t wait for tip-off
TWolves also lost their point forward off the bench, Slo-Mo.
The preseason games were scary;
‘Gainst the Wolves we’ll have to be wary.
Still cheer for our team
To light up the beam
Though our odds may look slim to nary!
+1 Wave off the big, bad Wolves!
&ct=g
New season means new Jman pre-game rhymes!
And, the universe is back in harmony.
Thank you JMan. The best.
LET’S GOOOO!!!!!!
Welcome back Will!
You might be a bad person for liking the gold jerseys.
My controversial color choice is the Red Kings hat. It’s my favorite.
Welcome back, Will!
Is there going to be a Nostradumbass contest for this season? I also can’t remember if last season’s winner was announced?
Hi Klam,
Was gonna do a post on this at some point but no, no more game night prediction contests. It just got way too time consuming for me as my life and work have gotten a lot busier. I might find a way to reimagine it to keep it going if I can find an easier way to do it. I will still be tabulating and honoring the results of last year’s Nostradumbass contest though.
Thanks for doing it all those years! It was fun while it lasted, but all things must pass.
I do have a prediction though, and maybe I’ll just post one every game and see if it comes to pass.
Ant will lead all scorers but Domas will record his first triple-double of the season.
Triple double for the ox. Book it.
While I will miss the contest very much, I will not miss the anxiety I’d feel every 2 or 3 games when I had to scramble because realized it was 3 minutes to tip-off and I forgot to get my picks in 🙂
Hate to nitpick but the Kings will actually be going 83-0 this season.
99-0 including playoff victories.
I know, name checks out. (Ha! Beat you to it.)
Hate to nitpick your nitpick but
The Kings will most assuredly go 99-0 this season. The regular season is 82 games. The In Season (Emirates Cup) affords an additional Championiship game which does not count towards the regular season record. The Playoffs are 4 rounds (1st round, 2nd round aka Conference Semi-Finals, Conference Finals then NBA Finals).
This is most assuredly what will happen. Only doubters think otherwise.
Ah, so 98-0 officially, 99-0 unofficially. Thanks!
Haters gonna hate.
Fantastic write up! Highlights everything we love about this place–great writing, great passion, great community.
I am pumped for the game tonight, and for the season as a whole… going to be a special year.
40 years in Sac… hard to believe! GO KINGS!
I am expecting to see an angry Timberwolves team having lost to the less talented their namesake Lakers on NBA opening night. (Hey – AD was very impressive and clearly the best player on the floor, IMO. How many nights can he do that? That is the Lakers question as they appear to be not at all better, personal-wise, compared to last season).
Last season, Sac stacked up well against Minny. Fox does well against the less talked about as seemingly ageless Mike Conley, and I am guessing Keon will see time against Ant Man, along with some Keegan.
Another interesting match up will be the McDaniels, Alexander-Walker, DiVicenzo trio on Deebo.
The big deal for those TWolves is their size: Gobert, Randle, (still not a King)Naz Reid in a formidable front court – and that is exactly what we fans have been worried about. Domas is but one man. Trey Lyles, Keegan, Alex Len against those 3. That’s my Bigs worry.
It’s a 3 Point League: The TDubs shot 41 3PA (make only 13 for .317%) in their first outing. I expect at least that amount this contest. Last season they attempted nearly 33 3PA but hit at a .387% rate (just a hair under Boston for the NBA’s 3rd best). Not the best use of their height – but Naz Reid, Randle will hoist up threes (just like KAT last season – in fact, both KAT and Julius Randle exacted the same 5.3 of 3PA/game last season)
Shine that BEAM tonight Sacramento!
Matchups will be interesting. Conley can’t guard Fox so last year McDaniels guarded Fox. That left Conly on KH or Keon, Gobert on DS and KAT on Keegan and Edwards on HB.
Kings want Keegan on Edwards to start, then maybe Keon. Fox on Conley, KH on Jaden and leaves DDR on Randle.
Both teams will have trouble in crossmatches.
One of the reasons- just one- that Keon is not starting is that Kings want Keegan on Edwards.
That doesn’t really make any sense to me…this is the exact type of game where Keon is a better option to start.
The least worst option IMO is:
Fox on Conley
Keon on Edwards
DDR on McDaniels
Murray on Randle
Domas on Gobert
VS the expected option of:
Fox on Conley
KM on Edwards
KH on McDaniels
DDR on Randle
Domas on Gobert
The defensive matchups with Keon in the lineup are more preferable to the matchups with Huerter and in both scenarios you could put Murray on Ant
if you need to although I wouldn’t do so due to Randle likely taking advantage of anyone not named Murray.
Going to be a tough one tonight but coming out with a win would be a great way to start the year!
The Wolves actually won all the quarters but the second on Tuesday which they lost 19 to 33. In that one the Lakers shot 52% from the field while still only going 1 of 8 from 3. It follows then that the Lakers had 72 points in the paint on the night. That doesn’t seem like a standard way to beat the Wolves within Gobert defending the rim and McDaniels providing some help.
The Lakers shot a god-awful 5 of 30 from 3. If the Kings can hit their threes at a reasonable clip, that will help them win. There is the Kings preseason, but I don’t think it matters much. No Huerter, no Lyles, lotta G-Leaguers, and a lot of “it’s preseason” attitude.
MIN did have 15 player TOV (and 1 team TOV), with 14 in the first three quarters. Hopefully, it was the late addition of Randle and DiVincenzo that caused that, and they’re still learning to work together but not there yet. I viewed all the TOV and it just seemed like they were sloppy; it wasn’t chemistry issues. If true, that’s not good as they will be locked in tonight to avoid starting 0-2.
Will on the keyboard is like Big Daddy Kane on the mic: A story will be told, and it will be told remarkably well.
Will giving what the Kings must – 110% ! Yea NBA and Kings .
Nice post. Totally agree on your Heurter Ellis take. The Okpala treatment. I think in the end it’s probably the best way to go about this for both players psychologically.
I think the Kings will win, I try not to take preseason games too seriously. The T-Wolves are also still putting the pieces together.
I don’t see the logic of giving Huerter an opportunity to start and play defense. That’s never going to happen.
Can’t wait for full strength and full throttle Kings tonight!
Great to see you, it’s been such a long time. Kick off your shoes and take the bedroom at the back of the hall. Don’t expect clean towels because I gave them all to Aunt Mildred. See you at the game.
So if the Kings come out, hold court, and get the W, can we all put pre-season behind us and chalk it up to the “flow” experiment?
Or, if the Kings wet the bed like they have during pre-season, can presume there is a problem?
I’m of the belief that as long as they don’t look like pre-season, win or lose, I call it it a win.
Pre-season and one game means nothing. I will be concerned if they quit again in the third quarter. That is a consistent pattern with years of samples.
I’d still be concerned if we see the same kind of offense and perimeter defense that we saw in preseason. Brown admitted to trying some new things to learn, but if he is still running the same “flow” system, I’m gonna be worried. Give me some solid PnR and DHOs that look purposefull.
Yeah I think it’s about how they look. If they can’t shoot or defend the three at all like was the case in the preseason then I’ll be worried. But if they lose a close game to the Wolves who I think are a better team and a title contender, so be it. I just want to see cohesive offense and defense.
“In my Flow era”
Dubya G! Welcome back! I have missed your writing, as entertaining as your musings are on the podcast.
I think the dawn of The Purple Reign is upon us, and your previews are an absolute highlight. The parmesan cheese on the shell of a Jimboy’s taco, if you will.
I think the King’s are gonna absolutely cook this season. Third year MB, confident with his contract, and a veteran all-star with both pedigree and leadership in DeMar, added to two All-Stars with chemistry in Fox and Sabonis, a young wing about to pop in Keegan, and a 6th MOY candidate in Monk who loves this city? Boom. Vibes are strong.
Who is stopping DeMar, Domas, De’Aaron, Monk, & Keegan in crunch time? Sprinkle in some K-Von, Trey, Keon, Dougie McBuckets, Len-sanity, and later in the year Carter, the steal of the draft, coming in off the top ropes? Get on board, this train is heading to the Western Conference finals.
I keep reading how stacked the West is. Is it? How many teams are relying on old and injury prone players? How many teams have to be quantified with multiple “if’s”? Or “on paper”? Rather than a mid offense & mid defense like last year, with a mid result, the Kings have chosen to double down on what made what they might be good at and they have decided to be great at it. That offense is going to be great, and they are going to overwhelm teams. Good doesn’t win, average doesn’t win, greatness wins, and the Kings offense will definitely be great.
Opponents better hope umbrellas are in the visitors’ locker room at G1C, because The Purple Reign is coming, and it’s going to rain buckets.
I feel that if they play like each one can they will win. IMO last year has stuck in their minds and they don’t want that to happen again. This is a new year and hopefully a start of a new era. GO KINGS!
I am fired up! Will is back. G-Man’s 40th season. Going to take advantage of the 20% off at the KH store and look for a guy selling molly at the next Kings game. Not to buy any just to thank him and Shout. GO KINGS!!!
Badge Legend