Multiple sources are reporting a deal between the Cleveland Cavaliers and Sacramento Kings involving forwards Omri Casspi and J.J. Hickson is imminent.

From Marc Stein, ESPN.com:

It’s believed that the teams must complete the deal Thursday before midnight to ensure its completion, with a lockout widely expected at 12:01 a.m. ET Friday, barring unforeseen progress in labor talks between the league and the NBA Players Association.

The deal reportedly also involves the Kings sending the Cavs a first-round pick.  From Mary Schmitt Boyer, Cleveland Plain-Dealer:

In addition, the draft pick from Sacramento could be a late lottery pick if the team doesn’t turn things around. It likely would be top-10 protected, so the Kings wouldn’t send it to the Cavs until they’re drafting 11th or lower in the first round.

UPDATE (10:50 am): SI’s Sam Amick spoke with Casspi over the phone and tweeted his reaction:

“I’m happy. It’s a great opportunity for me to play. They don’t really have a 3-man.”

Casspi also tells Amick he spoke with Geoff Petrie and that the deal will be official “in a couple of hours.”

Just a bit of house keeping to take care of here for the Sacramento Kings:

The Sacramento Kings have exercised the rookie contract options on guard Tyreke Evans, forward Omri Casspi and center DeMarcus Cousins for the 2012-13 season, Kings’ President of Basketball Operations Geoff Petrie announced today.

Really no surprise here.  Both Evans and Cousins appear to be building block type players for the Kings, while Omri Casspi has been a nice contributor in his first two season.  So far, the Kings have announced a qualifying offer for Marcus Thornton and now the option years being picked-up for Evans, Cousins and Casspi.  Last week, the Kings waived guard Jermaine Taylor, per his request and the Kings have yet to extend the $1,091,100 qualifying offer due former Kansas Jayhawk big man Darnell Jackson or announce if Pooh Jeter’s $788,872 team option for next season has been picked-up.  All in due time.

The rumor mill is in full tilt tonight, with Yahoo! front man Adrian Wojnarowski leading the charge.  Is there a possible blockbuster trade looming between the Sacramento Kings and San Antonio Spurs involving All-Star guard Tony Parker?

The San Antonio Spurs are engaged in discussions about trading point guard Tony Parker to secure a high pick in Thursday’s draft, league sources told Yahoo! Sports.

The Spurs have talked to teams in the lottery, including the Toronto Raptors and Sacramento Kings, who hold the fifth and seventh picks, respectively. The Kings are determined to get a frontline point guard, and have also talked with the Denver Nuggets about Raymond Felton.

Wojnarowski followed his initial story with a series of informative tweets:

If Spurs deal Tony Parker to Kings for 7th pick, expect Omri Caspi to be part of package, sources say. RC Buford has been long fond of him.

Followed by:

The Kings coaching staff, in win-now mode to stay employed, are fully behind trading the 7th pick for an established player, sources say.

There’s no question the Kings coaching staff would appreciate a seasoned-playoff veteran like Parker to run the show. And so might Tyreke Evans.  The beauty of Evans is that though he was drafted as a point, the 6′-6″ 2009-10 Rookie of the Year can play both the shooting guard and small forward positions.  It’s unknown how close a deal like this is near completion, but tossing small forward Omri Casspimight not be something that interests Sacramento.  Although Casspi finished the season rough, he is a quality three-point shooter and a backcourt of Tony Parker and Tyreke Evans will need all the perimeter shooting it can get.

With less than two days left before the 2011 NBA draft, the no. 7 pick is looking more and more desirable by the minute, as teams are posturing to both move up in the draft as well as drop salary in anticipation of a new collective bargaining agreement.

Check back later this morning for our podcast with Kings beat writer Jason Jones of the Sac Bee, where we discuss the potential Parker deal and other speculation surrounding the Kings draft day options.

Yes, this is the greatest thing ever!

In case you missed it, the Sacramento Kings got taken to the woodshed by the NBA’s best team on Friday night.  The game was over before the first quarter expired as the 42-8 Spurs toyed with the Kings on their home floor for the rest of the game.

Sure-fire Hall of Fame power forward Tim Duncan played less than thirteen minutes as Coach Popovich was able to rest his stars after a tough win the night before in Los Angeles against the Lakers.  It was at this point that I started thinking -

How are the Spurs, as a whole, so much better than the sum of their parts?

Read more…

Late news from yesterday- Kings.com’s Nate Rose is reporting that starting power forward Jason Thompson is a no-go tonight against the Boston Celtics.  Veteran Samuel Dalembert, who has had tremendous success over the last few games, will start in Thompson’s place.

Before the injury to Thompson, Coach Paul Westphal had started the line-up of Tyreke Evans, Beno Udrih, Omri Casspi, Jason Thompson and DeMarcus Cousins five consecutive games.  That stretch is the longest that any one group has started together the entire season.

Paul Westphal is a completely likable guy.  On January 6, 2011, he won the 300th game of his career, a feat that he was unaware of until after the game.  Unfortunately, as the coach of the Sacramento Kings, Westphal has lost more games than he or anyone else would like.  There are certainly many reasons for the losses, outside of his coaching ability, such as the team’s youth, lack of talent, injuries and even bad luck.  The losing aside, if there is one thing that Westphal does as a coach that drives people crazy, it is the constant line-up changes.

So far this season, Coach Westphal has used 16 different starting line-ups in just 39 games.  Of those 16, only five of those line-ups have been used more than two games in a row and none more than four games consecutively.  Not all of these changes have been by choice.  Tyreke Evans was suspended one game and missed another four due to injury.  Samuel Dalembert began the season injured, missed a game due to a funeral and hasn’t been the impact player the Kings hoped he would be when they traded for him in the off-season.  Rookie DeMarcus Cousins has been erratic both on and off the court, but he is showing flashes of the brilliance the Kings hoped for when they made him the fifth pick in the 2010 NBA draft.  In short, the Kings have had to deal with injuries and growing pains to go along with an imperfect roster.  For some unknown reason, this particular blend of veterans and young players, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, hasn’t meshed as well as expected.

Many fans would like to blame Westphal and his tinkering for the inconsistency of this group of players, which is probably fair on some levels.  Westphal has started 13 of the 15 players that have appeared on the Kings’ roster this season, leaving only rookie second round pick, Hassan Whiteside, who spent most of the last two months playing in the NBA D-League, and Antoine Wright, a player who was waived November 29th, as the only two players not to start a single game.

Is the tinkering over?  I doubt it with the trade deadline looming in February and injury issues that are bound to come up again.  Has the tinkering slowed?  It appears so.

Over the last ten games, a clear rotational pattern has developed.  Due to injuries facing Evans and Garcia, changes have occurred, but they are clearly injury replacements and nothing more.  It appears that not only has Westphal decided on a rotation of players, but he has cut the rotation to nine and stuck to it.

The same starting five, when healthy, has started six of the last ten games since January 1st, and barring a major turn of events, will continue to start for the foreseeable future.

Here are the lucky winners:

 

Tyreke Evans (Guard)- Last season’s rookie of the year and the new face of the franchise, Evans is the player the Kings hope to build the franchise around.  His numbers are down across the board, but he has struggled with plantar fasciitis and personal off-court issues.  Coach Westphal would call these struggles “reasons” and not “excuses” and Tyreke is still considered the player most likely to deliver the Kings from the hell they have been mired in for the last half decade.

Stats since Jan. 1:  38.7 min., 17.7 points, 6.7 assists, 4.8 rebounds.

 

Beno Udrih (Guard)- Once considered a minor albatross because of his contract, the Slovenian native has become the Kings’ most consistent offensive weapon.  The Kings will continue to look for the perfect backcourt mate for Evans, but until then, Beno will do.  Udrih is shooting 50.4% from the field and averaging 14 points a game, both career highs.

Stats since Jan. 1:  34.5 min., 14.7 points, 3.4 rebounds, 3.2 assists.

 

Francisco Garcia (Small Forward)- From opening day starter, to bench player, to DNP-CD and back to starter, Garcia is the Kings’ best pure shooter and the team’s undisputed leader.  When Garcia is on, the Kings’ offense opens up; when he is off, the Kings see a lot of zones.  After missing all but 25 games last year due to a horrific arm injury, Cisco has only missed four total this year including coach’s decisions.

Stats since Jan. 1:  30.9 min., 11.6 points, 3.7 rebounds, 1.1 assists.

 

Jason Thompson- Considered a building block a year ago, the third year big man out of Rider is just now figuring out how to play alongside rookie DeMarcus Cousins.  Sometimes lost in the rotation of quality big men, Thompson does a lot of things well.  JT is not the shot blocker that Dalembert is, a pure scorer like Landry or the post force of Cousins, but he is a more versatile player than any of the other three at this point in his career.

Stats since Jan. 1:  22.6 min., 10.0 points, 6.4 rebounds, 0.8 assists.

 

 

DeMarcus Cousins- The rookie big man out of Kentucky has had his ups and downs, but over the last 10 games he has been dominant.  At this point of the season, only Blake Griffin has been a better rookie and Cousins’ best days are clearly ahead of him.  DMC is showing an uncanny ability to not only improve week by week, but quarter by quarter and he looks like a pretty good bet to be the Kings’ second all-star caliber player along with Evans.

Stats since Jan. 1:  28.8 min., 17.4 points, 7.9 rebounds, 2.2 assists.

The starting five isn’t all that is set.  Westphal has pared down the rotation off the bench as well.  For most of the season, Westphal has used 11 or 12 players in almost every game.  In the last 10, he has, for all intents and purposes, cut that number to nine players, the five starters and four players from the bench.

Meet the second unit:

 

Pooh Jeter- Jeter is the primary back-up guard behind Evans and Udrih.  He is a change of pace player who pushes the ball with incredible speed.  If you want to know about his impact on the floor, just ask Omri Casspi who raves about the little man out of the University of Portland.  Beyond his offensive prowess, Jeter has shown an amazing ability to guard some of the league’s elite point guards, even with his size limitations.

Stats since Jan. 1:  18.3 min, 4.1 points, 4.3 assists, 1.5 rebounds.

 

Carl Landry- Landry is the Kings number one weapon off the bench.  Last season, before the trade that brought him to Sacramento, Carl Landry was in the running for the NBA’s sixth man of the year.  Up until the last 10 games, he had struggled to find his rhythm, either as a starter or bench player this season for the Kings.  Carl now has a role and Coach Westphal has decided to use him in tandem with Samuel Dalembert, which seems to be a good pairing of offense and defense.

Stats since Jan. 1:  27.0 min., 14.0 points, 4.8 rebounds, 1.7 assists.

 

Omri Casspi- Omri’s path is similar to Francisco Garcia’s.  He has been the starter and a bench player and even received the dreaded DNP-CD this season.  Casspi also shares two other traits with Garcia, he is a fighter and he can really shoot it from behind the three point line.  The Kings’ second unit is at its best when Casspi is hitting his perimeter shots or running the floor with Pooh Jeter.

Stats since Jan. 1:  24.7 min., 8.6 points, 5.3 rebounds, 0.9 assists.

 

Samuel Dalembert- The veteran center has just recently started to figure out his place with his new team.  In his last four games, Sammy D has put up 8.8 points and 6.3 rebounds, which are major improvements over his season averages.  More than the numbers, Dalembert looks comfortable, especially on the offensive end where he has really been absent all season.

Stats since Jan. 1:  16.2 min., 5.4 points, 4.1 rebounds, 0.9 assists.

The other five players on the roster- Donté Greene, Jermaine Taylor, Darnell Jackson, Hassan Whiteside and Luther Head, are the odd men out as of today.  When the Kings have been healthy (six of the last 10 games), these five have combined to play a mere 47 of a possible 1440 minutes, or 3% of the total action over those six games.

Surprisingly, three of the five players completely out of the rotation have started during this 10 game stretch due to injury, keeping with Paul Westphal’s policy regarding the importance of continuity in both the starting and second units as well as having quality players coming off the bench.

Donté Greene was the latest of the out-of-the-rotation players to get a start, playing 35 minutes in the Kings’ Martin Luther King Day loss to the Hawks.  It will be interesting to see if his play will merit yet another change in the rotation.  For now, I would think that it is unlikely.

There are reasons that each and every one of these players aren’t getting the playing time that they so desperately desire.  Greene was given his chance.  Starting a total of 19 games this season, the third year player out of Syracuse just hasn’t been able to find a consistent stroke, shooting just 37.2% from the field and only 28.9% from three.  Jermaine Taylor is new to the club, arriving from Houston on December 15th via trade.  Hassan Whiteside is faced with the duel challenge of being a second round pick who missed all of training camp due to injury and also having a very similar skill set to Dalembert.  Luther Head has fought a myriad of injuries and illnesses, while Darnell Jackson, a player Coach Westphal thinks very highly of, is lost in a numbers game with the crowded front line.

So there you have it.  Many fans have asked for a solid nine man rotation, and after trying 16 different looks, Westphal seems locked in to group that he feels comfortable with.  The team has responded with quality play, but they are still struggling to translate that into consistent winning on the court.  Hopefully with a little bit of time, this unit will grow together and start seeing the fruits of their labor pay off because be it a reason or an excuse, the rotation issue looks to be solved.

NBA 2K11 can get boring at times.

Sounds crazy, right?

When you do marathon square-offs like my friends and I do, blowouts can be fun for the trash talking and buzzer-beaters are a daggerfest the likes a good NBA League Pass night can give you. However, whenever you have those games that constantly sway between eight and 12 points and your opponent can’t quite make a good enough run to make it interesting, sometimes you start intentionally giving up baskets and making questionable decisions to make it more of a game.

With the way the Kings played in the fourth quarter against the Warriors, it almost looked like that was their plan. This game was too in their control and they decided to make it more intriguing. Only it backfired on them and they ended up giving away a rare victory.

Now, we know they didn’t ACTUALLY make plays to their detriment in order to make it more interesting. That’s the kind of thing we only find in segments of Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel or the movie Blue Chips. It would just be a much more believable scenario for why the Kings would turn the ball over nine times in the fourth quarter or fouling a 3-point shooter twice in the final 20 seconds of a game.

A lot of people are focusing on the choking gestures an exuberant (to say the least) DeMarcus Cousins was making right before he choked in grabbing key rebounds to help close out the game. But really the decision-making of the entire team should be under the interrogation lights.

Two turnovers by Cousins in the fourth. Two by Beno. Three by Tyreke. The Kings only made six shots in the fourth and one of those was assisted.

They just couldn’t execute and the Warriors shoved the fastbreak down their throats. They couldn’t execute all game.

Sometimes it’s just a matter of knocking down shots too. A trend for the Kings this season is not making open shots set up by the guards (or occasionally a big man who passes out of the post properly). They’re one of the worst in the NBA at it (ranked 24th according to Synergy).

This game was no different. Kings made six of their 23 spot-up shots. That’s a blistering 26%. And this is the problem of the team overall.

This team can’t shoot. At all. When Tyreke does create open shots for his teammates, they don’t seem to knock them down. The alternative appears for him to barrel into traffic like he did last season only he can’t finish anymore. Or he’ll shoot horrible jumpers off the dribble. Or Carl Landry will get the ball and waste possessions (most games, not this past one. He was fantastic against the Warriors). Or maybe Cousins will try to do too much driving to the hoop or Donté Greene and Omri Casspi will struggle to find a good shot they can knock down.

The point is the offense can’t go anywhere if you’re not making shots. And if the offense can’t go anywhere for a young team, they start rushing. When the Kings start rushing, the wheels fall off. They’re not a team that can weather their own storm. When things go bad, they go REALLY bad. Part of that is being young and learning how to grow together in this league and part of that is just not being good enough to win these games.

And that’s what is frustrating about this game for the Kings and their fans. The Warriors (ESPECIALLY and undermanned Warriors team) is completely beatable on every night. They have their own issues and inefficiencies. You saw that in much of the second and third quarters. Instead of the Kings gutting out a much-wanted victory, they made things interesting.

And it backfired.

Makes you wonder if it’s time to hit the reset button on this game.

Immediately after the Kings’ final possession against the Dallas Mavericks failed, Paul Westphal was under scrutiny from those who watched the Kings lose at home in probably their best game of the young season.

But after watching it a couple of times, I have to say there was nothing wrong with the play call. It was actually a very good play with tons of options to score. The ball was put in the hands of DeMarcus Cousins and he ended up failing. It wasn’t Westphal’s fault. Cousins just made a mistake.

Let’s break this down Sebastian Pruiti style and pretend we’re NBA Playbook for a day.

Play starts with a clutter of Kings between the elbow and the 3-point line with Francisco Garcia down by the baseline. Omri jets to the near corner, Landry flashes to the far corner and Garcia moves to the far sideline above the 3-point line. Cousins flashes towards Tyreke to receive the pass.

As soon as Tyreke inbounds the ball, he cuts through the lane behind Jason Kidd after he fakes towards Cousins for the hand-off. At this point, Cousins should have hit Reke with a good pass over the top. This is where the play begins to fall apart.

Once Cousins misses the opportunity, Chandler’s wingspan takes away the passing lane and closes off that option for DeMarcus. This gives Cousins the lane to drive, which he does.

Cousins has one more chance to pass to Reke once Chandler has to cut off the drive, but Kidd drops down. As DMC gets into the lane, Dirk helps off of Carl Landry. This is another misses scoring opportunity because Cousins did have a slight window to drop the pass down to Reke. He also could have just tried to score the ball himself.

Cousins opts to kick out to Landry at the 3-point line, probably out of nervousness. Dirk tips the pass and it gets Landry farther away from the basket but actually gives Carl a better driving lane on the baseline.

Landry drives the baseline but instead of just going into Chandler and trying to score over him or draw the contact, he goes deeper towards the baseline and gets caught behind the backboard.

Landry really has nowhere to go with the ball or the pass at this point. He forces one out to Garcia about 35 feet from the basket. Jason Terry cuts over to intercept the pass and seal the win for the Mavericks.

Sad Panda. Terry steals the ball and the Kings lose the game.

Here is the play in real time.

Overall, I think Westphal is unfairly taking heat for this final play. The play in theory was brilliant. It gave the Kings multiple opportunities to score and tie the game. Maybe you can rip him for putting the ball in the hands of a rookie, but that happened a few times last season and worked out fine.

Good play but poor execution.

How We Feeling?
Totally awesome and then SOOOO the total opposite of awesome.

The Kings came out with energy. Evans came out destroying the Bulls and their staunch defensive efforts after he frustratingly missed his first two layups of the game. Samuel Dalembert and Jason Thompson controlled the paint. Donté Greene was the right kind of aggressive on offense. Omri Casspi was the right kind of shooter to swing the ball to. The Kings were taking care of the ball with their only two first half turnovers coming on offensive fouls.

Then the second half happened.

While the third quarter wasn’t killer for the Kings, it showed an outline of how the rest of the game was going to go for the Kings. While the Kings still shot the ball and scored relatively efficiently in the third quarter, they had turnover issues and it all started with the Bulls defense. It would be nice to say the Kings just got sloppy with the ball but the Bulls defense crippled everything the Kings wanted to do. They started by swarming Tyreke with double teams and traps whenever he got the ball in the half court. They pushed him away from the basket, forced him to give up the ball and then retreated defensively to get back to taking away passing and driving lanes.

Watching the Bulls work on defense was pretty special. With the Kings, it’s not hard to get them out of their offensive flow – usually because they don’t often have an offensive flow. Get Tyreke to have to go left and you’ve already stalled the offense. His passes over the top are slow and looping; they give the defense time to recover. But overall, the Bulls match up well with teams like the Kings. Rose is good enough athletically to stay with guys like Beno and Head defensively. Deng can stay with slow small forwards that aren’t strong at dribbling. Taj Gibson is just a damn good defender that can guard quicker 4s or be big enough to handle more massive power forwards inside. And Noah is just all over the place in a good way. He can guard just about anybody while still helping everywhere on the floor.

The Kings just don’t have anything to battle a defensive team like that with the current lineups they’re running. Cousins played way too much in this game, considering how ineffective he is on his right now and how ineffectively they’re using him (elbow jumpers instead of planting him on the block). I understand that Luther Head gives them so much defensively right now but they’re basically playing 4-on-5 out there on offense, and Dalembert isn’t always a viable offensive option either.

The Kings really gave this game away with their atrocious fourth quarter. Great starts by Tyreke Evans and Omri Casspi, and a great overall performance by the combo of Jason Thompson and Samuel Dalembert just couldn’t correct all the wrong that happened in the final 12 minutes of the game. The Kings broke down offensively and allowed themselves to be taken out of this game.

Key Sequence in the Game
Can the entire fourth quarter be considered a sequence of the game? It can? Awesome. Let’s go with that then.

Kings made three shots in the entire fourth quarter and turned the ball over seven times. I’m not basketball expert but I do know that you put your team at an extreme disadvantage when you have more turnovers than field goals made. If the Kings looked stagnant, it would have been a big upgrade from how they played offense in the fourth quarter.

Donté Greene made two of the Kings three baskets and Cousins made the other one. Outside of that, not a single player made a bucket. Evans got to the free throw line for two attempts, but those were the only attempts of the quarter. It was a lot of one shot and done. Kings scored just nine points in the quarter. NINE!!

The Kings had no space to operate on the floor. After the Bulls tied it up in the fourth at 76-76, Tyreke finally found some room to operate. The Bulls stopped trying to force the ball out of his hands and Evans had spacing on the floor. He ended up getting to the free throw line and then on the next time down the floor, he found Donté for a wide-open 3-pointer that he knocked down. Those were five of the Kings’ nine points in the quarter in a span of about 39 seconds. They’d only score four points in the remaining 7:39 of the game.

A Big Concern
The comments coming out of the Kings locker room after the game are actually a big concern to me. This isn’t just a team that is trying to figure out how to get over the hump. This is a team that is embarrassing themselves and having a hard time getting their collective games together to be a team right now.

Here are some of the quotes (via Jimmy Spencer of NBA.com):

- Westphal on team’s inability to stay focused: “… it could be selfishness … it could be not trusting your teammates”

- “We’re going to have to watch the tape. Coaches are going to have to watch the tape and figure out things.” – Omri Casspi on 1st vs 2nd half

- “We were down and it looked like I was supposed to make a play every time.” – Tyreke Evans after home loss to Chicago

The coach is saying trust and selfishness could be issues. Omri is saying the players and the coaches have to watch tape and the coaches need to figure it out. Tyreke sounds frustrated that he’s the only creator. These are not good things to hear 15 games into the season.

Advanced Stuff

The weird thing about this game is Tyreke was pretty neutralized in the second half (after a great first half of 13 points and six assists) and yet still ended up with the only positive plus/minus for the Kings in this game. He was +2 for the game and everybody else not named Pooh Jeter (who was an even 0) had a negative plus/minus.

A lot of people like to discount the idea of plus/minus but I’d like to offer up that it means just as much as how many points a player scored in this game. You can’t take everything from this statistics but you also can’t take everything from just how many points were scored in a game (just look at how Monta Ellis racked up points while poisoning his team last year).

Tyreke was so bad in the second half and yet still remained a positive overall. And keep in mind that Tyreke was on the court when the Bulls pulled away during this game with a 16-2 run.

Player of the Game
Jason Thompson is easily the player of the game for the Kings.

Carl Landry overslept and it opened the door for Jason Thompson who should be in the starting lineup anyway. JT isn’t the consistent scoring option that Landry is advertised to be, but he’s also not the ball-stopping force that Landry has shown to be this season. JT moves the ball really well and did a nice job of flashing to the middle of the floor to get open shots against the Bulls.

On the boards, he was active in tipping the ball away from guys like Noah and Gibson, while managing to grab some for himself. He was also a pretty good defender in this game. He and Sammy did a great job of challenging shots and making things difficult for the Bulls inside.

Thompson ended up with 18 points on 6/12 shooting, 6/7 from the free throw line, nine rebounds, four assists, one block, three turnovers and three fouls.

On to the Next One
Kings play the Indiana Pacers at Arco Arena on Tuesday, the 30th. Tip-off is at 7pm PST. The Pacers are currently 7-8 after dropping two straight to the Thunder and Lakers.

Key Matchup – Samuel Dalembert vs. Roy Hibbert
Roy Hibbert is becoming a formidable force inside for the Pacers and it will be up to Sammy to shut him down. Keeping him off the boards could be the biggest thing because Hibbert’s 3.4 offensive rebounds per game could be big in keeping Indy’s offensive game flowing.