The Sacramento Kings received a rude welcome Tuesday evening in the City of Brotherly Love, losing 112-85 in a laugher. Rookie Jimmer Fredette got the call in place of the injured Marcus Thornton, scoring just seven points and handing out three assists in 24 minutes of play.
The 76ers finished with six players in double figures, led by veteran Elton Brand, who scored 21 points and grabbed 10 rebounds. DeMarcus Cousins scored 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for the visiting Kings, who start off their five-game road trip on the wrong foot.
The Sacramento Kings begin a five-game road trip against a familiar face in Spencer Hawes and his Atlantic Division-leading Philadelphia 76ers. Can the Kings win their first road game of the season tonight at the Wells Fargo Center?
The team over at Yay Area’s Finest put together an amazing mixtape of all the highlights from the Goon Squad Classic. Tremendous tip of the hat to them for their work.
Shameless plug alert. My final thoughts on this past weekend over at SB Nation Bay Area. A snippet:
Following suit with most of the exhibitions played during the lockout, the contest, which took place at an approximately two-thirds-filled-to-capacity UC Davis Pavilion, was more style than substance. Greene’s team, which featured rookie-to-be Jimmer Fredette, Jason Thompson and former teammate Spencer Hawes won 167-164 in overtime against a squad highlighted by Tyreke Evans, Isaiah Thomas, DeMarcus Cousins, Hassan Whiteside and Matt Barnes. But more important than the result was Greene and company’s presence back in the community. Without the constraints of the NBA’s tightly-guarded structure, they were more accessible than usual.
Case and point? Saturday morning, Greene along with Thompson tailgated with fans at the 58th Annual Causeway Classic between UC Davis and Sacramento State’s football teams. And they did so with ease. The two wandered around the main parking lot of Hornets Stadium, mingling and chatting with fans. There were no security or bodyguards trailing their every move. Like normal people, they immersed themselves and genuinely enjoyed the college tailgating atmosphere.
“I can really appreciate (this) because when I went to college at Rider University we didn’t have a football team,” Thompson said after socializing and throwing footballs around with fans during Saturday’s tailgate.
Sure they were trying to promote and sell tickets to Sunday’s game, but nobody forced them to organize it in the first place. Greene and the players who participated chose to play for this region that nearly lost the NBA all together.
Add another former Sacramento King to the Goon Squad Classic lineup. Philadelphia 76ers center Spencer Hawes will make his return to the capital city region for the planned November 20th charity game.
A new flyer features the former Kings center, along with Donté Greene, Jimmer Fredette, Kevin Durant and others. Former Kings guard Kevin Martin, now with the Houston Rockets, has also committed to playing in the exhibition.
The game looks to be a go, but it’s still pending an official announcement due to the NBA labor impasse. The players union and owners are conducting another federally mediated negotiating session today. And though the league has cancelled all games for the month of November, an agreement on a new labor deal would probably nix the GSC from happening.
With all of the golf coverage from this last weekend, we got away from the morning cup o’ Kings. Today, we are back and since it’s his birthday, we will look into some old footage of Kings power forward/center Jason Thompson as a senior at Rider University.
Kings President of Basketball Operations, Geoff Petrie, became known for his ability to mine talent in Europe through the late 90′s and early 2000′s. Peja Stojakovic and Hedo Turkoglu became crucial pieces during the glory years of Kings basketball, both drafted as young European prospects by Petrie and his staff. Following the European invasion, Petrie turned to players from small U.S. colleges such as Western Carolina, Rutgers and Rider. Like his European picks, Petrie found success, first with Kevin Martin and most recently with Jason Thompson.
Thompson started out hot as a rookie, joining Spencer Hawes in a promising front line. But the hope that a Spencer Hawes/Jason Thompson front court could return the Kings to the playoffs dissipated quickly. Before last season, Hawes was traded to Philadelphia with Andres Nocioni for center Samuel Dalembert, clearing minutes for rookie DeMarcus Cousins. Lost in a four man rotation of Dalembert, Cousins and Carl Landry, Thompson struggled in his transition to a role player. After starting 114 games his first two seasons, JT started only 39 games last season and saw his minutes drop from 31.4 in year two to just 23.3 in his third year as a pro.
There is a very good reason for the now 3-month-long-boogie that has been in Kings fans hearts ever since draft night of 2010.
You’re damn right I started off with a nickname pun. Because when you’re dealing with 295 pounds made of nothing but pure talent, he can make everything – even nickname puns – work. The only problem is how. Because even though he has the ability, the body, the everything he ever needs, if you can’t put it together, it could end up as bad as my pun.
You’ve probably heard it by now, multiple times. You’ve been reading it non-stop since 2010 mock drafts started to surface. The attitude questions, the motor issues, the supposed lack of conditioning. The abundance of questions that all boil down to the same basic concept. Will he behave? Will he be able to use his massive frame and massive skill for the betterment of mankind, AKA Kings nation? Or does this road end in nothing more than a pat on the back from those burnt by Tyrus Thomas, Michael Beasley, and all other “draft by potential” headcases that never panned out? Will he be pre 2010, hold up the ball, kill your teammates’ will to live, airball iso 3s Zach Randolph? Or will he be 2010, dominant post scorer, rebounder extraordinaire Zach Randolph? All versions of the same question. Of THE question.
An MRI performed today on the left knee of Sacramento Kings center Spencer Hawes revealed a deep bone contusion and an irregular signal in the joint line. Hawes is going to seek a second opinion from Dr. Lawrence Holland in Seattle tomorrow morning. Holland previously performed surgery on Hawes’ left knee prior to his rookie season.
Hawes will miss the team’s remaining six games of the 2009-10 season.
Spencer Hawes’ season is over, which is definitely the best idea for his career. No need to risk seriously injuring himself over these last six games. Hopefully this will not require extensive treatment/surgery and he can be ready in time for training camp later this year.
“He’s pretty sore,” Kings coach Paul Westphal said. “He’s almost certainly out (tonight at Minnesota).”
Hawes said he was kneed in the back of his knee. He missed Sunday’s loss in Cleveland because of a lower back strain.
Even though Spencer Hawes has been sort of obliterated by Al Jefferson this season, I think against a matchup like Ryan Hollins or Darko Milicic (who is apparently the new centerpiece for the Wolves franchise) could be very good for Spencer’s confidence.
Against guys like Love and Jefferson, he’s just not quick or strong enough defensively to guard these guys straight-up. He has to get a quick double team help and pray the Kings rotate properly. And especially against Jefferson, he seems to bite on the pump fake way too often/easily. However, against someone like Hollins or Darko, Hawes would be able to play off and be a dangerous weakside shot blocker. He also would be able to crash the boards while keeping his man off of them. Offensively, he can stretch them to the perimeter where they’re completely ineffective as defenders and use his quickness inside for a couple of good scores.
With him out, the Kings will feature a heaping dose of JT and Landry. This also means Brockman should get some good minutes. My condolences to the Wolves bigs for the bruises and sore muscles Brockman will cause.
Defensive and offensive efficiency haven’t been the strong suits for the Kings this year. And when neither side of the floor is something you excel in, you sort of have to trick opponents or catch them off guard to win games.
That’s essentially what happened early on in the season. The Kings would push the tempo, hit the offensive glass and pray Tyreke Evans or someone else stepped up at the end of a close game to pull them through to victory. It worked about half the time until the rest of the league caught on that the Kings weren’t going to score in the post and they needed Tyreke Evans to drive in order to create their offense. Opponents started packing in the lane against Tyreke Evans, the shots became harder and harder to get for the entire team and the post option on offense was a myth, much like dry land in Water World.
When Kevin Martin returned to injury, he didn’t come back as Tim Duncan. Since his healthy wrist didn’t turn him into one of the most prolific low post scorers of all-time, the Kings STILL didn’t have the inside option to balance out the attack. The Kings kept falling and falling. They were looking less like a team of the future and more like the 17-win debacle of the 2008-2009 season. And that’s where the problems started.
When the team isn’t winning and the return of their most efficient perimeter scorer doesn’t give them a much-needed Kevin McHale clone down low, they start to turn on everybody. They turn on the fans, their teammates and even the coach. Frustration rules all and it affects the play on the court. When Kevin Martin was traded for Carl Landry, the Kings finally seemed to have a low post scorer and yet, the tension on the team still existed.
Then Westphal decided to show Spencer who is boss by not letting him suit up for the home game against the Detroit Pistons, followed by some moron making an animated video with a satirical viewpoint of the whole situation. Next thing you know, World War III was going on within Arco Arena and it looked to be the low point of the season.
What happened next was the ultimate example of two foes squashing beef with each other (basically the opposite of what Tupac and Biggie did). They put their differences aside and bumped chests.
Since this display of Sacramento-style Ubuntu, the Kings have seemingly righted the ship. They’ve played .500-ball with a 4-4 record and their offensive and defensive efficiency ratings have improved drastically.
The Kings offensive boost is not really THAT big of a surprise. They added a low post threat (that they had been missing all season) and it balanced out the offense. Not only was the addition of Carl Landry a boost to their offensive schemes but also his ability to score with great efficiency is a big reason for their increased rating on offense.
(For those who don’t know, offensive rating is the amount of points scored over 100 possessions. With the fact that not every team plays at the same pace, it’s the best way to show just how efficient an offense is. The Warriors may lead the league in points per game because they play at the fastest pace but they’re only the 14th most efficient offensive team in the NBA.)
Before the chest bump, the Kings had an offensive rating of 105.6 (currently 20th in the NBA). After the act of brotherhood between Coach and Spencer, they’ve improved to 108.1 (would be good for 13th in the league now). But again, this doesn’t really shock me with the addition of Carl Landry coming around the same time. He’s added a valuable weapon to their team arsenal.
The real shocking improvement has been the increased effort and performance on defense by the Kings. Check out this chart that I poorly attempted to Ziller-fy:
This chart shows the defensive efficiency for the entire year. The Kings have had some very strong performances in terms of defensive efficiency and had many more poor performances in that category throughout the entire season. But since the mythical chest bump, the Kings are performing at a much higher rate of defensive efficiency than most of us could have imagined.
From the start of the season up until the moment Spencer and Coach Westphal touched chests, the Kings had been pretty horrific in terms of defensive rating. In the first 57 games of the season, they garnered a defensive rating of 110.5 (27th). But in the eight games since the bump, the Kings have improved to a defensive rating of 107.0 (would be good for 15th).
Don’t forget, it’s not exactly like they added Dennis Rodman or Hakeem Olajuwon to their defense. All they did was subtract a sub-par-but-making-strides perimeter defender in Kevin Martin and add a middle-of-the-road post defender who doesn’t rebound in a truly spectacular fashion.
So what could be the reason for this turn around?
It’s clearly the unbridled positive power of the chest bump. The chest bump is proving to be a cure-all for what ails you. Perhaps if the Clippers had a chest bump between owner Donald Sterling and Mike Dunleavy, MD, Sr. would still have a job in the front office. Maybe if the guys in Reservoir Dogs had chest bumped each other before the job, nobody would have had to lose an ear or their lives.
The chest bump is something that can make a difference in your daily life and in the success of your career and personal goals. Don’t have anybody to chest bump to make your life better? Bump the mirror.
Special things can be done when you properly wield the power of the chest bump. If it can work for the Kings defense, it can work for anybody.
