Official 2008 Draft Night Thread...the future is now.

[KF10]

Kings pick Ewing Jr.

dude do you realize you predicted ALL 3 Kings picks???

Thompson
Singletary
Ewing Jr.

I did? I don't remember making predictions during the draft. I think I just posted the picks AFTER they were selected. But, if you think that, I know, Im good.

[Sacramento_King]

"Assets" do no good when you don't have room for them on the roster. As of now the Kings have 14 guys on the roster, and this doesn't count the soon-to-be unrestricted FAs (Beno, Johnson and Wright). And who says Petrie is done adding rookie talent? There are still some undrafted guys who can get camp invites along with young FAs from the D-league. But even at that, there's still not going to be room to add these "assets" unless some of the existing "dead weight" is moved...which is easier said than done.

Portland utilized two "assets" in Asik (pick 36) and Taylor (pick 55) to get four additional 2nd round picks of which I believe three are next year. They will be active again next year and added no players to their active roster from those two picks. Houston used Batum to get Greene, Dorsey and a 2nd next year. Teams outright sold their 2nd round picks a couple times yesterday. So I disagree that you cant use "assets" unless you have space and even if you did have to many players I would rather do that and continue to try and build for the future than sit on my hands and do nothing.

[deNIEd]

Thompson is not the problem. I don't care who we draft really. He could work out, he could not.

Problem is that we are not being nearly active enough, nor do we as an organization have any balls whatsoever.

Do you just want us to be more like the Knicks and make moves because we can?
Also how do you know that we havent tried to make trades?
I would say we do have some balls; moving a fan favorite in Peja for a guy with character issues in Artest is a pretty ballies move. Drafting a player out of a small school called Western Carolina is a pretty ballies move. So I wouldnt say we havent had the balls to make moves.

Why does it always become "you want to become the Knicks?"

Any of us, can do a better job than Isiah.

Regardless of having attempted or not attempted to make trades and other moves, the end result is nothing has been shown for. Outside of the Bibby trade, which, is starting to seem like a useless/not so good trade (We could have no pg next year, and Sheldon really hasn't shown to be all that great. The money we do save doesn't ultimately help us in the free agency market since we didn't move anyone else. It saves the owners money, but did little for the team.)

We can't judge Petrie on what we believe he may be or may not be doing, but instead on what he has done. In the past yes, there has been a lot to show for, but recently (past 2-3 years), not much at all.

You can say that Quincy Douby is a scoring machine during practice (apparently he is?), but if he can't do that in the game, its useless. The end result is, that recently we have seen no changes, while the rest of the league are having orgies of changes.

When I say Maloofs/Petrie have no balls, I mean they aren't willing to do a full rebuilding program. Artest vs Peja, Artest was clearly by far without question the better player. But yes, that was kind of ballsy. Drafting Thompson? No, I don't really call this ballsy because I feel that Maloofs/Petrie (Not sure were the blame lies), still want to compete for a playoff spot next year (impossible), Thompson is a senior, and will likely be the most NBA ready out of all the remaining players we could have drafted.

[rpa]

When I say Maloofs/Petrie have no balls, I mean they aren't willing to do a full rebuilding program. Artest vs Peja, Artest was clearly by far without question the better player. But yes, that was kind of ballsy. Drafting Thompson? No, I don't really call this ballsy because I feel that Maloofs/Petrie (Not sure were the blame lies), still want to compete for a playoff spot next year (impossible), Thompson is a senior, and will likely be the most NBA ready out of all the remaining players we could have drafted.

So apparently it isn't ballsy to draft a player that you think will be good but you KNOW you'll get slammed for by everyone in the basketball world because THEY thought he'd go lower?

Kevin Martin came out after his junior year; it took him 3 years to develop--sure doesn't sound like NBA ready to me. Garcia also came out as a junior and didn't contribute his first couple years either.

[Sacramento_King]

So apparently it isn't ballsy to draft a player that you think will be good but you KNOW you'll get slammed for by everyone in the basketball world because THEY thought he'd go lower?

That's not true. They have already stated that they thought GSW would take him at #14.

[deNIEd]

So apparently it isn't ballsy to draft a player that you think will be good but you KNOW you'll get slammed for by everyone in the basketball world because THEY thought he'd go lower?

Kevin Martin came out after his junior year; it took him 3 years to develop--sure doesn't sound like NBA ready to me. Garcia also came out as a junior and didn't contribute his first couple years either.

Its not ballsy to always pick the sure thing, and never ever ever picking a potential pick. Our last potential pick? Gerald Wallace. Pretty sure he turned out damm good.

Kevin Martin and Garcia were both late late picks. Your mentality for drafting cannot be the same for all drafting positions. Also, our teams were a lot better when we drafted them.

And again, Petrie drafts a softer player. - (Haven't watched Thompson play, so I can only go off of mocks/comments of others)

Weaknesses
• Didn’t always dominate against weak competition
• Gives up position in the post
• Struggles guarding perimeter
• Extremely poor all-around defender
• Lacks focus
• Suspect Basketball IQ/Awareness
• Doesn’t know his limitations
• Settles for bad shots
• Lacks toughness/Not always physical enough
• Needs to add strength

Look guys, its exactly what we need, a weak big who doesn't play defense that is good at scoring.

Again, I'm not completely against drafting Thompson due to the fact that I have no idea who he is, but I do think its funny that everyone who was against Love and his weak defense, are no longer attacking Thompson for his weak defense.

[KF10]

So apparently it isn't ballsy to draft a player that you think will be good but you KNOW you'll get slammed for by everyone in the basketball world because THEY thought he'd go lower?

Kevin Martin came out after his junior year; it took him 3 years to develop--sure doesn't sound like NBA ready to me. Garcia also came out as a junior and didn't contribute his first couple years either.

Its not ballsy to always pick the sure thing, and never ever ever picking a potential pick. Our last potential pick? Gerald Wallace. Pretty sure he turned out damm good.

Kevin Martin and Garcia were both late late picks. Your mentality for drafting cannot be the same for all drafting positions. Also, our teams were a lot better when we drafted them.

And again, Petrie drafts a softer player. - (Haven't watched Thompson play, so I can only go off of mocks/comments of others)

Weaknesses
• Didn’t always dominate against weak competition
• Gives up position in the post
• Struggles guarding perimeter
• Extremely poor all-around defender
• Lacks focus
• Suspect Basketball IQ/Awareness
• Doesn’t know his limitations
• Settles for bad shots
• Lacks toughness/Not always physical enough
• Needs to add strength

Look guys, its exactly what we need, a weak big who doesn't play defense that is good at scoring.

Again, I'm not completely against drafting Thompson due to the fact that I have no idea who he is, but I do think its funny that everyone who was against Love and his weak defense, are no longer attacking Thompson for his weak defense.

Draftexpress has been OFF on the defense aspect for Thompson. I have seen some games from Thompson. He is actually a GOOD overall defender. He is very good in the defensive side, he was awarded the Defensive Player of the Year for his conference. So, that Draftexpress comment is false.

[rpa]

Draftexpress has been OFF on the defense aspect for Thompson. I have seen some games from Thompson. He is actually a GOOD overall defender. He is very good in the defensive side, he was awarded the Defensive Player of the Year for his conference. So, that Draftexpress comment is false.

+1. Other places have defense as a strength. That plus the fact that he won DPOY for his conference (twice I believe) tells me that DX was talking out of their asses.

[chriswebb86]

Thompson is not the problem. I don't care who we draft really. He could work out, he could not.

Problem is that we are not being nearly active enough, nor do we as an organization have any balls whatsoever.

Do you just want us to be more like the Knicks and make moves because we can?
Also how do you know that we havent tried to make trades?
I would say we do have some balls; moving a fan favorite in Peja for a guy with character issues in Artest is a pretty ballies move. Drafting a player out of a small school called Western Carolina is a pretty ballies move. So I wouldnt say we havent had the balls to make moves.

Why does it always become "you want to become the Knicks?"

Any of us, can do a better job than Isiah.

Regardless of having attempted or not attempted to make trades and other moves, the end result is nothing has been shown for. Outside of the Bibby trade, which, is starting to seem like a useless/not so good trade (We could have no pg next year, and Sheldon really hasn't shown to be all that great. The money we do save doesn't ultimately help us in the free agency market since we didn't move anyone else. It saves the owners money, but did little for the team.)

We can't judge Petrie on what we believe he may be or may not be doing, but instead on what he has done. In the past yes, there has been a lot to show for, but recently (past 2-3 years), not much at all.

You can say that Quincy Douby is a scoring machine during practice (apparently he is?), but if he can't do that in the game, its useless. The end result is, that recently we have seen no changes, while the rest of the league are having orgies of changes.

When I say Maloofs/Petrie have no balls, I mean they aren't willing to do a full rebuilding program. Artest vs Peja, Artest was clearly by far without question the better player. But yes, that was kind of ballsy. Drafting Thompson? No, I don't really call this ballsy because I feel that Maloofs/Petrie (Not sure were the blame lies), still want to compete for a playoff spot next year (impossible), Thompson is a senior, and will likely be the most NBA ready out of all the remaining players we could have drafted.

I agree somewhat with what you have to say, but do you just want Geoff to make a move to make one? Thats what it seems like to me. While I do not work in the NBA, I am guessing it is a lot harder to make moves especially if you come calling a GM has to wonder if you know or see something you dont see.

I agree Quincy has a lot to still show, but he has only been in the league for 2 seasons now. So, I wouldnt write him off yet, but he is pretty close to being written off.

I would say taking Thompson is pretty ballsy especially when there are other players out there with a lot of "potential". While some of the later picks may turn into great players, I am very execited to see what Thompson can do. He brings a great all around game to this team and adds some help in areas that Kings fans have been calling for Geoff to make moves for. I see us being a better rebound and shot blocking team because of him.

Finally, while us Fans think owners should spend lots of money on players the Bibby trade made a lot of sense for the Kings. It move the Kings out of the LUX Tax area, and gave us a young player with a chance to become a solid role player here, especially if he works out getting in shape.

Overall, I see where you are coming from and I feel it is frustrating to see the Kings as a So-So team with no real direction, but I beleive that over time we will become a team with a direction. I am not sure which direction, but it will be based on the moves that Geoff decides to make.

[KingInExile]

Thompson is not the problem. I don't care who we draft really. He could work out, he could not.

Problem is that we are not being nearly active enough, nor do we as an organization have any balls whatsoever.

Do you just want us to be more like the Knicks and make moves because we can?
Also how do you know that we havent tried to make trades?
I would say we do have some balls; moving a fan favorite in Peja for a guy with character issues in Artest is a pretty ballies move. Drafting a player out of a small school called Western Carolina is a pretty ballies move. So I wouldnt say we havent had the balls to make moves.

Why does it always become "you want to become the Knicks?"

Any of us, can do a better job than Isiah.

Regardless of having attempted or not attempted to make trades and other moves, the end result is nothing has been shown for. Outside of the Bibby trade, which, is starting to seem like a useless/not so good trade (We could have no pg next year, and Sheldon really hasn't shown to be all that great. The money we do save doesn't ultimately help us in the free agency market since we didn't move anyone else. It saves the owners money, but did little for the team.)

We can't judge Petrie on what we believe he may be or may not be doing, but instead on what he has done. In the past yes, there has been a lot to show for, but recently (past 2-3 years), not much at all.

You can say that Quincy Douby is a scoring machine during practice (apparently he is?), but if he can't do that in the game, its useless. The end result is, that recently we have seen no changes, while the rest of the league are having orgies of changes.

When I say Maloofs/Petrie have no balls, I mean they aren't willing to do a full rebuilding program. Artest vs Peja, Artest was clearly by far without question the better player. But yes, that was kind of ballsy. Drafting Thompson? No, I don't really call this ballsy because I feel that Maloofs/Petrie (Not sure were the blame lies), still want to compete for a playoff spot next year (impossible), Thompson is a senior, and will likely be the most NBA ready out of all the remaining players we could have drafted.

Translation, you think the Maloofs/Petrie have no balls because they won't do a fire-sale gutting of the roster for pennies on the dollar just for the sake of making it look like they are doing something. How many times has it been said that Petrie is targeting the summer of 2010 as the key summer for rebuilding? Last time I checked the calendar the year was still 2008. I swear some of you act like the impatient kids in the backseat on a family trip asking "are we there yet" every 30 seconds. You guys need some valium!

Look, there's no requirement that you have to agree with the way Petrie is approaching rebuilding. But would it really kill you to step back and look at the big picture for once? All those GMs that are out there constantly tinkering and looking for the next major deal just remind me of day-traders in the stock market. Sure they can get lucky and strike it big every once in a while. But more often then not they end up losing their shirts. Petrie is a long-term investor who carefully blends his portfolio with a variety of risks that will give him a secure and profitable return in the future.

[KingInExile]

So apparently it isn't ballsy to draft a player that you think will be good but you KNOW you'll get slammed for by everyone in the basketball world because THEY thought he'd go lower?

That's not true. They have already stated that they thought GSW would take him at #14.

Which just means that the Ws would have been bashed last night for taking him at 14 instead of the Kings getting bashed for taking him at 12. The fact is that a lot of people were bashing this pick last night (not just Kings fans, other team fans and some media pundits) because there were a lot of mocks that had him in the mid to late 20s. The more I think about it and the more I learn about Thompson, the more I like this pick. Franky if he would have got to some major college he would have easily been a lotto pick...maybe even a top 10. Unfortunately he gets disrespected by the press (and those who only rely on BSPN for their info) just because he went to a small school.

Edit: You know, thinking back to last year, I seem to remember a lot of people around here bashing the decision to take Hawes at 10. IIRC, many of those bashing that move the most were some of the ones now bashing this pick. How did Hawes work out?

[longfellow44]

To be Honest I like the pick. However I'm in agreement with the posters that said Petrie isn't ballsy. He also isn't very creative as far as trades go. Look at what portland has done the last couple of years and you can see a creative GM. Petrie is good at drafting not at making trades however if he could make some creative trades plus be the drafter that he is we would be in much better shape with a little more excitment surrounding our franchise.

Secondly take a look at what both Indiana and NJ did last night and this week they completely remodled their franchises. NJ got to very nice bigs yesterday and picked up CDR not too mention moving Kidd earlier in the year really set them up nicely. Indiana moved oneal who really changed their entire draft. Indiana has a whole new future and it happened in one draft with two trades. My major complaint here is that Petrie is just not capable of making these kinds of deals. He's very good at drafting and i'm just JT will be a very good player but he's not the best GM for making trades and building excitment.

New Jersey
Lopez/Boone
Yi/Sean W
Simmons/nachbar
VC/CDR
Harris/Williams

Portland
Oden/Pryzbilla
Aldridge/Diougu
outlaw/Batum/Fernandez
Roy/Webster
Bayless/Blake

Indiana
Hibbert/Rasho
Murphy/McRoberts/Foster
Granger/SWilliams/Rush
Dunleavy/Rush
Ford/Jack

Sacramento
Miller/Hawes
Moore/Thompson/Shelden
Artest?/Salmons/Ewing
Martin/Garcia
Douby/singletary/Udrih?

[deNIEd]

I agree somewhat with what you have to say, but do you just want Geoff to make a move to make one?
...
I agree Quincy has a lot to still show, but he has only been in the league for 2 seasons now. So, I wouldnt write him off yet, but he is pretty close to being written off.

I would say taking Thompson is pretty ballsy especially when there are other players out there with a lot of "potential". While some of the later picks may turn into great players, I am very execited to see what Thompson can do. He brings a great all around game to this team and adds some help in areas that Kings fans have been calling for Geoff to make moves for. I see us being a better rebound and shot blocking team because of him.

No, I don't want moves to be made just to be made. However, I do believe that a team should always be looking to improve themselves. Regardless of how good they are, or how bad they are, what prospects they have or lack, they should always be thinking of ways to improve themselves.

In the past 2 years there has been 1 trade? 2 free agency signings? 1 trade in 2 years for a "rebuilding" team is simply not good enough. Like you said, we don't work in the NBA and don't know how hard deals are to pull off, but what I do know is that other GM's are making deals and making deals that work, whether it is to get another draft pick, setting up future drafts, setting up cap space, etc. 1 trade in 2 years is not good enough.

If all the deals you are proposing are being turned down, propose more trades. Think of more ways to improve the team instead of waiting for the perfect oppurtune moment. Go and create that moment yourself.


About Douby, I think we should give him 1 more year, let him be our starting PG or at least have a large portion of the minutes. Either he fails, and we give up on him, or he succeeds and its a win win. Let Douby control his own future.


"I would say taking Thompson is pretty ballsy especially when there are other players out there with a lot of "potential"
This is exactly why I call Thompson a non-ballsy type move. Thompson on day 1, will very likely be the best for the team, he is a senior, has a lot of experience, and can play some. He will be a player that can step in as a rookie and help us win. Help us win. It's not ballsy because we are still looking to winning as many games now/making the playoffs now. Again, I don't know if the blame falls on Petrie or the Maloofs, but we do not have the balls to rebuild at all.

The players that have a lot of "potential" won't necessarily be best next year, but will ultimately be better down the road, wouldn't help us much at all next year if we are still clinging to the dream of making the playoffs.

I guess its "ballsy" in the sense that most other GM/owners wouldn't draft him, but its the safe pick that can help us win tomorrow, but may do us very little 3-4 years from now compared to the other players we passed on.

[Sacramento_King]

Which just means that the Ws would have been bashed last night for taking him at 14 instead of the Kings getting bashed for taking him at 12. The fact is that a lot of people were bashing this pick last night (not just Kings fans, other team fans and some media pundits) because there were a lot of mocks that had him in the mid to late 20s. The more I think about it and the more I learn about Thompson, the more I like this pick. Franky if he would have got to some major college he would have easily been a lotto pick...maybe even a top 10. Unfortunately he gets disrespected by the press (and those who only rely on BSPN for their info) just because he went to a small school.

Edit: You know, thinking back to last year, I seem to remember a lot of people around here bashing the decision to take Hawes at 10. IIRC, many of those bashing that move the most were some of the ones now bashing this pick. How did Hawes work out?

I am not bashing the pick. I have stated in another post that I thought Thompson would be a good late 1st round pick and to try and acquire another pick to do so. They had info that GSW would take him at 14 so they pulled the trigger at 12. It is what it is.

[dozencousins]

Am i the only one but i think we had a terrible draft thursday !

I am ver dissapointed so far

I hope petrie does his magic with deals

we don't need to add salary at all if we want to make a play for big name free agents in a year or 2 then we cant spend the money on guys unless we get rid of the deadwood bloated contracts by
reef,k9,& miller

[Ballings7]

I thought we had a pretty solid draft, but really could of been better...

I terribly disagree.

[BMiller52]

Draftexpress has been OFF on the defense aspect for Thompson. I have seen some games from Thompson. He is actually a GOOD overall defender. He is very good in the defensive side, he was awarded the Defensive Player of the Year for his conference. So, that Draftexpress comment is false.

+1. Other places have defense as a strength. That plus the fact that he won DPOY for his conference (twice I believe) tells me that DX was talking out of their asses.

IIRC he locked down Beasley when they played and had no problems scoring on him either.

Ballings are you saying you like it or hate it??? I can't tell.

My main regret is going Ewing Jr. over DeVon Hardin.

[longfellow44]

I don't think that Petrie has any magic really. He's a good drafter but doesn't have much talent for trading.

[Sacramento_King]

I don't think that Petrie has any magic really. He's a good drafter but doesn't have much talent for trading.

In my opinion, the Bibby, Peja and Webber deals were almost had to do something type deals which is why he probably didnt fare as well. Hedo for Miller was a pretty good one. I think he traded Nick Anderson for Cat, JWill for Bibby, Webber for Rock, Williamson for Christie. He's won more than he lost.

[Ballings7]

Ballings are you saying you like it or hate it??? I can't tell.

"Pretty solid" - relative to liking it