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He sucks, plain and simple. How much of this is Natt's fault? I've watched couple of games lately and he seems worse than Theus. Beno isn't even involved in offense, all he does is bring the ball up in half-court and passes it to either Martin or Salmons. There are basically no pick and rolls with Miller, which was supposed to be Beno's strength because they seemed to have good chemistry. A bad thing to do with a guy who you just signed a long-term contract with.

Don't put this on Natt. Beno sucked long before Theus was fired...Natt is just the guy who is actually doing something about it. The Kings are 26th in turnovers and 23rd in assists. Beno is the second wost on the team for committing turnovers (averaging 2.5 per game) and is averaging an atrocious 4.5 assists per game. Those are the kind of numbers that demand that a point guard gets locked in the dog house, which is where Beno is. And when you combined those numbers with his laughable defense (a priority for Natt), there's no surprise that Beno is being thrown under the dog house.

You have to remember that Natt spent 9 years sitting on the bench next to Jerry Sloan, the guy who invented the brick dog house. Natt's response to Beno's poor play is a lot like something Sloan would do...and I like it!

Natt does have a different style than Theus did. While he still starts Beno, Bobby J is finishing (Which is what happened a lot back in the day when Bibby and Bobby were here). Also Natt is starting to have Cisco play some PG. So Natt has reduced the minutes played by Beno, Bobby Brown, Sheldon and Donte Greene. Sheldon and Donte are DNP for the most part.

Natt is stressing defense which is great. But the Kings continue to have trouble scoring in crunch time. Lets hope Coachie can get the guys scoring better when the game is tight.

KB

We've got five years more of him, and veen if we get a real PG who can pass and doesn't hide on defense, we're still gonna have to pay Beno 6.5 for the next 5 years. Oh, joy.

Bobby Brown >>>> Beno

I like that Natt is sitting Beno but I don't like how Bobby J is taking minutes away from Bobby B. Bobby J isn't in our long term plans so why are we playing him so many minutes. I would think with Beno sitting Bobby B would see an increase in minutes and I haven't really noticed that yet.

The frustrating thing is that he does have talent, but he just seems to be in a funk right now. The team doesn't seem to be a great fit for him, and he's letting that affect every part of his game.

Beno is who he is. A high turnover PG who likes to control the offense. He was last year, he is again this year. In the beginning of the year, Theus let him control a ton of the offense, and he put up identical numbers as he did last year. Unfortunately for Beno, expectations are higher this year, and with no Artest we are losing a lot more, meaning much more scrutiny on everyone else. Natt got tired of Beno's lack of focus and let the offense run elsewhere, hence Beno's role now is a spot up shooter who brings the ball up the court.

I don't think Kenny Natt has a creative bone in his body. His utilization of Beno is awful, to be honest. And he's trying to play the tough disciplinarian with Beno which didn't even work under Popovich. We need Beno to probe the defense (using Theus' words). The ball should primarily run through Beno and Brad, both of whom have to keep their eyes open for Martin either cutting or spotting up. It's going to be a high turnover offense, that's inevitable. But this offensive muzzle that Natt has put on Beno has got to go. </Armchair Coach>

Hopefully, Yoda will come in and set Beno free. He's one of our more talented players, and we can't have him getting obliterated nightly by the opposing PG.

Beno's game is based on confidence. When his confidence is high, he is playing at his talent level. When it is low, it's crappy.

Beno DOES have talent but as is right now his confidence is pretty much shot.

Easy,

Mediocre player, with one of the worst teams in terms of talent, with absolutely zero confidence or heart = Beno

It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

xx_skaterdude_xx wrote:It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

For the record, I was never thrilled with the signing last summer. I didn't mind keeping him, just not for the contract (I wanted something along the lines of 3yrs for $10-12M with maybe team a option for 2 more).

xx_skaterdude_xx wrote:It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

I wasn't excited at all, but instead quite pissed when it happened. Looks like I was correct.

mitchweber wrote:The frustrating thing is that he does have talent, but he just seems to be in a funk right now. The team doesn't seem to be a great fit for him, and he's letting that affect every part of his game.

I've been on the fence and have had my doubts that Beno could be a consistent pg in this league. I never thought he was the answer and never did I think he was seriously talented. The thing is the games he plays well is when he is scoring. He's not going to get a lot of guys opportunities to score. His defensive skills are hopelessly bad. The worst thing about it is his teammates don't click with him.

I've seen enough. He won't be able to run this team from the pg spot and he's way too inconsistent.

KingInExile wrote:

xx_skaterdude_xx wrote:It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

For the record, I was never thrilled with the signing last summer. I didn't mind keeping him, just not for the contract (I wanted something along the lines of 3yrs for $10-12M with maybe team a option for 2 more).

I don't think we would have been able to retain him for that price. I wasn't against the signing at the time. we still didn't have another plan at PG.

I really didn't understand the immediate rush to sign Beno.

It's clear that we need a young PG, and would likely be forced to draft one. So why not just let Bobby Jackson play the year out at PG with Garcia/Salmons/Brown helping out instead of signing Beno?

Bad decision.

ICMTM wrote:
I've been on the fence and have had my doubts that Beno could be a consistent pg in this league. I never thought he was the answer and never did I think he was seriously talented. The thing is the games he plays well is when he is scoring. He's not going to get a lot of guys opportunities to score. His defensive skills are hopelessly bad. The worst thing about it is his teammates don't click with him.

I've seen enough. He won't be able to run this team from the pg spot and he's way too inconsistent.

Oh I don't know if anybody thought he was "the answer". Even when he was signed, the general consensus was "he won't be our future at PG, but that's okay, because a MLE-caliber player is very rarely going to be the answer".

I don't know, I mean I think some kind of change of scenery could help him, although I don't really have anything in mind. He'll never be a great playmaker, but he can improve his assist/TOs by just making fewer boneheaded TOs. He can get to the hoop and he's a fine finisher when he gets there. And otherwise, he is a very capable shooter from all over the floor--particularly in the midrange game. He should be great at scoring in the pick 'n roll. But right now, he's not.

deNIEd wrote:I really didn't understand the immediate rush to sign Beno.

It's clear that we need a young PG, and would likely be forced to draft one. So why not just let Bobby Jackson play the year out at PG with Garcia/Salmons/Brown helping out instead of signing Beno?

Bad decision.

Didn't we not have Bobby yet when Beno was re-signed? I don't think we had either Bobby. Plus, I mean, it's pretty clear that Beno looked like the much better option as of last year. We all know Bobby has never been a real starter. Beno looked like he was last year.

ICMTM wrote:

KingInExile wrote:

xx_skaterdude_xx wrote:It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

For the record, I was never thrilled with the signing last summer. I didn't mind keeping him, just not for the contract (I wanted something along the lines of 3yrs for $10-12M with maybe team a option for 2 more).

I don't think we would have been able to retain him for that price. I wasn't against the signing at the time. we still didn't have another plan at PG.

A plan? We are the 3rd worst team in the league...do you really think it would matter if we decided to do a Bobby/Brown PG combo instead of a Beno/Bobby/Brown? Would our record be the same or worse? If worse...who cares? At least we would save 5-6 million a year for 5 YEARS. Like KIE said, I wouldn't mind if he expired in 2010 or 2011...but dear lord, we are STUCK with this guy for a LONG time. No one in their right mind will take him unless we give them something MUCH better in return.

xx_skaterdude_xx wrote:It's not even the All-Star break yet, and already everyone wants Beno out of here...I wonder how many of those people were the ones who were excited to have Beno re-signed?

I wonder what the expectations were of the people bashing him now??? You get what you pay for, Beno is producing (when given time) at roughly the same level as last year. MLE is about right and a fair contract for what he is capable of. I am sure once there is some sort of identity for this team he'll get much better. You forget that we are working a lot of stuff that doesn't really involve him much. For the last couple of games we've had mostly Miller and Martin doing things they've done for years, almost just working off of memory.

Yes PLAN!

I don't know what's so wrong with having a plan to improve this team. Signing someone for 5 years seems like he's part of the long term plan to me.

ICMTM wrote:Yes PLAN!

I don't know what's so wrong with having a plan to improve this team. Signing someone for 5 years seems like he's part of the long term plan to me.

Signing someone for 5 years, who shouldn't and is NOT part of our long term plans, seems like a terrible mistake to me. I don't care how he played last year, we all knew he was never going to be a long term starting PG for this team. Meanwhile, Bobby Brown is capable of putting up similiar, or even BETTER numbers than him, for much much less $$.