Kings @ Portland (7:00)

[bjax24]

We should call ourselfs the Sacramento Tacos.

Seriously those teams should keep some of them tacos for us Kings fans to make these away games toleratable.

I was just thinking about that it seems everyone gettin tacos against us

[whatchaknow]

Can't remember a broadcasting crew ripping us or any other team for that matter, like Portland's doing to us right now.

They're mostly right, but, ouch.. listening to this broadcast is absolute torture.

Dont give em too much credit for being right, they do it to literally every team. Its quite embarrassing and even though Rice has his funny moments he more often then not sounds like a delusional drunk.

Good luck the rest of the way Kings fans. Hopefully Cousins stays bought in and keeps giving solid effort like he has lately, the guy is a great talent. Jimmer can play, hopefully he works on his defense like JJ Reddick did and can find himself a nice role in the league. And hope that Tyreke figures it out, he just doesnt bring it like you would hope your star player would every night. Wouldnt mind snagging Thompson or Hickson from you guys, they are both pretty active but dont seem to know their role on the squad

[SacKingZZZ]

Kings need to recognize that they don't have the personnel to be a running team. this team is built for the half court. they need to walk the ball up and set up an offense. we have the guys that can break down a defense and a big man that can post up on everyone in the league and be relied upon to be a primary post score. we are made for the half court.

You can't be a running team if you can't convert at a decent rate or there is simply no reason to give another team that shoots at a higher percentage more possessions.

Exactly, this team in terms of it's best talent mirrors that of the team that Petrie built around Webber and Peja. Yes, they did play up tempo but that certainly wasn't what you would categorize as a running team. While this team can run, I don't even see anything on paper that tells you they should base their identity around running.

With that said, I really like the comments they showed from Smart before the game when talking about it. He basically made it sound like they haven't had time to put in a legit half court system yet so he figures anyone can run so they should learn to do that first. I get that, makes sense. I didn't like the sound of him building this team up as a running team before, this sounded like a bit of a back track, which would be smart (no pun intended).

You can finally see Cousins in positions to pass thankfully. Guys are starting to cut and they aren't playing the completely clueless ball they were under Westphal. Major improvement. Can't wait to see this team once they get some more practice, Chuck Hayes comes back, Cisco finally gets the start!!!, and they get some freaking home games under their belts.

[ADoaN17]

Evans inconsistency really is a big reason for a lot of the losses.

[pillwenney]

I don't really cared what the numbers directly seem to show. I thought Tyreke was playing really selfish tonight and it infected the rest of the team. He's one of the elite players in the league at going 1 on 5. The problem is that going 1 on 5 is always stupid. It's still bad percentage wise, and it alienates your team.

Annoying too, since he was starting to play more unselfishly, but it was pretty clear when we started playing better in the 4th that it was largely because of unselfishness. Having a real PG (which Isaiah actually sorta played like tonight) isn't just good for the purely on-paper reasons. It leads to a more unselfish mentality within the whole team.

And we definitely tried to run things through Cousins a little more tonight. What seems to be happening though is that he gets the ball, guys are actually moving now, but they're still not getting open. Part of that is that JT can't be hanging around the basket. I mean really, having anybody standing around the basket in a motion system just doesn't work--which now that I bring it up, is a cause for concern with Hayes.

[KF10]

The thing about Reke is that he has little to no mid-range game. In that sense, he's limited as an offensive player. The thing I saw Portland did is that they told Felton to play man-to-man D on Evans very closely throughout the game. If Evans broke the initial defense, a guy like Wallace & LMA are waiting to stop him at the basket. I lost count how many times Wallace was able to challenge Evans at the rim.

That kinda extrapolates of how "selfish" Evans is. He can't do anything other than drives to the rim or the occasional (inconsistent) J. Dude needs the ball in his hands to be effective. If he manages to pass the ball when the defense collapses onto him, most of the time, his teammates bricks the shot.
This Kings team is a horrid offensive team. Their offensive numbers are near or at the bottom of every significant categories. It's almost a lose-lose situation for Evans.

But with that said, most of our opponents (the last 18 games) were playoff-bound teams from last year. The Kings currently have the most road games completed so far with the exception of the Bulls (same # of road games completed). So, it's expected that the Kings shouldn't be doing well at this stage of the season.

The Kings are horrible at the road so far. They are losing at average, ~20 pts. I want to see them play a good amount of home games just like with everyone else before really judge the team.

[longfellow44]

Regardless of everything else, I see this team making a move soon. Not sure what it will be but something has to be done. Our shooting and ball movement is terrible, and again it looked like we couldn't keep up with the blazers in transition. How are we supposed to be a running team when we can't keep up with other running teams.

This should be a half court team with a very structured offense to take advantage of our strengths.

im hoping the kings look to make a splashy move and trade for someone with real pg skills. im fine with sending out one of tyreke, thorton or jimmer to get it done.

[PaKwAn]

At some point, the front office should listen to offers for reke while he still has value... Not saying i would trade him right away but if the right offer comes then why not... I dont see that big improvement from him yet... And im still not a fan of how he plays... Cuz is clearly the face of this team now!

And to mr petrie, what the hell did you see in salmons that you traded for him!

[kevin44]

Another bad loss. They need a leader/point guard to take control of this team. We have enough talent to not get blown out every other game.

[Wolfay]

Our offense is terrible. I almost rather see Kevin Martin flopping than this stuff. Much of it is ball movement, though that's improving lately. Tyreke still stops the ball at times and forces something, but he has been looking for teammates much more since Smart took over. I think a major issue that few are mentioning is that nobody can hit a jump shot from anywhere on the court, no matter how open they are. This makes it real easy for opposing teams to plan since all they have to do is focus on defending the paint, and that's why Smart wants to run. Going into a halfcourt offense and moving the ball around until someone gets an open look is only half the job, and won't do any good if someone is just going to miss the shot. Thornton who was shooting great last season has been way off this season. Garcia and Donte have always and will probably remain streaky as hell, and Jimmer looks like he's having conditioning issues, and you could say conditioning has been a real issue for everybody on the team, since a lot shots are hitting front iron and we look gassed by the start of the second half.

If we could start hitting some jump shots, the offense will look better.

[SacKingZZZ]

I don't really cared what the numbers directly seem to show. I thought Tyreke was playing really selfish tonight and it infected the rest of the team. He's one of the elite players in the league at going 1 on 5. The problem is that going 1 on 5 is always stupid. It's still bad percentage wise, and it alienates your team.

Annoying too, since he was starting to play more unselfishly, but it was pretty clear when we started playing better in the 4th that it was largely because of unselfishness. Having a real PG (which Isaiah actually sorta played like tonight) isn't just good for the purely on-paper reasons. It leads to a more unselfish mentality within the whole team.

And we definitely tried to run things through Cousins a little more tonight. What seems to be happening though is that he gets the ball, guys are actually moving now, but they're still not getting open. Part of that is that JT can't be hanging around the basket. I mean really, having anybody standing around the basket in a motion system just doesn't work--which now that I bring it up, is a cause for concern with Hayes.

Eh, I thought Thomas broke from the plan just as much as Reke did. Both guys were having a bad time out there and you could tell they were getting frustrated.

There's a way it can work and last night we saw another glimpse of how Reke can be effective w/o the ball by cutting to the rim. If I'm his coach I'd be drilling that into his head. He wants to get into the paint? Good, do it when Cousins has the ball up top, he'll find him.

Yeah, having that guy in around the basket is troubling, but it probably has something to do with the love affair this team has had for the last couple of years to crash the offensive glass way too much. Hayes will be a welcome sight because he knows how to cut to the rim and when to cut to the rim very well. Don't forget, he played in that type of system under Adelman and flourished as both a passer and cutter. JT is pretty good at it too though. It's better than last year though when you had Cousins 15 feet from the rim posting up and Daly coming in underneath everyone and posting up 3 feet from the rim at the same time.

One interesting play call I saw last night was something Smart yelled out as "Horns". They had Cousins and Hickson set simultaneous picks up near the 3 point like facing eachother. I have no idea of what the intention was because I think they whiffed the play but I'm interested to see what they were doing on that half court set. My guess is a misdirection where you don't know which pick the ball handler is going to use whereby one of the screeners slips to the basket. Still a pick and roll whatever way you look at it and I don't think using Cousins in the pick and roll other than the way they used Webber in it will work long term.

[pillwenney]

I don't agree with that at all. Isaiah was really looking for people last night and for the most part, shot off of kickouts, when he was supposed to. He just wasn't making his shots. The team clearly played more together in the 4th though when Reke was out. I think that was pretty clear. We played well enough to get back in. The problem was really that Portland's play didn't decline at all.

When I think about it, the problem with Cuz in general right now in terms of being the hub of the offense is that if you scout him properly, he's totally stoppable. You just have to not double and stick with your man off the ball. If you can do that, then you simply wait for him to make his move before you double. When Cuz gets started making his move, he gets total tunnel vision. I don't think it's selfishness at all, but rather a lack of ability to deal with it right now. If you bring the double at the right time, it still almost always results in a turn over or a bad shot. The same is true to a large extent with Tyreke.

[SacKingZZZ]

Thomas went inside more than a few time in an attempt to get some points on the board, which resulted in nothing. He most certainly looked a little flustered out there. There were moments of passing but as it was in that Blazers game the Kings broke into the legit passing category. 23 assist with less than 15 turnovers.

A lot of Cousins' problems has more to do with a lack of options than anything. They load the other side of the floor up with everybody which you only do when you are looking for pure iso. Multiple times in the last 3 games Cousins has attempted to make passes to somebody across the floor, a very difficult pass when teams pack the paint to close of the lanes. Still made a few to guys on the other side that didn't convert a wide open jumper. The way to cure that? You simply move a guy to the top of the key, into the triangle off of Cousins, or cut the post feeder base line instead of clearing out through the middle of the paint area. The Kings have rarely gone to any of these super simplistic and potentially foundational sets in their offense.