The Positives

Everybody who is freaking out about the loss against the Suns now needs to calm down. Anybody who thought that this team has a shot to get to the playoffs was delusional imo. We are not a great basketball team right now, but there are a lot of encouraging things to see:
-Fox has been great, he is already farther ahead in development than most would have expected. The kid has played three games and is already our best player.
-This has been Bogdan'a first NBA game, so give him a break for cooling off in the second half. In the first half he looked very good, and I'd probably start him over Buddy
-Skal keeps improving. He is far from a finished product, but as long as he keeps getting better at this rate, we have found our 4 of the future
-We will probably have another top 5 pick, and I really like the talent that is available there. Basically all players listed as top 5 now address a need for this team.

Fox, Skal & Bogs the bright spots to look forward to as of now. The rest are meh.

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I just want the kids to show something. I really don't care about wins.

We get another top 5 pick this summer, we're in great shape.

Fox is dope. Skal is looking better and better. This is what a rebuild looks like.

Skal is the biggest bright spot for me. He's my likeliest candidate to be a franchise player out of the guys we have on the roster. Natural scorer

Skal is solid, but please dear God don't let that be where we set our standard for 'franchise player' be...I like what he brings, but he's not a superstar or anything in the making..

I like Fox a lot and hope he gets paired up with a star in the future and watch them bring it. Bogdan and Skal both to me can be very good role players, like Klay Thompson level MAX. Which isn't bad, but still, I'm highest on Fox.

Your posts have been and continue to be my lowlight of this board.

Buddy needs to be in lineups with one or both of Fox or Bogdanovic. Part of his struggles is that he is having to create shots and be in spots he shouldn't ideally be in with that first unit. At best he should be a secondary playmaker where he makes a play after the ball is swung to him.

I would like to see Joerger do

Starters:
Fox
Hield
Bogdanovic
Skal
Willie

Bench:
Hill
Temple
Jackson
ZBo
Papa

Positive:

Still not mathematically eliminated from 50 wins.

...


No but seriously, good post.

Click my name. Click ignore. You're welcome.

Really? Over Fox? You must be pretty high on him.

Skal is a weird one because he has elite touch, length and athleticism but his feel for the game is below average. He is a good weapon to put alongside Fox/Bogdan though. Apparently he didn't play organized ball till much later than most so I'm hoping his basketball IQ can grow to at least average.

That’s my preferred starting unit

Fox, Bogdan, Skal, WCS, and Buddy are all positives. Bogdan is proving why he must start over Buddy you need 2 playmakers on the floor also helps that he’s s good defender. Before the draft I didn’t think Fox had franchise player potential and I was wrong, once he adds strength and gets calls he’s suppose to he’ll be a 20-8 pg for us.

Skal needs to add strength but he’s showing that he’s a clear starter as well pure jump shot.

Fox, Skal, Bogey, WCS, and Hield have shown flashes of excellence. Fox appears the best of the group, outside of times when Hield gets blazing hot and can't miss anything.

If Jackson can somehow become a solid 5th option for the 3, the Kings have a serious core moving forward with either Hield or Bogdan as a great 6th man.

My biggest disappointment this season has been Hill. He had one great game and hasn't been good since. Surely he will snap out of it.

We have set him up to fail by trying to make him the #1 playmaker, if we allow him to play more off the ball and focus on spot up shooting/1-2 dribble drive floaters and playing defense instead of running the whole show which he's not very good at and has never done he would find his normal level of success he experienced in Jazz/Spurs/Pacers.

I'd take five Klay Thompson's any day of the week.

Mason needs minutes.

Uhm I think every team of the NBA would do that. Funny how Thompson still is hit with the role player label, just because he isn't a main ball handler. If even one of our rookies reaches the level of a Klay Thompson in his own specific trait we can count ourselves lucky. Thompson is elite at what he does.

I would have tried Frank Mason III on Mike James last night. I'm thinking Frank could have slowed down James career night. I would make Frank my Ace defender for the smaller PG's around the association. That would be his role to start off. Give 100% stopping the Mike James and JJ Bareas of the League.

Bogey's defense looked good when he came in and I was more impressed with the D than his scoring which was pretty damn special Kayte mentioned that Bogey was talking on D the whole time he was on the court. I noticed Bogdan must be stronger than he looks. He blocked out one of the Suns Centers and did it so well the Ref called him for a foul. Of course it was not a foul

Skal has a sweet shooting stroke and just rises up over just about anyone to shoot it. Remember Skal along with Willie came to the game late in life.

Willie continues to play good D that pretty much goes unheralded. His jump shot is much improved along with his ball handing.

Justin Jackson has been defending the starting SF pretty much by his lonesome and doing a fair job of it. I don't think his number gets called to score so any points he gets are on broken plays or the occasions where he is so open teammates have to pass it to him.

Buddy heated up after Bogdan's good play. Buddy is having trouble staying in front of his guy and getting past screens.

Fox is a game changing talent. Defenses have to focus on him. As he becomes more accustomed to the NBA, his teammates and Joerger's schemes he can average 10 assists per game I believe. He also improves the Kings defense where he can stop the opposing team at the point of attack a lot of the time.

GT had a great game last night while the other vets had an off night.

I would like to see Big Papa get a few minutes setting picks and rebounding in the paint. I also think he has the best chance of defending the lob teams have been throwing down against the Kings. I would have him not switch out and let the guards defend their man. This leaves the Big Fella to defend his guy and he is also in better position to rebound. Of course the Guard with the ball is going to score some of the time.

Interesting 1st quarter to say the least (terrible, horrendous, monumentally bad might be better adjectives). Several people warned that this could be a trap game, a Suns team that was struggling badly and now the coach has been fired. The possibility to create a perfect storm where they would play inspired and way over their heads. Other people were reveling in the Suns misfortunes and assuming easy pickings.

Well, the Suns certainly played an inspired 1st quarter, nothing like their previous performances. The Kings ran into a buzz saw. Can some of it be laid at the King’s front door, lackluster start, low energy, poor lineup mix? Probably, to a point, but they still ran into a buzz saw.

Positives? They were just flat out “whupped” in that 1st quarter, but they battled back, didn’t hang their heads, especially the young guys. Not to get all Pollyanna on it, but if you could throw out that 1st quarter the Kings would have won handily and with a break or two, could have pulled it out, anyway.

Some takeaways from the game, particularly the 1st quarter. In the 1st quarter, Suns made 14 of 20 field goals (70%) including 4 of 6 3-pointers (67%), and all 4 FT they shot. They out rebounded the Kings 15 to 6. Here’s the thing about the rebounding, the Suns only missed 6 shots so there was only 6 opportunities for defensive rebounds for the Kings and they snagged 4 of them while managing 2 offensive rebounds. The Kings missed 15 shots, so that was 15 opportunities for defensive rebounds for the Suns and they snagged 13 of them while grabbing 2 offensive rebounds. If you are missing a bunch of shots while the other team is making almost all of theirs, you’re going to get out rebounded (unless you have a Dennis Rodman on your team).

The Suns came out inspired after all the adversity they had and played way over their head in the 1st quarter (however, don’t forget they do have some talent, Booker in particular). After that 1st quarter the Kings handily won the second quarter (34-23) narrowly lost the 3rd (25-28) and battled and fought for the win in the 4th falling short but still winning the quarter (39-30). For the game, they still shot poorly (43.4% and only 46% after the 1st quarter) but they were only out rebounded in the game 54 to 50 after that horrible 1st quarter and in effect won the rebounding battle after the first quarter 44 to 39 and again that is with providing the Suns with a lot more defensive rebounding opportunities than the Kings had (for the game the Kings missed 56 shots to the Suns 35 missed shots, not counting FT misses). The Kings were +12 in turnovers (Kings 9 TO, Suns 21 TO).

So, yes there were some positives. A lot of people are already getting caught up early in wins and losses, and that is not really the way to measure this team at this point. Look for growth and development. This team is young, inexperienced, even the vets haven’t played together, coach has a plan to develop the team and that might even be at the expense of some wins early. It’s a process and if all you care about is the number of wins, then you are going to be badly disappointed. Look for growth, development, did they learn something and did they use the learnings to improve? Improvement will be incremental, see what they look like after 20 games, after 40 games. Of course, over the last 20 games a lot of people will go back to that “tanking” philosophy and start complaining if they win too many games, then. I don’t like tanking, but, in my opinion, taking losses while you are developing players is not the same as tanking.

I’m adding Jackson to that list and probably Mason III as well.

Jackson is a team player, professional, has good length and can shoot. I’m surprised he’s seen so many minutes so early on tbh.

Frank reminds me of a poor man’s Jameer Nelson. He may be small but he’s strong as hell. Still think he’ll end up one of the absolute steals in the draft.

He's an enigma, indeed!

Skal is already a solid scorer in the NBA, and is showing steady improvement in other facets of the game. I think we're still a couple years away from knowing what we have with him.

I'd say his floor is a guy who can give you an efficient 14/6 as a stretch 4. If he can add muscle and improve his rebounding/defense, he's going to be a valuable part of our core going forward.

Easily my 2nd favorite prospect after Fox, who's got stud written all over him.

Skal is the somewhat ungainly 6'11" stork who eventually will turn into a beautiful swan, imo. Among other reasons for my liking him is that his head is in the game when he plays; he really does want to get better and better and he seems willing to work to get there. I just think that when it really clicks with him in the next year or two it will click in a big way.

Lin ! top 5 pick here we come, good developmental play from the kids, Skal and Fox are future perennial all stars and cornerstones to this franchise.

If Buddy can gain consistency then we're looking real good

Did anyone notice that the Kings had turnovers in the single digits? That is new.
Watching Fox, Bogie and Temple play defense was inspiring. Willie was pretty good too.
All of the Kings guards are good rebounders.
Watching Fox on a break is the most exciting thing about the Kings that I have seen in years.

We need a Tiger at PF, not a beautiful swan lol

y'all over here talking about swans and tigers...and i'm seemingly the only one that's worried about how we're gonna grab a single rebound vs the pels.

The fact that there is even an argument about certain young players playing over others represents a major issue that could haunt a ton of the value the Kings have on their roster if handled incorrectly. Anyone with eyeballs can see that the top 4 prospects on this team right now are probably Fox, Buddy, Bogdan, and Skal. They have to be able to play at the same time for this to work to full effectiveness. If they can't then Vlade has some work to do.

Positives: Fox's entire game, Bogie's play making and shooting abilities, Skal's elite offensive game, Hield playing elite defense (against the Suns though)

Negatives: WCS still can't defend or box out, Hield can't hit water in a boat, Skal's low basketball IQ especially passing out of the post, Hill/Randolph/Carter look horrible and are taking up valuable minutes, Joerger won't play Frank Mason, Justin Jackson looks the least ready.