On to the rankings!
NBA.com
#30 (-4)
The Kings have now lost eight straight games since that initial, post-Boogie win over Denver. Two of last week's losses - the led the shorthanded Spurs by 28 on Wednesday and the Wizards by 15 in the fourth quarter on Friday - were particularly brutal. The skid has basically ensured an 11th straight season out of the playoffs, but Dave Joerger continues to play vets - Arron Afflalo, Darren Collison, Tyreke Evans and Anthony Tolliver - who have contracts that are either expiring this summer or partially guaranteed next season. Buddy Hield, who has shot 52 percent as a King (67 percent in the paint), did get his first two starts with his new team over the weekend.
ESPN
#28 (NC)
With eight straight defeats, good for the league's longest active losing streak, Sacramento has quietly sunk to the depths of the league's sixth-worst record. Yet that's precisely what the Kings should be doing in the wake of the DeMarcus Cousins trade, hard as it must be for owner Vivek Ranadive to stomach in the first year of the long-awaited new Golden 1 Center. The Kings, as we'll keep noting over and over in this comment cyberspace, have to finish in the top 10 in the lottery in May to ensure that they keep their first-round pick in June rather than ship it to Chicago. The first-round pick Sacramento received in the Cousins deal from the Pels, meanwhile, is only top-three protected, which means the Kings are on course for the No. 6 and No. 7 picks in the 2017 NBA draft as we speak. The nightmare scenario for the Kings, of course, would be New Orleans jumping into the draft's top three via the May lottery, enabling the Pelicans to keep the pick. For the moment, though, Sacramento has to be encouraged.
Sports Illustrated
#26 (-1)
Make it eight losses in a row and just one win since trading Boogie. Are there Vivek truthers still out there?
CBS Sports
#29 (-3)
Buddy Hield looks good. Willie Cauley-Stein looks good. Skal Labissiere looks good. There are things to feel good about with this team, if you can get past the Kings-ness of it all.
NBC Sports
#28 (-1)
Losers of eight in a row, they will keep their pick this season (top 10 protected). One of their picks last season was Skal Labissiere, who was heralded coming to Kentucky but got off to a slow start there. With Cousins gone, Labissiere has been given a little leash and has shown some real flashes of that potential. I liked what I saw from him at Summer League, I think he could develop into something for the Kings.
Mean Ranking: 28.2
Beer of the week:
This is an imperial stout from Cheluna Brewing, new to the Denver metro area. It leans more chocolaty than roasty, and is very full-bodied. Don't fall for the green beer trap. Stouts are how to celebrate St. Paddy's day. (Pro Tip #2: It's Paddy, not Patty. Patty is a girl's name.)
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