Over the weekend, a report from Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports suggested that Dave Joerger and the Kings‘ front office don’t necessarily see eye-to-eye on the team’s priorities and direction, potentially putting Joerger’s job in jeopardy. General manager Vlade Divac swiftly issued a statement dismissing the report, suggesting that Joerger has the team’s “full support and confidence.”
Digging into the situation in Sacramento a little deeper today, Sam Amick of The Athletic reports that Joerger is not in danger of being fired anytime soon. However, that doesn’t mean that Haynes’ report is “much ado about nothing,” according to Amick, who says there’s a genuine disagreement within the Kings’ ranks about player development.
Haynes wrote on Saturday that Joerger is focused on winning as many games as possible, while team management would like to prioritize the development of young prospects a little more, and Amick’s report seems to confirm that. Sources tell Amick that there’s concern within the organization about insufficient playing time for Marvin Bagley III and other young prospects.
Here’s more out of Sacramento:
- Although Joerger has another year on his contract beyond the 2018/19 season, his assistants are in the final year of their respective deals, per Amick, who describes the situation as “a second-level sort of lame-duck status.”
- Joerger has believed since last season that assistant GM Brandon Williams was in the market for a new coach to replace him, sources tell Amick.
- Amick describes Williams as a “major backer” of Bagley. Conversley, Nemanja Bjelica – the veteran power forward who is currently starting ahead of the club’s No. 2 overall pick – was a “Divac-driven” acquisition during the offseason, per Amick.
- Now that the Kings have lost three of four games and have failed to deal internally with the possible discord within the organization, Joerger will face an even tougher task as he looks to hold his young team together, writes Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee.
Kings had same problem with Deaaron Fox and George Hill last year, finally trading Hill to the Cavs.
Now the old dudes on the Cavs are giving Colin Sexton a hard time, Tyronn Lue got fired because of it, and nobody wants the old dudes on the Cavs. Kind of like Zach Randolph.
The FO needs to get a grip. They are the ones that passed on two better assets in the draft for a 1 position big, and then signed Bjelica, who’s also a 1 position player at the same spot. Neither was a mistake necessarily (the latter looks like a steal), but it does create a development issue. Neither is the coach’s fault. Just like it’s not his fault that Bagley was hurt at the start, and Bjelica is tearing it up. The coach is only to blame for the Kings are actually winning more than they have in a very long time. Not even at quarter pole of the season. Vlade needs to thank the coach for maybe making his trade of their 1st in the next draft not look as stupid as it was.
Who are you thinking was more highly rated than Ayton or Bagley? They were 1, 2. Doncic was 3 but had a lot of doubters, and they had just drafted Fox #5 in ’17. Doncic was not projected as a F except to make light of him & his slowness.
Divac made the consensus draft call and not a bad one, given what we know so far.
Doncic is doing well at F– in theory, PF– though they are not winning.
Bagley is not optimal mentally; he’s regular there; he isn’t going to adjust as quickly as Bamba or Carter. It’s year 1 for him, he will be fine, huge talent, plenty of learning time available.
It is strange that signing Bjelica is a problem that puts that vulture Williams looking over his shoulder.
Fire Joerger! That’s the easy way, but if he doesn’t wanna play the young guys, the other solution is to trade the vets he plays & bring more youngsters, then he will have no option but to play them or walk.
By the way to me is a crime to play Bjelica ahead of MBIII, specially because they are overpaying Bjelica. If you see last year, his best in the league, he was the sub of Taj Gibson, how bad is that man. MBIII is a star in the making, while Bjelica is a solid bench player at best, if Joerger cannot see this maybe he needs to change his day job.
Joerger sees how to win contests– that is doing his job. This is not a developmental league! When Bagley improves to the best option, he can get more minutes.
Hopefully he’ll get fired and shortly after Thibs will too and Joerger can coach the T-Wolves.
Their owner needs to let the basketball people make basketball decisions. Given those guys are Vlade Divac and Peja Stojakovic but damn just let these guys do their job and stop meddling in everything dude
Let the season play out. So far it’s working fine. Bagley may get more playing time later. They’re playing well above expectations. Don’t mess up a good thing