The Kings are expected to make Kevin Huerter, Trey Lyles, and draft capital available as they go shopping for help on the trade market ahead of the February 6 trade deadline. However, given the fact that Sacramento is off to a 13-16 start this season and is currently out of the play-in picture, teams around the NBA are curious about whether the Kings will consider becoming in-season sellers, according to Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report (video link).
“I’m not reporting that Malik Monk is available,” Fischer said. “However, rival teams certainly want to know if Malik Monk will be someone that the Kings are willing to part with.”
In discussing Monk, Fischer acknowledged it would be “tricky” to move last season’s Sixth Man of the Year runner-up, who signed a new four-year, $78MM contract with the Kings over the summer.
“He’s so crucial to what the Kings have done,” Fischer said. “… He’s best friends with De’Aaron Fox dating back to Kentucky. If you’re curious about the long-term ramifications of keeping De’Aaron Fox in Sacramento, you’re probably not wanting to move his best friend, who he recruited to join the Kings.”
Of course, Fox’s own long-term future in Sacramento isn’t certain either, so the Kings are a team worth watching closely in the coming weeks.
We have more items from around the Pacific:
- The Suns are monitoring swingman Grayson Allen for a possible concussion, head coach Mike Budenholzer said after Saturday’s loss to Detroit (Twitter link via Gerald Bourguet of PHNX Sports). “We’ll see how he is in the morning,” Budenholzer said of Allen, who took a Simone Fontecchio elbow to the head while battling the Pistons forward under the basket in the third quarter (video link).
- Budenholzer and Kevin Durant engaged in a heated discussion during a timeout in the third quarter of Saturday’s loss, with the head coach appearing to call out Durant for a defensive mistake and the Suns star firing back. Both men downplayed the dispute after the game. “We know we got the microscope on us, so any little spat like that may be taken the wrong way, but coach respects my perspective,” Durant said (Twitter video link via PHNX Sports). “… When you look at it from the outside, the chemistry may look off, but I just think that’s part of great chemistry actually, when you can have those conversations in the heat of the moment and move on.” Budenholzer agreed with Durant’s assessment, as Bourguet relays (Twitter video link). “He’s a pro, he’s coachable,” Budenholzer said. “If you don’t have a few of those, there’s probably something wrong with your team. KD’s the best. He wants to be coached, and I love being around him.”
- After starting six games in a row, Warriors forward Jonathan Kuminga came off the bench on Thursday in Memphis and Saturday in Minnesota. However, head coach Steve Kerr said that the experiment of having Kuminga in the starting five isn’t over, explaining that he started Kyle Anderson on Saturday because he liked how the former Timberwolf matched up against his old team (Twitter link via Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN). It was Anderson’s first start of the season.
Kuminga has been disappointing this season. You would expect him to take the next leap to be a star but so far just a average player.
Because his development has been stunted by Kerr. He is going to be a star in this league in 2-5 years, Podz might be too. But not under “I refuse to develop youngsters” Kerr. Both guys do not fit the timeline, and both should be traded, underperforming Wiggins too. Look at how well TJD played last night, he could have been doing that all year, but Kerr always defaulting to smallball.
GSW needs to commit to Steph/Dray and build around them, not add whatever draft picks who aren’t instant rotation pieces who Steve cant develop.
Schorder himself stunk last night, but his spacing led to Curry getting open and look what happened….
Neither of Kuminga, TJD, or Podz have played particularly well this year despite all receiving enough minutes to produce something of value. Strangely, you use that as justification to say Podz’s minutes should be drastically shrunk while Kuminga’s and TJD’s should be expanded. We all know the reason why and it ain’t based on sound logic or rationality.
As I said elsewhere before, I don’t think Kerr’s rotations have been great and he has to share some of the blame generally speaking. But your solutions are just as bad, if not worse.
Kuminga: 25.2 MPG
Podz: 24.3
TJD: 17.2
We all know why you are reply guying to me, and its entirely to run some bogus “fact check” against my airtight criticisms. Debatelording, once again, is worthless. Either show up with hardline evidence to prove me wrong, or pass me by, but you cant say “Trayce has barely gotten any run, but he’s bad because I say so” when he has always been ready. You don’t know anything about the Warriors, yet you think I am wrong, when all I do is get proven correct over and over, because I know ball. I’m never going to be 100% correct, but I am right more than I am wrong, hence my long posting.
You don’t even offer a solution, you are criticizing my criticism, that’s WAY worse than a valid criticism of a millionaire player by a fan who pays their wages. This is what debatelording is, you stand for nothing, you don’t even care about the Warriors, you have nothing, you are only here to argue anything I say. I don’t respect your takes because you don’t have any, its just reactionary garbage that is based in emotion not reason or facts. If you want to get muted, just say it
Your airtight criticisms has huge holes. TJD’s minutes are down because he was timid on defense. Just ask Draymond. He has talked about it a few times. You keep saying Kerr doesn’t develop players. Ty Jerome proves you are wrong. He signed an Exhibit-10 contract with the Warriors. Next season he had a 2 year guaranteed contract with the Cavaliers. There is no way he would have gotten the contact unless he had developed under Kerr. You can’t get around that.
Nobody cares if you mute them. They just smile and ignore it.
I am concerned
Kuminga trade value is gone down 50% from last year
Ingram may go down 70% from last year
Monk is not available
Two players need to traded ASAP are
DeRozan and Paul George
These guys lost steps on defense
Trade
Why would any team trade for either one of them? Both are on bad contracts.
Kuminga was a rental who was going to require a max he hadn’t yet earned to keep around (as sometimes is the case for max extensions given their timing). His trade value was always overstated. But, yes, it has undoubtedly gone down further with regression/lack of progress in some of the areas he needed to clean up (decision making, defense, etc), not to mention his efficiency has gone down. At least he’s shooting the ball a bit better these days, though.
My guess is that Kuminga is gonna be traded as every time his name comes up there’s some controversy.
Slomo had a 0 +/- in 17 minutes. Great work Steve!!
How did the kings become such a mess so quickly? Guess they’ve been overachieving since the Sabonis trade and the reality is they just kind of stink.
they play no defense. Sabonis is a PF at center position. He is not a defensive player only offense.
Seems like just yesterday everyone was “lighting the beam” now they are lighting a funeral pyre…
Kings should consider doing a trade with the Rockets who has defense but not offense.
Come on
Kings have salaries
Rockets can’t add any more salaries. They have 3 big free agents next summer
VanVleet
Eason
Smith
easy Sacramento trades Fox to Rockets for Brooks, Eason, and Smith plus a 1st rounder. Tough decision for the Kings but now Rockets have Fox, Green, Segun, Shepard, Smith, Thompson, as the core. Let Van Vleet go. Now you have a strong core with flexibility to sign them all together.
Then Kings would have to pay luxury tax
New payroll
Brooks 20m
Smith 30m
Eason 30m
Yeah that ain’t gonna happen man, why would Sacramento help Houston? In direct competition.
Eh I wonder how much of Rockets lack of offense is coaching/schemes vs. personnel. Sengun, Green, even Flintstone are offensive guys. That said Fox would be an interesting pickup…