Kings Rumors

Injury Notes: Giannis, Avdija, K. Murray, Celtics, Knicks

Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo went from questionable to doubtful to out for Sunday’s game against New Orleans, according to Eric Nehm of The Athletic (All Twitter links). The two-time MVP is dealing with left shoulder tendinopathy.

It’s worth noting that Milwaukee was on the second end of a back-to-back and officially clinched a playoff spot in the East on Saturday. That’s not to suggest that Antetokounmpo’s injury isn’t legitimate, but there’s also no reason to rush him back when the team has already secured a playoff berth.

Antetokounmpo, who has made the All-NBA First Team each of the past six seasons, will need to play in one of the Bucks’ final four games to qualify for major postseason awards. He has been playing some of his basketball of the season recently, averaging 36.0 points, 12.3 rebounds, 13.7 assists and 1.7 steals on .638/.500/.838 shooting over the past three games, all victories (39.3 minutes per contest).

Here are a few more injury notes from around the NBA:

  • Trail Blazers forward Deni Avdija is another player who’s been on a tear to close out 2024/25, averaging 26.8 points, 11.2 rebounds, 5.5 assists and 1.2 steals on .520/.457/.817 shooting over his past 13 games (36.6 MPG). However, he recently sustained a sprained right thumb and was ruled out of Sunday’s victory over San Antonio, the team announced (Twitter links). Sacramento’s win over Cleveland on Sunday has officially eliminated Portland from play-in contention, tweets Sean Highkin of The Rose Garden Report. That means the Blazers will have a lottery pick for the fourth straight year.
  • Keegan Murray has been quite durable over his first three NBA seasons, playing 80 games as a rookie in ’22/23 and 77 in ’23/24. He missed his fourth game of ’24/25 on Sunday due to back soreness, per James Ham of The Kings Beat (Twitter link). Trey Lyles started at forward in Murray’s place during the Kings‘ victory, tweets Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee. The fourth overall pick of the 2022 draft, Murray will be eligible for a rookie scale extension this summer.
  • The Celtics played without Jayson Tatum (left ankle sprain) and Kristaps Porzingis (illness) on Sunday, but they still made quick work of the 17-win Wizards, Brian Robb writes in a pair of stories for MassLive.com. Tatum was initially listed as questionable before being ruled out, while Porzingis was a late scratch.
  • As expected, the Knicks had Jalen Brunson and Miles McBride back in action for Sunday’s contest vs. Phoenix, as Ian Begley of SNY.tv relays (Twitter links). Brunson had missed the past 15 games with a right ankle sprain, whereas McBride had missed the past eight with a left groin injury.

Pacific Notes: Payton, Beal, Hayes, Carter, Kings

Golden State should have one of its top defensive players back in the near future. While veteran swingman Gary Payton II has been ruled out for Thursday’s game against the Lakers, he is making “good progress” from the partially torn ligament in his left thumb is now considered day-to-day, according to an announcement from the Warriors (Twitter link).

Initial reports on Payton’s thumb injury indicated he would be sidelined indefinitely, but the Warriors announced last Thursday that he’d be reevaluated in one week and it sounds as if that exam went well. While the defensive specialist won’t suit up on Thursday, he has yet to be ruled out for the second end of the team’s back-to-back set, so it’s possible he could return as soon as Friday vs. Denver.

Here’s more from around the Pacific:

  • Bradley Beal isn’t listed on the Suns‘ injury report for Friday’s game in Boston and is on track to make his return after missing eight games with a left hamstring strain. He shares fans’ frustrations about his inconsistent availability this season and is hopeful he won’t have to miss any more games this spring, writes Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic. “It’s not ideal, obviously, it’s not fun,” Beal said. “You don’t enjoy it. You control what you can control. That’s all I can do. I always preach about being available and that’s something I’m definitely kicking myself about, but that’s sometimes how the cookie crumbles. All I can do is keep my head up and keep getting better. The staff has been great, my body is in a better place and I feel really good right now. Hopefully it continues to stay that way.”
  • Jaxson Hayes averaged a career-low 12.5 minutes per game in his first season with the Lakers in 2023/24, but has taken on a significantly more important role in the second year of his minimum-salary deal following the trade sending Anthony Davis to Dallas. Hayes, who will be an unrestricted free agent this summer, is looking to make the most of the chance to start at center alongside an elite pick-and-roll play-maker like Luka Doncic. “I just view it as opportunity to make a name for myself, an opportunity to go win some games and win a ring,” Hayes said on Wednesday, per Dan Woike of The Los Angeles Times. “And I just look at it as I gotta come in locked in every day and just try to make the most out of every day, be the best version of myself.”
  • The Kings got good news on Devin Carter after the rookie guard exited Saturday’s game early due to a right shoulder injury. Carter is considered day-to-day due to a shoulder contusion and is being listed as questionable to play on Friday in Charlotte (Twitter link via James Ham of The Kings Beat). Carter has a history of shoulder issues, so the team can breathe a sigh of relief now that the injury appears to be relatively minor.
  • While the Carter update was a positive one, there hasn’t been much else to celebrate in Sacramento as of late. As Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee writes, the Kings‘ loss in Washington on Wednesday represents a new low for a team struggling to separate itself in the play-in race from a Phoenix squad that has lost four games in a row. The 36-40 Kings have a one-game lead on the Suns for the No. 10 seed in the West.

Rory Maher contributed to this post.

Spurs Notes: Paul, Vassell, McLaughlin, King, Ingram

When a player signs a contract that includes unlikely incentives, those incentives can be worth up to 15% of the player’s base salary. The Spurs took full advantage of that rule last summer when they signed Chris Paul, making the most of their cap room by agreeing to a one-year deal with a base salary of $10.46MM and another $1.569MM in achievable unlikely incentives that wouldn’t count against the cap.

Paul began cashing in on those incentives on Wednesday, according to ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link), when the Spurs registered their 32nd win of the season, beating the Nuggets in Denver. The veteran point guard earned a $262K bonus as a result of the team reaching that win total, Marks reports.

Paul is on track to earn another $523K before the end of the season by meeting two more individual performance benchmarks, Marks tweets. As Marks previously wrote for ESPN.com, those bonuses are related to Paul’s net rating and true shooting percentage.

Here’s more on the Spurs:

  • Spurs wing Devin Vassell was held out of Wednesday’s win for left ankle injury management, missing a game for the first time since December 6. Acting head coach Mitch Johnson explained that the team decided to rest Vassell because he was “getting a little bit too much in the danger zone” after having been playing through an ankle injury, writes Tom Orsborn of The San Antonio Express-News. “It’s being mindful of the big picture, keeping him healthy, and so we made the call,” Johnson said.
  • A throw-in piece in the De’Aaron Fox blockbuster in February, guard Jordan McLaughlin has barely played for the Spurs since being dealt from Sacramento to San Antonio. But he was a +8 in 17 minutes of action in Denver on Wednesday and made a crucial three-point shot in the fourth quarter. With just nine Spurs players active for the game, McLaughlin said the reserves’ attitude was to “go out there and have fun,” as Orsborn relays. “We all work really hard behind the scenes even when we’re not playing, so it was just a great opportunity for us to go out there and play basketball,” the veteran guard said.
  • Scott King, the head coach of the Austin Spurs, San Antonio’s G League affiliate, has been named the NBAGL’s Coach of the Year, the league announced on Wednesday (Twitter link). A former Knicks player development coach, King led Austin to a 22-12 record and the No. 2 seed in the G League’s Western Conference in his first year at the helm, finishing ahead of runners-up DeSagana Diop (Westchester Knicks) and Quinton Crawford (Stockton Kings) in a vote conducted by the league’s 31 head coaches and GMs. At the time of his hiring, one report indicated that King was viewed as a future NBA head coach — he likely bolstered his case with his performance this season.
  • Speaking to Grant Afseth of RG.org, Spurs two-way forward Harrison Ingram said his goal is to earn a standard contract. The 48th overall pick in the 2024 draft, Ingram has appeared in just three games for San Antonio this season, having spent most of the year in Austin, an experience he discussed with Afseth. He’ll be eligible for restricted free agency this summer.

Award Candidates Who Still Need To Reach 65-Game Mark

There are just 12 days left in the 2024/25 regular season, which means time is running out for certain end-of-season award candidates to meet the 65-game minimum to qualify for consideration.

A player doesn’t need to reach that 65-game mark in order to be eligible for Sixth Man of the Year, Rookie of the Year, or All-Rookie teams, but it’s a necessary requirement for most of the marquee awards: Most Valuable Player, All-NBA, Defensive Player of the Year, All-Defense, and Most Improved Player.

According to ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link), the following players who could be in the mix for one or more of those awards haven’t yet met the 65-game criteria, but still have a chance to do so:

In some cases, a player’s actual games played total doesn’t match up with the figure noted above. That’s because in order for a game to count before the 65-game minimum, the player must be on the court for at least 20 minutes. A player is also permitted to count a maximum of two games between 15 and 20 minutes toward that minimum.

Let’s use Mobley as an example. The Cavaliers big man has technically appeared in 66 games this season, but he played just 12 minutes in one of those games, 18 minutes in two of them, and 19 minutes in one. That means he only has 64 games that actually count toward the minimum — all 62 games in which he played 20-plus minutes, along with two of those games between 15-20 minutes.

Mobley will have to play at least 20 minutes once more this season in order to be eligible for awards like Defensive Player of the Year, All-Defense, and All-NBA. Given that he’s healthy and the Cavs still have seven games left on their schedule, Mobley should have no problem meeting that requirement. But it’ll be a taller order for some of the other players on this list.

Durant is currently sidelined with an ankle sprain and has been ruled out for at least two more games. He would have to play 20-plus minutes in three of the Suns‘ final four games to be award-eligible. Brunson, on the shelf due to his own ankle sprain, is in a similar boat, though the Knicks guard has a chance to return before Durant does.

Lillard, who is out indefinitely after being diagnosed with a blood clot in his calf, seems pretty unlikely to play in six of the Bucks‘ last seven games. Holiday is healthy but has no wiggle room to miss any of the Celtics‘ remaining seven games.

Many of this year’s other top award contenders have already met the 65-game criteria. Nuggets center Nikola Jokic did so in style on Tuesday night — his 65th game of the season was an incredible 61-point triple-double in a 140-139 double-overtime loss to Minnesota.

However, according to the latest straw poll conducted by Tim Bontemps of ESPN, Jokic is the clear runner-up to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (who has played 72 games) in the MVP race. Of the 100 media members polled by Bontemps, 77 picked the Thunder guard as their Most Valuable Player, while just 23 chose Jokic. The three-time MVP may need a couple more performances like Tuesday’s in order to close that gap by the end of the season.

Besides Jokic, one other notable player who has narrowly eclipsed the 65-game minimum is Cade Cunningham. The Pistons guard has missed four games in a row with a left calf injury and is considered doubtful to return on Wednesday, but he played his 65th game on March 19, prior to his recent absence.

That’s especially important for Cunningham and the Pistons because, as Bontemps notes, the fourth-year guard is considered a virtual lock to earn a spot on one of this year’s All-NBA teams, which will ensure that his maximum-salary rookie scale extension begins at 30% of the 2025/26 salary cap instead of 25%. That would increase the overall projected value of Cunningham’s five-year deal from $224.2MM to $269.1MM.

And-Ones: P. Gasol, Head Coaches, Tanking, Incentives

Former NBA star Pau Gasol is gaining momentum to become the CEO of the NBA’s proposed European league, according to a report from Eurohoops. Citing Gasol’s “strong links” to both the NBA and European basketball, a league source tells Eurohoops that the idea of the Spaniard taking on the CEO role for the new league has “universal approval” among the NBA’s governors.

A six-time All-Star and two-time champion in the NBA, Gasol played for FC Barcelona at the start and the end of his professional career, winning Spanish League championships in 1999, 2001, and 2021. He also compiled a lengthy list of accomplishments in international tournaments, winning three Olympic medals (two silvers, one bronze), a World Cup title, and three EuroBasket championships with Spain’s national team.

Here are a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world:

  • The Grizzlies and Kings currently employ interim head coaches and will be looking to name a permanent coach after the season. Tim Bontemps of ESPN breaks down the pros and cons of the jobs in Memphis and Sacramento, while Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report considers which other head coaches might be on the hot seat this spring, including Willie Green of the Pelicans and Chauncey Billups of the Trail Blazers.
  • Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic is the latest NBA writer to propose suggestions for how the league could address its tanking problem. Vorkunov’s ideas include having the lottery determine the top eight picks (instead of four), further flattening the lottery odds, and automatically assigning the two worst teams the fourth and fifth overall picks.
  • ESPN’s Bobby Marks highlights some incentive clauses in player contracts to keep an eye on during the season’s final two weeks, including Rockets forward Dillon Brooks ($1MM) and Timberwolves forward Julius Randle ($1.4MM) getting bonuses for their teams making the playoffs. Magic forward Jonathan Isaac must appear in at least four of Orlando’s final six games to reach the 70-game threshold, which would assure him of a $2.6MM bonus, Marks notes.

Pacific Notes: Lakers, Redick, Beal, Carter

Saturday’s win over the Grizzlies in Memphis represented perhaps the best overall showing to date for the Lakers‘ trio of LeBron James, Luka Doncic, and Austin Reaves. They combined for 85 points, 25 assists, and 21 rebounds, with Reaves (31 points, eight assists, seven rebounds) leading the way.

The performance came on the heels of head coach J.J. Redick gathering James, Doncic, and Reaves for a meeting on Saturday morning, according to Dave McMenamin of ESPN.com.

“We challenged all three of them when we get to their three-man actions to play with a little more force and a little more thrust and a little more creativity,” Redick said of that meeting, noting that it paid immediate dividends. “We played as well as we’ve played so far, offensively.”

“I think the meeting was just still trying to build that chemistry amongst the three of us to help the team be successful,” Reaves added. “(Saturday’s game) just showed that when we play the right way and trust one another, especially offensively, we can have open looks on almost every possession. … It was really just a conversation about how bad all of us want to win and win at a high level.”

James, Doncic, and Reaves have all missed multiple games this month due to new health issues and/or management of old injuries, but they’ve all been available for each of the past five contests. While the Lakers lost the first of those two games, they’ve won two of the past three, with their only loss in that stretch coming on Josh Giddey‘s half-court buzzer beater on Thursday.

Here’s more from around the Pacific:

  • Within a feature story about Redick, Dan Woike of The Los Angeles Times writes that the first-year head coach has expressed a strong affinity for Los Angeles and hopes his job with the Lakers gives him a reason to remain there for the long term. “I’m not moving again. I’m not moving my kids again,” Redick said. “We’re in it for the long haul. I would love to be the Lakers coach for the next 15 to 20 years. If I’m not the Lakers coach, I’m in it for the long haul in L.A.”
  • Suns guard Bradley Beal missed a seventh consecutive game on Sunday due to a left hamstring strain. As Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic writes, Beal is pushing hard in the hopes of returning to action sooner rather than later. “He wants to get back,” rookie guard Ryan Dunn said over the weekend. “He’s working his butt off.” Phoenix is 1.5 games back of a play-in spot and will be without leading scorer Kevin Durant for at least the next three games.
  • Kings guard Devin Carter exited Saturday’s game against Orlando early after injuring his right shoulder (Twitter video link via Sean Cunningham of FOX 40 Sacramento) and had his right arm in a sling after the game, tweets Chris Biderman of The Sacramento Bee. Carter, who has a history of shoulder issues, has been ruled out for Monday’s game in Indiana due to a right shoulder contusion, tweets James Ham of The Kings Beat.

Stein/Fischer’s Latest: Kings, White, Grimes, Mavs

A number of people around the NBA view Wes Wilcox‘s decision to leave his position as the assistant general manager in Sacramento for a college job with the Utah Utes as a sign that the Kings‘ front office is on shaky ground entering the 2025 offseason, according to Marc Stein and Jake Fischer of The Stein Line (Substack link).

Whether or not the Kings make major changes to their basketball operations department could depend in part on how the rest of the season plays out, Stein and Fischer note — a number of scenarios remain in play in Sacramento, ranging from the team claiming a playoff spot to missing the play-in tournament altogether.

However, there’s “considerable angst in the air” in Sacramento, given how the team’s season has played out, Stein and Fischer write. Interim head coach Doug Christie is a favorite of team owner Vivek Ranadive, but after winning 10 of his first 12 games on the job, he’s just 13-18 since then.

At the very least, Stein and Fischer say, the Kings’ front office will likely operate much differently without Wilcox in the picture, since he frequently communicated with agents, as well as with rival teams during trade talks. His personality and his experience as a front office executive were among the reasons why Sacramento initially wanted him to pair him with McNair, Stein and Fischer add.

Here’s more from The Stein Line:

  • Coby White generated a significant amount of trade interest prior to last month’s deadline, according to Stein and Fischer, who say that the Bulls “swatted away” that interest. That decision has paid major dividends, as White has been on a tear in recent weeks, averaging 29.1 points per game on .496/.377/.875 shooting in 14 March outings. He’ll be extension-eligible this offseason, but without cap room available, Chicago may not be in position to make him a competitive offer prior to free agency due to restrictions on veteran extensions.
  • Quentin Grimes didn’t explicitly request a trade out of Dallas last month, despite some rumors to the contrary, Stein and Fischer report. But the move from the Mavericks to the Sixers has certainly worked out for Grimes, who was among March’s standouts along with White, averaging 26.6 PPG on .504/.403/.738 shooting for the month. Despite the team’s high projected payroll, Philadelphia is hoping to re-sign Grimes this summer as a restricted free agent, per Stein and Fischer.
  • Unsurprisingly, Stein and Fischer say the Mavericks would “love” to promote two-way players Kessler Edwards and Brandon Williams to their standard roster immediately if they had the ability to do so. Both Edwards and Williams have reached their two-way limit of 50 active games and Dallas doesn’t have enough room below its hard cap to elevate either player and reactivate them at this point.

Florida Notes: Harris, Fultz, Larsson, Ware

Veteran guard Gary Harris has emerged as a reliable late-game defensive threat for the Magic with several of the team’s regular rotation players ailing, writes Jason Beede of The Orlando Sentinel (subscriber link).

The 30-year-old has played sparingly with Orlando this season, averaging 2.8 points and 1.4 rebounds in 15.2 minutes per game across 41 appearances with the club.

After missing five games as a healthy scratch since the end of February, Harris has been a major defensive leader on the perimeter. He’s averaging a steal per game across his last five contests.

“His defense is something that you probably wouldn’t know unless you looked into it, but he’s one of our best guard defenders,” guard Anthony Black said. “His activity, he picks up the ball full court, gets clutch rebounds and he’s a knockdown shooter… All those things are huge to us, and then he’s just a really good veteran leader. It’s just good for us on the court.”

There’s more out of the Sunshine State:

  • Former Magic guard Markelle Fultz, who spent five seasons in Orlando, played an emotional first game back against his old team as a member of the Kings in a blowout loss Saturday, Beede writes in another story (subscriber link). “It’s good to talk a little trash, play, go out there and compete, but at the end of the day, it’s love,” Fultz told reporters. “It’s a lifetime relationship that I have with these guys.” He was sidelined for 39 contests last season with left knee injuries and opted to rehab the knee before signing with a new team. “That’s something that was big on my mind going into the summer, just getting healthy and taking my time to do it… That’s the choice I decided to [make] in the beginning of the year and that’s why I took that time off.” Across 17 games since signing with Sacramento last month, Fultz is averaging 3.1 PPG and 1.2 APG in 8.7 MPG.
  • Rookies Kel’el Ware and Pelle Larsson have been shining for the Heat as of late, writes Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald (subscriber link). The frontcourt standouts each enjoyed impressive nights in Miami’s Saturday victory over Philadelphia. Larsson scored 14 points, grabbed six rebounds, handed out four dimes, swiped four steals and blocked two shots. Ware logged a 13-point, 14-rebound double-double without missing a shot. Jackson notes that Larsson seems to have replaced second-year forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. as head coach Erik Spoelstra‘s preferred swingman behind Andrew Wiggins. “Pelle is just an ignitable player. He makes things happen – the steals, the deflections, the hard plays,” Spoelstra said. “Those are momentum shifting plays that he has a knack for. He spends so much time in the gym that the rest of his game is getting better — the play-making, shooting, the facilitating.” Jackson opines that Ware needs to get stronger, since he has looked pretty movable in the post against opposing veteran bigs. Still, Spoelstra seems to like where the big man is right now.“I love what he’s doing,” Spoelstra said. “Number one, he’s glass eating. He has such a knack for rebounding over a crowd. He does rebound in traffic, too. There’s a lot of contact down there.”
  • In case you missed it, former six-time All-Star Heat wing Jimmy Butler, now with Golden State, downplayed his first game against his old team since forcing a trade this year.

Magic Notes: Play-In Tournament, Fultz, Anthony, Isaac

It’s been obvious for a while that the Magic are headed for the play-in tournament, and they officially clinched a spot with Saturday’s lopsided win over Sacramento, writes Jason Beede of The Orlando Sentinel. The 121-91 victory improves Orlando to 36-39 and extends its lead to 8.5 games over 11th-place Toronto.

The Magic got 63 combined points from Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Caleb Houstan and led by as many as 35 points. Coach Jamahl Mosley was happy about his team’s resilience after Thursday’s loss to Dallas.

“They responded the right way to the other night,” he said. “This group did a very good job of holding each other accountable and just continuing to play the right [way], first and foremost defensively.”

Orlando moved percentage points ahead of Atlanta in the battle for seventh place and the chance to host the play-in game for the No. 7 seed.

There’s more on the Magic:

  • Today’s game marked the return of Kings guard Markelle Fultz, who spent the last five seasons with Orlando, Beede adds. Fultz, who received a video tribute, remained a free agent for most of the season before signing with Sacramento in mid-February. “It’s known how I feel about Markelle, how we feel about Markelle, and what he does, what he means, who he is as a young man, as a husband, as a father,” Mosley told reporters before the game. “… All of those things about Markelle Fultz, I cannot speak more highly of a young man that I’ve ever been around.”
  • Cole Anthony missed his sixth straight game today with a strained left big toe. He posted “Back soon!!” on social media this week, but he still hasn’t been cleared for contact at practice, Beede states in a separate story. “He’s doing some individual things on the court,” Mosley said. “Just ball-handling, dribbling, light movements, all those little things.”
  • Jonathan Isaac has seen a sharp cutback in his playing time, averaging just 11 minutes per game since the All-Star break, Beede observes in another piece. The veteran forward, who’s averaging 5.3 PPG and shooting a career-low 26.2% from three-point range, acknowledged that he has to provide more offense to earn increased minutes. “I haven’t played well over the course of the season,” Isaac said. “I haven’t shot it well, haven’t played well overall. I’m not necessarily blaming anybody or mad at anybody but myself. This is where I’m at and I’ll be ready to play when my number’s called, provide energy and try to help this team win games.”

Kings’ LaRavia Out At Least 7-10 Days With Thumb Injury

Kings forward Jake LaRavia underwent imaging on his injured left thumb and has been diagnosed with a bone contusion, the team announced today (Twitter link via James Ham of The Kings Beat). LaRavia’s injury occurred in the fourth quarter of Tuesday’s loss to Oklahoma City when he took a hard fall under the basket (Twitter video link via Sean Cunningham of FOX 40 Sacramento).

According to the Kings, LaRavia will be sidelined for the time being and will be reevaluated in approximately seven-to-10 days. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll be ready to return at that time — just that he’ll be reassessed.

LaRavia, who was traded from Memphis to Sacramento at last month’s trade deadline, has played a regular rotation role off the bench for his new team. In 19 appearances since joining the Kings, he has averaged 6.1 points, 2.8 rebounds, and 1.3 assists in 19.3 minutes per contest, with a shooting line of .438/.385/.579.

The timeline for LaRavia indicates he’ll at least miss the team’s next three games – on Saturday in Orlando, Monday in Indiana, and Wednesday in Washington – and could remain out for more beyond that. Saturday’s contest is the first of a six-game road trip that runs through April 7 before Sacramento returns home for its final three games of the regular season.

With LaRavia unavailable, forwards Trey Lyles, Isaac Jones, and Doug McDermott are among the candidates to pick up additional minutes in the Kings’ frontcourt.