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It'd be a podcast out here. I said what I.
Said, heating up. It's the heat check check.
It's here's a little appetizer before we get into the main event interview with James Hamm. We had the great Keith Smith on through spoke track on my nightly show bet MGM tonight. By the way, I have a betting show that's on Monday through Friday seven to eleven Eastern Standard time. It's a lot of hours, so why don't you come join us enjoy sweat out some bets from all around the association, the NFL, college football, college basketball, and women's hoops. I was joined by my co hosts
Nick Ashe and Ryan Horvack. Keith always insightful, so let's get right into it.
Keith Smith jumps on with us now and uh, you know, you know what, Let's start with your Celtics a little bit. I'm looking at a team right now, Keith. That God, they look like, if not the best team in the NBA, pretty damn close. But we got the Sixers up four on them about two minutes to go here in the second quarter. When you watch the Sixers and you see what's going not just tonight, but just just in general
for the Sixers team. I don't want to say, like, hey, are they better than what they could have been with James Harden, But it just felt like there was a distraction there and in some ways, I don't know, maybe he held them back somewhat. Do you see a Sixers team that is maybe I don't know, has a higher ceiling now just give it the way they're playing without James Harden, I don't know that.
They have a higher ceiling, but but I do think sometimes you know, it's addition by subtraction. There was clearly a major distraction going on with him and the way things were going and the way you know, things were headed with this situation. Where getting that out of there, we're moving that distraction, allowing everybody to just basically take their role and slot in and do what they're going to do. That puts them in a great, great place,
you know, moving forward. Now, you know, anybody worrying about, all, right, well, when he gets back, what's my role going to be when he is not around? What? You know, then what do I have to do? Now? Everybody can just play what they're going to play and just move forward with it. So I think there's a chance it's edition by subtraction for Philly. This ceiling that will ultimately be determined, you know, when we get into the playoffs and we'll see do they have enough offense creation?
And like this question is random but near and dear to my heart because people are calling me a hater on Twitter right now.
What is your.
Thoughts on Cam Thomas and how the Nets have basically allowed him to have superstar green light right now, he's attempting the most amount of shots in the NBA with the lowest assist ratio. As you can tell, Keith, I'm not super high on building a team or building an offense around him.
Yeah, I think the problem for the Nets right now is they just don't have enough offense. So it's a lot of Michale bridges and then they need anybody else who can create their own. Look, Cam Johnson hasn't been there, he's been out, so you got to you know, figure things out, sort through it for as long as it's going to take to get him back on the floor. So that that's been you know, a challenge for sure for the Nets. So that's going to be a you know,
a whole thing for them. So for right now, I'm kind of okay with them letting Cam Thomas go, but I think, yeah, you're going to struggle to find yourself in a spot where if Cam Thomas has taking thirty shots a night, you're probably not going to be a very good team unless all of a sudden he develops into the most efficient score in the world, because he's not always doing it with the most efficient levels.
Keith, it's only a seven game sample size, but are you a believer in what the Dallas Mavericks are doing here early at six and one?
Yeah, yeah, I think you know what they did really well was they want with shooting in defense around Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, and that's that's how you're going to have to win. You know, Grant Williams is one of the best value signing this summer because it'll play defense and it'll make open shots. He did that with Boston at a pretty good clip. We saw him do it also in you know, high level important games, so no reason to think he can't still do that with Dallas.
And then Derek Lively has injected just some energy, some you know, bounce into that starting group. He's really figuring it out pretty quickly. And their depth is all of the nonstin They've got enough guys kind of round the two stars that they need. So when you build a team like that, you're gonna probably have pretty good levels
of success. So I think it's sustainable. I don't know that it's you know, one loss every six to seven games sustainable, but I think they should be a top six team when all a said and done in the Western Conference, which really you should be if you're building the team around Doncich and Irving Keith.
We're looking at the Bucks right now give up almost one hundred and seventeen points a game, which is actually slightly better than where they were earlier in the season when they were twenty eighth and points allowed. Do you look at this and say, ah, it's a team, got some new players on there, Dame's not really a defensive guy. This is going to take some growing pains to figure out everybody's role on both ends of the court. Or do you maybe see a bigger issue in Milwaukee.
I think there's that part with Damian Lillard and some other new guys that are playing, you know, pretty big roles there Milwaukee. But I think the other challenge that you have with them right now is you've got the Bucks are playing a very different scheme they have. You gone through a period where they're bringing Adrian Griffin's new scheme in and they're putting Brook Lopez up at the level of the ball. And the challenge with that is
that's not taking advantage of what he does well. Even when he was much much younger, he was not going to be a hedge hard, hedge high guy and then quick hard recover to his man. He was always going to be someone who is going to be all right, they need to lay back a little bit, And that's just not taking advantage of what he's done and what the real kind of skills are of him that's made him the defensive Player of the Year candidate year in
and year out. But I'm okay with trying it and trying some new stuff because you're never going to know if it will work unless you give it a shot. Now, but it's one of those things where I think eventually they'll probably scrap some of that, at least when Lopez is in the game and go back to what they know works real well for them.
Yeah, that's a really good point.
What is it time for us to panic about the Sacramento Kings.
Yeah, let's see what happens. You know, it's two old. How long is Darren Fox out for him? What do they look like when he is fully backed in the fold, Because that's gonna be something they're certainly going to have to figure out, you know, because if he's there and playing, then you're probably doing, you know, pretty well. If he's not, you know, if they're not winning games when if he's back, and that's worrisome for them. And in the Western Conference,
you can't give up too many games. There's too many good teams. So you're gonna end up in a spot. You know, we've seen the Grizzlies. They're kind of in that spot already, and you're gonna end up in a spot if you're the Kings where if you look up a month from now and you're five six games already out of the playoff picture, you're making your task in the second half of the season really really difficult.
If you're a Miami fan, is there any reason to be concerned at all? I mean, you're three and four you're the ten seed in the East, but really all you have to do is get into the playing tournament and you're probably guaranteed to go to the finals again for whatever reason.
Yeah, I mean they did. There's some of that, right, but it also I think what you saw with Miami, much like with the Lakers in the Western Conference, but it definitely with Miami was they ran out of gas by the time they get to the finals because they had to push so hard, you know, to get all the way there. You know, you don't want to make that path more difficult if you don't have to. But you're also seeing some limitations of a team that they
make the big trade. They didn't build out their roster because it felt like they spent most of the summer anticipation of making the big trade. So that bele comes, you know, a major thing for the you know Miami heat of you know, all right, you know they're gonna have enough, you know, we know their top line guys are pretty good, but are they gonna have enough to really get you know, all the way you know where they need to be, and you can't just count on
every year we're going to get in the playoffs. We're going to make a run from the you know, playing tournament deep into the playoffs, because that's just not a sustainable thing.
Keith, I'm looking at the NBA Most Improved Player right now. Tyrese Maxie is the favorite of plus two twenty five, Scottie Barnes is five to one, and then Cam Thomas that we just mentioned obviously seven to one, kgs way back at sixteen to one. It's it's kind of a weird award, like, you know, there's no real It just kind of feels like you have different situations every year when a player wins. Sometimes a guy could just jump up and be an All Star. Sometimes it's bigger role,
sometimes it's new team, whatever the case is. Does this kind of just feel like as long as Tyrese Maxi keeps pace with just the season that he started to have already, this is his award the loser. Could you see anybody like a Scottie Barnes, of Cam Thomas, maybe even a kid Cunningham jumping up and maybe winning the award?
Yeah, I think fair or not. I think a lot of time team record get involved in these kind of awards too, and that probably really shouldn't be it it should just be based on, you know, what did the guy do, But like a guy like Cam Thomas, for example, it's more role. He's always kind of been this guy.
I don't know that he's any improved. I think he's just always been a guy who can score buckets if he's given the opportunity, and he's certainly been giving it right now, Maxy, I think what you're gonna see is can he keep up the playmaking and keep up to defense. If he can keep up those two things, that's much
improved because now he's not simply a scorer. I'll give you another guy, though, who I really think by the end is going to be someone that people will be talking about, especially if the team can win a little bit, is Albern Shangoun of the Houston Rockets. He is playing really, really good basketball, and you can see now. When he came into the league, one of the things that a lot of really smart draft people said was he's not
Nikola Jokic, so let's not get it confused. But there's a lot of Nikola Jokic in his game, and you're starting to really see that with Shangdun at this point.
Yeah, Shangun's been really good. He has dominated Sabonis those last couple of games as well. Yeah, I'm curious your thoughts about some of these rookies, right, Like Scoot Henderson's been injured, but I think maybe he started off a little bit slower than a lot of people expected. Brandon Miller's been kind of up and down, Kyanty George finally in the starting lineup, Like, who's been the most impressive rookie so far to you outside of Wemby?
All Right, I was gonna say, if we're taking him off the table, I mean I'll throw Chat Holmgren in that mix too, because he is still rookie the way the league classifies him. So I think he's played really, really well and done a lot of good stuff. But yeah, you mentioned a couple of guys who who have looked Yeah at times. I think Brandon Miller is starting to figure stuff out a little bit, and he's starting to get a little bit more opportunity with Terry Rogier out.
I think it's just Charlotte's in such a weird place. They have a lot of guys at that forward spot. We don't know what it to look like when they get back to Miles bridges in the lineup and when that comes, if if it comes, you know, with his more recent trouble, so we'll see what that all looks like. But yeah, I think it's you know, this is obviously
it's one Minyama's race to lose here. But I think Holmgren has done some stuff for Shore and I think Scoot Henderson I know what you're saying, and I've heard a little bit of that where a couple of people have said, yeah, yeah, some you know, it started off slow. But I think the one thing is that's a really really hard position in the NBA to adjust to, especially when your coach is a former point guard. The level of expectation there is quite high. So I'm still very
very high on Scoot Henderson. I think he's going to be a great player. It's just gonna take him a little bit to get there.
Yeah, you kind of just give a little bit more detail in terms of how difficult it is to step in and be a.
Point guard on a and have to lead a team as a rookie.
Yeah, you're processing a lot right out of the gate. You're running the offense, so not only are you making the calls in transition, generally, which especially before and they're playing a lot up and down games right now, so that they're looking for him to kind of run those things. The guy he thought was going to be his backboard running mate, who should have made life easier on a Manfreny Simon's got hurt right away, So that makes it
a little bit more difficult. Then you're trying to process when you do get into that, or your coach is setting you up and all right, this is what I want to run, and you know, let's make sure we get into it, and you're trying to make sure we're on a team with a whole bunch of new faces too that you know, all right, let's uh, you know, get everybody on the same page here, and that that makes it hard as well. And then defensively, you know, you're you're kind of the head of the snake there
at that position. You're the one stepping out, you know, up there, if you're guarding on ball, you're going to be involved in a lot of on ball actions, a ton of picking rolls, and you're gonna put that guy through quite a bit. So I think scut Henderson's, you know, he's done well considering all you have to absorb at the point guard position. But there's a reason why, you know, everybody says point guard, you got to give him a
year or two to really adjust to the speed. And this is even for a guy who played at a professional level for the last couple of years with the guage. The NBA is just a whole different ballgame.
Keith, I have to ask a selfish question here as a bull stand because I knew it was going to be bad, and I know they won their last game. But now they're three and five and they've scored ninety eight point one points per one hundred possessions. They've been outscored by twenty point eight per one hundred. So it hasn't been good. It's been actually worse than I thought. Any chance that they're sellers at the deadline, I.
Would like to say yes. I think the challenge is it's just not what they do. You know, under Jerry Rehyinstorp ownership, they've never really bought him the team out when it's happened a couple times, but it's happened naturally through all right, just the wheels came off. We'd wait too many injuries and now here we are to Derrick Rosier,
for example. So that's the challenge is, you know, unless they are willing to lean into saying, all right, the best thing is, let's trade a bunch of guys really bottomless thing out be bad. I just don't know if they're going to go in that direction. And that's unfortunate because as the roster is built right now, they're never going to be better than a team that's battling around the playing line. And that's just for my money, that's not good enough. But I don't want to be there every year.
Thanks Keith, always good to talk to you, buddy.
Thank you to Keith Smith and the whole crew. I bet MGM tonight.
Let's now welcome James Ham to the show. They call him the Hammer. He is a Sacramento icon covered the team for more than a decade. I think fourteen years he's been on the beat. He co hosts The Insiders on ESPN thirteen twenty with my man Kyle Manson on an Odyssey station Buddha Doo. So let's get right back
into it. Welcome to the show, James Ham. James Ham is a Sacramento Kings guru, been covering the beat for a long ass time Insider co hosts actually The Insiders with My Guy, My Guy Kyle Madn on ESPN thirteen twenty. Find them on Twitter. James underscore Ham NBA. He is here to tell us what the fuck is happening with the Sacramento kegs Man.
That's a good question, Trista. I wish I had all the answers. First of all, the pace has fallen off a cliff the last three games, slowest pace in the NBA. They actually posted a pace of like eighty nine and one of the losses to the Houston Rockets. Dearon Fox is out and they just don't look like themselves without him pushing the tempo. But that's not an excuse.
It's okay.
This is a fast paced team. They should be moving the ball up and down the court. It shouldn't be all on Davion Mitchell to deliver pace. But they are searching right now, and they definitely did not expect something like this to happen in the first week of the season, where they went from really high with a win opening to open against Utah, a win over the Lakers, a couple of losses to the Golden State Warriors, and then to just fall on their face against the Houston Rockets twice.
They did not expect that.
Yeah, you know the question, you mentioned Davion Mitchell, and you know, I'm a big fan of Davion.
I love I've got no negative things to say about Davion, But his player comp isn't the same as d'erran's. They're not like, you can't just substitute Davon into the lineup and it be anywhere close to the same style of offense. The closest player to meet on the roster is Malik Monk. Why isn't Malik Monk taking the Deer and Fox role and Davion staying in the role that he was in when deeron Fox is running the show.
Yeah, so Monk has carved out a different role for himself on this team. Of course, he's a six man extraordinary. He's a guy who brings all kinds of energy off the bench. That's not who Davion is even when he comes off the bench. And so to take a guy out of that role would really upset the avl karte with your second unit as well. Just think of all the Malik Monk and JaVale McGhee like hookups that we've
got going on right now. These lobs that they have going that would go away if they weren't playing together. So I think Monk needs an expanded role. I would like to see him play thirty five minutes. I'd like to see him come in at the five minute six minute mark of the first quarter and play a huge stretch to the first and second quarter. But for right now, Mike Brown has been reluctant to put him in the
starting lineup. He didn't do it last year. Deeron Fox miss nine games last season, and I believe that all but one of those games that Davion Mitchell started, and this team, you know, outside, if we take the one game at the end of the season, there was a total throwaway where Fox didn't play. This team was four and four without Fox. So they shouldn't have this type
of disparity when he walks off the court. And it's something that they're going to have to figure out because it's gotten really, really ugly very quickly here in Sacramento.
Why do you think the pace is so bad and like the offense has fallen off.
Of a cliff.
Well, I think if you take Fox off the floor. It does allow oppositions to just stack everything they've got right on Sabonis. Take away his passing lanes, take away his dribbling lanes, take away his ability to get into the paint and score or for himself. I mean against the Rockets this last game out get four shot attempts and that's just not going to cut it. You know, this is a very very high end player. He's an All NBA player, and to see him his numbers kind
of fall off so quickly is really strange. But I think it also has something to do with the fact that the Kings haven't been able to get their shooters going. Keegan Murray and Kevin Herder have struggled to hit the three ball to open the season. Both of them are shooting around twenty five percent, maybe a little bit less for Keegan now, and they just haven't found a rhythm
as an offense. They made some subtle changes to this offense during the offseason, and I think it's time to look at those changes and maybe pull those changes out and go straight back to what you're doing before and then just try to build nuance into your offense. And we haven't seen that so far. I really think the offense looks so far different than it did last year. And it's not just because they're missing shots. It's for a lot of reasons. It's not just that.
Explain that to me.
What are those changes that you can see with your and which ones that are specifically the ones that are not working.
Yeah, So the Kings basically have you know, a system where four guys run to four spots on the floor and then Demonis Sabona settles in in the high post, and then they use those guys to rotate and switch off of each other and set screens for each other.
And it feels like they're trying to do way too many backcuts, Like the guys that are usually setting screens for other players, players that they would typically set a screen for in the corner isn't coming off of that screen and coming back to the top of the dhow Like we've seen in the past, a lot more cuts or resets, guys going either straight to the basket or just going to the other side. And that's one major change.
I'd also say like teams are just pushing the Kings further and further away from the basket, and so Sabonis might be running the dhow like you did last year, but he's doing it from the three point line. And then when guys are coming off the screen at the top, you know, Kevin Herder is getting quote unquote wide open shots. But they're not twenty three to six. They're at twenty seven feet and that's a big deal, you know, like they're pushing the whole offense further and further away from
the basket. This team was number one and two point field goal percentage last year. They shot I think it was fifty eight point three percent from two. They got a lot of easy baskets. This year, they're all the way down, like number twenty two. They're shooting like fifty three percent. They've lost five or six percent off of their their two point field goal percentage. Not to even mention like they're number two in three point attempts, but
they're twenty two in three point percentage. So they're shooting a ton of threes, they're not hitting them. That's a problem. But more than that, they're just not getting easy looks like they were last year. And I don't think the league just magically caught up to them, or that they were able to watch game film of a seven game series against Warriors, and somebody's got the magic recipe and they've passed it along to every other team in the league.
I don't think that that's the case. I changed.
I just think that they're starting off playing a little clunky, a little different, and they've got some to find their soul a little bit here.
Do you think Mike Brown and I agree that the Kings didn't play great defense during the regular season.
I think we all kind of knew that.
Yeah, I don't know.
If that really matters. Honestly.
I think they played really good defense against Golden State in the first round, which shows what they're capable of.
And they had.
Timely defense during the regular season, which, yeah, you lose some games that way, you win some games that way, but it shows that you have that ability. It kind of feels to me like there was such this huge emphasis on physicality and defense because everyone banged on them for not playing defense, or maybe there was just some soul searching internally.
Where we have to be better. But it feels like.
That pendulum has swung so much to that emphasis that getting buckets has now kind of become too less important.
Yeah, I mean, I agree with you to a certain extent. I'd also point out that they're not playing good defense right now.
Seconds right now in defensive rating.
Yeah, and so what we've seen so far is the emphasis to be physical, to pick up shooters way further out, to try to blow up pick and roll situations, you know, sort of charge the pick and roll that hasn't worked.
And you know, you got guys like Chris Starte who come in and almost every single time he steps on the court, he's got three fouls, and it happens so quickly he gets he picks up three fouls, and the next thing you know, the Kings are in the penalty like I've never seen a team be in the penalty
so often. Like they're giving their opposition free throw after three, free throw after free throw, and they're they're really struggling to translate what it means to play defense, physical defense without fouling.
They are. You can see it.
And it's funny because you go out there and you watch a Houston Rockets play, and that's exactly what I saw. I saw physical defense from a young team without fouling, and is what the Kings will face when they play Okay, see on Friday, they'll face a team that really plays physical, hard nosed defense without fouling, and sometimes they pick up fowls, but overall, the concept is to play without valuing. This is not what the Kings have done the other the opponent.
I don't know what the number is, but I'm going to guess that they're giving up eight free throws attempts more than they're getting every single night on average.
And that's just not going to cut it either.
So they've got to figure out a way to translate what Mike Brown is asking for. But also Mike Brown needs to realize that there's something wrong with his offense and he needs to go back to the basics of we're there last season. They haven't made enough structural changes or replacement pieces in place to actually change what they were doing last year. The only difference is Trey Lyles hasn't played a game this season because the cap injury, and Dearon Fox has missed three going on four games.
Outside of that, this offense should have been flowing like it was before and we're seeing a lot of standing around. So the emphasis on emphasis on defense, it very well could be a big part of the problem here.
I'm very curious about Kevin Herder because he was so good for a lot of last year hit game winners and was the kind of a part of the soul of the fun and the vibe, and he was just atrocious in the playoffs. It was just like unplayable. And it feels like that has carried over into this season. And I'm not sure if it's a confidence thing. I'm not sure if it's something else, but like, what the hell is going on with Caveon?
He seems to be finding himself a little bit. I think that Mike Brown really singled him out early in training camp, and I mean he kept saying, hey, this, everyone has to be better at this, everyone has to be better. But it's it's Kevin who is losing his spot in the rotation or potentially losing his spot in the rotation, or literally had Chris Darte start for him in a preseason game. And so I think he Mike
Brown maybe overestimated the psyche of Kevin Herder. He put a lot of onus on him to be better defensively and to make all these changes, but also like he just became the poster child for everything that was wrong, and I don't think that was Mike's intention. His intention was to say, like, look, everybody is struggling on these
these issues that we have. But for some reason, you know, Herder was not picking up on the changes quickly enough in training camp, and so I feel like Mike accidentally piled on a little bit, and then the fans piled on, and then Kevin got off to a rough shooting start, and next thing, you know, this saying snowballed a little bit. We're seeing him figure it out slowly. The rebound numbers are way up. He's starting to pick up assists. But I mean, we're talking about a team that just lost
a starter who averages thirty one points. But also, you know, twenty three and a half shots per game in dearon Fox, and instead of replacing those with guys like Kevin Herder, guys like Demona Sabonus getting more shots or you know, Harrison Barnes, they just don't shoot those twenty three shots anymore. They slowed the game down so much that it's almost like they just have a ghost as a fourth player that's not actually on the court, and they're really struggling
to find it. And I think that Kevin's shooting wills are part of that, but also just like the transition to him having to play defense at a higher level is something. You know, Mike Brown pushing buttons, I think it sent him a little off kilter.
Are they pray to be aggressive and.
Gun I don't think so. We're seeing a lot of weird things that are popping up. So like as far as like three point shooting, I don't think that they're they're afraid to be aggressive. I mean, we watched all the way through preseason where they're averaging almost fifty three's a game, right, and we get into the regular season they're doing the same thing again. Like two games ago, they're second in the league in attempts from three point range and you know they're still they're still second at
forty two and a half percent. It's just they're not hitting. You know, that's a problem. And so I think, you know, a guy like Herder, maybe he got a little gun shy initially, but a guy like Keagan Murray, we're seeing some I think he might be struggling with expectations, like
we're watching him. Katie Rishinson described it as drifting while he's shooting, and I think it's a perfect way to describe what you're seeing, Like he's just not getting his feet set, he's not squaring his hips and his shoulders to the basket initially. He's doing all of his adjustments mid air, and he's missing. I mean, we've seen him airball threes, and we're so used to him just being so steady that the last thing he's been is steady. Throughout the first six games of the season, he's been
all over the map. I also think it's just, you know, everyone is trying to adjust to their new roles. Everyone is adjusting to you know, trying to become like a guy like Keegan trying to become a third scorer or even a second scorer on a team, and sometimes those things come with some hiccups.
Harrison Barnes also hiccups.
Had that one big game thirty three gets the money, and he's right now nine point six points per game, two point rebounds per game, not counting that first game.
Like, why do you think he's struggling?
Yeah, it's a great question. I think more than you know, Like his shooting percentages are fine right up until he had a like a clunker of a game in the second game against Houston. He was shooting well over fifty percent from three. Problem is he's just not taking any shots. He's not in the flow of the offense. And there has to come a point where Harrison has to be part of the solution and not just saying, well, you know, it wasn't really Harrison's fault.
It.
To me, it's really strange because.
Overnight he kind of became Andrew Wiggins as a rebounder and as like the rest of the game outside of you know, the defensive prowess of Wiggins, And I don't know if Wiggins is still the defender that he was for that like one moment in time that.
We saw him.
But right now they're very similar players. Like he's not rebounding the ball at all. He's a career five rebounds per game and he's right around two rebounds per game. And this started this stated all the way back to like it started in February last year, started dropping off to like three three and a half rebounds per game to finish out the season, and like there's there's really not a huge reason for that outside of him just
not going and getting rebounds. From what I can tell, it's not like someone else started stealing all the rebounds. Sabonis was there the whole time, so like, he's gonna have to make some adjustments here, and he needs to be more vocals. So if you don't have Dearon Fox out there and Demonic Sabonis and Harrison Barnes combined for ten shot attempts in a blowout loss to the Rockets, and you know, again they had plenty of time. They
even played in the fourth quarter. That's just not acceptable and there needs to be some accountability, not just for you know, Davion Mitchell, who isn't pushing the tempo fast enough for you know, JaVale McGee who's got too many turnovers, or Malik Munk who came in the game and picked up three thousand like had to go leave the game and looked totally disinterested against the Rockets in the second game, but also for the guys that are out there that
are your leaders, that should have a voice on what's happening.
Yeah, I'm curious.
It feels like you kind of think one portion of it is obviously the accountability on the players, but a lot of this is just tweaks that maybe shouldn't have been made by Mike Brown.
That's possible.
Yeah, I mean, you need to be better defensively, and I understand that everyone should understand that that this team needs to be better defensively. But at the end of the day, it's really about net rating. It's not about offensive rating or defensive rating. It's about having a higher net rating and winning games. I think he did put a lot of focus on the defensive end, and I also, like, let's be honest, it's not like anyone did him any favors.
You know, you went into an offseason knowing that you didn't have enough length in athleticism at the wing to play elite defense. You knew you didn't have great defensive players. You came back with virtually the same exact rotation, except for you have JaVale McGee there, and you have Sashova Zinkoff and you have Chris Dwarte. But again, these aren't major pieces that are playing, you know, tremendous amounts of minutes.
So you're asking the same group of players to do something different than what they've done before.
And it worked. Yeah, well, no, it did.
But I think that like you expected some organic growth on the defensive end, and maybe you're not twenty fourth. Maybe you somehow get to eighteenth by just adding a couple of small pieces, but I don't think that was enough for Mike, and I think he wanted to take a major jump to get up to you know, number twelve, number fifteen, and that seems to I don't buy that the Kings are tired because they're playing a more physical
brand of defense. I don't buy that at all, because they're not playing that that great on the defensive end. And I don't see that there's so much exertion on the defensive end that it should be costing them or their legs should be shot shooting the three ball. But at the same time, I don't understand the tweaks on the offensive end, and like they're subtle and whatever it was, you know, Mike Brown said, we had this specific playset in our bag last year, but we only used it
like three times a game. Now we're going to use it like thirty and whatever that playset is and needs to go because there's something wrong right now. You can bring it back and maybe you can go, you know, double it up to six times a game that you do that, But for right now, they've lost the soul of who they were last year, which was his fun, crazy offensive juggernaut that everybody in the league is like,
look at that. I mean, it's kind of like what we're looking at the Indiana Pacers right now and going, oh my goodness, that that short does look like fun. Everyone wants to go play in that's in that offense, and that was the Kings last year, and all of a sudden they've lost sort of like a direction of who they are.
Mike Brown said, nobody's position on this team is sacred, which felt like changes could potentially be coming.
Like, what do you think he meant by that?
Well, I think the biggest change it comes is that Dearon Fox steps back into the starting lineup and everybody
like takes a step backwards. I mean, it is a big deal that, you know, Demonista Bonus has to be the number one on your team for you know, the better part of the week and a half now, and that means that just out of default almost it's that Harrison Barnes now you're number two, and that Kigan Murray or Kevin Herder and you're number three, and your number four and Malik Monk you throw in there like it does matter that deeron fun is gone and that you're
you're having to rely on guys that maybe aren't comfortable with where they have to be in your in your offense or you know, where they have to be is like part of your scoring group. But you know, again, like changes, there aren't a lot of changes. It can happen, Like what are they gonna do? Are they gonna put Chris Duarte in the starting lineup for for Kevin Herder? To be honest, Kevin Herder hasn't been that bad the
last two or three games. He was bad the first two games, but then he's he's slowly starting to come out of whatever it was that was a problem. And so if it's not him, then who is it? I mean, is Kessel Or Edward's going to replace Harrison Barnes in the starting lineup? Are you gonna bench Keegan Murray? Like the answer to these no, like saschev Zenkoff is going to step in and take somebody's job. So and certainly there's no way that we're going to see JaVale McGee
start over demonessta Bonus. So what are we talking about here? Like maybe it's your spot in the rotation, Maybe Davion Mitchell. If he can't push the pace, maybe they do go to Colby Jones. Maybe they give it a different look. Someone who's young and like will run and do things whatever they're asking to do. He's just saying yes, sir and going and doing it. But at the end of the day, you know, like you got to keep this
group together. It's early and they're having a hiccup here, but you're still only two and four to start the season.
Do you think this roster is the same come trade deadline?
No?
Yeah, I don't think so at all, especially if they don't wake up very quickly, like their expectations here that have never been here before, and those expectations are going to play out in real time, like if this team takes a huge step back and all of a sudden is scuffling and misses the playoffs or is fighting for the back end of the playoffs, don't think. I don't think if a vecron A DV and his group are are ready for that. They've treated ticket prices like, you know,
they flex this thing. You know, they've been waiting for a decade for this team to be good, so they can bump ticket prices and all of a sudden boom, ticket prices jump up. The last thing you want to see is this thing starts empty out towards the end of the season and a bunch of finger pointings start to happen. So I think they'll be aggressive. I think
they'll be aggressive. You know, after December fifteenth, that's when you know you can move guys that you signed during the off season, But the Kings don't have a lot of those players. I think later in December on twenty eight, twenty ninth, is when a person like Harrison Barnes, who signed exten an extension during the off season, becomes trade eligible.
And you know, again it's not like Harrison Barnes makes so much money and that you know teams wouldn't take on Harrison Barnes like seventeen eighteen and nineteen million this year in the next two that's an easily movable contract, especially with the salary cap set to skyrocket again you're looking about twelve percent of the salary cap. That's a player that, like teams understand as part of business in
the NBA. So I definitely think that they're going to be active, and you know they clearly they need that one more big piece or maybe two big pieces to get them into a conversation of something much, much bigger.
You know what has been absolutely awful this year and not used at all is Pascal Siakam. He's on an expiring Do.
You think he's that piece for the Kings regardless of whether he's gettable or not, because Massia is a total wild card, But do you think someone like him is that piece or is that somebody else for you?
No, I mean I think he would be under consideration. He's a player that the Kings have liked a lot in the past, but also like to stay with Toronto. The other guy is og and Anobi. That is the guy that I believe the Kings have tried to get multiple times and they believe is like the defensive tone setter that they need. And whether they can get him out of there or not, I don't know. The Kings
do have they don't have their twenty twenty four. Well, if they make the playoffs, they don't have their twenty twenty four. If they miss the playoffs, then that hold that they have on the first round pick. It's a lottery protected in twenty twenty four to twenty five. In twenty six, so they can't trade it until twenty twenty eight. But they still have some assets that they can move.
They have these these contracts like Kevin Herder or you know, Davion Mitchell or Harrison Barnes that you could package and move. I think there are they have movable pieces and movable contracts, but it's it's really whether or not they can pull the trigger.
On something like that.
I like Siakham and in that situation, of course, you know, you'd move Keegan Murray over to the three and you'd figure out how to you know, build around a different group. But I just don't think that Messi Usury is ever going to trade anybody. He'd rather let them expire and lose them like you did with Fred van Vliet than to do the right thing and actually, you know, get an asset for his players.
Yeah, that's that's a great point.
I told Dlo and Casey also on your station that I wouldn't panic until deeron Fox is back and you see what this team is for ten games for you, When is the time to really be concerned.
Yeah, I mean, first of all, we need to see when Fox is going to be back, you know, like we heard the reports, oh we could play us early as Saturday, And then he was the first one to say, well, I haven't really heard that report.
And that seems strange since it's about me. So I don't know.
We need to see when Fox gets back and then what he looks like when he gets back.
He's a guy who's had a history.
Of ankle injuries, although it wasn't this ankle that he had the Grade three a few years ago. But once he's back in the flow and this team is rolling, like, I think you've got to give him twenty five games, Like you don't want to be embarrassed like what happened on Monday night against against a marginal Houston Rockets team.
Not to be rude, but like that team is still a long ways away from being like a super competitive team and to just walk in there and get slaughtered two games in a row and have Alpern Shangoun look like the All NBA player and not Demones savonas like that's an issue. But again, this team is predicated on two stars to do very specific things. You take one of those stars out, you are going to have some struggles. I just don't think anyone thought it would be this
kind of struggle. This early good stuff, James.
Last question, what is your favorite vegetable?
Oh, I hate all squashes. I hate asparagus. I do like broccoli, tomatoes, a fruit, or I would probably go there. If I'm choosing something to put on my plate, it's usually green beans, you know, So like if I have a choice of like six things, it's usually that I don't like Brussels sprouts.
I don't like the bitter vegetables. That's an interesting question. I don't know.
I do like, if I could say tomatoes, I grow a lot of tomatoes at the house, and we do a lot of like tomato and brota with basil salads and stuff.
Yeah, good stuff, James, James Ham.
James find him on Odyssey on ESPN thirteen twenty The Insiders with Kyle Mattson, who's also a hoot. He gives you everything up, straight up, no angel dust, gives it to you like without any.
Filter, and he's on the ground. Thank you so much for joining us.
James, Hey, anytime, Trista.
That's all the time that.
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