DeMar DeRozan on Sacramento Kings Dysfunctional Season
Um, on top of that, uh, Demard Rosen, uh, was on the run your race, uh, podcast with Theo Pensson and AJ Richardson. Um, he kind of rehashed the the chaos of the 2024 25 season. And um like for me it was interesting to watch I know it sounds weird. It was interesting to watch like a really really like solid veteran guy who’s been in the league for this was his 16th season but uh go through chaos for the first time. Mhm. Because I’m so used to chaos. Yeah. No, this is not normal what happens in Sacramento. It’s not normal. So like I I can say let let me think just off the top of my head. Um, Keith Smart replaced uh Paul Westfall mid-season. Um, Ty Corbin replaced Mike Malone mid-season and then George Carl replaced Ty Corbin mid-season. Um, on top of that, we’ve got uh we’ve got Alvin Gentry replacing Luke Walton mid-season and you’ve got Doug Christie replacing Mike Brown mid-season. So, I’ve seen a coach replace mid-season five times. Mhm. Yeah. I feel your for you media guys out there is kind of, oh, here we go again anytime it does go down. No, totally. I And I’ll tell you, I remember when um the puke game when the guy throws up all over the court and then Luke Walton is let go the next morning. Um, we were walking, we we were walking down to uh the the media room and Brendan Nunez had not gone through this before and it was like it was quiet and everyone was like and he’s like, “What do I do here?” And it and I looked at him, I’m like, “Don’t worry, me and me and Jason and Sean, we got you. We we’ve been through this a bunch of times.” And he’s like, “Okay.” I I said you if you I said if you want to ask a question but you what you don’t want to do is ask about the game because that’s not what the story is tonight. The story is a coach that’s about to get fired. And like we all knew and then we walked in the media room and it was like peppering around and it was like interesting. But now here we are a couple years later and Brennan’s been through it. He’s already been through it again and you you see it coming. You’re like, “Oh, yeah.” No. When Mike Brown got fired, like there was no question. Like I knew a couple of days before. Mhm. And we had talked about it and like like we knew it was coming right before Christmas, but then they waited until after Christmas and it was really uncomfortable like Right. But you’ve been through it a bunch of times. So to have a player come through who’s a Hall of Famer and Demard Rosen who’s been in the league 16 years. Yep. And who has never been through a situation where a coach got fired mid-season was like stunning. Like what do you mean you’ve never been through this? Well, like the guy played for the Raptors and the Raptors have never really been too dysfunctional as far as I can think. Well, I mean they did with him. No, probably not. They did fire um who was their coach? Um Dwayne Casey. Dwayne Casey. Yeah, he won uh coach of the year. Coach of the year and then they fired him that I mean but that can be a bad thing. Yeah, I don’t know if that was dysfunction or more so because they kept losing to LeBron at that time and stuff like that, but either way like it wasn’t like this in Sacramento or anything like that and then you get to San Antonio and San Antonio was tiptop shape no matter what. Yeah. And it’s just kind of Chicago was surprising that they never fired a coach there. Yeah. Like Yeah. like Chicago was just a playing team or whatever and then you get to Sacramento just boom boom boom boom boom boom and he kind of fell into a role that probably wasn’t he wasn’t supposed to be in when he got there. Yeah, I I think you’re probably right. Like the reason why he ends up being a a player who um who you know was able to average 20 plus a game this season is because of the chaos. Mhm. Like there should have been a point where you started to transition this team to like the Keegan Murray team and you didn’t do it because like chaos hit and then going through like having the best player on a team traded and people can like want to argue that or whatever on the outside like De’ar Fox inside the locker room and in the practice facility and on the court was like understood as the best player on that team like by the players like Dear turns our guy, right? So when that happens, that’s also like another like earthshattering like chaotic moment. Um, so yeah, because Demar during the podcast talks about like it was one thing after we’re not playing the clips, I think they cut down or whatever, but he talks about like Mike Brown gets fired, then De’Iron gets traded and then like Zack Lavine and the new guys get here and he talks about how he’s trying to find his footing with the guys that are already there. people get traded and then he’s kind of assumed this leadership role because no one else is there or whatever and like he’s kind of trying to work with Zach when he’s still trying to figure out like the past team and all that stuff. Like there was just there was never a flow that that team found at all last year just based off of what he said. It was just constant just on the move like Doug Christie was saying um saying when he took over it’s kind of trying to fix a plane on the fly and they just never found their footing at all and it was impossible to too like I don’t think it was just way too much going on for them to even find any sort of consistency. Well that then you had the injuries happen you know yeah you talked about Monk getting hurt and all that. Monk, but also you remember Sabonis. Everyone thought Sabonis was going to be out for the season and was able to come back and keep playing. Like it it’s just I I always uh joke around I I have a running thing that me and uh Dell Enus uh one of the scorekeepers, the official scorekeepers, we always take a like a gauge on what we think is going to happen for the season. Like right before the season starts, we throw out a number of how many wins. And uh there was one season where I said, “I think this team can win 45, but I want a plus or minus 8.” And he’s like, “Well, no, that we always do a plus or minus three.” And I’m like, “Yeah, but this season in particular, I I think if they let the chaos come in, it will eat this team and they’ll they’ll drop to 35 wins or 38 wins.” And I said, “But if not, I I think they can actually win 50.” And sure enough, they traded Demarcus Cousins that season. Rudy Gay popped his Achilles. They traded Omry Caspi. They Yeah. The chaos got him. Yeah. The chaos came to Sacramento. And And that’s the problem. Like how do you avoid the chaos and how do you keep the chaos out? And and I wonder like how much will this change like the Kings were able to land Demar De Rozan as a free agent. Again, one of the most accomplished free agent signings the Kings have ever had, right? Um even in the fact is he was 35 and they had to do a sign and trade to get him. it still was a free agent acquisition. I wonder if this is going to impact the way that some of the like older players might look at the Kings and be like they’re still not a team I would consider. Well, you look at it because they were talking about in the pot as well like there was pieces there like there was something you could believe in and right now do they have something you can believe in? It’s going to be tough. Yeah. Yeah. They got a lot of work to do for to convince anyone that to believe in this team moving forward for for this season. And like like Doug’s got a lot of work to do as a coach, but also Scott Scott Perry has to he’s got to go out there and try to find his Shay or his Tyres Hallebertton or his Jaylen Brunson or his Good luck, Scott. Or his uh Anthony Edwards. Yeah. Uh well, we’ll discuss that more when we come back. Uh we’re the insiders here on ESPN 132098.5HD2. Uh, you can find us on youtube.comespn1320. Uh, Twitch, we’re on the Twitter box, all of that stuff. Uh, brought to you by Jeffy Loop. We’ll see you in just a minute. The A’s acquired Shawn Nukem from the Red Sox. From the Red Sox yesterday. Yeah. Or two days ago. Yeah. Nukem just at laid up a bunch of binnings. He played for the A’s before, I think. Really? I don’t remember. I think they saw that. I thought he’s he’s just a 32 bullpin arm that’s going to eat up five innings if you need him. Yeah, but he’s been a starter. He’s got Well, you might be right. This year he’s he started Yeah, he didn’t he didn’t he didn’t um earn it. Not earn, but he didn’t make a spot in the rotation spring training. Yeah. 395 RA. He’s given up uh this season. Wow. 55 hits and 17 walks, struck out 41 in 41 innings. What’s up, Germs? What’s up, Germs? Hey, if you guys are in the uh YouTube, make sure you guys hit the thumbs up. We appreciate that. And I’m still waiting for James to replicate the thumbs up emo. Do you the other day, remember you did the thumbs up and it did the emoji on the screen? Oh, that’s that’s only on the Apple or the Mac though, right? Oh, were you at home? I was at home when I did it. Okay, gotcha. So yeah, you can go like this on the and at at at home um there’s a setting in your that you have to turn on like allow emojis. That’s not what I wanted to click on. Mark, I don’t disagree, but that’s not the path they’re taking. They’re not going to do it. Yeah. And like I’m generally optimistic. Yeah. Joe’s a pretty happy Yeah. Oh man. And I’m not feeling too It’s It’s even I’m gonna need some convincing which is worrying. But there was someone uh you know Sean Nukem did pitch for the A’s in 2023. That wasn’t even that long ago. He pitched seven games. Uh interesting. Um yeah, someone mentioned earlier too uh like of like the Kings have to find a star, right? And I I don’t know how they do that. Um, and that’s where I disagree with a lot of people here like, hey, don’t just go throw a bunch of assets at something because if you find the right star, you might be able to build around that star like quickly. Like it doesn’t have to be like a long drawn out thing. And so I’m intrigued because uh somebody brought up like Tyrese Maxi and I don’t think Philadelphia is going to let go of Tyrese Maxi, but I do think that there is a world in which you can give them an offer they can’t refuse. And I don’t like dealing with Daryl Daryl Mo. Um, but I didn’t like Monty McNair dealing with Daryl Mo because they were close and I felt like Daryl Mo always just mess with money.
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