What Will The Sacramento Kings Do With Malik Monk?

What Will The Sacramento Kings Do With Malik Monk?

Lord my God. That’s Jam. I’m Kyle Madson. Joe Brazil with us on the insiders sponsored by Jiffy Loop. We’re hanging out with you till noon. Then we’ll hand it off to DLo and KC and they will continue to try and make sense of the Kings off season so far. They wind up not trading Malik Monk. And that’s kind of where I want to start right now is the Malik Monk’s name has come up in in multiple kind of trade rumors leading up to the off season.
Mhm. And it makes me wonder if the Kings are shopping him or if teams just want him. Maybe Detroit said, “Yeah, hey, this is a guy we need and we think he fits with Kade Cunningham, Jaden Ivy, and all that.” Or are the Kings going, “Hey, we have a glut of players at this position. We’re looking for hard-nosed defenders who are going to do the do the little stuff on the margins, and Malik is too inconsistent offensively. He doesn’t play enough defense, and we just don’t. We’re just eh like I think that’s I think that’s one of the other things that that sticks out to me here is okay so Malik Monk has been involved in all these trade rumors.
Mhm.
His place where where I believed Malik Monk was was he’s a perfect six-man. He is the emotional fulcrum of the Kings. He is what what their roster what on their roster passes for this vocal leader. Uh they he is their most important player. That’s the that’s the train I’ve been on.
Mhm. But it it it at least appears that that’s not the case anymore because I just I can’t believe that that was the case. They’d be willing to trade him for Dennis Shruder which again that didn’t wind up happening. It doesn’t sound like. Yeah. But that was very much like what was banded about last night was it was going to be the sign and trade and it was gonna be Malik Monk for Dennis Rder. And if that’s the case, I don’t know how you move forward with him on your roster.
Okay. So, you said something there that really stuck out. He was he’s the emotional fulcrum.
Mhm. And I think sometimes when you’re uh when you you switch management and they bring in a whole new group of people Mhm. you want to change the emotional fulcrum of a team. Like I I think that that’s possible. That that’s where we’re at with this. Like Scott Perry walked in the building and from what I know, he interviewed like every single person in the building. Like no stone unturned. He wanted to get a feel for what was happening in Sacramento from top to bottom. We’re talking about ball boys. We’re talking about locker room attendants and and you know trainers and he sat down with everybody and got a lay of the land. sometimes a lay of the land things get come out that that maybe make you uncomfortable as a GM or maybe things come out that
like look it it’s not like I think when you look at Malik Monk he is a lightning rod for for energy and everything else but that doesn’t mean that it’s always positive like you know there there are certainly times where you know Mike Brown and and Malik Monk went toeto toe because Malik Monk thought practices were too long.
Mhm. There are times where, you know, Mike Brown lost his job and there are players within the walls of that franchise that had gone to management and asked for Mike to not be there anymore
during the summer before. It’s very possible Malik Monk was one of those guys. Like there are enough things that happened here where, you know, Malik has been pushing and pushing and pushing to be the starter.
Mhm.
Then was a starter and it didn’t go well.
Mhm. and the team struggled and the team fell apart and and then you look and like okay well how do you go back and we kept saying well you can’t really go back once you press that button
well they have to go back like if if this team is going to survive
shout out to lost
he’s got to he’s got to be somebody who goes back to a position that he was at before that realistically isn’t what he wanted to do so yeah I get it he loves Sacramento I get he’s been embraced by the fan base but Like there there are certain points where you got to wonder like how much blood is on people’s hands behind the scenes and and which players have some of that blood on their hands and sometimes it’s just that it’s just like hey we need to switch things up. You know you talk about again an emotional
fulcrum.
Maybe Scott Perry doesn’t want an emotional fulcrum tied up into either one person or this specific person. Mhm.
Maybe the interview didn’t go well when he sat down with Malik Monk and he walked away from that going,
“Okay, uh maybe I need to make a different move.” And so, like, look, I I think that as from the outside, everybody sees the player, everybody sees what they want to see in a player. They they see the excitement, they see all this stuff, but they ignore the 32% from three.
They ignore the bad turnovers. They ignore the blown defensive assignments because that’s not who they want to see. Mhm.
They want to see this guy that they love, that they adore as like this electric guy who, you know, is just like super funny and and all of these things. But sometimes that’s not what a new management group wants. They look at a player and they go, “Okay, I I get it,
but I don’t want that.” And so I’m not saying that’s 100% the case here with Malik, but there’s enough smoke here that that you know the kings are going to get better that he might be the piece that they use to get better.
And I guess I guess that’s everything you just laid out is the is the basis of my concern here. What if they can’t trade him? And now you have this guy who has been we’ll we’ll continue using the phrase emotional fulcrum who has been that who’s now in the locker room and it was clear there’s some kind of um I don’t even know what to call it. I don’t want to say friction but it’s clear that that whatever Malik Monk does on the court or off the court I I have no idea. there’s something there where the king said, “We’re going to move on from this guy.” And and if they’re not, you you you have him in your locker room still. And I don’t know how you navigate that because he’s not just going to go sit in the corner and go about his day and do his thing. He’s just not wired that way. So, I think they’ve now presented another issue here where I saw last night, I saw the same thing you did on social media like, “Oh my god, how do you trade Malik?” It’s like now I think you have to I don’t think you can recover from this where you go, okay, hey Malik, I know we tried to trade you, but hey, you’re going to come back in here and you’re going to do this thing and you’re going to be like if you’ve decided he’s not part of your program. I don’t I don’t think you can go into this year with him in your program. I think you can. Um, but I think this is where coaching comes in. This is where Doug Christie and and his group have to like embrace, you know, if Malik is still on the roster when we get to the, you know, start of the season. And like, look, just going to throw this out there. This this has a feeling to me a little bit of
um actually the Kings did this so many times it’s so stupid. Um, they had uh they had Isaiah Thomas and then um they brought in Darren Collison and instead of letting them compete, they gave away Isaiah Thomas for nothing.
Mhm.
They should have just let them compete. Best man wins.
Right. Then they they have Darren Collison. Um but they bring in Rondo and you know instead of letting them compete they just they give the job to Rondo and then eventually Darren Collison’s gone.
And then they just kept kept doing this where like hey if if you open up training camp and Dennis Rutder and Malik Monk are your two point guards. Mhm.
Let them compete. let them compete for the starting job because to be honest with you, they are like the Spider-Man meme. They’re just like four years, five years apart, right? They are they they’re very similar players. They bring very similar energy and everything else. Either one of them can start or come off the bench. Go ahead and like let them fight it out for who’s going to be the starting point guard. I don’t think that will happen.
Um but like why not? because you can’t I mean again if they’re both on the roster I know it sounds really strange Malik Monk will make more money this year than Dennis Shruder
right
like let the best man win if that’s what you’re going to do so I’m okay with it I I I’m also like I understand full well that that you know Malik Muk could be attached to a different trade especially the Kings have been chasing Russell Westbrook and wanted both like there’s a possibility that there was another trade out there uh because this Detroit thing kind of materialized late. It sounded like
it was weird. Yeah.
Uh it was weird, but they also the Malik Beasley thing happened on Sunday right before the start of free agency where he all of a sudden is being federally in uh investigated for for you know potentially fixing games.
So we have that situation happening and then all of a sudden so the bottom falls out for them. They were able to sign Caris Levert which might take up some of that. Um, but also I wouldn’t, you know, Detroit liked Malik Monk before
and that’s why all of a sudden I think everyone thought that this might be a sign and trade.
Um,
you know, like because it kind of made sense
uh for the Kings to clear out a guy uh who maybe didn’t make sense for them anymore and bring in a guy like this.
Either way, like look, the Kings have a lot of work to do. Scott Perry’s got a lot of work to do and it’s not just in adding players and and and all that stuff. like there’s a cultural shift that they’re trying to accomp, you know, trying to accomplish right now.
And as of right now, they they don’t have that cultural shift. Most of the players on the roster are the same exact players that were here the year before. You know, Dennis Rutder’s here uh at at this point, but you know, I’m not going to like Markel Folultz and you know, uh Jay Crowder and and Doug McDermott, those aren’t like foundational pieces, right,
that are all gone. you know, maybe the closest thing you did have to a foundational piece out of all of those guys is Trey L. And we don’t know what’s going to happen with him, but at the same time, like look, there is a a shift that’s happening. And to be honest, it had to happen. You went from 48 wins to 46 to 40.
Mhm.
And we can start pointing and placing blame on why that happened.
And I I think it really is easy to do that,
but also like a lot of these players were the same players and they didn’t perform at the same level.
Yeah. No doubt. and they let they let the fans down as much as anyone else does. Like there’s no excuse for for being a sub 500 team at home or being right around 500 on the season at home. Not when you have a fan base like this. Not when every single player talks about how amazing the fan base is and how, you know, they’ve played in other cities and there’s nowhere near as many fans and they’re not nearly as rowdy and all that stuff. Okay. Well, then play better. Play better at home. Sure. Represent better. Mhm.
Stop embarrassing your own fan base.
You know, I remember Tai uh Hallebertton, they asked him very specifically like somebody asked him if this was like the most disappointing um game in his career because I think the Kings had just lost to Atlanta like by 30 or something.
He goes, “No, last year we lost by like 45 or something at home.” He’s like, “That was the lowest the low.” You shouldn’t have to have a list of games at home where you were embarrassed so bad that you can actually start to put them in a one through 10 category.
Yeah, you shouldn’t have a ranking of the worst games. So, yeah, tough stuff.
You mentioned in there Russell Westbrook whose name was out there a lot connected to the Kings last night. There was Malcolm Brogden who was initially reported by I think it was Jake Fischer and Mark Stein on Mark Stein Substack that the Kings were interested in him. I guess I if you’re going to bring in one of those guys, uh I I I I the money for me matters less right now than uh the roster construction. So you’re bringing in two point guards at that point. If you still have Malik Monk, is he just your sixman and playing off the ball all the time? Is he still playing on the ball a little bit? Uh, you still have Devin Carter, you still have Zack Lavine who’s going to have the ball in his hands a lot. I I I struggle to outside of like the vibes of Russell Westbrook, right?
Or Malcolm Brogden can shoot it a little bit. he hasn’t been able to stay to stay super healthy in his career, but um I don’t I don’t see the logic. Like you said, the the direction is changing and I don’t see it. I see them spinning their tires.
Yeah. Well, no, I I mean, for me, like look, I I still think, you know, I I see people putting up the the current back court like the log jam. Like Malik Monk is fine playing point guard off the bench. like it’s what he’s done. It’s what he’s been extremely successful. He’s the main ball handler.
And let’s be honest, the Kings got to a point where they didn’t have enough playmaking
and you know, especially when when uh Malik and Kevin Herder got hurt right before the playoffs, right before the play year uh a year ago.
Um like they just had this huge issue with no playmaking. Like you added another playmaker, the Kings had to at least do add one playmaker. If you add a second, then somebody’s got to go. Like you you can’t bring in at this point. You can’t bring in a Westbrook or a Brogden unless you are moving off of Malik Monk. That’s the only thing that makes sense.
That’s what I’m that’s what I’m kind of getting at.
Yeah. Yeah. That’s the only way.
I’m so interested in those guys. It has to be because you have something lined up for Monk.
Yeah. That just is that has to be the case. Yep.
Or else none of it. We talk the Kings roster would not make sense just in a different way now.
Mhm. while still being not making sense in the same way it did, but now we’re adding a new element.
Exactly. Yeah. Hey, man.
Making my head hurt, bro. Like, uh, switching your entire uh, like what you’re trying to build like in one off season isn’t simple.
Yeah.
So, I don’t know. We’ll see.
What else is out there? What else can they do? We’ll get to that next. We’re going to try and end this end this thing on a high note. That’s James H. I’m Kyle Madson.

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