Jonathan Kuminga, Keon Ellis, RJ Barrett and the Latest Sacramento Kings Rumors | Locked On Kings

Jonathan Kuminga, Keon Ellis, RJ Barrett and the Latest Sacramento Kings Rumors | Locked On Kings

Jonathan Kaminga had a meeting with the Sacramento Kings that I’m told went really well. Plus, RJ Barrett, a name to monitor because of his history with Kings general manager Scott Perry. And for the love of God, can we stop talking about Keon Ellis as part of a Jonathan Kaminga trade? It ain’t happening. And you’re listening to Locked on Kings. You are Locked on Kings, your daily Sacramento Kings podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. And now, ladies and gentlemen, it is that time. Time for another episode of Locked On. Hello and welcome into Locked on Kings, your podcast hub for Sacramento Kings coverage all offseason long. Today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. My name is Matt George. I have the privilege of being your host here. I’m a Sacramento sports anchor and reporter for ABC 10 News. And I’d tell you, I’ve got the latest on the Jonathan Kaminga situation, but in reality, it’s a lot of the same. The most new information that we have is that the Sacramento Kings and Jonathan Kaminga met recently and I have been told that the meeting went really well. Now, that doesn’t mean anything beyond there’s of course mutual interest on both sides. Jonathan Kaminga would be open to signing with the Sacramento Kings and playing for the Sacramento Kings. I’m sure he looks at the Kings as more of an opportunity to get a predominant role uh compared to what he’s getting with the Golden State Warriors. And of course, the Sacramento Kings have interest in Kaminga. The opportunity that acquiring Kaminga uh presents and acquiring a piece that fits more of a long-term timeline instead of the the short-term veteran roster that they have right now. All of this is great. A lot of it we’ve already known and I’m happy to hear that at least the conversations between those two parties are going well, but the conversations between the Sacramento Kings and Golden State Warriors in a sign and trade situation have not changed. If they have, it’s only slightly. We are in a stalemate. That’s what it is. just a stalemate between these two teams. Earlier in the week, Shams uh from ESPN shared that there are two concrete offers actually on the table for Kaminga. Sure, there have been discussions that have had been had with other teams around the league and and whatever, but there are only two actual concrete offers on the table for Kaminga. One of them is an offer from the Phoenix Suns. I don’t know the specifics of that deal, but it’s it’s not great. The Warriors are not interested in it. And the other offer is from the Sacramento Kings, and it’s basically the exact same offer that I shared with you a month ago, Devin Carter, Dario Sarich, and where things have slightly changed in any sort of way is initially it was second round draft pick compensation. Now, we’re talking about a potentially protected firstrounder. And I’m not talking top 10 protected. I’m talking talking a pick, a firstrounder with some pretty heavy protections that in my mind more likely than not would end up just conveying into a future second or future seconds down the road. And of course, the Golden State Warriors are not interested in that package. Let me reiterate this because I’ve said this a number of times here on Locked on Kings since the moment I heard that Sarich Carter offer in the first place. I don’t blame the Warriors for not being excited by that deal. I don’t blame them. I don’t blame their fan base at all. What I do blame the Warriors for is this preposterous idea that they feel that they could get Keon Ellis or Keegan Murray in a deal. Of course, they want either of those guys. I want a Lamborghini. Doesn’t mean it realistically I’m ever going to get one. Why would the Sacramento Kings or any team for that matter give up more value for a player than what the Warriors themselves actually value that player? Keon Ellis is more valuable and important to the Sacramento Kings than Jonathan Kaminga is to the Golden State Warriors. Keegan Murray is way more valuable to the Sacramento Kings than what Jonathan Kaminga is to the Golden State Warriors. Now, that doesn’t mean that both of those players are better than Kaminga. That doesn’t mean that both of those players have higher ceilings than Kaminga. Jonathan Kaminga’s got all the upside in the world. But everybody in the league, everybody that calls themselves, even a casual basketball fan, knows how the Golden State Warriors feel about Jonathan Kaminga. They have not hidden it. They’ve made it very obvious based off of how they have handled his situation and his playing time. Everybody knows that Steve Kerr is not a believer in Jonathan Kaminga. Everybody knows that Jonathan Kaminga doesn’t want to be there. Everybody knows that the Warriors don’t want to pay Jonathan Kaminga. So why in the world would any team give up a piece that they value for more or or that’s that’s more than what the the Warriors value Kaminga. It doesn’t make any sense. Again, that doesn’t mean that the Warriors just have to suck it up and just take the king’s offer and and just accept your losses. No, they don’t have to do that. They can do the qualifying offer if Kaminga agrees to it. they can sign him and figure it out down the road. And more than likely, that’s what I think is going to end up happening. But that does not bother the Sacramento Kings. It doesn’t. Think about flip the script. Okay? Flip perspectives. Let’s say the Sacramento Kings and Keegan Murray are not on the same page. It has not worked. Keegan Murray’s contract is coming up or Keegan Murray is is an unrestricted or excuse me a restricted free agent, but the Sacramento Kings don’t believe in Keegan. They’re barely play paying him or playing him anymore. The coaching staff does not really believe that he’s a fit for the Kings in their window and what they’re trying to do right now. and they don’t want to pay him the money that that he thinks he’s worth or a rough estimate of the or the range that we think he’s going to cost because of the Kings cap situation or whatever. The Kings are basically out on Keegan Murray, but they’re calling the Golden State Warriors up and going, “Okay, give us Jonathan Kaminga in that deal.” And we’re assuming that the Warriors in this scenario, again, flip script, Jonathan Kaminga is a piece in Golden State, or give us uh PDM Padmky, right? Warriors fans, think about that. How would you react to that? You would laugh. You would laugh. And it’s fitting that you would laugh because this Keon Ellis conversation keeps coming up. It keeps happening. It’s happening in Sacramento a ton today on Sacramento radio. ESPN 1320, Kenny Carowway on DLO and Casey talking with Jesse Topia and Leezy. Love those guys. and they they are in every they’re 100% in their right to talk about this and I know what they’re doing because I understand it. I’m also trying to get through this off seasonason too. I’m trying to get through the next two months where there’s nothing going on in the NBA until training camp starts. Preseason is over two months away, right? We are in a dead period for the NBA and this is one of the few things that we can latch on and talk about. But that’s all this is. This is talk. It’s not real because I have reached out multiple times at different times about the possibility of Keon being included in a Jonathan Kaminga trade. I have been laughed at every single time I’ve gotten the same response. LOL, not happening. That’s what I’m getting, right? Like, and it makes sense why. I understand the conversation that Kenny’s having and other people are having. Matt, if you have a chance to get Jonathan Kaminga, isn’t it? Don’t you have to consider moving on from a role player in Keon Ellis to go out and take that chance on Kaminga? I understand that conversation completely from Kings fans or from anybody that’s that’s looking at Kaminga as an asset and an opportunity that the Kings might not have again. And maybe because those opportunities are few and far between in Sacramento, giving up Keon is worth it. But that’s what this is. Ke um acquiring Jonathan Kaminga is an opportunity. It’s a project. It’s not a necessity in the eyes of the Sacramento Kings. the Kings can move on without acquiring Jonathan Kaminga with confidence that something else will open itself up down the road. Or maybe the door to a Kaminga signing or Kaminga trade can reopen at the trade deadline or next off season if he he’s an unrestricted free agent after signing the qualifying offer, whatever. They can kick the can down the road a little bit. They don’t have to do it right now. Yes, the Kings would like to have Jonathan Kaminga. I think Kaminga is a good project at a right time for this organization. But understand this, and this is what I keep coming back to in this conversation. Why would the Sacramento Kings bow to the Warriors or give the Warriors a get out of jail free card for a situation that they created? The Warriors hold the cards in terms of they get to decide what happens with Kaminga for sure. Sign and trade. They get the final say on that. Issuing him an offer or signing like as a restricted free agent, like they have the final say on that 100%. They hold the cards in that sense, but they are in the worst spot out of any team in these conversations, in these negotiations. The Kings would like to have Jonathan Kaminga, but they’re not forced to deal with him right now. The Golden State Warriors are. If you were to give up a player of the caliber of Keon Ellis, a player that you know your organization values and a lot 29 other organ organizations around the league values, if you were like if you give that up and and and give the Warriors that out when they’re the ones in the messy situation, it’s foolish. It’s dumb. Scott Perry does not have to do it. So, he’s not going to. He’s not. I’m again I I feel so confident it is not going to happen. And everything I’ve been told has been it’s not going to happen. And if Warrior fans responses, and I get these responses, I get them on social media all the time. Okay, then the Kings aren’t getting Kaminga. Cool. Okay, then the Kings aren’t getting Kaminga right now. Oh, darn. Jonathan Kaminga is not the difference between the Sacramento Kings winning a championship or being the mid team that they’re going to be next season. And clearly the Golden State Warriors don’t feel that Jonathan Kaminga is the right player to help maximize their title window for Steph Curry before he rides off to the sunset into the sunset and his career comes to an end. So cool. If it if if if that package for Kaminga is not enough to get a deal done and the Warriors say no to it, fine. All right. The Kings will move on and the Warriors will have the same problem. That’s the position that we are in and we’ve been in for the last month. Like I said at the top of the show, today’s episode of the Lockdown Kings podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Summer sports are in full swing. And whether you’re all about baseball under the lights, golf on the green, or high stakes soccer action, FanDuel is the best way to make every game even more exciting. You’re already following the action this summer. Heck, we’re using it to kill some time right now, right? But why not make it a little more thrilling? With FanDuel, you can get in on the game while your friends are getting sunburned at the beach. Use FanDuel to track your favorite teams, your favorite matchups, and the app will keep things fresh, new, and fun all summer long with different ways and new ways to bet. It’s easy to use. Payouts are extremely fast when you win and makes every regular season game feel like a mustwatch event. Whether you’re placing the same game parlay or watching a bet right into the ninth inning, FanDuel makes it feel like you are part of the action. If you’re new to FanDuel, new customers can bet just $5 and get $150 in bonus bets if your first bet wins. Open the FanDuel app today or visit fanuel.com to get started. Let’s talk a little bit about RJ Barrett. Now, I want to make this perfectly clear so nobody takes this out of context or takes this and runs with it. I am not saying that the Sacramento Kings are close to acquiring RJ Barrett, that they’re in aggressive talks with the Toronto Raptors about an RJ Barrett trade. What I’m telling you is that RJ Barrett is a name that the Sacramento Kings are monitoring and a name that we should monitor as well. And there’s a very specific reason why the Kings are keeping an eye on RJ and his potential availability in Toronto. It’s because Scott Perry drafted RJ Barrett with the third overall pick in 2019 when he was the general manager of the New York Knicks. RJ Barrett was his guy and from what I’ve been told, he and RJ Barrett have a great relationship and Perry is a big believer in RJ as a player. Now, has RJ Barrett lived up to the hype coming into the league as the third overall pick? No, probably not. And I don’t think RJ Barrett has turned into the player that Perry initially hoped he would be when he drafted him with the third overall pick in 2019. But there still is a belief in R.J. and it makes perfect sense for the Sacramento Kings and Scott Perry to be keeping an eye on R.J.’s availability and if he could potentially come to Sacramento. And I believe the Kings would like to use this wouldn’t it doesn’t work financially straight up because R.J. is making $27 million next season and I think $29 million the season after. But the Kings would love to or or would be open to potentially using like Malik Monk in a deal to go out and acquire RJ. I would not call this likely at all this off season, right? This is something the Kings are monitoring, something to monitor, to track, to follow, to know that there’s interest from the Kings and a connection with Scott Perry, but nothing more than that at this time. Would the Kings like to acquire RJ right now if they could? Sure. There’s no realistic path to to doing that. I don’t feel I don’t think a RJ Barrett for Demar De Rozan trade is on the table. Again, all indications to me are that the Kings and Demar De Rozan are going to continue their partnership going forward and that Scott Perry is a fan of Demar De Rozan and wants Demar De Rozan here. Zack Lavine’s contract don’t think it’s being moved. Demanis Sabonis’ contract don’t think it can be moved. And the other small money or smaller money contracts the Kings have tried to move or are struggling to move and have struggled to move over the course of this offseason and they’re not enough to go out and acquire a player like RJ Barrett. So, I’m not expecting anything on the RJ Barrett sweep stakes to happen. And maybe another team comes and swoops in and takes RJ. This is something to like keep an eye on and revisit during the season and maybe monitor when the trade deadline gets closer, right? Is R.J. does his his is his does his price go down because things aren’t working uh in Toronto or at that time are the Kings more willing to move on from Demar D Rozan or or whatever the case may be. But RJ Barrett is a name to keep an eye on and that the Sacramento Kings, I’ve been told, are keeping an eye on and monitoring. And I’m curious what you think about R. We’ve had conversations about R.J. earlier this off season about a potential target. Again, I don’t think it’s anything that’s happening necessarily this summer, but I think anytime there’s going to be rumors and news of conversations around RJ Barrett’s availability going forward, the Sacramento Kings to some extent will be involved. Not necessarily as front runners or anything like that or a team that’s hungry and desperate to go and get him, but the Kings will be involved in those conversations. And I I think that’s going to be interesting to uh monitor. Another thing I wanted to talk about wanted to talk about Devin Carter really quick. From what I understand, the Kings are still clearly as part of the Jonathan Kaminga trade, too. The Kings are still very much making Devin Carter available. I’m not saying the Kings are desperate to move him or anything like that, but Devin Carter’s performance in summer league hasn’t doesn’t seem to have changed any of that or impacted any of that at all. While he’s a member of the Sacramento Kings, he’s maybe going to get opportunity. The Kings do see some of the value of what he brings to the table. Scott Perry knows that he is able to handle certain responsibilities on the defensive end. I don’t believe Scott Perry and and many in Sacramento feel that Devin Carter is a good option at that backup point guard spot. I don’t know if they feel that anybody on this roster right now is a good option at the backup point guard spot. Maybe Nate Clifford could become that, but I don’t know if they feel like he’d be able to do that from day one. I still think Devin Carter will be on this Kings roster come the start of training camp and the start of next season. But I I have pretty strong feelings and gotten pretty strong indications that the Kings are still very much making Devin Carter available and looking to um to move him in the right deal this off season or early next season or whenever uh that time may be. Before we wrap up, I wanted to talk about something that Scott Perry talked about on Sacktown Sports 1140 radio. He was on earlier this week with Carmichael Dave on the Carmichael Dave show which you can catch in the mornings on on Sackown Sports uh with Jason Ross. Jason Ross co-hosts that show. Uh Perry was talking about Keegan Murray and he told Dave, quote, “In an ideal world, I’d like to be able to get Keegan more opportunities playing the small forward.” Makes perfect sense to me. I think a lot of people in Sacramento, including many of you in my comment section, have been calling for that same thing. We think Keegan’s more of a three, not a four. We want to see how Keegan can get to that three spot. I don’t see any realistic scenario of that happening anytime soon. Like certainly with the way the roster is constructed now, I don’t know how you could possibly get Keegan to the three unless Maxim Reno is like ahead of schedule and you could play Maxim at the four and Sabonis at the five or vice versa. Like that’s the only realistic pathway that I see to Keegan Murray getting time at that three spot. And even then, if you’re playing Keegan at the three, one of Zack Lavine or Demard Rosen can’t be in the game unless one of the two of them is running the point, which sounds like a disaster. I like I know in an ideal world, the Kings would like to get Keegan some opportunity at that three spot, it’s going to be few and far between and anytime it happens, it’s really not going to make sense. And even if the Kings were to go out and acquire Jonathan Kaminga, is Kaminga moving potentially to the four so Keegan can play three? No. I I would say Kaminga is probably the three and Keegan’s the four next to him. So I understand the appeal or the desire to have enough size and length in Sacramento to be able to play Keegan Murray realistically and regularly at the three. It just ain’t here. We’re we are a long way off from anything like that happening. It’s good that that’s a goal of Paris, but I imagine that’s a goal to accomplish after Keegan Murray is resigned, not before. Keith Smith uh wrote an article recently talking about and he talked to a Kings executive about um both Keon Ellis’s contract situation and Keegan Murray’s contract situation and both were pretty optimistic talking about like the the the Kings want to get deals done with both of them. Feel pretty good about getting deals done with both of them. I feel like deals are going to get done on both those ends. Like going back to the Kaminga and and Keon Ellis conversation from the first segment. Like that’s the only realistic way that makes sense to me at all that the Kings would ever consider using Keon Ellis in a Jonathan Kaminga deal is if because they picked up his option for $2.5 million or whatever it is that Keon is so upset and his camp is so upset by the the money that was left on the table for not getting him a new deal this summer that the bridge is burned and he’s refusing to resign with the Kings going forward and he’s going to leave in uh unrestricted free agency next summer. If the Kings felt that way, then maybe they’d be willing to include Keon in in a Jonathan Kaminga trade. Again, I’ve been given no indication that that’s the case. I’ve been told, in fact, that they’re everybody’s on in good spirits or they’re on the same page. Well, maybe not the same page. That’s me adding my own commentary. I’ve I’ve been told that there’s no like animosity. People Everybody’s on good terms. That’s what I’ve been told. Like, as of right now, it’s fine. I have there’s no doubt in my mind that Keon and his camp are at the very least disappointed, more than likely frustrated that they didn’t get a deal done this summer and they probably didn’t feel like they were the priority this summer. And you know, when I I spoke on it when it happened, I would have just gotten the Keon Ellis deal done and then figured everything else out after that. That’s not what happened. But I don’t think we’re anywhere near that that hypothetical scenario that I just laid out there that Keon is so upset that the Kings are basically worried they’re going to lose him for nothing. So, they include him in a Kaminga trade. That’s that’s not where we’re at. So, and I don’t think we’re anywhere close to Keegan Murray playing the three in Sacramento consistently anytime soon. All right. I want to hear your thoughts on the latest on the Jonathan Kaminga situation. thoughts on RJ Barrett as a potential long-term target to keep an eye out on. Whatever you want to talk about, hit me up. Even Warrior fans listening, feel free to share your two cents and your side, your perspective on things. Matt George Sack on Twitter. You can email me matte [email protected] or leave your thoughts in the YouTube comment section down below. Appreciate your support as always. Can’t wait to have you join me on the next episode of Locked Onings. Until then, my name is Matt George. You’ve been listening to the Locked On podcast, part of the Lock On podcast network.

Matt George shares the latest on the Sacramento Kings’ pursuit of Jonathan Kuminga, how Keon Ellis is NOT involved in conversations, and keeping an eye on RJ Barrett.

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Jonathan Kuminga, RJ Barrett and the Latest Sacramento Kings Rumors
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