3 Reasons Why Sacramento Will Run The West Next Season

3 Reasons Why Sacramento Will Run The West Next Season

the first reason why the Sacramento Kings could very well be a top five team in the Western Conference next season is because of the fit of Demar D rozan in the ongoing arms race in the Western Conference the Kings have slipped behind the curve from making the postseason in 2023 and if it wasn’t for a 50o masterclass from Stephan Curry they probably would have won that series to now missing the Playoffs completely along with the Improvement of the other Western Conference contenders the Kings had to make a move to stay relevant and they have made that move acquiring Demar de R rozan in a and trade with the Chicago Bulls only having to give up Harrison Barnes Chris DTE and two second round picks with Fox and sabona scoring in the paint and outside Shooters like Keegan Murray and Kevin hder the kings were missing that on ball mid-range threat Demar D rozan will be that guy for the Kings D rozan is incredibly skilled in the mid-range making over 43% last season however with the Bull’s lack of FL spacing these numbers are low for dear as last time he had sufficient Flor spacing in 2022 he made 46% of his shots in the mid-range in the 2022 season the balls were great as before the Lonzo ball injury they were actually the one seed in the Eastern Conference and d r roen was a huge factor in their success putting up 275 and five on an efficient 50% shooting last season when the Kings lost Monk and herder their offense became a lot slower and as a result worse Fox sabonis and Murray weren’t able to generate the consistent offense once their possession slowed down forcing dearon Fox to take tougher shots and once Malik monk was injured there wasn’t a real secondary scorer on the floor sabonis as we’ll get into more deeply later is a great playmaker for his position but isn’t able to generate consistent offense for himself Keegan Murray is very limited at this stage of his career either getting shots by attacking the clothes out or H didn’t catch and shoot triples this is where DeMar rosen will make the biggest difference for the Sacramento Kings with his well-known ability to generate offense out of isolation and in the mid-range he’ll be able to keep the scoreboard moving even when the game slow down with a smaller matchup D rozan will often post them up using his size and strength to get to a fallway jumper or right to the cup when he’s playing against a bigger matchup he’ll face them up creating enough separation with his handles to either get a step back a driving lane or a fade away on just how good of a fit dear is in Sacramento it’s admittedly not a perfect fit but it’s not horrible either D rozan is super durable actually leading the NBA in total minutes played last season and while playing all these extra minutes he also averaged a career low and turnovers per game as for his perceived poor three-point shooting dear shot 33% on three attempts per game in 2024 showing that he is willing to shoot it this paired with his ability to generate offense all by himself will take some much needed pressure off of guys like monk Fox and sabonis to deliver offense every single time down the floor here with a big switch da he faces up and knocks it down then when he’s matched up against an ideal opponent with a wing he first tries the jab step and once that doesn’t work he gets right back to the post up using a step through to create enough separation to bank at home demato Rosen has a seemingly endless bag of tricks when it comes to scoring in the mid-range as he genuinely might be the greatest mid-range scorer of NBA history here with Desmond Bane playing good defense it simply doesn’t matter he’s also one of the game’s greatest tough shot makers as here NZ Reed doesn’t fall for the fake but dear will take the shot anyway he unbelievable shot making will be perfect for the Kings once the game slow down come April and May here he takes Barrett to school with a bump and some perfect footwork drawing the foul and won here with Harrison barns draped all over him he still knocks it down I can’t even begin to explain to you just how important this will be for the king’s offense next season but it’s not just his skill that makes the mar so effective but it’s the clutch shooting also teaming up with dearon Fox the Kings arguably have the two most clutch players in basketball right now considering his age dearon Fox is not afraid of taking big time shots as here with seconds left in a tired game he dribbles to midcourt and sends the magic home then against the Mars balls he pulls up over two Defenders and knocks it down even if he doesn’t get the ball he can still make a clutch play here parachuting in for a putback slam now with the addition of D rozan there’ll be two guys to go to in the clutch for the Sacramento Kings here in an overtime game against the Clippers Demar blows right by Nicholas Paton for the slam and then here down one against Atlanta he spins through two Defenders to draw the foul and one and when we talk about clutch demard R roen plays you can’t look past his back-to-back game winners here on December 31st he pulled off on a one-legged triple against the Pacers and nailed it then only a day later on January 1st first he loses kissper and makes this shot over Bradley Beal down the stretch of games is where this king’s team will feel the most comfortable with two big time performers the second reason why the Kings will be much better next season is because of their coaching adjustments back in the 2022 season under Luke Walton the Kings didn’t have a clear offensive Vision but once they fired head coach Luke Walton and brought in Mike Brown along with trading for damont sabonis and playing a pace and space offense things turned around quickly for Sacramento when the Kings hired Mike Brown they went from the 25th worst offense in the league under Luke Walton in 2022 to the number one offense The Following season they took parts of the Golden State motion some of mik anon’s 7 seconds or less Suns and a lot of what the Nuggets do with jic to create a pace and space system that led them to the best offense in the league and the third seed in the western conference after only one off season a significant adjustment that Mike Brown had to make to this king’s offense was to give it a clear focal point and that was to put the ball in the hands of damont sabonis even though dearon Fox is clearly the most talented scoring option the Kings have it’s sabonis that often runs the team’s offense like what the Joker does in Denver sabonis will often be the guy with the ball making all the decisions here in transition he fakes the pass back to Monk and instead finds Fox open for three then after a pick and roll Fox again diverts to sabonis who finds the cutting Murray then here sabonis looks more like a point guard than a center as he brings the ball up and then masterfully finds herder cutting to the baskets he also does the classic big man stuff too here setting a screen for monk allowing him to get all the way to the rim for two however in year one Mike Brown was unable to put forward a better defensive effort still ranking 25th worst in the league after a slow start to the 2024 season things would pick up for the Kings in November but once Mon and herder was sidelined with injuries the team was forced to play the defensive minded guys like Keon Ellis and Davon Mitchell after these lineup changes the king’s defense saw an almost unbelievable improvement over the months of March and April the Kings had the fourth best defense in the NBA holding opponents to only 111 points per game down from the near 120 points a game they were giving up beforehand for the first time showing that they aren’t just limited to dominating teams with their offensive prowess with Fox Ellis and Murray all being more than capable Defenders the Kings could have a very solid defense next season now I’m not suggesting that Sacramento will have an elite defense by any means as the back court of Keon Ellis and dearon fox weren’t able to battle with bigger guards or forwards and now without Harris and Barnes that load will likely fold to Murray and D rozan which is where this team might run into some issues however against your typical guards Fox and Ellis are great Defenders and we saw this in the playing game against Golden State where Ellis held Stephen Curry to 22 points on eight of 16 shooting in a 11894 win when you’re just talking about the defensive Improvement you’d think that this team got dramatically better than they were at the start of the season however that was simply not the case as when the Kings rolled out these defensive lineups the offense was prone to being bottled up within these lineups there was a lot less bll handling and spacing making it much harder to create nearly as many advantages as they were beforehand again this is where Demar steps in perfectly potentially giving the Kings The Best of Both Worlds as there’s a pretty good chance that the Kings will have an above average offense and defense in the 2025 season the third reason why the Kings will be much better next season is because of the improvements dearon fox has made to his game over his first five seasons in the league Fox was unable to Be an Effective three-point shooter only making 32% from Deep on 3.5 attempts per game this in turn made his game very one-dimensional as the defense knew that he wanted to get downhill to the basket every time allowing defenses to Sag off of him which made him a bit bold dominant but over the last two seasons and especially in 2024 fox has been much better making 30% of his threes on more than six attempts per game with a lot of these coming off the catch which has given guys like monk herder and Murray more space to operate and an option to kick it back out if the defense collapses but it wasn’t just off the catch that fox was making these threes but also off the dribble here Fox sizes up toan Prince and with a nice hesitation he gets enough room to make this shot his pull-ups look so effortless as here he just strolls into this triple it’s not just the pull-up though as he also has a nice step back here creating the separation to knock it down here against Victor web inyama he has to use a hesitation and a step back to create enough separation and once he does he connects on the triple then against his former teammate buddy heeld he notices is that heeld is playing him far too low giving up a pullup three which he takes however the reason buddy heeld was so far back was because of plays like these here he uses the sabona screen to get deep into the paint then making a tough Fall Away floater plus the foul N1 here Wiggins plays the three and gets beat off the dribble for two this is why the pull-up three is so effective for Fox as Defenders are afraid that he’s going to do something like this completely losing everybody for an easy two here he again beats Wiggins off the dribble which gives him ahead of able to draw the foul and one here Chris P bites on the pump fake allowing Fox to get airborne for this tough finish he doesn’t have jar on Anthony Edwards athleticism but he’s still able to make these incredibly tough finishes here against the best paint defender in the league he fakes ad out of his shoes and then puts it home then again first he beats Atura off the dribble and then he challenges Davis at the rim and is successful there’s not many players in the NBA that can challenge Anthony Davis at the rim and get away with it but Fox is one of those guys with the new additions and the bench pieces that the Kings still have they might present themselves as Challengers to the other Western Conference contenders such as the Nuggets Thunder and wolves but what do you think will this king’s team take another step in the right direction or will the D rozan experiment not go to plan let me know in the comments below

3 Reasons Why Sacramento Will Run The West Next Season

The First Reason why the Kings could be a top 5 team in the west next season is because of the fit of DeMar DeRozan

With the ongoing arms race in the western conference the Kings were slipping behind the curve. From making the post season in 2023 and if it wasn’t for a 50-point masterclass from Stephen Curry they probably win that series to now missing the playoffs completely along with the improvement that other west contenders have made the Kings had to make a move to stay relevant.
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