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Why Scott Perry won't make ‘rash' decision despite Kings' disastrous season originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

The way the Kings have operated over the past two decades has given Scott Perry some clarity on how he plans to handle things as general manager moving forward.

If you need a refresher: The Kings, after 16 long seasons without a playoff appearance, finally broke the streak as the No. 3 seed in the Western Conference just three seasons ago. Since then, they fired coach Mike Brown, traded away franchise point guard De’Aaron Fox and hired a new front office regime to clean up the mess.

If you take a closer look, the Brown firing fell on the lap of Fox, who was blamed for the decision despite being vocally outspoken about his close relationship with the coach. Amid all the outside narratives, no one from the Sacramento leadership held a press conference to clarify the situation or address the decision.

Instead, they let the narratives run and then traded Fox two months later.

“You fire the coach and don’t do an interview?” Fox told ESPN’s Anthony Slater after the trade. “So all the blame was on me. … I felt at the time the organization didn’t have my back.”

Kings owner Vivek Ranadive urged McNair to fire Brown as the coach was driving to the airport for a road trip, a decision that stemmed as “panic was rising internally” among the organization, Slater reported in a column published Wednesday, citing team sources. Ranadive, at the time, was on vacation in Cabo San Lucas.

Sacramento then, in another desperate move, traded Fox to the San Antonio Spurs in a three-team deal that brought Zach LaVine, a player Ranadive has long been enamored by, to the Kings. The move was finalized despite McNair’s apprehension, Slater reported, citing league sources.

McNair was relieved of his duties immediately after the Kings’ play-in loss to the Dallas Mavericks.

From the Beam Team fairytale to back to the dumps of the West, Perry watched from afar, and he was hired to fulfill the challenging role left vacant after McNair’s firing. But he took notes as he observed the three-year rollercoaster. And now, even as the Kings sit with an 8-29 record and remain one of the worst teams in the league, Perry, unlike previous front offices, won’t make decisions out of desperation.

“I use the phrase prudent and opportunistic,” Perry told Slater. “Which I’m going to continue to be. I’m not someone who’s going to do something rash. Nothing rushed or panicked.”

The trade deadline is where things are perceived to change for Sacramento, but as Perry alluded to, he won’t “blow it up” if it doesn’t make sense for the Kings long-term.

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Bench boost: Four players who are turbo-charging Celtics' second unit originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

Considering all the consternation about the Boston Celtics’ depth following their summer roster overhaul, maybe the most surprising aspect of their climb to No. 2 in the Eastern Conference has been how much they’ve been able to lean on their depth pieces. 

The Celtics, winners of four straight and eight of their last nine overall, have routinely leaned on a 10-man rotation in recent weeks, and that’s with early season starter Josh Minott struggling to break free from the land of DNPs. 

The C’s are now 17-3 whenever their bench generates 35+ points this season (and 6-9 when they don’t). What’s more, Boston is 18-2 when the bench makes at least seven 3-pointers (and 5-10 when they don’t). 

Over the last eight games, Boston’s bench production is up to 41.9 points per game, with bench players shooting 48.9 percent from the field and 42.6 percent beyond the 3-point arc. Celtics reserves are averaging 7.9 3-point makes per game over that span.

Boston’s bench players are a combined +80 in that span. The next-closest bench unit is Detroit’s at +44.

Boston’s recent bench boost coincidences with the resurgence of Luka Garza, who overcame his own DNP stretch to reenergize the Celtics’ reserve groups. Offseason addition Anfernee Simons looks more comfortable in his bench role and shoulders the offensive burden, while Garza, Hugo Gonzalez, and Jordan Walsh fly around injecting a little bit of chaos into every possession.

Given Boston’s bench success, here’s one notable way each of the four primary bench players have impacted winning:

Simons says… defense?

Simons’ offensive credentials are well-established. He erupted for 27 points in the second half against the Bulls to ensure the Celtics got to the finish line of a win on a night where Jaylen Brown and Derrick White were struggling with their offensive efficiency. 

But Joe Mazzulla keeps making it a point to highlight Simons’ defensive efforts.

The NBA’s defensive tracking data suggests that opponents are shooting a team-worst 36.7 percent against Simons over the last eight games. He’s holding opponents to a team-best 8.4 percent below expected field goal percentage in that span.

The Celtics have done a good job hiding Simons. The folks at the stat-tracking site BBall Index suggest he ranks 486th out of 506 players this season in matchup difficulty. But Simons also deserves credit for his defensive toughness. He’s fighting through screens, he’s staying attached to cutters, and he’s doing all he can to repair a reputation as an uninterested defender.

Simons limits his fouls — something he’s done throughout his NBA career — and when he stays close to his assignment, he’s making things difficult.

Opponents are shooting 1.7 percent less than expected on all of his contested shots, and 4.5 below expected at the rim. Both marks rank in the 83rd percentile or better for his position.

Hugo and the o-boards

The Celtics are gathering offensive rebounds on a staggering 46 percent of their missed shots while the 19-year-old Gonzalez is on the floor over their last eight games. For context, the Houston Rockets lead the NBA with an offensive rebound percentage of 40.8, while the Celtics slot sixth overall at 33.6 percent. 

Gonzalez and his relentless motor can often be seen streaking from the corner in hopes of extending possessions. Even when he doesn’t corral the miss, the chaos he creates throwing himself into the big-man mosh pit can often create second-chance opportunities for Boston.

Individually, Gonzalez corrals rebounds on 6.6 percent of his team’s missed shots while he’s on the court, which ranks in the 88th percentile among all wings, per Cleaning the Glass data. Gonzalez’s ability to help clean the glass has been vital for a Celtics team that lacks pure size, particularly off the bench.

One more notable number for Gonzalez: The Celtics have a defensive rating of 96.5 during his 165 minutes of floor time over the last eight games. That’s the best mark on the team by nearly 5 points. 

Garza’s bone-crunching screens

Garza’s been a force since rejoining the rotation, averaging 10.4 points and 5.6 rebounds over 21.9 minutes per game over his last eight outings. What’s more, he’s shooting 54.5 percent on 3-pointers in that span.

But his biggest impact is generating quality looks for everyone else on the roster.

Garza leads the NBA with 41 screen assists since December 20. That’s five more than the next-closest player (Sacramento’s Maxime Raynaud, 36). Garza’s 96 screen points generated also tops the NBA in that span, with the next closest player being Minnesota’s Rudy Gobert at 81 screen assist points. 

For the season, Garza is averaging 6.6 screen assists per 36 minutes. That’s the second-best per-36 number in the league, trailing only Dallas’ Dwight Powell (8.2). Garza is content to set screens and either roll like a maniac to the basket, or pop free for an open 3-point look. 

The Celtics are outscoring opponents by a team-best 28.5 points per 100 possessions during Garza’s 175 minutes of floor time over the past eight games.

Baylor taking charge(s)

Like Simons, fans will tend to fixate on Baylor Scheierman’s offensive output (and he’s actually been highly efficient while shooting 42 percent on 3s this season). But he’s quietly emerging as a defensive pest with the way he’s goading opponents into offensive fouls.

Scheierman, despite limited playing time, is second on the team with 11 offensive fouls drawn. Only Derrick White (19) has drawn more this season, and the next-closest is Gonzalez at six.

Scheierman has a knack for taking a charge in a key spot or getting a whistle while getting jostled by a moving screen. He ranks in the 99th percentile for his position while generating 1.6 offensive fouls per 100 possessions.

Kings reportedly ‘checked in' with Warriors on Jonathan Kuminga situation originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

The Kings’ interest in young Warriors wing Jonathan Kuminga hasn’t wavered.

And since Kuminga is back out of Steve Kerr’s rotation, those talks apparently have been rehashed.

Kuminga, who signed a two-year, $46.8 million contract in late September that ended a months-long standoff with the Warriors, is trade eligible beginning Jan. 15.

The Warriors reportedly are “exploring the deadline landscape,” ESPN’s Anthony Slater reported in a column published Wednesday, citing league sources, but are willing to keep Kuminga past the deadline if nothing appealing materializes.

Slater added, citing league sources, that Kings general manager Scott Perry checked in with Warriors GM Mike Dunleavy last week on the situation.

Kuminga, in a stunning turn of events, started the first 12 games for Kerr this season, averaging 14.9 points on 48.1-percent shooting, with 6.8 rebounds and 3.1 assists in 29.1 minutes over that span.

Since then, he has registered several DNPs, including sitting out of 12 of Golden State’s last 13 games.

Over the summer, the two teams engaged in several discussions for a trade involving Kuminga. Perry visited Kuminga during his workout in Miami over the summer when he was a restricted free agent. He, Kings assistant GM B.J. Armstrong and coach Doug Christie also had conversations with Kuminga over the offseason.

“There remains mutual interest,” Slater wrote.

However, Perry is hesitant to offer the same 2030 protected first-round pick that was on the table for Kuminga in the summer, Slater wrote. The Warriors don’t want to take on a multiyear contract they view as “negative value,” Slater reported, citing league sources, which has made veteran Kings guard Malik Monk a “nonstarter” in negotiations.

There are other pathways to getting a deal done, but it isn’t easy.

And both sides have made it clear they won’t make any rash or impulsive decisions to get it done.

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Middling Warriors in similar spot as last year ahead of NBA trade deadline originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

It’s déjà vu all over again for the Warriors less than a month from the Feb. 5 NBA trade deadline. 

A 103-102 loss to a James Harden-less Los Angeles Clippers team Monday night, one month to the date from the deadline, dropped them to 19-18 on the season, giving the Warriors the same record through 37 games in four of the last six seasons. 

The other three seasons are 2020-21 when they finished as the No. 9 seed and missed the playoffs after losing twice in the play-in tournament, 2022-23 when they were the No. 6 seed and beat the Sacramento Kings in seven games before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers in six, and last season when they won their play-in game as the No. 7 seed and lost to the Minnesota Timberwolves in five games without Steph Curry after beating the Houston Rockets in seven. 

The two seasons they weren’t 19-18 were the 2021-22 championship team, in which the Warriors were 29-8 through 37 games, and 2023-24 when they went 17-20. That season ended with a play-in tournament blowout loss to the Kings in Sacramento that also was Klay Thompson’s final game with the Warriors. 

Hope didn’t start for the Warriors last season until the trade deadline after acquiring Jimmy Butler. But the Warriors were stuck in the blocks at the beginning of the race and sprinted to the end to try and catch up. Their superstar who will be 38 years old at the start of this season’s playoffs couldn’t make it through the finish line. 

Curry’s strained hamstring put a stop to the Warriors’ puncher’s chance of making a run at another ring. He’s averaging 28.7 points per game in Year 17, the fourth highest of his career, and ranks ninth in the league. Of the eight players ahead of him, Nikola Jokić, 31 on Feb. 19, is the only one who’s in his 30s. 

The first and most obvious avenue for improvement this season starts the day Jonathan Kuminga becomes trade eligible on Jan. 15. The summer saga of Kuminga’s restricted free agency has turned into him holding a $22.5 million contract on the bench as he watches games in warmup gear. Kuminga played 21 and a half minutes against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Dec. 6 and then was a healthy DNP (Did Not Play) in the Warriors’ next three games, going 1-2. 

Coach Steve Kerr raved about a string of practices Kuminga put together and said he would be rewarded in the Warriors’ Dec. 18 game against the Phoenix Suns. The Warriors lost by one point and Kuminga played nine and a half minutes where he scored two points on 1-of-5 shooting and had four rebounds. 

Kuminga was ruled inactive with an illness two nights later against the Suns and was back to being a healthy DNP in five straight games. Kerr said Kuminga was going to be in the rotation against the Oklahoma City Thunder but he was a late addition to the injury report with lower back soreness and missed a game the Warriors also were down Curry, Butler and Draymond Green. Kuminga has been a healthy DNP in the two games since. 

The Warriors are 9-9 in games Kuminga has played this season, and 10-9 without him.

League sources told NBC Sports Bay Area the Kings, Chicago Bulls and Washington Wizards all have different levels of interest in Kuminga. The Dallas Mavericks, who initiated contact with the Warriors about their thoughts on trading for Anthony Davis, as The Athletic’s Sam Amick first reported, also like Kuminga, sources confirmed. But the Mavericks do not have interest in Green, whose $25.8 million contract would be needed in a deal to get Davis, who’s making $54.1 million. 

And the Warriors also haven’t shown any interest in trading Butler, another big contract that would land Davis, one year later.

The Mavs badly want to get off Davis’ contract ahead of him being eligible for a $275 million max deal next summer, and draft picks are more enticing. Teams like the New Orleans Pelicans and Brooklyn Nets are eyeing the future and will want draft compensation more than anything for their best players who could be available. One league source speculated Trey Murphy’s price tag would cost giving the Pelicans three first-round picks, and two to the Nets for Michael Porter Jr., if either player is available. 

Letting go of draft picks while also knowing what the post-Curry era could look like is the Warriors’ best bet of adding a big enough piece to really compete. How far will they go? 

The Warriors own their future first-round pick in every year aside from 2030, which they can trade the rights to that year only if it lands in the top 20. They have three unprotected firsts, the ability to swap in three other years and the protected pick in 2030 over the next seven drafts. 

The Butler move made Curry believe again. Can he believe the Warriors in their current construction right now are championship material? 

Warriors general manager Mike Dunleavy joined NBC Sports Bay Area’s Bonta Hill, Chris Mullin and Festus Ezeli on “Warriors Pregame Live” before Golden State’s eventual 120-97 win against the Orlando Magic two weeks ago and poured water on the idea of making a move as big as last year’s Butler acquisition. Kerr recently also spoke publicly on the precautionary tales of teams that went all-in for a star and now don’t have any future first-round picks.

“We’ll look to do stuff that makes our team better,” Dunleavy said. “But I wouldn’t bank on that type of move. To get a guy like Jimmy Butler, to have the improvement that we did … that’d be pretty unrealistic.”

The Warriors went 23-8 with Butler down the stretch last season. Their record was one game below .500 at the trade deadline, and the season ended in the second round of the playoffs after Curry’s injury. 

Even if the Warriors don’t make a move to the magnitude of Butler, this year’s situation is similar in the way of addition by subtraction, and the sentiment is shared despite them liking the players who make up the bottom half of the roster. The Warriors lost four players and brought in one with Butler. Aside from his talent, the move allowed the Warriors to solidify roles and rotations much better. 

If the Warriors can move multiple players for one who would be in their top four every night, “that would make things a lot easier [for them], it’s kind of what happened last year,” one league source said.

Kerr still is using 12 guys, and Kuminga isn’t one of them, with 14 players healthy. Open roster spots would open a lane to a standard contract for Pat Spencer, and the Warriors might have big help, literally, in waiting from their Santa Cruz G League affiliate. 

Charles Bassey, a 6-foot-10, 230-pound center/power forward was a former top high school recruit and second-round pick in the 2021 draft who has 115 games of NBA experience, including two this season. Santa Cruz traded for Bassey, 25, on Dec. 27 and in 26.4 minutes per game he has averaged 17.6 points, 11 rebounds and 3.4 blocked shots through his first five games with a 60.3 field goal percentage and 45.5 3-point percentage. 

His last three games have been some crazy box scores, and Bassey’s energy and effort jumps out. First, he went for 17 points, 17 rebounds and six blocked shots on New Year’s Eve and then dropped 34 points on 13 of 21 from the field and 3 of 6 on threes, 13 rebounds and two blocked shots. Bassey in Santa Cruz’s most recent game went for 14 points, 15 rebounds and another three blocked shots. The Sea Dubs won all three games. 

“He’s an NBA player,” one source said. 

“He still is,” another source said. “All that stuff is real.”

Like Kevin Knox last year, though, Bassey isn’t eligible for a two-way contract. Teams started being able to sign players to 10-day contracts on Jan. 5. As Bassey has impressed the Warriors, the big man is sure to be on other teams’ radars outside of them as well with rosters soon to be in flux.

More traction to Kuminga’s market is going to come the closer we get to Jan. 15, starting a three-week window to the trade deadline. Both sides agree it’s best to move forward and on from each other. The Warriors’ picture of what team they’ll be to make another run should become clearer in the next four weeks, and likely sooner, just like a year ago.

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