Sacramento Kings: Better With Greivis Vasquez; Option At The Wing

Greivis Vasquez’s debut marks an opportunity for better offense for the Sacramento Kings. (NBA.com photo)

As I mentioned a week ago, the Sacramento Kings have not been coming on TV much. This was the best quality video NBA.com could find of last Thursday’s game against the Phoenix Suns and their matchup Sunday against the Trail Blazers was only televised in Portland (though admittedly, I probably could have streamed that game in not-quite-legal ways). Box scores and highlight films are not the best way to judge a team’s performance — then again, preseason games are not the best way to prejudge the regular season. But, for now preseason highlights and box scores are all we have and from them we can at least come up with a few things to take with us heading into the Kings’ final preseason game and the soon coming regular season.

The Vasquez Factor

Greivis Vasquez has started in the Kings’ last three games and in general it seems like the Kings’ offense has functioned better because of it. DeMarcus Cousins has looked monumentally better offensively in the two games he has shared the court with Vasquez; statistically and in general, the team is functioning more cohesively — though this may have as much to do with the squad starting to grasp Mike Malone’s offense. However, the one area I was somewhat optimistic regarding Vasquez’s effect has shown little improvement. That is, I hoped Vasquez’s pass-first mentality could become somewhat contagious for the Sacramento Kings — the league’s second-worst passing teams by way of assist percentage (55.3 percent last season). Instead, the Kings have logged a disappointingly similar 55 percent assist figure in Vasquez’s three preseason games and are not becoming the ball-moving team I was hoping they would become.

This is not totally surprising. While Malone was in Golden State, the Warriors only assisted on 58.9 percent of their buckets despite a plethora of willing passers and the Kings are still made up of almost all shoot-first players. Teams can still be successful offensively without piling up assist numbers; however, those teams that had success without great assist percentages last year — mainly the Oklahoma City Thunder and the worst-ranked New York Knicks — still managed top numbers on offense because of the dynamic scorers that led their offense. I have spoken on this repeatedly, but DeMarcus Cousins does not possess the scoring prowess of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and Carmelo Anthony — or even J.R. Smith, for that matter. If the Kings want to be successful on offense they will have to at least be slightly better at distributing. Hopefully Vasquez, playing a full load of minutes, will be able to spark that improvement.

Relative To The Alternative

I almost wrote, “The Kings are ridiculously thin at the small forward position,” before catching myself, realizing that is not the case. Sacramento actually has three options to plug into their wing spot, but those three players — John Salmons, Travis Outlaw, and Luc Mbah a Moute (MbAM) — are so below average offensively that they are really deplorable starting options. Think this:

Over the preseason, though, two options have surfaced as viable alternatives to giving any of these three players significant minutes.

The first option, which I have mentioned previously, is the prospect of Patrick Patterson getting some small forward minutes. This initially started as a way to find Patterson minutes outside of the Kings’ overloaded power forward position, but with Carl Landry missing the first few months of action, Patterson has pretty much locked up Sacramento’s third big man spot. That being said, I will not put it past Malone to play Patterson, Jason Thompson and Cousins together at the end of games in an effort to get his five best players on the court. Patterson — still early in his career — is clearly a more polished offensive player than any of the Kings’ traditional small forward options. In addition to being significantly more efficient in front of the line, Patterson will also provide, at the least, a vague 3-point threat in his accuracy from the corners. The ability to knock down the corner 3 is more than three aforementioned players can provide — though in Salmons’ defense he was close to average 3-point shooter in general last year — and that corner 3 is a big asset in the Horns sets Malone is using a lot with Kings so far. His ability to defend the position may become an issue, but the prospect of the size and shooting advantage is tantalizing.

The other, more traditional option involves sliding Ben McLemore to the small forward position. Surprisingly, I have been really high on McLemore this preseason, after being admittingly overcritical of him this summer. His shooting has yet to fully materialize, but he still provides a bigger threat beyond the arc than any of the three traditional options (except Salmons). More importantly, McLemore has looked great in almost every other aspect of play this preseason — with the exceptions being his shooting and his passing. He cannot be accused of not playing hard or being uninterested — an all too common offense with this year’s class of rookies; he is using both his size and athleticism defensively and seems to quickly be grasping NBA defense under Malone (Klay Thompson-style); and he is making plays offensively by being an aggressive offensive rebounder and a veteran-like basket cutter. I doubt he becomes the offensive power many expect him to be. But with the right coaching and a jump shot that hopefully comes to form, he can be one of the better 3D wings in basketball.

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