Written by Jared Mintz at Bloguin
It’s been almost a week since the report of a Sacramento Kings implosion.
Following last Monday night’s loss to the San Antonio Spurs, star player and/or “perennially upset non-leader” DeMarcus Cousins blew up at first-year coach George Karl, leading to a player’s-only meeting, followed by some iteration of general manager Vlade Divac asking the players if the team will be able to move forward with its coach.
Since none of us were in the home team’s locker room at Sleep Train Arena on Monday evening, a lot of what’s been reported could be exaggerated or sensationalized. With that said, there’s no doubt that this is an organization that’s been hamstrung by dysfunction, and is in desperate need of a culture change.
It’s seemed rather evident since the moment team owner Vivek Ranadive hired Karl that he wasn’t the right fit for Cousins, and thus the much needed culture change, as the two have been reported to be at odds pretty much since Karl was brought on board back in February. Whether Cousins is still upset at the way the team handled former coach Mike Malone (who’s now coaching the Denver Nuggets), or Karl’s been stubborn about doing things his way – capiche, this was supposed to be the season the Kings turned a page, as they went out and added guys like Rajon Rondo, Caron Butler, Kosta Koufos and rookieWillie Cauley-Stein to the mix last offseason, among others.
Well Monday night marked the team’s seventh loss in its first eight games, and it looked like we might see our first fired coach of the still relatively new season. Since then, the Kings are 2-0, and it was even reported that Cousins doesn’t want to see the team part ways with Karl.
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