Turnover Prone Kings Fall To Grizzlies

You know, I really don’t want to come off as a negative nancy. I really don’t. But if the Kings keep pulling crap like this, well, just give me a wig and some tits.

The Kings dropped their second consecutive last night, this loss the product of unforced errors. The Kings piled up 20 turnovers during last evenings tilt, most of them out of pure carelessness and neglect. I can only recall a handful that were a result of the Grizzlies defense. In addition to their extremely (and I mean extremely) error prone ways, their collective team defense was very poor. And while that’s to be expected, the effort (other than in some stretches) was lacking consistently throughout the night. When the Kings played defense as a group, the Grizzlies struggled mightily – fortunately for them, the Kings could only buckle down in two or three minute stretches.

I really don’t have a problem losing – I have a problem beating yourself. I fully understand the Kings are a young team and I pride myself on being realistic, so my expectations were tempered. With that said though, playing poor defense, shooting poorly from the charity stripe (which the Kings have early in the season, sans last night), excessive turnovers, none of which is acceptable in my book. All I ask is hard work and effort – the rest comes with that. Losing to a team who’s playing their fourth game in five nights (and a devastating 2 OT game the prior evening), all on the road, because of an inability to play a professional brand of basketball? Not okay in my book. And my book is full of too much fucking awesome.

As for the player performances, Tyreke Evans was filthy good last night, hitting shots from all over the floor. His perimeter shot never looked better. And considering how poorly his teammates played around him, his fantastic game was even more impressive. He finished with 30 points, 8 rebounds, 4 steals, and 5 assists.

And as to those players who played poorly around him, well, pick a name – you’ll get it right. Beno Udrih and Carl Landry both had really poor evenings, Landry going 1 of 4, Udrih going 2 of 10.

On the rookie side of things, Whiteside was active but finished without seeing the floor and Cousins struggled off the bench, clearly never getting into the flow as he was in constant foul trouble all evening. He finished with 4 points and 3 rebounds, and was a key contributor to the shitty ball security with 4 turnovers.

For Memphis, Rudy Gay was simply unstoppable. His unique high arching shot was no match for any King as he continually fired bullets over the top of each defender, completing his night with 32 points on 11 of 19. OJ Mayo, Zach Randolph, and to a lesser degree, Mike Conley, all had their own impressive stretches throughout the game and the Kings had little answer for the Grizzlies starting five.

Oh – and for those wondering – Donte Greene got his third (well, fourth really) consecutive DNP.

Yikes.