When George Karl was hired to be the new Sacramento Kings head coach, we all jumped for joy and took our celebration to the streets. “The Kings are back baby!!!” we said exuberantly, and when the Kings won their first game in the Karl era, it seemed like all we needed was a little bit of George to turn the Kings sagging fortunes around.
But the very next night in Los Angeles, we were plunged back into reality — the Kings are still the same old Kings.
It was a painful lesson that we all learned that night, that there will be no instant fixes under Karl, and nor should we expect it to be a quick fix. It is going to take some time for Karl to fix a team that play’s defense like a person trying to dodge cars on a freeway, and an offense that still relies too heavily on the production of two players.
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Yes, Karl can change all of that, but it is not going to be overnight. He will have to purge this team of some nasty habits, and that’s going to take some time. So while it was a tremendous feel good moment for the Kings to win their first game under the Karl era, we should always keep in mind that this is going to be a long process to get the Kings back to being playoff contenders.
Yes, I know all about the Karl record, which gives me, and all Kings’ fans, hope that this team will be turned around. But at the same time, reclamation projects are also painful in the short term, so we should prepare ourselves for a little more losing before Karl finally right’s the ship, and even then, this is a team that needs to have some serious work done to it in the offseason, an area that, unfortunately, Karl has no control over.
So as the headline of my article made clear enough, we shouldn’t expect any instant miracles from Karl. Yes, the turnaround will happen, but we have waited years for the Kings to get back to respectability, so I think we can stomach eight more months.