The first major trade of year sent Trae Young to the Wizards in exchange for Corey Kispert and CJ McCollum. Thankfully, the Sacramento Kings managed to steer clear of that whole situation. While Young seemed like a good fit from a distance, he might have just brought more of the same problems.
As everyone knows by this point, the Kings are in the earliest of early stages of a massive rebuild that will at the very least turn them into a less shameful team. Getting to a season record of .500 would be a massive accomplishment, let alone actually contending for sort of title.
After giving up both De'Aaron Fox and Tyrese Haliburton in recent years, the King are in desperate need of a young point guard to lead their team. One of the candidates was Trae Young, someone who fits the bill on paper. Reality has turned out to be something quite different.
Will the real Trae Young please stand up?
After a draft night trade in 2018, Young ended up on the Atlanta Hawks, where he has played his entire NBA career until now. While he is highly skilled and has shown a lot of potential, that never really manifested into anything for the Hawks.
Young is an undersized point guard who plays selfish basketball, doesn't defend, and is injured a lot. He's spent most of this season on the bench, leading the Atlanta front office to the realization that the current incarnation of the Hawks play better without Young than with him.
Given Young's problems and high salary, it became apparent rather quickly that his trade options were limited. He indicated that his preferred destination was the Wizards, and that's where he ended up. Hopefully, this trade works out for both sides.
It was a gamble the Kings didn't need to take
Trae has his issues, but part of the problem was playing for a Hawks team that didn't work and in the last couple of seasons moved past him. A change in scenery might be exactly what he needs to find his game. That's not a risk the Kings needed to take to get a new, young rebuild point guard.
The reality of the rebuild process is that it will take a long time to put together and the slightest misstep will completely derail it. There's a real chance that bringing Young in would likely have been the latter and not the former for Sacramento.
While Young had potential, the Kings don't need another veteran who takes a lot of shots and basically doesn't play defense. That's probably why the King reportedly dismissed him as a trade target months ago.