3 Sacramento Kings players who are rated too low on NBA 2K25

Keon Ellis

2K Rating: 76

Anyone who was really paying attention to the Kings down the stretch knows that Keon Ellis is one of the most underrated role players in the association.

He functions like a light version of the world champion and Gold Medalist, Derrick White. He is a great perimeter defender (93rd percentile DEF EPM) who offers positional rim protection (76th percentile block rate) and turnover creation (92nd percentile steal rate). And on offense, he gives you shooting (41.7% from three) and closeout attacking (88th percentile true shooting on drives, per Thinking Basketball).

However, it doesn't seem like 2k was paying attention. At 76 overall, Ellis is tied for sixth on the Kings with Kevin Huerter. This part doesn't trouble me, as the players he's rated behind make sense (Sabonis, Fox, DeMar DeRozan, Keegan Murray, and Malik Monk).

What is bothersome is some of the players around the league that are ranked higher than Ellis. For instance, Cam Thomas – a player notorious for being a high-volume scorer who struggles to provide any value elsewhere – is ranked higher than Ellis (81). Another player who is ahead of Ellis and probably shouldn't be is Tre Mann (77) – an even worse version of the Thomas archetype.

To get a feel for how off these ratings are, here is a look at all three of those players' Estimated Plus-Minus (EPM) from last season.

Now, keep in mind that one-number metrics aren't everything (although EPM is the best publicly available one on the market right now). But, in this specific case, it serves as a good proxy of these players' standing among one another.

It seems like 2K is valuing inefficient bucket-getting over a strong complementary skillset. As a general rule, on high-level teams, you prefer a strong role player over a flawed scorer.