The Sacramento Kings had a busy offseason, one that included re-signing Malik Monk, drafting Devin Carter, and executing a sign-and-trade that netted them DeMar DeRozan.
But hidden in the fog of all those marquee moves was a seemingly inconsequential deal on the second day of the 2024 NBA Draft. In that trade, the Kings traded Davion Mitchell, Sasha Vezenkov, and two second round picks for Jalen McDaniels.
The move was mainly viewed as a salary dump. However, it also was a signal that the Kings were giving up on their first round lottery pick from the 2021 NBA Draft.
Given how his last season with the Kings went (only averaging 5.3 PPG and struggling to make a meaningful impact on the defensive side of the ball), it makes sense why the team would do that. Plus, with De'Aaron Fox, Malik Monk, Keon Ellis, and Carter, the Kings had a serious logjam at his position.
Davion Mitchell may be finding his role with the Toronto Raptors
Unfortunately, Mitchell has been playing better basketball since leaving Northern California. Since joining the Toronto Raptors, Mitchell is averaging 7.1 PPG and 5.5 APG (the latter being a career high). He's also posting a career-high on-off rating, as the Raptors are 5.6 points better per 100 possessions with Mitchell on the floor compared to when he's on the bench.
Some would argue that Mitchell has a puncher's chance of winning the Most Improved Player of the Year (MIP) award. The website Opta Analyst has a statistic called "DELTA," which measures the change in a player's DRIP (the website's in-house one-number metric) score from the beginning of the season until now.
As it stands, Mitchell has the 11th-highest DELTA score of any non-rookie (since they can't win this award) in the NBA. So, while he isn't a frontrunner, he's still clearly one of the most improved players in the league.
Now, it is worth noting that DELTA and DRIP are heavily dependent on box score numbers, which are greatly tied to a player's minutes. This year, Mitchell is playing a career-high 27.9 minutes per game. That's a career-best and 12.6 higher than his average in his final year in Sacramento.
Overall, Mitchell is finding his niche in Toronto. But as a Kings fan, I wouldn't be too sad about his departure because Ellis has been great in his opportunities this year, and if Mitchell was still on this roster, he'd be taking away opportunities from him.