The end of the 2025-2026 season for the Sacramento Kings also meant it was the end of general manager Scott Perry's first full year. He celebrated his one year anniversary on April 21, 2026. While he's gotten a surprising amount done, there is a lot of work left to do to make this franchise relevant.
When Perry walked through the doors of Golden 1 Center in April 2025, the Kings were in freefall. Head coach Mike Brown had been fired. Longtime point guard De'Aaron Fox had been traded. Poor roster construction had left the team unbalanced and without a path forward in any fashion.
Expectations were high for Perry as he had proven himself to be a savvy front office member with Detroit, Seattle, Orlando, and New York before arriving in Sacramento. Those expectations were wildly unfair as the mess left on his desk will take years to clean up, not months as many fans hoped.
Perry's year one moves were few, but impactful
Trading players with bad contracts like Zach LaVine and Domantas Sabonis is important, but difficult. Perry has smartly chosen to be patient on this front, looking for the right opportunities rather than taking bad deals just to get them off the books.
One step forward doesn't matter if you also take two steps back as part of the same move.
How does everyone feel about Scott Perry after Year 1?
— Brenden Nunes (@BrendenNunesNBA) April 30, 2026
- Rookie Class (Nique, Max, Dylan)
- Signing Westbrook and Achiuwa
- Traded Valanciunas for Saric to make room to sign... Dennis Schroder (3yr/$45M)
- Traded Schroder and Ellis for Hunter
- Kept Doug Christie as HC
First and foremost, he drafted well in 2025 by picking up Nique Clifford and Maxime Raynaud. Even better, Perry signed Dylan Cardwell to a two-way contract, then made room for him on the main roster by sending Dennis Schroder, Keon Ellis, and Dario Saric away.
On the veteran front, Perry also made the right call to sign both Russell Westbrook and Precious Achiuwa. Westbrook has already proven to be a key mentor for the rookies while Achiuwa had somewhat of a breakout season playing alongside those same rookies on the court.
Perry is building a strong foundation for the future
More than anything else, his greatest success this season was finally getting co-owner Vivek Ranadive to buy into a full rebuild. Perry has taken the long view, consistently preached patience, and managed expectations with diplomacy and care.
There were failures, as well, such as the Schroder experiment and trading for De'Andre Hunter. That's all part of the growing process. Not every move will be successful on its own, but can still be used to make the leap to the next step of the rebuild.
Fans and pundits may not have gotten the big changes they wanted, but it's hard to ignore what Perry has already accomplished in one year on the job. It's unlikely that the Kings will crawl out of the NBA's basement any time soon, but Perry has put them on the path to doing exactly that.
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