The Sacramento Kings are a team very much in transition. They’re a year-and-a-half removed from the DeMarcus Cousins trade, which ended a tumultuous era for the franchise that included destabilizing coaching and personnel upheaval and widespread organizational dysfunction at every level.
They spent the bulk of last season sifting through the wreckage as they tried to develop their young talent in De’Aaron Fox and Justin Jackson alongside savvy vets like Vince Carter and Zach Randolph, and, unsurprisingly, they ended up back in the lottery this summer.
But by selecting a presumptive can’t-miss prospect in Marvin Bagley III at Thursday night’s draft, the Kings finally have reason for optimism about the future. Leave it up to oft-embattled GM Vlade Divac to blow all that way out of proportion.
“I think it’s a super team, just young.” pic.twitter.com/Hcl9jcuBXN
— Kings on NBCS (@NBCSKings) June 22, 2018
“My team is a superteam, just young,” Divac said. “We are competing, we are playing hard, fun, fast. Last year, we have a few of those superteams, we beat them, twice I believe, so we have to learn and be better every day, every year.”
Divac is clearly referring to the Kings’ two regular-season wins over the eventual-champion Golden State Warriors, which apparently in his mind vaults them right up there in contention with the NBA’s elite squads.
There’s nothing wrong with taking a positive outlook on his squad moving forward, but ratcheting up the hyperbole will likely only do a disservice to his players, if only for the constant trolling and ridicule that is sure to come their way because of it.
