Kings riding ‘maintain-improve' philosophy after quiet trade deadline

Despite the outside pressure and desperate pleas from tired-of-being-patient fans coming off one of the worst losses of the 2023-24 season, the Kings stayed silent at the NBA trade deadline ... again.

When general manager Monte McNair sat down at the podium to address the media after the deadline last year, the team’s continuity was the main reason as to why no major move was made.

One year later, McNair re-emphasized the importance of keeping the same group together while staying true to a team philosophy he still believes in: Maintain and improve.

“The defense, I do see the improvement. We've done some really good stuff,” McNair told reporters Friday in Sacramento. “I think Keegan [Murray] in particular has taken a step on that end. But I think we're seeing also, this is one of the benefits of that continuity: Second year with coach and his system. We certainly haven't brought it every night on the defensive end, but overall we've seen our rank improve and we've seen some really good performances. 

“That said, we have not maintained our offense -- and that's an issue. We got to get better on that end. Because if we had maintained our offense and seen the defensive improvement, we'd be in a much different position. We know those things. The improvement has been a positive, [but] not maintaining some other aspects is something that we can continue to work on and need to get better at.”

Sacramento currently sits in seventh place in the Western Conference with a 29-21 record, so if the NBA playoffs started today, they'd have to go through the Western Conference play-in tournament just to play a first-round series.

At this point last season, the Kings were sitting comfortably as the No. 3 seed with a 31-23 record and had a decent shot at rising to the second spot. At this point last season, though, they were an offensive machine that thrived off pace and space, 3-point shooting and their two All-Stars in De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis.

Sacramento led the league in scoring (120.7 PPG) last season while recording the highest offensive rating (119.4) in NBA history, and its offensive dominance led the Kings to their first playoff appearance since 2006.

But as the old-school coaches say, defense wins championships. And “old school” is Kings coach Mike Brown’s middle name.

The defensive-minded coach ironically led a historic offense in his first season with Sacramento, but after the team’s first-round playoff exit last season, the shift – and priority – has been on defense.

And despite the numbers, the Kings have shown improvement on that side of the ball this season. Sacramento finished last season with a 116.0 defensive rating, the 24th-best in the league, or, more fittingly, the seventh-worst. This season, through 50 games, the team sits 16th with a 116.0 defensive rating.

While McNair has seen the defensive jump from certain players such as Murray and Fox – who both have made significant strides on defense this season – he knows the team as a whole must collectively lock in if the team plans on making it past more than just the first round of the postseason.

“Well the big one is our defense, and coach Brown has harped on that,” McNair said. “We know we got to win the 82 games in the regular season for sure. The West is going to be tough. Right now I don't think we're even in the playoffs. We know we want to get into the top six first and then hopefully into the top four for home-court [advantage]. At the same time, when you get to the playoffs, it's a different game, which we saw last year. 

“I think it's great for our guys to have that experience. We know defensively, I think we did a good job against Golden State that's carried over into this season. But offenses are only getting better. I think the league is up two points as a whole. We got to find ways to improve, we got a target on our back. But if we get that back up into the top 10, top five, with our defensive improvement, that's how we can make some noise.”

The Kings still will make defensive adjustments moving forward, but McNair’s concern this season has done a full 180 and made its way to the other end of the stick.

Oh, how the tables have turned.

Sacramento’s offensive showing this season has made last season’s seem like it was centuries ago. With mostly the same pieces returning to the team this season, the production drop has been puzzling.

"I think one big one is our pace. We were a pretty clear No. 1 last year," McNair said. "This year, we've had some really good moments. We all know what De'Aaron can do. We just have to be more consistent. That's one where we can impose our will. And our defense should help us, we're No. 1 in defensive rebounding, but we got to run off of those. We got to be better there. So that's a big one.

"And the rest just gets back to the consistency. We've had some highs, but we just haven't done it night-in, night-out like maybe we did last year. We've seen some really good improvements. Our shooting in particular has come back, but the pace is the number one thing I'd point to because that is in our control more than shot-making or things like that.

At the same time, though, perhaps the focus and emphasis on defense could factor into the drop in offensive production.

Murray, for instance, has accepted the challenge of defending some of the NBA's best players, including guards and wings. From Steph Curry to Luka Doncic to Donovan Mitchell – Murray is doing the little things that are putting him on the right track toward two-way supremacy. Spending all summer guarding Fox surely helped.

And in return, Fox, too, has grown defensively, using his quickness to deflect and steal from opponents. The 26-year-old is averaging a career-high 1.8 steals in 44 games this season, and 18 over Sacramento’s last five games.

While every player wants to light up offensively, doing the things that don’t always show up on a stat sheet is just as important -- especially come playoff time.

“I think we all know we've got to be better on both ends because we're not where we need to be,” McNair said. “But the defense was the easiest thing for us to improve because, as I mentioned, we wanted to maintain our offense to get there, but right now our offense has slipped as our defense has improved and we're in a similar spot with our record as last year. The biggest thing for us is at the end of the night, we got to have more points than the other team. Especially in the playoffs. You're going to have to stop some really, really tough players. Just look up and down the West. It is multi-time All-Stars, All-NBA guys, future Hall of Famers that you're going to have to stop.

"So we got to learn to do that because when April and May come, we got to do that. At the same time, we got to figure out a way to score because, in this league, it's taken 110, 120, 130 [points] to win. So we got to do both. We can't have a good defensive performance go to waste because we can't score enough. It's always a two-way street. I think the easiest thing we see is to be top-10 offense and defense, that usually gets you in a good spot."

The Kings' lone trade deadline move became a meme Thursday night as Robin Lopez was spotted reading at the Milwaukee Bucks game, but nothing is funny about McNair's belief in his current roster and the aspirations he has for it this season.

That was pretty evident last season. It is crystal clear this season.

Now, the Kings can only hope to do well with McNair's trust in them.