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Report: Kings Shopping Rudy Gay to Make Room for Rondo

By Michael Hilperts

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The Sacramento Kings have officially lost it.

Contradicting reports have surfaced over the past-24 hours regarding the Kings’ plan for DeMarcus Cousins. While Kings owner Vivek Randive and recently-appointed General Manager, Vlade Divac, have adamantly denied the availability of Cousins, it appears head coach George Karl has a different agenda.

Karl may be pressuring the Kings’ front office into trading Cousins to the Lakers in a three-team deal involving the Orlando Magic. This would net the Kings Nikola Vucevic and the Magic’s 5th pick with the possibility of future 1st round picks.  This move reeks of desperation and illustrates a fundamental lack of direction in the Kings organization.

Now, according to Kurt Helin of NBC Sports, it appears the Kings are shopping Rudy Gay to clear cap space to sign disgraced point guard, Rajon Rondo. Gay, who bonded with Cousins and enjoyed a higher efficiency in Sacramento than on his previous teams, has three years remaining (last year being a player-option) on a $40 million contract. Since Gay’s salary is affordable, especially with the new TV deal dramatically raising the salary cap next year, teams won’t mind spending $13 million a year for a talented scorer who can effectively play the four in small ball lineups.

Many insiders believe Rondo will seek a one-year deal this offseason to raise his stock and thus enjoy the benefits of a higher salary cap next season.  This makes it a risky acquisition for the Kings as they’d be operating under the unsafe assumption of Rondo returning to Sacramento next year. These “wink-wink” deals, where you acquire a player for only one season and hope for them to return the following season, haven’t worked out recently (Iguodala on the Nuggets, Howard on the Lakers).

This would be a terrible decision for the Kings as they’d be sacrificing a solid player in Rudy Gay for the mercurial and potentially over-the-hill Rajon Rondo.

The Kings time-and-time again surprise the world with their overt stupidity and are thus, very capable of making this rudimentary of a mistake. If the Kings do royally screw up, Danny Ainge should seriously consider trading for Rudy Gay.

Divac and Ranadive would demand a first round pick, in addition to a either an expiring contract – like Gerald Wallace’s – or a capable wing, such as Avery Bradley. The Kings did recently announce that they were looking to add a defensive-minded player, and Bradley fits that description perfectly.

If the Celtics were to acquire Rudy Gay, they’d be in solid position to win the (feeble) Atlantic division.

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Since Gay was drafted by the Grizzlies, Gay was labeled a “high-volume scorer”, which, is just a nice way of saying chucker. Memphis traded him for Tayshaun Prince during the 2012-2013 season due to his inability to gel in Memphis’ newer and more stats-driven model. However, following an extremely inefficient stint in Toronto (14.7 PER, .388 FG % in 2013), Gay was traded again, this time to Sacramento, where he matured emotionally and played a smarter style of basketball. Gay averaged 20.1 ppg, shot 48% and had a PER of 19.6.

He did all of this on a Sacramento Kings team devoid of any stability.

On a stable Celtics team with Brad Stevens at the helm, Gay could only improve. He would serve as a priceless mentor to his young teammates, who – to this point – have lacked an experienced and vocal star (sorry, Gerald) to share the court with.  In crunch time, the Celtics would not have to solely rely on Isaiah Thomas for scoring, as Gay would give the Celtics more options down the stretch.

Often in late-game situations, the Celtics relied on setting high screen-and-rolls for Thomas, which many teams, including the Cavaliers, recognized and thus, made necessary adjustments to stifle the offense. With Gay on the court, the Celtics would be able to run the offense through him in addition to Thomas.

Rudy Gay’s inefficiency in Memphis and Toronto can be attributed to his propensity to set up from the perimeter. Gay’s shot chart was saturated with long two pointers and contested threes. While Gay is athletic, he doesn’t have the speed nor the ball-handling skills to consistently drive past defending wings from the perimeter and therefore get himself high-percentage shots. Without an elite mid-range game like Kobe Bryant’s, this style of play is too inefficient in the modern NBA.  At this point, Gay’s stock began plummeting as his skills were considered antiquated.

However, in Sacramento, Gay found success playing in former-coach Mike Malone’s offensive sets, which forced Gay to operate primarily from within the three-point line. Gay matured into a post-up specialist, who was now equipped with an arsenal of post moves and a deadly baseline turnaround jumper. One of the Kings’ better play calls involved posting Gay up on the weak side, where he’d frequently overpower more slender wings in the low post.

While Gay excelled in Malone’s slow-tempo offense, his athleticism and ability to run the floor makes him an equally deadly asset in a fast-paced offense. Additionally, Gay serve as an excellent four in Brad Stevens’ small ball lineups. In dire times of offensive struggles, Stevens could go real small and deploy a lineup of Thomas-Bradley-Smart-Gay-Crowder, which, minus Gay, has used in the past.

Following this season – if the Celtics were to acquire Gay – they’d have the flexibility to sign two additional max players. Although Gay isn’t going to be the best player on a contending team, he could certainly be a third option on a Championship-winning team. If I were Danny Ainge, I’d make any player not named Isaiah Thomas or Marcus Smart available in a trade bringing Rudy Gay to Boston.

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