Sunday Musings: Let yourself believe in 2021-22 Sacramento Kings

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Let yourself believe. 

It’s a powerful statement and not one that I typically type when writing about the Sacramento Kings.

Patience? Yes, that is something that I have requested countless times and for countless different reasons. 

But belief? That is a word that comes with expectations. The Kings don’t do well with expectations. Neither do their fans.

Nine games into the 2021-22 season and there is something different about this team. The talent level is better than it has been in close to a decade, but that’s only part of the equation.

Friday’s drubbing of the Charlotte Hornets showed flashes of who this team can be. They have scoring depth all over the court, but also enough defensive prowess to be interesting. 

A 140-110 victory may not become commonplace, but the fact that the Kings walked in against a strong Eastern Conference opponent and showed a killer instinct is just one more item to check off the list.

The game that may have sold me on this bunch came earlier in the week. The team had a mountain of excuses lined up. They were playing the second night of a back-to-back that coincided with the end of a four-game road trip.

Despite Zion Williamson, Brandon Ingram and Herb Jones all missing the game, this is a contest that the Kings lost at least 50 percent of the time in past years. Call it a trap game or an excuse game or whatever you like, but for some reason the easy ones are never easy in Sacramento.

Following the game, there were a series of comments that struck a chord. De’Aaron Fox’s brutally honest moment about his mental state after some major struggles stole the show, but there were more meaningful comments from Fox, head coach Luke Walton and shooting guard Tyrese Haliburton. These are the moments that tell me this version of the Sacramento Kings might be on a new path.

“We’re going to struggle, everybody is going to struggle,” Haliburton said when asked about Fox and his breakout game. “Obviously, he hasn’t played the way he wanted to this year, but that’s my teammate, that’s my brother and so we’re here for him.”

You don’t find second-year players that step into a media session and both protect and support a teammate like what we saw from Haliburton. There is a thoughtfulness and an honesty that resonates. 

Haliburton is only one piece to the culture of this team, but his presence is something that head coach Luke Walton, as well as plenty of others within the organization, are drawn to.

“I’ve challenged him -- I want his personality imprinted on our team,” Walton said of Haliburton. “He is that type of guy. I want him as loud as he wants to be. I don’t even care if he makes mistakes right now. If he wants to call his own play coming off the free throw line, call it. The more that he can share who he is with the identity of our team, the better we’re going to be.”

Haliburton isn’t perfect, but he has a style that is very reminiscent of former King Bogdan Bogdanovic. Both can do just about everything on the court well, but their drive to win and their unselfish play make the players around them better. 

While Haliburton is quickly becoming a glue guy for this team, this is just one ingredient that stands out. He brings joy to practice, the team plane and the game action, but he also needs to be held accountable, like everyone else. 

“I told him to shoot the f***en ball,” Fox said when asked about his backcourt partner.

While this statement is crass and not nearly as eloquent as the one that Haliburton made toward Fox, this is how a team is built. Personalities intertwine to create a culture. For every Haliburton, you need a player like Fox to be blunt, honest and demand something from a teammate in a language that he understands.

Rookie Davion Mitchell is just finding his voice with this team, but even he has thrown out some zingers. 

"We've got to do a better job of keep playing 48 minutes and not 40"  Mitchell said earlier this week.

Succinct. To the point. Real in a way that is almost too real for a player with nine games of NBA experience.

The young guys are finding their voices. They are learning how to step forward and much of this is due to the veteran squad that has been brought in to provide support.

Tristan Thompson was told he was out of the rotation in the game against New Orleans. Alex Len was going to play with the hopes that he could matchup against Jonas Valanciunas for at least a few minutes.

When Richaun Holmes fouled out, Thompson stepped in and played eight second half minutes. While he didn’t put up a single stat, he ran a plus-5 in his minutes on the floor and helped his team win.

“I thought Tristan’s eight minutes were a perfect example of who we are as a group,” Walton said. “He wasn’t playing, he was out and when Richaun got tossed, he got checked in -- he knew the game plan, he knew the execution, what we were trying to do and he was ready to go.”

Harrison Barnes has been incredible through the first few weeks of the season, but veterans like Thompson, Len and Moe Harkless are doing really solid work under the radar. They are filling the voids that this team needs, both on and off the court.

“It’s just doing little things that are needed to win games,” Harkless told The Kings Beat earlier this week. “I like to think of myself as the type of player that can affect a game in a lot of different ways. I just try to do what’s needed on a nightly basis.”

Sacramento has had solid veterans before, but this might be the moment when the team finds balance between youth and experience. 

The Kings are speaking a coded language that hasn’t been there before. The accountability is different. The talent is better, but that only takes you so far in the NBA. A group of players pulling in one direction with a shared purpose is dangerous.

It’s early. This kumbaya moment could be fleeting. But it doesn’t feel that way. This group is not like any I have seen in the previous 11 seasons and there is so much room for growth.

So the message is clear. As Kings fans, you already hang on every made or missed basket. You tune in every game. You scream and yell at your keyboard and you want it so bad you can taste it.

Until this group proves otherwise, let yourself believe. Enjoy the buzzer beaters and the blowouts. Get frustrated with the losses and the mistakes. But also enjoy the personality of this squad that is developing, because it has a chance to be special.