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The Sacramento Kings formally punched their ticket to the NBA finals in 2023 with a 120-80 victory Wednesday. That's right: the NBA's longest postseason absence, which lasted 16 years, is finally over. Turn on the damned light.
It took a few additional days, but the Kings defeated the weakened Portland Trail Blazers to seize charge of their own playoff fate. Chants of "Light the beam" erupted at the conclusion of the contest... in Portland.
The Kings join the Denver Nuggets and Memphis Grizzlies as the third club in the Western Conference to secure a postseason spot. To put it simply, this is not what the betting community anticipated prior to the season; prior to training camp, BetMGM placed the over/under for Sacramento's 2022-23 victory total at 34.5 games. Those low standards came in the backdrop of a calamitous decade and a half: the Kings hadn't surpassed that total in three seasons and had only beaten it twice since 2005-06.
As much as Brown, who began his career with Gregg Popovich's Spurs, presided over elite defenses in Cleveland, and served as Steve Kerr's lead defensive lieutenant in Golden State, would prefer that those expected wins come via consistent strings of stops, these Kings, like their C-Webb-era forerunners, win with their offense. Sacramento has the most points this NBA season, tallying 176 in a double-overtime battle against the Clippers. It also earned a share of the no-overtime high-score by dropping 153 points on a Nets team that still had Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving in a nationally broadcast asskicking that authoritatively proclaimed the Kings' arrival as a team of significance.
Following the acquisition of an immediate impact shooter in the draft, McNair added two more in free agency, sending a package headlined by a lottery-protected 2024 first-round pick to the Hawks for Kevin Huerter and using the midlevel exception to snare Fox's old Kentucky teammate, Malik Monk, from the Lakers. Huerter was a natural match alongside Fox in the starting lineup, recording career-high shooting percentages both inside and outside the hoop while playing at his best usage rate. Monk has been one of the NBA's most dynamic backups, leading the league in points and assists per game off the bench while scoring at career-high per-minute rates.
Flanking Sabonis — one of the league's top high-post offensive centers as well as the league's leading rebounder — with multiple wings who could shoot, pass, dribble, and cut opened up a world of options for Sacramento's offense. No team finishes more possessions per game via dribble handoff, no team scores more points per possession on those plays, and the 26-year-old big man has the highest assist rate of any non-Nikola Joki center in the 3-point era. All that inner room and Sabonis' service have helped release Fox, who earned his first All-Star spot alongside Sabonis thanks to career-high scoring and his rise as the league's best late scorer this season.
The Kings' final success this spring will most likely be determined by their ability to put together enough saves for their attack to win the day. The good news is that no matter who they face, that attack will be a beast to contend with.
"I believe our potential is limitless," Fox recently told Bleacher Report's Chris Haynes. "We know we can score against anyone." Our season will be saved if we can get some saves, which is something we're working on every day. We could win a title if we improve our defense."
That is, to be sure, an extremely high objective. The Kings, on the other hand, have taken the first step toward it by qualifying for the playoffs — and given how far they've come and how fast they've done it, perhaps we should question them at our risk.
Daniel Weinman was crowned winner of the 2023 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event on Monday, taking home a record breaking $12.1 million in winnings. Weinman had to outlast the other 10,043 entrants to take home the prize and get his hands on his share of live poker’s largest ever prize pool – a staggering $93,399,900. As well as taking home the prize money, 35-year-old Weinman also got his hands on the WSOP Main Event bracelet. The huge bracelet contains 500 grams of 10-karat yellow gold, as well as 2,352 various precious gemstones.
Daniel Weinman won the World Series of Poker's main event world championship on Monday in Las Vegas, earning $12.1 million along the way. Playing in the tournament for a 16th year, Weinman was tops in a deep pool of 10,043 players vying for $93.39 million. His victory came after just 164 hands at the final table. "I was honestly on the fence about even coming back and playing this tournament," the 35-year-old Atlanta native told reporters afterward. Weinman's final table featured Jan-Peter Jachtmann, who landed in fourth place and took home $3 million, as well as Toby Lewis, who finished seventh and secured $1.42 million. According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the main event's entry pool far outpaced the previous record of 8,773 set in 2006. "I've always kind of felt that poker was kind of going in a dying direction, but to see the numbers at the World Series this year has been incredible," Weinman said. "And to win this main event, it doesn't feel real. I mean, [there's] so much luck in a poker tournament. I thought I played very well." Steven Jones finished second, securing $6.5 million. And Adam Walton settled for third and a $4 million prize.
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