The Sacramento Kings aren’t content with just snapping their playoff drought last season. Sacramento intends for making the postseason to be a regular thing. To make that happen, they are expected to be aggressive in trade talks this season, according to Shams Charania of FanDuel.
The Kings are expected to be involved in discussions for any star-level player that comes on the market. That could include players like Pascal Siakam, OG Anunoby and Zach LaVine.
Kings general manager Monte McNair has kept most of his draft picks (the Kings owe a lottery-protected pick to the Atlanta Hawks) to be ready to make a trade for a star. Sacramento also plenty of tradable salary to put into a deal for an All-Star.
In the summer of 2018, Sacramento signed LaVine to an offer sheet worth $78 million over four years. The Chicago Bulls matched that offer sheet, and then re-signed LaVine to a five-year, $215 million max contract in 2022.
Amazon is a known suitor for NBA media rights, as the league looks into their next broadcast deals. Amazon doesn’t just want a package of regular season games, however.
“Would something like the playoffs be an important part of [our bid]? Yes, I think that’s fair to say,” Amazon Global Head of Sports Jay Marine told John Ourand and Andrew Marchand on an upcoming episode of their podcast, which will post on Nov. 22.
Marine also said he believes that the NBA fits in with where Amazon wants to take their Prime service. He also said that it’s clear that people care about the NBA, which drives value as well.
“What fits is that it is one of the biggest leagues in the world and people care about it,” Marine told Ourand and Marchand. “At the end of the day, do Prime members care about it? Is it important to their life? And as a result, can it be meaningful in terms of the value it adds to Prime members and the Prime program? And I think with the NBA, it is true on all of those fronts.”
