The painful education of growing up - the Sacramento Kings

It has been disappointing watching the Kings in their past two games. Collectively, they’ve stunk up the joint.

When Sacramento meets Phoenix Friday night, it’ll be a match up of two of the NBA’s worst defensive squads, so look for many, many points to be scored.

However, the Kings are youth-laden while the Suns are a veteran crew. When in doubt, take the experience.

When you can’t take care of the ball (19 turnovers in a 98-89 loss Wednesday night to Minnesota), you can’t muster consistent offensive production and you can’t find a way to keep an admittedly ultra-talented Michael Beasley and clearly improved Sebastian Telfair from dominating your squad, disappointing is the word that comes to mind.

Here’s another: $#@@&%%!!

Once again, the basics of Basketball 101 in Marty Mac’s World are a team usually needs four or five players doing what they do to snatch a victory.

It would be a good thing if one of those players was your best player.

However, Tyreke Evans was as terrible against the T-Wolves as Minnesota’s defense was determined to keep him from the basket. Omri Casspi scored 17 points in 27 minutes, but he was the first victim of Beasley’s assault.

Beasley treated Casspi as if he were his little brother. The second-year forward is an amazing talent but he was allowed to get off early, as almost every Kings opponent has been.

By the time, Donte Greene, yes, that Donte Greene, came off the bench for 3:40, Beasley was so hot, he’d have lit up an in-prime Dennis Rodman, the 6-foot-8 forward who already should have defended and rebounded his place in the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Francisco Garcia, Samuel Dalembert and Antoine Wright followed in the procession of torches, uhh, defenders to get some from Beasley on the way a career-high 42.

Only Dalembert, Darnell Jackson and Beno Udrih (other than those four turnovers) played well.

That’s not enough to overcome missing 12 of 32 free-throws, committing 19 turnovers (many sloppier than unforced) and making just five of 20 three-point field-goal attempts.

That left the Kings with three straight home losses during a stretch eight home games in nine. It’s extremely early in the season; however, this is where habits are formed.

This is where identities are created and established.

Remember, identities can be negative. It’s important for a team to establish difficult-to-discern and measure qualities like toughness, confidence, teamwork and chemistry.

Yet, without those qualities, a team has no shot at success.

Right now, the Kings have none of these qualities.

And it’s the team’s composition that is most responsible for that status.

Minnesota assistant coach Bill Laimbeer was discussing talented young forward Kevin Love and working with a young team.

He was speaking of the Timberwolves and Love, but his words equally could be applicable to the Kings and Tyreke Evans and DeMarcus Cousins.

Laimbeer was asked how Love can improve.

“By learning the game, how to get more involved in a team structure, which all of our young guys have to learn,” he said of the T-Wolves. “Defensive wise he has to learn how to short cut things and take away other guys opportunities and discourage passes coming into the post because he’s not the tallest guy or the strongest guy.

“He has to do his work early in order to discourage his guy from getting the ball.”

Laimbeer, one of the league’s great intangible players as well most despised, said many dynamics go into team and individual growth.

“When you don’t get to grow up as a unit,” he said, “it can be frustrating. That takes a few years. As far as Kevin, he’s going to learn his way. When you are young like this, you are thinking about how I’m going to get mine and how I’m going to establish myself as a player. And unless you are surrounded by intense veterans who are winners, you are going to stub your toe along the way and these guys are no exception.

“He’s very young, yes, and that’s a positive and a negative. You are so young you want to get out of the bad habits you pick up because you don’t know any different. And quite frankly being on a team where he hasn’t won that’ll wear you down and you don’t want to get into that rut early in your career.”

Youth means learning how to make the most of one’s ability and skills. It means avoiding one’s weaknesses and mostly, how not to defeat yourself.

We have yet to see how long this process will take, or if will occur. And tonight against a veteran Phoenix team, we’ll get one more indication.

Wayman Tisdale's Fonk Record release party was a smoker

Former Indiana Pacers, Sacramento Kings and Phoenix Suns forward Wayman Tisdale was a special, special person.

How many folk are talented and fortunate enough to become stars in two professional environments? Basketball and music demand such high skill levels and the competition is so fierce.

For those who didn't see Tisdale play ball, he could be an unstoppable low-post force. His flipper, as he called it, was a left-handed jump hook that was so effective that people like me criticized him for not using more. Shoot, everytime he touched the rock would have been enough for me.

The answer to the aforementioned question about multi-professional excellence is very, very few, but Tisdale did it with a flow of smooth in his hoop game and jazz game.

He died May 15, 2009 but last Sunday night his spirit was alive, bumpin’ and fonkin at Harlow’s Nightclub in Sacramento.

The occasion was a celebration/CD release party of Tisdale’s posthumous project called Wayman Tisdale – The Fonk Record featuring Tiz and the Fonkie Planetarians.

And trust, there is very little smooth about The Fonk Record. The CD, which I’ve been jamming and sharing since the day I received it from producer/bassist Derek (DOA) Allen, is straight funky to the core.

Tisdale is a self-admitted country boy from Tulsa, Oklahoma so out of respect for my man, with who as a Kings beat writer, I spent day after day after month after month. So I roll in this piece with 'fonky' instead of 'funky.'

Much love Wayman’s longtime friend and ace-boon-coon (since we’re making it fonky), drummer Arthur Thompson was the co-producer.

Thompson was down with Tisdale like pores to skin.

“Art was with him when he took his last breath,” Allen said.

The Fonky Record couldn’t help but be dirty, nasty and stinky personified with contributions from the ultimate funkmeister Parliament/Funkadelic orchestrator George Clinton and legendary keyboardist George Duke, who also firmly straddles the funk-jazz line.

So get your toilet paper, handi-wipes, towelettes or whatever your choice before succumbing to Tisdale’s Fonk Record.

A number of prime-time musicians on the club’s stage turned a quiet evening into a funkafied, hot, sweaty, basement party minus the crib.

It was a party that back in the day likely would have moved a neighbor to call the police and tell them to make those loud people go home. Where were John Witherspoon and the late Bernie Mac when you needed them?

If you were without a handkerchief, face or body towel, you were under dressed and ill-prepared.

Actually there were so many big-time musicians and entertainers on the stage, the mentions were too numerous to make, but the appreciation of talent and time given by all only could be understated.

Former Sly and Family Stone and Graham Central Station Rock and Roll Hall of Fame trumpeter Cynthia Robinson could have been legitimately accused of trying to bring the club into ill repair with her nocturnal funkiness spraying throughout the joint.

She took me back to 1968 or so when I saw her and Sly on a 90-plus degree summer day at Harlem’s Mt. Morris Park. I was sporting my knit shirt, silk and wool pants and playboys (shoes). If you don’t know about that, you’d better ask somebody. I was hot as hell, but cooler than cool waiting for Sly to show up an hour and a half late, as usual. Then they turned out the joint.

It was kind of late Sunday evening when former Tower of Power lead singer Lenny Williams took the Harlow's stage and broke into his soulful and inimitable style that has stood and over-run the test of time.

Even with the likes of saxophonists Mike Phillips and Kim Waters, percussionist extraordinaire Sheila E, actor-bassist poet and entertainer Malcolm Jamal-Warner, keyboardist/bassist/singer ChuckII Booker, Sacramento bassist (DOA) Allen performing in a ridiculously funky and soulful jam session, two stars of the night shined more brightly.

Those were Regina Tisdale, Wayman’s wife, and his daughter, Danielle, now an Atlanta resident. They continued the legend and legacy of class and style Wayman had established as a major basketball star. And Danielle jumped on the stage and blew as well.

The night began with TV Judge Judy bailiff Petri Hawkins-Byrd emceeing the festivities and providing an introductory funk education to those who didn’t know.

For Gina, the night was another step towards closing a circle after losing her husband to leukemia at the age of 44.

Mrs. Tisdale spoke of how she and husband often discussed how badly and determined he was to take his hugely successful smooth jazz in another direction if only for one project.

“We grew up in Oklahoma listening to Charlie Wilson and the Gap Band and Funkadelic and Wayman always dedicated part of his shows to soulful funk,” she said. “He wanted to get as funky as he always has been and many people didn’t know.

“When Wayman was going through chemotherapy sessions, he’d be sitting down and clowning around with the funky stuff. He’d be clowning so hard, there were times if I wondered if he was serious. But he’d say, ‘No, baby, I’m going to do this.’ “

Wayman would take his wife into the studio connected to their home and share just how serious he was.

“I’d go out there and listen and say, ‘Wow, this is something real. This dude really is serious.’

Allen talks about how the project was put together through sharing and exchanging computer files across the country.

He spoke of Tisdale thinking of the concept of donning an afro wig, sideburns and high heels. He’d walk down Hollywood Blvd. into the offices of record executives, let them see the gold tooth in his mouth and put his music on for them to see.

“He would introduce them to the Fonky Planetarians in that way,” said Allen, who in addition to working as the project’s producer, over the years had performed the same role on other Tisdale projects.

There was a reason why Allen and promoter Mike Dailey decided Sacramento was the spot to introduce Tisdale’s Fonk Record.

“Wayman’s whole professional music career started here in Sacramento,” Allen said. “(The late) Robert Brookins played a major role in convincing Tis that he could do this. He clearly was able to transform from basketball star to jazz artist, but his love of funk always was there.”

Allen said getting three performers – Duke, Clinton and singer Ali Woodson - to contribute to the Fonk Record was integral to Tisdale.

“The thing was that we never had all of these cats in a studio at one time,” Allen said. “And it was no thing to get Duke to contribute, but Clinton, that was something different.”

Allen said he and a few folks literally had to chase down Clinton, whom shall we say, can be a bit unpredictable.

“We went to Reno and hunted him down. George had given Tis his word and I knew we had to hook it up,” Allen said. “We couldn’t have done it without the help of Ray Grady, who had long worked with Clinton.

On a video associated with the project, Allen and his people can be seen literally stopping at gas stations and randomly asking folks if they’d seen Clinton. In fact, if you know of Clinton’s unusual flair for independence dress, et al., once you’ve seen him it’s clear he won’t be confused with anyone else on this planet.

Clinton, a Plainfield, New Jersey, has said he’s not of this world and as a lifelong Funkateer, I’m convinced.

At the same they were chasing down Clinton, Allen, with the help of a Sacramento engineer, Brian Porter, was trying to secure studio space to do their thing with Clinton.

“There was a spot called Granny’s House Studio in Reno where Fleetwood Mac and Michael Jackson had done some work,” Allen said. “So we tried to hook that up. We couldn’t find the joint and figured we’d go to where the concert was that night and talk to some stage hands and roadies. We’d gone to one big house in a residential area and knocked on the door for about 15 minutes before we decided to go to the venue.

“Once we got there, they told us we needed to hook up with this big ol’ brother and talk to him about his studio,” Allen said. “We hooked up with him and he said it was cool, but he needed $2000 a day.

“We couldn’t do that and we decided on a price of $300. He said he’d let us use his studio and on the way there, we noticed we were going in the same direction we’d just come from. He took us to Granny’s House Studio, the same big house where we’d been banging on the door.

“We ended up paying him a little more than the agreed upon price. We hooked up with George. He did his thing and it all worked out. We all had to feel that Wayman was there the whole time.”

The completion of the project was something Allen felt had to be done. Tisdale had passed on and the day after the funeral service, Allen approached Tis’ wife about the project.

“Derek was in the kitchen and told me he wanted to finish the project because Wayman wanted it so badly,” she said. “He told me to take my time and do what I had to do and let him know.

“I said at the time, ‘Absolutely,” Mrs. Tisdale said. “Give me a couple of months and then we get talk about it and start handling the details.”

Mrs. Tisdale said she was amazed by what she’d heard.

“I really began to believe we’d get it done after I heard the fourth cut or so. And I was amazed by how good Ali Woodson (a former singer with The Temptations) sounded. Like Wayman, he’d had throat cancer, but he sounded so strong and forceful. At first, Wayman had wondered if he should even ask Ali because he was sick.”

Woodson, like Tisdale, passed away before the project was completed.

Mrs Tisdale said, “But we talked about how music had helped Wayman get through some very tough times after his chemo treatments and how this might have that same effect for Ali.”

Indeed Woodson’s performance on ‘Been Here Before,’ is one that has made me repeat the cut over and over and his passionate, from-the-heart words regarding his love for Tisdale and how he’s always been there for him.

Regina said she received the completed project a couple of weeks ago, but initially didn’t listen to it

“I was giving them to people but I didn’t listen to it,” she said. “I couldn’t until last week. I was laughing and crying. There was a bitter-sweet excitement. It’s just like (Sunday night). It was bitter-sweet because it was like Wayman was there.”

Regina said she hadn’t been to Sacramento in far more than a decade.

“Even seeing his buddies was something special,” she said. “Wayman always was going to think you were a good cat until you proved otherwise.”

Yes, Tiz and the Fonky Planterians and the Fonk Record are all special.

And during these times of athletes speaking of legacies and legends, Tisdale has established another level to which they can aspire. However, most of them might want to put on some MC Hammer because they can’t touch this.

More information on the project, the cartoons, the video and all that can be found by googling Wayman Tisdale for a start.

Two things are for sure. If you weren’t at this party, you missed a stoned cold blast. Secondly, Wayman didn’t miss it. You could feel him.

Lessons learned part of process for young Kings

The Sacramento Kings are in the midst of an overhaul and coach Paul Westphal realizes keeping life real is more important to their growth than worrying about their feelings.

Tuesday night, they open the 2010 preseason at home against the Phoenix Suns, so things are about to get real. Well, as real as the preseason can get.

Reality comes in different shapes and forms to different people. The Kings will open the regular-season as one of the NBA’s youngest teams.

They’ll also be one of the most inexperienced. Only six of the current Kings were here for 2009 training camp.

Tyreke Evans and Omri Casspi were rookies last season. Now they are relative Kings veterans just because they’ve been here before – once.

Westphal said Saturday he read a quote from Utah coach Jerry Sloan describing his Jazz players. Westphal liked the message, so he brought the sentiment to his players.

Sloan told the Salt Lake Tribune, “At this stage, they’re probably a little but tired, but I don’t really care. From that standpoint, they should be in better shape when they get here. If you’re going to spend your time getting conditioned in training camp, then you’re probably going to be trying to play catch-up the biggest part of the time.”

Westphal was not dogging his team in any manner. In fact, following Saturday’s long afternoon workout, he spoke of how his team had been fortunate to have few players miss practice.

He was asked how his team was holding up physically.

“Pretty well, really,” he said. “Five days of training camp, a lot of times you can expect more missed practices than we’ve had. They are tired and they are sore, but that’s to be expected.”

Said Westphal of Sloan's quote, “I read that and told that to our young guys today. That’s the way it is. If you don’t come (into camp) in great shape, don’t complain about being sore. It’s time to pay the piper.”

The NBA season is a long, long journey and it’s conceivable the Kings will begin the regular season with seven players (possibly more) with fewer than three seasons of experience.

Center Samuel Dalembert, acquired this summer from Philadelphia, is the most experienced with eight NBA seasons. Beno Udrih is next with six and Francisco Garcia is entering his fifth season.

Conversely, Boston’s Shaquille O’Neal has 18 years of NBA experience all by his large lonesome.

So, many of the team’s key performers will balance the positives of younger legs against on-the-job education.

One of the lessons Westphal hopes his players acquire is respect for the game. All the players truly need to do research the fervor and aggression with which Westphal and assistant coaches, Mario Elie and Leonard (Truck) Robinson played the game.

Check out the sideline antics of 80-year-old assistant coach Pete Carril. He could be a veritable mad man when his passion and competitive nature was unleashed.

Sloan’s Utah teams usually display his intensity. It’s one reason why Sloan ranks among Westphal’s most respected coaches.

“There are a couple of coaches that I think really respect the game in a way I admire,” the Kings coach said. “(Those are) Larry Brown and Jerry Sloan.

“Both of them, I think, would rather have a game called correctly than in their favor. At the same time, they’d fight for every advantage they could get. They love the game and they have a good perspective about competition.

“I don’t want to slight anybody else, but those guys have been around for a long time and I think it’s because they have such a great love for the game.

They’d do anything to win, but at the end of the game, they’d shake your hand and mean it.”











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NBA playoffs go from sour to sweet

For weeks there were complaints about the early rounds of NBA playoffs being non competitive with one sweep following another.

Never mind that few folks would have chosen the Phoenix Suns to beat, much less sweep the San Antonio Spurs. Or selected the Spurs to defeat the Dallas Mavericks in the first round, for that matter.

There are those observers, including myself, who believed the Miami Heat had a legitimate chance to surprise the Boston Celtics in the first round. Miami had ended the season playing well, while Boston had struggled throughout the season's second half.

The Oklahoma City Thunder have come and gone, but it was just a couple of weeks when that squad looked like the up-and-coming squad that had a chance to throw legitimate fear into the then shaky and injured defending champion Los Angeles Lakers.

However, NBA nuts like myself, now have the Celtics holding on to the cliff with every finger and nail as they attempt to hold off the rejuvenated Orlando Magic. The Magic appeared to have thrown in the towel during Game Three of the Eastern Conference Finals.

The Celtics, meanwhile, were throwing blows with a smothering aggressive defense and a balanced solid offense that could attack from many angles. They were ahead 3-0 and had Game Four at the house.

Two defeats later, the Celtics can't be sure who among Glen (Big Baby) Davis, Rasheed Wallace and Marquis Daniels will be healthy enough to play in Game Six at their gym. Even if they can play, how well can they play or will Davis and Daniels remember playing after suffering freak concussions during Game Five.

And each respective injury speaks to the unknowns attached to merely stepping onto the court. The Celtics began Game Five with a somewhat comfortable 3-1 lead over the Magic and walked off with a tenuous 3-2 advantage and 25% of their squad requiring serious medical attention and hopefully quick recuperation.

When Davis was hurt, he had not left his feet. Dwight Howard drove to the basket and was smacked across the wrist by Nate Robinson in an attempt to block his shot. (For the record, no foul was called.)

What goes up must come down and Howard's arms came down with his left elbow landing on the cheek and nose of Davis.

Perhaps had Robinson actually blocked the shot, Howard's elbow might have missed Davis. No one knows that, but we do know Davis looked like Joe Frazier against George Foreman after the big forward was struck.

Wallace goes to the basket and extends to make a layup and came down like a 54-year-old after reaching for a book off the top shelf of the library. His back was sore as heck and stiff and many of us can speak to that feeling.

Grissom suffered his concussion after when his head bumped into the body of Martin Gortat on a baseline double-team. How flukey is that?

Still unmentioned is how close Celtics center Kendrick Perkins came to being suspended after receiving two technical fouls. One technical was rescinded, but it didn't have to roll like that.

So here the Celtics are having wasted two opportunities to close out the Magic. The Beantown Boys have a shot Friday night at the crib before the world comes crashing down. The last thing they want is a seventh game in Orlando before a maniacal crowd and buoyed, confident Magic squad smelling blood.

Since I believe each game is it's own entity, I believe the Celtics are capable of shaking off three defeats and still winning a Game Seven.

However, that's not the way they are trying to get to the NBA Finals for the second time in three seasons.

Phil Jackson just the other day was speaking about how losing those two games in Phoenix put them into a situation they should embrace 'because that's the way it should be for a championship team.'

Wonder if he was thinking that when Jason Richardson banked in that game-tying three-pointer right in front of Phil's throne? I doubt it.

Trying to make a quarter out of 15 cents

It made all kinds of sense that free agents to-be Dwayne Wade, LeBron James, Joe Johnson and Chris Bosh will parlay regarding their intentions to see if they can and want to hook up for a Super Crew.

Free-agency is the time when players have control of their destiny so why not utilize it to the fullest. I wonder if the players' agents will be in this meeting.

What if the meeting turns into a greed-fest and two guys crossing-out other guys to get what they want. I wonder if this has happened before, but it's sure to happen again.

As an athlete, often you become a piece of meat. Some become amazingly high-paid meat, but nonetheless meat. That means at one point, you can be sliced, cooked and eaten.

As a people, we tend to always focus on those making crazy cash forgetting far more players can struggle to make teams and forge a career with stability and security.

Orlando's Matt Barnes clearly is a guy who has a place in the league, yet he's played with Los Angeles Clippers, Sacramento Kings, Philadelphia 76ers, New York Knicks, Golden State Warriors, Phoenix Suns and the Magic.

Barnes, a dogged defender and big-time team guy, only has been with Golden State for more than one season and those were the 2007 and 2008 campaigns. As you see, he has a place, it just hasn't been the same place.

Barnes, 30, and his lady now have twin boys. The end likely could be closer than the beginning. Barnes says he wants to come back to the Magic and has an option on his contract for next season.

He was paid $1.6 million this past season and becoming a free-agent likely will be his ticket to making considerably more cake in the future. He played in 81 games in 2009-10 and as a starter he and his agent, Aaron Goodwin only figure to come to General Manager looking for a salary upgrade.

Here's a guess Barnes won't be invited to the big-money free-agent summer, but it is players like him who help the big boys win in the post season.

Boston's Kendrick Perkins always is one of the biggest guys on the floor. He's also one of the league's biggest complainers. Virtually every foul he commits has to be the first in his mind. This dude virtually whines about every call.

That being said, Perkins was thrown out of Game Five of the Eastern Conference Finals after receiving two technical fouls. He inadvertently elbowed Orlando's Martin Gortat while trying to grasp teammate Paul Pierce's wrist and help him off the floor.

Perkins' hand slipped and his elbow hit Gortat. The referees missed on that one and so did the league a full day later when it rescinded the second techincal.

Perkins, who entered the game two technicals short of being suspended for the next playoff game, received his second one for spinning around and stomping off after getting called for a personal foul.

If either technical should have stood, it was that one. Players can't get away with stomping and whining all the time, and when a crew with Joe Crawford comes to town, it's time to chill. Everybody knows that. OK, maybe it's everybody, but Perkins. Recognize, young fella'.

Lies, lies and more lies

We're entering a period of NBA life during which there possibly will be more lies, lies and more lies told than ever before.

There are so many lies out here right now, even before I can get started on this topic, I just heard another one.

Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson Wednesday afternoon on being tied 2-2 in the Western Conference Finals with the Phoenix Suns after losing back-to-back games in the Valley, "There's absolutely no doubt that we love this. This is what champions are made of. We had this situation with Oklahoma. We had it with Denver last year in the (Conference) finals. It should be like this."

Yeah, Phil. Really?

Why do people feed us this garbage like we're disposals? I mean, you can't just put anything even in a disposal.

He's got a center in Andrew Bynum, who currently because of a knee injury has the mobility of former mountainous Utah center Mark Eaton.

The Suns have used a 2-3 matchup zone of sorts to lure the Lakers into make shooting from the perimeter in the past two games and they've been incapable of handling the responsibility.

The Lakers went to Phoenix with a 2-0 lead and left tied 2-2 and Jackson wants us, somebody, anybody to believe he'd rather be in this position than ahead 3-1 with a chance to move to Finals Thursday night.

Imagine this concept Phil, you wouldn't rather have won both of those game and have clinched a Finals berth?

Yeah, Phil. Let's just say I've got some land in Montana I need to sell. Oh, that's right, you've already got a spread up there.

Jackson's impending contract situation actually was one of the motivations behind this subject. ESPN.com's Mark Stein, whom I hold in high regard, reported the New Jersey Nets indirectly have inquired about Jackson's potential interest in coaching their squad next season.

Jackson's contract is up after this season and word is Lakers owner Jerry Buss wants the zenmaestro to return, albeit with a drastically reduced salary. He made $12 million and it's been reported Buss wants that dropped by roughly half.

Now I have doubts about that. Could Buss be crazy/senile enough to think Jackson, whose lady friend Jeanne happens to be Jerry's daughter and a Lakers exectutive, would take such a deal. For goodness sakes the man could be coming off back-to-back championships.

Jackson says he nor none of his people have discussed potential coaching gigs with New Jersey or Chicago or Cleveland.

So some one or somebody or some people are lying.

Each side can't be telling the truth.

We're told LeBron James had nothing to do with the firing of coach Mike Brown. Yeah, right.

That we've not heard James told the Cavs he'd come back if they retained Brown means the young star had something to do with Brown's release.

Coaches come and go because teams eventually stop wanting to hear their message and the grass always is greener.

Shoot, I loved my late father, but there were days I'd have traded his butt for two slices of Valentino pizza at the bus terminal on 165th street in Queens. No doubt, there are nights my son would make the cheesesteak for dad trade, too.

After having covered the Golden State Warriors, Dallas Mavericks and Sacramento Kings, being lied to comes with putting on socks in the morning. Executives and coaches lie to beat writers regularly. It's part of their job and as long as we accept that, it's a free world.

There are times the truth can destroy impending or possible transactions. That's understood.

However, can we keep a little sanity about these untruths. At least work on the falsehood. It's not like you come home and tell the wife just anything. Can we as fans and writers get similar respect, please?