Kings vs. Lakers Preview: Race for your jewels

After the Kings' best season-opening loss in ten years, the Sacramento packed their bags and set off for a battle against LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers. Winners of their first two games, the Lakers will play back-to-back on the second night and… Okay, are the casuals gone? Has your uncle from Santa Monica, who talks almost exclusively about getting mugged outside the TCL Chinese Theater and how the Palisades is really going downhill, gone? Good. You really didn't think I would pass up the opportunity to follow the worst franchise in professional sports again after more than 20 months, did you? If you're here for analysis and want to get a good, solid understanding of today's game, head over to Elon Musk's X.Com while it's still halfway usable and look for Will Z or a number of other Sacramento writers for more to experience poise and professionalism in their little fingers more than I have in my entire body.

I'm not here to impress. I'm here to depress, especially all of you who are cosmetically addicted to Ozempic, slinging the Mamba Mentality, born and raised in Brentwood, and are such crazy exhibitionists who commute. “Oh, we had a World Series game, a Lakers game, a USC football game, and two whole concerts tonight!” Okay, well, I have a wife who loves me and DeMar DeRozan, who loves my professional sports franchise, and if only one of those things can be true, then it's still more than 97% of the plates that Valley drivers can claim. My translator would bet my money on that.

Let’s talk Kings basketball.

When: Saturday, October 25th, 7:30pm PST
Where: Yes Its Really Still Crypto Dot Com Arena, Los Angeles, CA
TV: NBCSCA – Kyle Draper (play-by-play)
radio: Sactown Sports 1140am

For your consideration

Once a future king: I wish I could say that my absence has softened my views on the Lakers, that I have scaled a distant peak in my pursuit of wholeness and found a wise, wizened thinker who, after a life of self-reflection, has given me something about myself Will voice my petty grievances or face an eternity of regret. I didn't do it. I hate the Lakers. To paraphrase one of three lifelong Angelenos I still respect: I hate the way they walk, the way they talk, I hate the way they dress, and if you ask me why, so something is just disgusting, it's not it. It must even be deep, I guess. There's just nothing to respect about them. I hate them like they hated Jerry West. I just hope that one day I can see the franchise fail, in part because of the heartache I have caused them, and while they gasp and strive for redemption and final reconciliation like the Lakers, I remain silent until then everything Is.

The Lakers embody everything that is bad about this world – nepotism, nepotism, De'Angelo Russell. They're a franchise populated by failed sons and failed daughters, people who can't tell the difference between a pat in the shoulder and a stab in the back and are so used to doing both that it's easy for them It doesn't matter what should happen where and to whom. Where a father rich in talent and success can become so cocky assuming his children will be the same and so powerful that no one can stop them from putting them on the team and then later become a TV to do a show that gives a taste of their exact plan to do this. At least Jerry Buss got an HBO prestige drama…all LeBron got was a Netflix original.

I guess that means I should talk about Bronny. To be honest, I have no dislike for the child. Being the son of anyone is hard enough, being the son of one of the great individual talents of the modern age must be impossible. Even with immense wealth and privilege, you will always be attached to the LeBron James brand – a teratoma, a growth on the side of an entire industry, who is your father, whose hair, teeth and complexion are part of his overall narrative but also separate . Carried by this being, it can never be completely removed or grow on its own. LA for high school, LA for college, declare after a bad season due to a terrible circumstance and then their boom, LA for the NBA. The LeBron Machine makes LeBron seem somewhat healthy, but if this whole Ken Griffey wannabe thing was about giving his son the most success on the court, he would have let him choose his school and told him to go back and playing a few years old and really becoming the player he could be. But it's LeBron. The narrative needs the moment, Junior be damned. Take some photos, I am proud of you, my son, for everything I have achieved.

God, if there weren't ten thousand sons of Bel Air pretending to live in Silver Lake who are in therapy for ten thousand versions of it.

Let's move on to someone for whom I have genuine compassion: Nothing screams Los Angeles like losing a wealthier roommate who finally gets tired of dealing with you and hires a part-time podcast host while you're away who has a history of drinking under the influence of The Void, they successfully begged their coked-up, failed father to hand over some money for a brand new apartment. The Lakers are still trying to portray “The Home That Bobby Bao Paid For” as some kind of Madison Square Garden West, and yet the Clippers, who loved their rich and rich history there so much, moved to Inglewood to escape that – that Scene of all the police drama and over-the-top Oscar bait that my local blockbuster served up for 30 years.

The best part is, if you think the arena is bad (it is), the team is no better. Kobe Bryant looks up to the Lakers fans who have been making their minds up all winter long on Austin Reaves being a starting shooting guard and Dalton Knecht being a rookie of the year candidate. 54% of Los Angeles residents have a script in their glove compartment and no one has told them how pervasive the white savior stereotype is. Even in two years, no one has told them they love them, but that's not relevant to today's conversation. Did the Lakers beat the team that beat the Kings last night and then beat the Suns last night? Secure. Congratulations. The ligaments in KD and Bradley Beal's bodies have the combined tensile strength of a microwaved cheese stick, and their bones have the toughness of day-old tostilocos. Anthony Davis remains the most frustrating player in the league, vacillating wildly between being an MVP-level player and 75 games of unavailability. LeBron is still LeBron (positive), De'Angelo Russell is still De'Angelo Russell (devastating negative). For anyone making the case for the Lakers having a comeback year because their coach did a Pat Riley impression instead of a Doc Rivers impression: is a bench of Gabe Vincent, Dalton Knecht, Max Christie (?), Jaxon Hayes (??? ?) is supposed to scare anyone? “But Will… Jarred Vanderbilt and Christian Wood are injured!” THEY COULD BE A BETTER TEAM FOR THIS. I know Nana will be safer sitting on the sidelines and behind the home basket in the next few games!

I'd say the scariest person on the floor in Los Angeles tomorrow night is Jack Nicholson, but even he seems to prefer languishing in oblivious peace for eternity rather than watching his once-glorious team play.

The right choice, Jack. I don't blame you.

The little stuff

Finally, this will be a section where I discuss little, silly things that I noticed throughout the season. So imagine if I had taken the time to write about the sense of masculinity within the Lakers Bros community. Nothing is smaller or sillier than that.

forecast

Bronny James is becoming a decent basketball player. LeBron James realizes his mistakes late in life and, after great effort, is forgiven by his son. A volcano rises from the La Brea Tar Pits and destroys most of the surrounding area. Tommy Lee Jones is nowhere to be found.

Kings: 127, Lakers: about 7 or so.