It’s been 16 years since the Sacramento Kings made the NBA playoffs. Worst yet, they haven’t been even close to making the postseason since they last entered in the 2005-06 season. They haven’t finished higher than third place in the Pacific Division, and the most they had was 39 wins.
Given that there’s not much roster movement for Sacramento during the offseason, the Kings are expected to miss the 2022-23 playoffs despite having a young but talented core. We’d expect many NBA betting fans to wager against the Kings for most of their games, but there might be some good value odds to be found should the team cause an upset.
The Kings have regressed over the past four seasons. After a 39-43 record in 2018-19, they finished with identical 31-41 records in 2019-20 and 2020-21. They only had 30 wins last season despite having ten more games.
Those records led to the firing of Luke Walton and Alvin Gentry’s takeover as interim head coach. The Kings have hired Mike Brown as their head coach for the 2022-23 season.
The Sacramento Kings have undergone seven name changes and three relocations before their current form. The franchise was initially known as the Rochester Seagrams during its establishment in 1923. Since then, the team has been known as the Eber Seagrams, Pros, and Royals.
The team moved from Rochester, New York, to Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1957, bearing the name Cincinnati Royals. They stayed there until the 1971-72 season before moving to Kansas City, Missouri, and Omaha, Nebraska.
The squad was known as the Kansas City-Omaha Kings until 1975, when they became the Kansas City Kings. That name stayed until 1985, when the team relocated to Sacramento, California, to become the Sacramento Kings.
The Kings play at Golden 1 Center, which opened on September 2016. It replaced ARCO Arena, the Kings’ home court since 1988. Golden 1 Center has a capacity of 17,608 during basketball games. Kings fans are known to create a loud and energetic atmosphere, especially during playoff games.
The Sacramento Kings have had some rivalries against the Utah Jazz and the Dallas Mavericks. They have won two out of three playoff series against the Jazz since the 1998-99 season. Meanwhile, they also have a 2-1 playoff series record against the Mavericks in the 2000s.
But historically their greatest rivals were fellow Californians, the Los Angeles Lakers, especially during that hotly-contested 2003 Western Conference Finals. The Lakers won the series in seven games but not after stiff opposition from the Kings. As of the 2021-22 NBA season, the Kings have won 161 out of 441 regular season games against the Lakers.
