As Jerry Reynolds likes to say, the goal of a basketball game is to put the ball in the basket. If you can't do that, you're not going to win many games. The Kings have been atrocious at putting the ball in the basket, shooting just 39.0% from the field and 25.8% from three point range through the first 15 games of the season. Those are terrible numbers, but just how terrible are they?

Well since the advent of the three-point line in the 1979-80 season, no team has shot below 40% from the floor for the season or 26% from three. The Kings are currently beneath both marks (H/T Alex Kramers). The lockout definitely has been a factor, as you can see by the fact that of the four teams just ahead of the Kings, three of them (the Bulls, Hawks and Nets) were from the shortened 1998-99 season, and the other (the Wizards) is from this year.

UPDATE: I had originally put that the Kings were on pace to be the worst shooting three point team at all time as well. I was mistaken. The Kings, while bad from three, are not nearly the worst, as many teams struggled to adapt to the line in its first 10 years. This year's Lakers are actually worse from three than the Kings at 25%, but both those teams are shooting worse from 3 than any team has since the 1990-91 season.

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The Kings as a team have definitely been worse than expected, but if there is one group that has been better than the rest, it's the bigs. With DeMarcus Cousins, J.J. Hickson, Jason Thompson, and Chuck Hayes, the Kings have a deep big man rotation that still has potential to get better.

The biggest reason for optimism from these guys has been on the defensive end. All four bigs are currently better than average on that end, with one guy in particular (DeMarcus Cousins) standing out. All four Kings bigs are solid rebounders, and only one (Hickson) is really struggling offensively.

Speaking of Hickson, the Kings will have a decision to make this summer about which big to keep between Hickson and Thompson. It is slightly possible that the team could choose to keep both, especially considering that both players are Restricted Free Agents, but I believe only one will be retained. Currently, Hickson has been given more of a chance to succeed, but Thompson has been far more efficient and productive.

Chuck Hayes was the Kings marquee free agent signing this offseason, but he only played 8 games before dislocating his shoulder against Milwaukee, and will be out a further three weeks.

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Yesterday we took a look at our guards' advanced statistics, and today it is the wings turn. Sacramento has received very little quality production from its wings so far this season, and as you probably guessed, the stats are going to back it up. A lot of the Kings struggles on offense can be attached to the lack of production from the wing position. That is because a major part of the Kings offensive gameplan is to draw attention in the middle and then kick it out to a wing for an open shot. The unfortunate part of this for Sacramento is that every single one of their wings is in a shooting slump right now. Spot-Up shots are usually high percentage shots (since they're mostly wide open), but the Kings are shooting a league worst 29.5% in those situations. Nearly 40% of those spot-up opportunities have gone to the four wings listed in this post.

If you have a heart condition, do not read the rest of this post. It's for your own good.

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The good news is that the Sacramento Kings will not go 0-33 on the road this season. Thank you, Toronto. The bad news is that the Sacramento Kings might go 1-32 on the road this season, because God, they are awful on the road.

Here's a look at that mercifully over 1-4 road trip the Kings just ended.

OFFENSE

The Kings scored an average of 83.5 points, with a low of (wretch) 60 (barf) and a high of 98. The Kings had an average effective field goal percentage of .405 on the trip, which comes out to 0.81 points per field goal attempt. League average this season is .481 eFG, or 0.962 points/FGA.

The Kings' offensive efficiency for the trip: 87.4 points per 100 possessions. League average this season: 99.9. Holy Lord Almighty.

DEFENSE

The Kings allowed an average of 100.8 points per game, meaning that the margin of (un-)victory was -17.3. (This actually improved the team's road margin for the season. Thanks, Raptors!) Oppoents shot an eFG of .516, or 1.08 points per FGA. That shooting difference between the Kings and their opponents is worth roughly 21.6 points per game, completely swamping the Kings' big free throw advantage and strong offensive rebounding.

The Kings' defensive efficiency for the trip: 105.5. So the Kings' offense was 13.5 points per 100 possessions worse than average, and the defense was 5.6 points worse.

barf barf barf barf barf

Statistics are a valuable tool when analyzing how a player is performing on the court, but at their most basic, statistics don't tell the whole story. Advanced Statistics help broaden the narrative a bit and provide a more accurate reading of how a player is performing on the court. Ideally when analyzing a players play, you don't want to use just statistics or just your eyes, but a combination of both.

As Kings fans, we've watched almost every game this team has played. Most of us have an idea of what our players do well and what they don't. In this post, I'm going to go more in-depth by providing some complementary advanced statistics to analyze our players. This first post is on the guards, with posts on the wings and the bigs coming Wednesday and Thursday respectively. I'll be doing these analyses approximately once a month, so that we can track our teams' progression and regression.

I will be using several sources for my analysis. First, I'll be using the Advanced Statistics found on Basketball-Reference (PER, TS%, AST%, etc.). I will also be using Synergy Sports Technology's data to give a more in-depth look at how our players perform each possession, both offensively and defensively. Synergy Sports uses PPP (Points Per Possession) to track individual players. They track individual play types on both ends of the court and I will be provding samples of each players major play types. Finally, I'll be using HoopData's shot location statistics to see how our players shoot from certain locations.

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The Sacramento Kings are now 0-5 on the road to start the season, losing by an average of 23 points. At home the team is 3-3 and looks much better; that doesn't help when you have one home game out of nine during this brutal stretch to open Keith Smart's Kings coaching career.

If there's a bright spot to be found in the continued suffering on the road, though, is that's no matter the venue, DeMarcus Cousins has been producing really well.

Cousins is averaging 14.9 points and 10.1 rebounds per game. He's No. 9 in the league in both rebounds and blocks per game (1.8) ... while playing just 26 minutes per game. That restricted playing time comes largely due to foul trouble -- he's up to 4.9 per game this season, and 6.7 per 36 minutes, which is wondrously high -- and conditioning. On a rate basis, Cousins is No. 1 in the league in offensive rebounding (19.2 percent of opportunities) and No. 4 in total rebounding (20.8 percent).

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DeMarcus Cousins is off to a good start in the eyes of many Sacramento Kings fans, even if the numbers aren't spectaular. While Boogie is averaging 14 points and 11 rebounds per game, his field goal percentage is down around 40 and he's had nine fouls through two games -- too many given how vital he is to the team. Cousins has been good defensively, especially in the opener against the Lakers where he made Pau Gasol's life miserable late.

But there's real reason for hope on the offensive end, too: Cousins is using his shooting attempts much better, even if it hasn't get translated in the shooting percentages.

The biggest offensive knock on Cousins last season -- even bigger than the turnovers, of which there were way too many -- was that he took way too many long jumpers. He's a decent shooter and can get off a jumper against anyone, but his physical make-up and agility are best suited in the pivot. A key development point for Cousins would be to shift his shot structure to rely less on the perimeter and mid-range and more on the post.

So far, so good.

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About a year ago I created an Advanced Statistics Calculator for my general NBA Blog, the Pick and Scroll.  Unfortunately, there are only so many hours in a day, and I decided to focus solely on writing about the Kings and for StR.

You may have noticed a new picture on the sidebar of a calculator (the one up on top).  If you click it, it will take you to the new home of the Advanced Stats Calculator on StR.  Using it is very simple; Insert the raw stats from the game(s) you want and click calculate and you get your result.  

Advanced Statistics can be very useful when you want to go in deeper analysis on a game or how a player/team played.  Basketball-Reference has a nice glossary explaining what the Advanced Statistics in the calculator actually are in case you don't know.

Enjoy.

P.S. Before you ask, I cannot create a calculator for PER.  It is an incredibly complicated formula and beyond my programming skill.  However, I may add John Hollinger's Game Score, a simplified version of PER, at a later date.