DeMarcus Cousins still has Sacramento on his mind. Fans should just forget about him
DeMarcus Cousins is up to his old, tired act. Someone drop the curtain already.
For all of his marvelous basketball skills, Cousins remains programmed to blame others for what ails him or his team. Didn’t we expect him to grow out of it by now? He hasn’t and he won’t, but then again, Cousins is only 31, so there’s time.
Cousins is who he is, a giver off the court, a man of the people in the community who helps better the lives of those in need. But on his biggest stage, he is a lousy basketball teammate. He was in Sacramento, without debate and confirmed by teammates and coaches, and he’s showing it again with his eighth team, the Denver Nuggets.
Cousins earned an ejection in Game 1 of a playoff series against the Golden State Warriors. Then on Monday night there was the familiar image of Boogie barking with a teammate in the second half of Game 2 when things veered out of control for the reeling Nuggets.
Last Friday, before his antics went on national display, Cousins poured out his thoughts with Marc J. Spears in a lengthy interview on Andscape. This included how Cousins has endured myriad crushing injuries, stalling a career that got off to such a promising start in Sacramento when he was selected fifth overall in the 2010 draft, followed by four All-Star campaigns. The former Kings center stressed to Spears that what he really wants is to be appreciated as a player, saying, “For those that are gracious to my career, I appreciate you. But the rest of them, you know what it is. Middle finger to you.”
How about this: a middle finger right back, from paying customers or general NBA fans who deserved better than his theatrics and blame game. Nuggets fans may be exercising their finger of speech now.
A day after his conversation with Spears, Cousins was ejected at Chase Center. You’ve seen the show: bicker with referees, two technical fouls, tossed, and then the astonished expression of, “What’d I do?”
On Monday, after the Andscape story made its rounds on social media and talk shows, Cousins had another chance to help the Nuggets and his coach Mike Malone, who connected with him in Sacramento and brought Cousins aboard in Denver after he was cut loose by the Milwaukee Bucks. As Game 2 started to veer wildly out of control for Denver, Cousins couldn’t help but get into a verbal spat during a timeout with Will Barton, a teammate. Malone explained it later as “frustration.”
On Sacramento: ‘They sucked’
Cousins and frustration, they go hand-in-hand. The center expressed as much in the Andscape interview from his Kings days, saying, “It’s hard to even focus on Sacramento, and for what? They sucked before I got there. They sucked when I was there. They sucked after I left.”
Cousins declined to mention that his attitude especially sucked. That’s why the Kings shipped Cousins out via trade to New Orleans during the 2015-16 season for shooting guard Buddy Hield and a first-round pick that turned out to be De’Aaron Fox. The big man was moved because his act wasn’t sustainable with the Kings, a club rooted in misery and defeat. He was moved because he wasn’t worth a max contract. The Kings could have given Cousins the moon and he would have wondered, “Is that all?”
Cousins was correct in the Andscape story in his assessment that the Kings were a dysfunctional mess in his time with the club, with constant turnover, but he headed that parade with his behavior. He barked at coaches. Some threw him out of practice. He argued with teammates and Kings staffers on team flights. He boiled over with coaches after losses in the locker room. He got into it with members of the media.
Cousins raved about Kings fans in the story, and some fans will continue to be apologists in defending him now, believing that he was wronged by all when he was here. I spoke to a lot of fans during his tenure here, and a lot of them expressed disgust at his act. Some were embarrassed that he was wearing Sacramento colors.
Another Boogie hater, right?
I got to meet Cousins the man a few times, out of uniform, and he was a delight. Two different guys, this Boogie.
He was dressed as Santa Claus during the holidays, boosting kids with toy drives. He was radiant and cheerful during free youth basketball camps in the region. He attended Grant High School and Sacramento Charter High sporting events, signing autographs, taking selfies with kids, blending in, explaining, “I can relate to these kids. Great kids, some of them with tough backgrounds, and some of them misunderstood. That’s me.”
Cousins paid for the funeral services of a slain Grant football star J.J. Clavo. He did it because he cared. Cousins donated money to Sac High for new basketball bleachers, once telling me, “It was the right thing to do.”
In 2015, a freshman named Jordan Brown loomed large as a 6-foot-10 freshman on the Woodcreek High varsity team. He was a fan of Cousins. Within 30 minutes after a crushing playoff loss for Woodcreek at Arco Arena, a game attended by Cousins, Brown asked if there was any way he could go over and say hello to Cousins, who was seated courtside.
Sure. Follow me. I’ve got a media pass. We’ll find a way. We hustled over. I leaned in to say hello to Cousins and told him the guy casting a shadow behind me was a fan. Cousins waved off security to say hello to Brown. He complimented the teenager on his game, skills, effort and attitude. The chat made both of their day.
That Cousins is not the same one that played angry and with a cause in Sacramento. That’s fine when it comes to rebounding, not in dealing with people. Cousins suggested in the Andscape story that he is worthy of having his jersey retired by the Kings, insisting he’s the best player in Kings history. No chance. For starters, Cousins is not the best player in Sacramento history. That’s Chris Webber. I wouldn’t even list Cousins as the best center in Sacramento Kings history. My nod would go to Vlade Divac, whom Kings do-all marvel Jerry Reynolds once described as, “The greatest teammates I’ve ever seen in basketball.”
No one has said that about Cousins. In the same interview with Spears, Cousins shared his biggest basketball regret. That was having a predraft workout with the Kings in 2010. He wished it had never happened. All things considered, it’s mutual. The Kings didn’t get their money’s worth from Cousins. In the story, Cousins bemoaned that he gave more than he received. That’s a hard no. The Kings paid Cousins some $50 million for his services, a fortune by any measure.
Said Cousins, “What did Sac do for me? Besides say my name (on draft day). I did more for them than they did for me. I had two owners, three GMs, and seven coaches in seven years. Not much more needs to be said.”
George Karl had something to say about it. The retired coach soon headed to the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame went to Twitter to counter Cousins. Karl was one of the coaches Cousins burned through in Sacramento. Tweeted Karl on Cousins that the Kings, “Paid you approx $50M and gave you the opportunity to play professional basketball for a living.”
Karl wasn’t done. He Tweeted later, “I grew up blue collar with a mindset to always appreciate the gifts, mentors and opportunities I was given. And I learned to never upset the basketball gods. Cause they are watching and karma is real.”
This story was originally published April 20, 2022 at 5:00 AM.