What’s Gotten Into Sam Dalembert?
When we get to this point in the season, it’s easy for the media to put lottery-bound teams like the Sacramento Kings on the backburner. To many people, teams like that won’t matter until the June draft, and that’s why hardly anybody knows what an amazing March Samuel Dalembert has been having.
Despite the fact he’s averaging only 7.6 points and 7.5 rebounds per game—both numbers below his career averages—over the past 6 games he’s putting up 16.7 points and 11.8 rebounds. Those are huge increases for a guy who’s been largely disappointing since being acquired over the summer.
"He started out the year injured, and then his conditioning and timing were a problem. Plus we had Carl Landry, which means we had one too many bigs," said Kings’ head coach Paul Westphal. "His minutes just weren’t consistent, but since the trade I think it’s settled things down for Sam.
"He’s in shape, he’s really learning where his opportunities are, and he’s playing the way we always envisioned he’d play. It just took him a little while."
Some would argue Dalembert’s sudden uptick in numbers is a last-ditch effort to prove his worth towards the end of a contract year, but the logjam in the frontcourt before the Landry trade was a real problem. The fact it no longer exists has to be taken seriously as a real reason for Dalembert’s recent hot play.
"It’s the way the business is," Dalembert said. "Before I came in, the plan changed. Sometimes you’re putting a guy in and you know exactly what the game plan’s going to be, but other times you find that you want to try something different. Especially when you have a difficult season, you’re trying different stuff left and right—different combinations of players. When [Landry] did leave, that opened up opportunities and minutes for me, and I took advantage of it."
That’s been enough to already get some GMs across the league interested in Dalembert when he does become a free agent this summer. In fact, one Western Conference GM said this week they were already batting around the possibility of extending him a contract when the time comes.
{AUTHOR_BOX}For Dalembert, who turns 30 years old in May, this particular free agency session could be his last, and that’s why he’ll have to decide whether it’s more important to get paid, or to win. Ideally, he’d get both.
"Sometimes it just depends on what teams are interested," Dalembert said. "You’ve got to see what’s going to work, and sometimes you’d be surprised. It isn’t always the obvious team that you end up with. It might be a situation where everybody is thinking that there’s no way it’s going to work, but then it works. When the time comes, I’m really going to have to evaluate that and see what’s out there. In the meantime, I just have to go out there and play."
The Kings have only 17 wins on the season—the second fewest in the entire NBA—with only 13 left to play. Dalembert said right now, he’s only focused on scraping together as many wins as possible before the year ends.
"As a player with pride, we’re just trying to win as many games as we can right now. After that, when the season ends, we’ll see what happens. It’s one of the things I let my agent worry about. I can only control what I can control. Right now, I just want to help the team win, and eventually when the summer comes, we’ll see where I’m going to be."
It’s hard to believe that team will be Sacramento, but where ever he ends up, numbers like the ones Dalembert is putting up in March can be a huge help for a ton of teams. We’ll see next season whether or not he’s playing well because an opportunity opened up, or because there’s one last big contract at stake.
Either way, it’s nice to see Sam Dalembert playing like Sam Dalembert again.
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