With DeMarcus Cousins moving on to New Orleans, the stories of his time in Sacramento will be spun into legend. Over time, they’ll either become tales of the dysfunctional star who wreaked havoc on his team and the entire city of Sacramento, or yarns of the misunderstood stud who just needed a change of scenery and ownership to reach his full, championship potential. For now, they’re a little closer to historical fact than tall tale, and one may tie directly in with the Sixers’ previous dealings with Vivek Ranadive and the Kings.

In 2014, Vivek was very excited to draft Nik Stauskas. “Nik rocks!” will go down in infamy. Here’s what Vivek used to have to say about Sauce Castillo:

https://twitter.com/SacramentoKings/status/482962728428924928

Somewhere along the line, that turned. Obviously Stauskas’ shooting woes and 4.4 points per-game in his time with the Kings had something to do with that, but as a player he’s actually pretty comparable to Buddy Hield. But he’s better. And roughly the same age.

So what happened? Why would Vivek abandon a man he so coveted, just to clear up space for free agents he wasn’t actually able to sign? Let’s put on our speculation hats and wonder if he essentially had to choose between Stauskas and Cousins – an easy call. On today’s episode of the Lowe Post podcast, Zach Lowe brought up some of Boogie and Sauce’s past:

“DeMarcus Cousins ruined Nik Stauskas … or almost did. The stories about DeMarcus Cousins berating Nik Stauskas, threatening to fight Nik Stauskas on the plane to China when they were going there for the preseason, two years ago or whenever that was … he ruined Nik Stauskas.”

That may have been a very small part of it, but if it was, Boogie is not the crux of the two deals that decimated the future of the franchise. The other constant in this, of course, is Vivek and Vlade. It’s very possible that Vivek sets his sights on a player (Stauskas, Rondo, Hield) and hones in on them until he can get them. But with Boogie gone, and a rebuild ahead, they have no excuse.

[h/t realSeanG20]