Have the A's Cursed the Sacramento Kings?

Jan 27, 2025; Brooklyn, New York, USA; Sacramento Kings guard De'Aaron Fox (5) reacts during the second quarter against the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-Imagn Images
Jan 27, 2025; Brooklyn, New York, USA; Sacramento Kings guard De'Aaron Fox (5) reacts during the second quarter against the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-Imagn Images / Brad Penner-Imagn Images

The Sacramento Kings appear to be cursed. After fighting off relocation and snapping a 16-year playoff drought recently, the Kings are reportedly open to trading their star player, De'Aaron Fox, ahead of the NBA trade deadline. Fox is under contract with the Kings for one more season after this one, and is set to make a little over $37 million during the 2025-26 season.

According to Yahoo! Sports, Fox is apparently eyeing a landing with the San Antonio Spurs when he reaches free agency, so if the Kings aren't going to be able to keep him, then they may as well trade him to get maximum value for him.

This news has also led Locked on Kings host and lifelong Oakland A's fan Matt George to point to a specific moment when the team's fortunes seemed to change.

That is A's owner John Fisher at Sutter Health Park in April of 2024, announcing that his franchise would officially be leaving Oakland while their planned Las Vegas ballpark is built. The destination just happened to be one that was open to him by Kings and Sacramento River Cats' owner, Vivek Ranadivé.

Questioning whether or not the connection to the A's is the reason for the Kings troubles is totally fair, given that they had been lighting plenty of beams during the 2022-23 campaign, en route to their first playoff appearance since 2005-06. Sacramento finished ten games above .500 (46-36) last season, seeing them finish ninth in the West and losing the play-in game against the New Orleans Pelicans.

Right now the Kings are 24-22 with the No. 10 seed in the West, and looking to trade their best player.

The timeline adds up, and the A's could be at fault here, but given the fact that the Kings were hosed in the 2002 Western Conference Finals against the Los Angeles Lakers, it feels like there may be something deeper going on here. Success has not followed this franchise around in recent history, and that was true before Fisher set foot at Sutter Health.

It could certainly be argued that the A's impending arrival in Sacramento hasn't helped the curse, but it's a little tricky to say that they're the ones that caused it to happen in the first place. That is, unless you're counting the playoff appearance two seasons ago as the breaking of the curse, in which case this is almost certainly all John Fisher's fault.

Maybe, just maybe, Fisher told Ranadivé about how he has delighted in trading away fan favorite players in the past, and that gave the Kings owner an idea. With all that being said, A's single-game tickets go on sale later this week.


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Jason Burke
JASON BURKE

Jason has been covering the A’s at various sites for over a decade, and was the original host of the Locked on A’s podcast. He also covers the Stanford Cardinal as they attempt to rebuild numerous programs to prominence.