Inside The Kings

Newly-Acquired King Steps Into Spotlight After Domantas Sabonis Injury

Jonas Valanciunas has big shoes to fill with Domantas Sabonis set to miss at least ten days with a sprained ankle.

Justin Kovacs

Mar 17, 2025; Sacramento, California, USA; Sacramento Kings center Jonas Valanciunas (17) passes the ball against Memphis Grizzlies center Zach Edey (14) during the fourth quarter at Golden 1 Center. Mandatory Credit: Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images
Mar 17, 2025; Sacramento, California, USA; Sacramento Kings center Jonas Valanciunas (17) passes the ball against Memphis Grizzlies center Zach Edey (14) during the fourth quarter at Golden 1 Center. Mandatory Credit: Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images / Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images
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When the Sacramento Kings traded Sidy Cissoko and two second-round draft picks for Jonas Valanciunas on February 5th, most analysts graded the move highly. The Kings acquired a reserve center with elite rebounding skills who can also be counted on to contribute offensively. 

As a quality backup to starting center Domantas Sabonis, Valanciunas has proven to be valuable. However, for the second time in his short tenure with Sacramento, Valanciunas will be thrust into the starting lineup for a significant stretch of games. 

The Kings will need Valanciunas to replicate as much of Sabonis’s production as possible over the next six or seven games, with Sabonis set to miss at least ten days with a moderate ankle sprain. This is no easy task, as Sabonis leads the NBA with 13.9 rebounds per game while averaging over 19 points and 6 assists.

Valanciunas is unlikely to stuff the stat sheet quite to the level Sabonis does, as Valanciunas is not the passer and facilitator that Sabonis is from the center spot. Sabonis ranks second in the NBA with 51 double-doubles and third with 9 triple-doubles this season. That kind of overall production is what makes Sabonis unique, and is not something you can expect a backup to provide.

However, Valanciunas is an excellent scorer and rebounder in his own right, and with starter’s minutes can at least approach the nightly numbers that Sabonis puts up. Valanciunas’s averages of 9.5 points and 8.1 rebounds in just under 20 minutes per game with the Kings are impressive enough, but a better indication of what he is capable of becomes clear when we look at his per-36 minutes statistics.

For his career, Valanciunas has averaged 18.8 points and 13.3 rebounds per-36 minutes. In 17 games with Sacramento this season, he has scored slightly less at 17.6 points but has put up an impressive 15.0 rebounds per-36 minutes. 

In fact, Valanciunas’s TRB% (an estimate of the percentage of total rebounds a player grabbed while on the floor) of 23.2 with the Kings this season would rank as the second-highest of his career. For context, Sabonis leads the NBA in this category with a TRB% of 22.2 for the season. With Sabonis out, Valanciunas can provide virtually identical performance on the boards for the Kings. 

On the defensive end of the floor, Valanciunas can be considered a slight upgrade over Sabonis. In six games as a starter for Sacramento, Valanciunas has averaged 0.8 steals and 1.0 blocks in 26.7 minutes per game. Sabonis is averaging 0.6 steals and 0.4 blocks in 34.8 minutes per game this season, so Valanciunas can offer a little more in the way of clogging passing lanes and protecting the rim.

Domantas Sabonis is regarded as one of the best screeners in the league, setting some of the hardest, most difficult picks to get around. Since acquiring Sabonis via trade in February 2022, the Kings have made this skill a feature of their offense. Pick-and-roll sets and dribble handoffs are both integral actions in the Sacramento offensive playbook. 

To illuminate this, look no further than Screen Assists (a screen that leads directly to a field goal) and Screen Assists Points (the points scored from those Screen Assists) per game. Sabonis leads the NBA in both categories by a rather healthy margin, averaging 13.5 Screen Assist Points on 6.1 Screen Assists per game.

NBA Screen Assist Leaders for the 2024-25 Season
NBA Screen Assist Leaders for the 2024-25 Season / NBA.com

This is another area where Valanciunas can approximate the level of production that Sabonis provides, as Valanciunas is known to be a tough screen setter as well. Valanciunas is averaging 6.8 Screen Assist Points on 2.9 Screen Assists this year in just 19.9 minutes per game, so with starter’s minutes we can expect those numbers to increase.

Losing a player with the distinctive and rare skill set that Domantas Sabonis has would be difficult for any team to deal with. Thanks to a trade they made last month, the Kings may be better prepared to deal with such a loss than they have been at any point since trading for Sabonis. 

Jonas Valanciunas is going to get the opportunity to step into a big role for the next two weeks and possibly more, and the Kings need him to produce like his fellow Lithuanian to avoid having their season completely derailed.

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Justin Kovac
JUSTIN KOVACS

Justin Kovacs covers the NBA and Sacramento Kings for Sacramento Kings On SI.

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