Here's the next installment of our team-by-team season preview series on the Sacramento Kings.

2014-15 Record: 29-53

Notable Acquisitions: Kosta Koufos (FA), Marco Belinelli (FA), Willie Cauley-Stein (Draft), Rajon Rondo (FA)

Notable Departures: Jason Thompson, Carl Landry, Nik Stauskas, Derrick Williams

Temperature Check:

After an absolute circus of a season, the Kings have reloaded in a big way. After giving up assets to dump some unwanted contracts, Sacramento brought in two solid vets and took a gamble on the mercurial Rondo. With a full training camp and preseason at his disposal, George Karl will have a chance to blend these new faces in with his returning core in hopes of snapping the Kings playoff drought.

Inside the Playbook:

While Ben McLemore showed improvement after an uninspiring rookie season, the shooting guard position needed an upgrade if the Kings are to seriously compete for the playoffs in a loaded Western Conference. Enter Belinelli.

The Italian guard has always been something of an offensive Swiss Army knife. Teams have used him as a floor spacer, pick-and-roll ballhandler and run him off screens in attempts to bend the defense. So far in the preseason, it looks like the Kings won’t hesitate to use their new acquisition in all of these same ways.

This type of a versatility will be a far cry from McLemore. The young Kings wing was solid in spot up situations (68th percentile) but average or worse in every other play type Synergy classifies. In general, if McLemore wasn’t finishing in transition or shooting immediately curling off a screen or after a kickout, he wasn’t very helpful to the team’s offense.

Last season, Belinelli wasn’t much better in non-spot up actions. But that is out of character for  a player that, two seasons, ago, he ranked in the top quarter of the entire league in pick-and-rolls, off-screen situations and spot ups. And despite being a wing, Belinelli is a reliable playmaker in pick-and-rolls, which is partly why he ran the point for his Italian national team at Eurobasket. The ability to have a secondary ball handler on the court for a Kings team devoid of non-Rondo playmakers is a huge asset in an offensive system predicated on ball movement and dribble penetration.

Now that doesn’t mean that Belinelli is going to be some kind of offensive centerpiece. Far from it. But his ability to be used more than one way at an efficient level will give a Sacramento team scrapping in a loaded conference some additional flexibility in the half court. Enough so that it may push them over the top and into the playoffs.

Lineup to Watch:

DeMarcus Cousins-Rudy Gay-Omri Casspi-Marco Belinelli-Rajon Rondo

This group will likely be the team’s most effective offensive unit...on paper. Cousins is, well Cousins, and Gay seems to be settling into a role as a volume 3-point shooter this preseason. For those who actually paid attention to the Kings near the end of last season, they saw Casspi develop into a monster with Karl at the helm. And as mentioned above, Belinelli can put pressure on defenses in a variety of ways.

They will of course be led by Rondo, a player whose reputation hasn’t matched his actual impact (for a variety of reasons) for a few seasons. Regardless of your opinion on Rondo, he can still pass the basketball which, shooting woes aside, will mesh well with this quartet around him. Because of his playmaking, this group has some real potential to light up opposing NBA defenses. 

But as we know, games aren’t played on paper and potential can just as destructive as it can be helpful. The jury is still out on how Cousins will handle the role he play in Karl’s system, if he even commits to it in the first place. Gay as a volume 3-point shooter is a great step in his personal efficiency, in theory, but is also a totally unproven spectacle.  Casspi and Belinelli have had up-and-down careers, with the former in particular not having put produce consistently over an entire campaign.

When it comes to Rondo, well, there are certainly a few warning signs. Players that can’t shoot have become massive eyesores to league offenses over the past few seasons. Add that to the fact that during early season run in Boston, under an emerging offensive wizard in Brad Stevens, Rondo produced a negative impact to the team’s offense (more on that later).

The concerns behind this lineup are very real, but not enough so that Karl won’t play it. Especially early on, before the team (and the league) has a chance to compile data on its effectiveness there is no doubt that this 5-man unit will see the floor. And how they fare in those minutes could change the course of the Kings season.

The Wildcard:

Rajon Rondo

Seemingly bidding against themselves, Sacramento took an expensive one-year flier on a falling star. After a nightmare situation in Dallas -- for both him and the team -- Rondo’s value has total tanked.

In Boston, the team’s offensive rating rose by nearly two points when Rondo went to the bench. The damage was even worse in Dallas. When Rondo was on the floor for the Mavs, the team’s offense posted a brutal offensive rating of 101.7. When he sat, it was far more respectable 106.3 (the defense was slightly better, however). While these numbers aren’t totally indicative of Rondo’s real impact, they certainly aren’t promising signs.

Aside from his often discussed shooting woes, there are parts of Rondo’s game that still can blend to productive offense. But while he was once thought of as a franchise-altering player, maybe the realization we need to have with Rondo is that he’s now part of the middle class of players whose production is entirely dependent on his situation.

That means if Sacramento has surrounded Rondo with the right pieces and a solid system fit, he could bust out and lead them to the playoffs. But if the inverse is true, it could be a long season for both Rondo and the Kings.

Coach’s Question:

How often will George Karl utilize frontcourts with two non-shooting bigs?

With players like Gay and Casspi at his disposal, it will be tempting for Karl to embrace the modern evolution of the NBA and go with a perimeter-bound player at the four. Yet in the post-Carmelo Anthony era in Denver, Koufos and Kenneth Faried helped spearhead an offense that was the class of the league.

Koufos now returns to the fold is joined by Cousins and rookie Willie Cauley-Stein. Even second year man Eric Moreland has seen some run this preseason. But with the effectiveness of stretch 4s taking over the league, the value of great finishers and offensive rebounders has been lost in the shuffle. Combinations like Koufos and Cousins or Koufos and Cauley-Stein, etc just offer a different path to efficient offense.

It all depends on what Karl wants to emphasize. If it’s offensive rebounds and pounding the paint with rim finishes, two bigs could be the norm. If Karl wants to buy his penetrating guards maximum space, Gay and Casspi will see some run. When, how long and who Karl plays in his frontcourt will be an interesting subplot in the Kings season.

Best Case Scenario:

47-35 If....

Cousins buys in on both ends of the floor. Belinelli provides some stability on the wings while Karl’s system rejuvenates Rondo’s game. Gay spends a lot of time as a stretch 4 and proves capable of knocking down a high volume of shots beyond the arc at a solid clip.

Worst Case Scenario:

39-43 If…

Rondo feuds with yet another head coach. Belinelli misses a significant amount of time and McLemore shows little-to-no improvement. Karl can’t find frontcourt combos that give him production on both ends.  

Click here for a full list of NBA Season Previews from Brett Koremenos.