NBA Trade Rumors: Sacramento Kings Need to Give Up on DeMarcus Cousins

DeMarcus Cousins of the Sacramento Kings is an absolute mammoth. He stands at 6'11" and 270 pounds with a 7'6" (!) wingspan.

Yet, for a man his size, he has terrific touch around the basket and fantastic footwork to go along with instinctive and aggressive rebounding skills. 

So, why then, is the Kentucky product the biggest name headlining any NBA trade rumor without Dwight Howard's name on it? Why would the Sacramento Kings possibly get rid of this 21-year-old with immense talent?

Oh, I don't know. Lack of maturity and work ethic come to mind. Poor attitude. Unwillingness to buy in to the team game plan. 

And that's just to name a few. 

This whole saga started a couple of days ago when Cousins apparently demanded a trade out of Sacramento. Head coach Paul Westphal didn't take too kindly to that and held the second-year player out of the Kings' game that day.

However, ever since then, reports, such as this one from Sports Illustrated, have been claiming that Cousins never demanded a trade and Sacramento doesn't intend on trading him.

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Cousins’ agent told SI.com that the second year big man had not in fact requested a trade, and Kings co-owner Joe Maloof told the media that the team was not looking to trade him.

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Then why exactly was the big man held out of the game? If it wasn't because of a trade demand, then it was probably something a whole lot worse. Whatever happened, that's quite a 180. If I was running the Sacramento Kings, I would rid myself of this whole situation as soon as possible.

Take a step back and look at Cousins' history. 

Even back in high school, everyone knew of his immense talent, but "maturing emotionally (was) his biggest challenge in the development of his game," said Jerry Meyer of Rivals. 

Then, during his only year with Kentucky, he constantly battled head coach John Calipari and was seen pouting on the bench on multiple occasions. 

Now in the NBA, the immaturity issues have failed to go away. He had a fist fight last year with fellow teammate Donte Greene and was kicked out of practice on another occasion. It appears this year won't be any better.

At some point, you have to realize that enough is enough. The kid is a baby in a grown (really grown) man's body. 

I understand that everyone wants to be the amazing individual able to change him and turn his life around, but you also have to know when to be realistic and cut your losses. He's only 21 years old, sure, and he might grow as a human being, but he has that aura of not being able to change.

Some people just don't grow up. Cousins is one of those people.

If the Kings were smart, they would shop him now before his value plummets to the ground. According to the earlier report, the New Jersey Nets are still interested.

If Cousins has one more incident like this, no one will be interested and Sac-Town will be stuck with him. 

Sacramento is trying to rebuild its franchise and you don't do that with unlikable, uncaring guys like Cousins. Are 15 points and 12 rebounds per game really worth all of the headaches he will continually bring?