The Official Washington Wizards Thread

[Destino]

Wall still hasn't entered the game in the 4th quarter yet

Magic spray isn't cheap.

[StillUnknown]

Wittman waited until there were 2:54 remaining in the 4th to bring Wall back in. Indefensible really.

---------- Post added February-1st-2013 at 10:12 PM ----------

Garrett Temple started the game tonight, don't remember seeing him at all in the 2nd half.

[stevemcqueen1]

The past few games have been so painful. Now Wall is hurt. Beal is hurt. Nene has been hurt for a while. Spurs tomorrow night. The next few games are completely brutal. The optimism of 7-3 is pretty much gone now.

We've got to get a good draft pick out of this year. If it can go wrong, it ****ing already has. This year has been a trial. We need to get Nerlens.

[Destino]

Wittman waited until there were 2:54 remaining in the 4th to bring Wall back in. Indefensible really.

---------- Post added February-1st-2013 at 10:12 PM ----------

Garrett Temple started the game tonight, don't remember seeing him at all in the 2nd half.

Wittman is a complete idiot. It's not just his rotations but his offense isn't working when the game slows. I think Flip would have one much better with this roster.

---------- Post added February-1st-2013 at 10:51 PM ----------

The past few games have been so painful. Now Wall is hurt. Beal is hurt. Nene has been hurt for a while. Spurs tomorrow night. The next few games are completely brutal. The optimism of 7-3 is pretty much gone now.

We've got to get a good draft pick out of this year. If it can go wrong, it ****ing already has. This year has been a trial. We need to get Nerlens.

The half court offense isn't going to improve until we get a perimeter player that can create and a coach that has an offense that isn't written in crayon. Ideally a SF upgrade would be perfect but this may be he worst year for it,

[shuler74]

wizards needs to draft this guy...

[The Robert Griffin Experience]

And without RG3 we're still slamming Dan Snyder.

Maybe. It's entirely possible that without RGIII, we're looking forward to next year coming off a 9-7 or 8-8 season with a young core of Morris Clairborne, Jonathan Martin and Russell Wilson. Not that I'd trade RGIII for all those guys combined twice over, but this team was on the right track long before he traded for RGIII.

The point is, Ted Leonsis is bad at running pro sports franchises, and loves to pretend he's good at it, and vomits spin about how brilliant he is.

Also, the thing with the Harden situation is that Harden is already a top 15, maybe a top 10 player, who's 23. I've seen enough from Beal that he MIGHT be that good. But Harden already is that good.

Also I think we should trade Wall. He provided a nice spark coming back but the fact is, he seems totally dependent on a healthy Beal, he will demand the max, and giving him the max is a franchise-crippling move. If Wall + Nene can get expirings and a lottery pick, I do it. Wall's a bust (given his draft spot and the expectations given and the pre-draft hype - remember when Rose was his FLOOR?), let's not mince words. He's an incredible athletic talent and he's a great passer, but he's a terrible shooter and his basketball IQ is below-average, and we can't toss a max contract at him hoping he'll mature into an elite player.

[stevemcqueen1]

I completely disagree that Wall's a bust. I don't think I could disagree more. I think he's already proven he's a good PG and I think he will be an All Star PG in time. If you build the right team around him, I think he'll be enormously effective and grow into his transcendent talents.

And he absolutely does not have a below average BBall IQ. He's a brilliant playmaker on offense and he's becoming one on defense too.

I don't understand the teeth gnashing about Wall's potential contract. He's going to get what he earns. Bottom line, you absolutely have to build around Wall because we're not going to get another talent like him for a long time. Trading him would be an absolute disaster that sets the team back who knows how many years? There isn't a single player in this class that would be picked over John Wall if he came out as a senior this year.

Also, I contend that it's not Beal vs. Harden. It's Beal plus a likely top 4 pick this year vs. Harden. On rookie contracts that help keep us under the luxury tax as the key pieces of the team develop together whereas signing Harden would have put us well into the tax for at least this year and next year. That's a HUGE difference.

I couldn't give less of a **** about the Capitals or the Mystics TBH. But I know the NBA and I see the potential this Wiz construction still has and I understand the timeline we're looking at. You've got a good foundation of Wall & Beal to move forward with but it's still years away from fully maturing. They are potential top five players at their positions. Maybe higher in any given year. Once they do mature, this team will win a lot of games, period.

After them, you've got mostly nothing though. Okafor and Nene are maybe B level players today, but they're so much older than Wall and Beal and they only serve to buttress the roster enough to keep the team competitive each night. They need to be replaced with a big time talent at PF or C sooner than later because they will probably decline from here. Crawford is probalby a B- level player now, maybe a little less, no more than a role player for any good team. But he's really the only other young piece proving he's worth keeping. Five good NBA players on the team. Only four of whom have a PER over the supposed league average of 15, and two of them being short term pieces. That's why we aren't winning yet, not because Wall is a failure.

Singleton and Ves are not developing and don't even seem to have roles. The time is running out on them. Ariza takes as much off the table as he puts on it. Seraphin has regressed and may lose his role on the team moving forward. Booker is pretty good but his availability is so unreliable. Martell, Price, Temple, etc., all vet stop gaps whose primary value comes from how cheap they are.

The team is still lacking long term talent and an acceptable level of talent among the role players who need to be filling out the roster. We could get by with a player like Booker being used for a role if we didn't have question marks with almost every other role player.

The heavy lifting is already done regardless. We've got two potential stars. Get a good front court player and you can build everything else pretty easily. When you've got your basic foundation of star players, finding role players is easy. Look at the Clippers. They were just as awful for longer than we've been and they very rapidly improved after they got their foundation set and it matured.

Hopefully we draft high again this season and get a good one. We've got a terrible record and there are at least two, maybe three or four bigs that are really good. If they don't screw this draft up and eventually get a worthy coach, the Wizards will be fine, and they will be built to sustain success.

[RonArtest15]

Maybe. It's entirely possible that without RGIII, we're looking forward to next year coming off a 9-7 or 8-8 season with a young core of Morris Clairborne, Jonathan Martin and Russell Wilson. Not that I'd trade RGIII for all those guys combined twice over, but this team was on the right track long before he traded for RGIII.

The point is, Ted Leonsis is bad at running pro sports franchises, and loves to pretend he's good at it, and vomits spin about how brilliant he is.

Also, the thing with the Harden situation is that Harden is already a top 15, maybe a top 10 player, who's 23. I've seen enough from Beal that he MIGHT be that good. But Harden already is that good.

Also I think we should trade Wall. He provided a nice spark coming back but the fact is, he seems totally dependent on a healthy Beal, he will demand the max, and giving him the max is a franchise-crippling move. If Wall + Nene can get expirings and a lottery pick, I do it. Wall's a bust (given his draft spot and the expectations given and the pre-draft hype - remember when Rose was his FLOOR?), let's not mince words. He's an incredible athletic talent and he's a great passer, but he's a terrible shooter and his basketball IQ is below-average, and we can't toss a max contract at him hoping he'll mature into an elite player.

Wall a bust, what???!!!???

Not living up to RIDICULOUS expectations (so far), yeah...I can see the argument. However to say he's a bust is flat out silly. Let me ask you...before the Clippers got Chris Paul, was Blake Griffin a bust?

Wall was put in arguably the worst situation for a player in the NBA. There was organizational dysfunction from top to bottom. Outside of maybe Paul/Rondo, I don't know of ANY point guard who would have thrived or done well playing here in DC with the boobs that we had on the roster. I've brought up this point many times before, but look at how Deron Williams played when he was sent from Utah to New Jersey. This was a man considered to be a top-3 PG in the league in many circles, and he was a shell of his former self while playing for the Nets. His coaching was bad, teammates were awful, etc. He was trying to do WAY too much and his game suffered. The same can be said about Wall. He's a pass-first PG. He's NOTHING like Derrick Rose. I hate the comparison. Anyone who compares the two hasn't paid close attention to their actual playing styles.

I'll give Wall a pass for his team struggles over the past couple of years. He's not without fault because there are a lot of aspects of his game that need obvious improvement. However, it's no coincidence, IMO, that Wall has played hte best basketball of his career upon his return to the team this season. He's got the best teammates he's ever had as a pro, and for all their ups and downs, the team has the highest b-ball IQ in his tenure as well. We're getting a small glimpse of the improvement this team shows when everyone has decent health. Obviously, it's not a finished product, but it provides the fans (and the media to an extent) some confidence that there is something here that can be built upon. All of this hinges on future moves laid out by the front office. Whether you have faith in them or not is another discussion for another day....however, my point remains that it's asinine to call Wall a bust as he's ONLY in his 3rd year as a pro. The W/L record is obviously poor, but his overall statistics put him in ELITE company as far as comparing him to other PGs early in their careers as well.


*edit*

SM beat me to the punch on this, but I echo his sentiments.

[StillUnknown]

I don't see Wall as a franchise player, and I'm not as sure as I used to be that he will develop into one, but calling him a bust on any level is ridiculous.

[stevemcqueen1]

The half court offense isn't going to improve until we get a perimeter player that can create and a coach that has an offense that isn't written in crayon. Ideally a SF upgrade would be perfect but this may be he worst year for it,

It'd be nice to get a creative SF but I'd settle for a 3 and D wing who actually hits his shots.

The level of shooting for the whole team seems to tank without Beal. He seems like the only guy who is going to truly be a good distance shooter on the team. Maybe Crawford but Crawford seems to only be able to shoot off the dribble.

We need other top notch shooters to keep the floor spaced out. The more you can put around Wall, the better. Best case scenario is not just getting a good shooting 3 but also a stretch 4 too IMO. Paul George & Kevin Love. That'd be a tremendous offense. How you get that, I have no idea, since you're right, there aren't any obvious top notch SFs in this class and probably no top stretch 4s. Maybe Isaiah Austin but I figured he was more of a 5 at his height. I don't know.

Otto Porter could fit the bill as a Nick Batum type 3 and D player but he's still pretty raw and might be more of a late lotto pick. McAdoo and Bennett aren't really the shooters I was looking for, plus they are tweeners and not pure SFs. Almost more of a face up PF. Tony Mitchell is a PF IMO. Poythress is also a tweener forward and not the kind of reliable distance shooter I want.

Shabazz is a tweener SG/SF who has the creative skills and the shooting ability I'd want but not the passing ability and not the ideal height for the position. McLemore is a SG at about 6'4, 200. He's also a finisher, not a creator.

It's looking like Otto Porter is our best bet at finding a pure SF that can shoot.

If we pick top four, I wouldn't want to take him in that range. I would take a big man or go BPA and just try and make it work with Shabazz or McLemore. Move Beal to SF and go small or deal McLemore for something good.

I would, however, consider trying to trade back into the first round if Otto Porter slipped into the late lottery. We really need to get SF sorted out.

[BRAVEONAWARPATH]

Georgetown plays St Johns on CBS at 4pm....if anyone's interested in watching Otto Porter.

[Destino]

I think every team needs a good amount of shooters. I'd say that unless a player is big and rebounds well there is no excuse not to be able to shoot at least decently well. Grunfeld's acceptance of players lacking basketball fundamentals is not a view I share. This team needs more than shooters however because Wall is not dominant (or very good) in a half court offense and this coach fails at X's and O's. They need an off the bounce offensive creator on the perimeter.

Wall is not a Bust. He's a starting PG in the NBA and that alone stops him from being a bust. He's not the dominant star he was thought to be, and frankly I doubt that he ever will be, so he may have failed to meet some of those expectations. He's way to good to be a bust though.

[Weganator]

Chicago Bulls Rumors ‏@chicagobullsbot
Chicago Bulls have spoken to the Washington Wizards expressing interest in F Jan Vesely. (Source: Rumor Press)

NOOOOOOOOOOO

[Destino]

Chicago Bulls Rumors ‏@chicagobullsbot
Chicago Bulls have spoken to the Washington Wizards expressing interest in F Jan Vesely. (Source: Rumor Press)

NOOOOOOOOOOO

Vesely for Noah straight up. In fact I say we throw in Singleton just to be nice.

[Weganator]

I was really hoping it would be Singleton or Booker that goes. The way the Ves runs the court and passes for a big had me holding out hope that he could turn into a solid player for us.

Don't get me wrong, he is incredibly raw and right now is either the worst or 2nd worst of those 3.. but I always thought if he bulked up a bit and got used to the position that he could be good.