Rocky21

From Post 5863

As everyone knows, I've been high on Chris Singleton all year. He is the single best defensive player in this draft - and in my opinion, the best defender to come out of the last five drafts.

Yeah boi.

The Sports Guy's new site Grantland posted this feature on the draft today.

6. Washington Wizards

State of the Team: Much of Washington's future will depend on how quickly and fully John Wall develops into a franchise player. When you look beyond last year's no. 1 overall pick, the Wiz have six players under contract and none to be particularly excited about: The league's second-highest-paid player is putting up a staggering 11 points a game (Rashard Lewis), the power forward they locked up through 2015 has a career rebound rate of 13.8 (Andray Blatche), and the best wing-scorer on the roster put up an agonizing 45.6 TS percentage in his rookie season (Jordan Crawford). The lack of a proven or even promising player at almost every position leaves Ernie Grunfeld with the (sort of) luxury of picking the best non-point guard available. Of course, in a draft with (maybe) two potential All-Stars, this isn't the best time to be rebuilding.

Stats:

W-L RECORD: 23-59

eFG% RECORD: 23-59

TOV% RECORD: 41-41

REB% RECORD: 40-42

FTA% RECORD: 31-51

BIGGEST WEAKNESS: SHOOTING

Pick a shooting-rate stat and the Wizards ranked toward the bottom of it. Twenty-ninth in eFG%. Twenty-fifth in field goal percentage. Twenty-eighth in 3-point percentage. Twenty-fifth in free-throw percentage. The worst shooter on the team was unquestionably Jordan Crawford, who used a team-high 26.9 percent of Washington possessions after being acquired on February 23. He took 101 threes and hit just 24, the worst rate in the league for a guy with 100 attempts or more. Crawford finished with a .417 eFG%, the third-worst figure in the league for guys with 1,000 minutes played.

Further development from John Wall and a shock collar to help prevent Josh Howard from taking 3-pointers (30-for-115, a .260 shooting percentage over the past two years) should help.

Front Office Profile: Ernie Grunfeld was responsible for 11 consecutive playoff seasons (no titles) while running the New York Knicks and Milwaukee Bucks. He played in the NBA, too, as an effective role player, and seems to apply lessons learned as an eighth man to his work running teams: find one or two very good players, and get out of the way. In the post-Arenas era, Grunfeld has been prudent with contracts — after Rashard Lewis, no one will make more than $6 million next year — and for now, the plan is to let John Wall be John Wall, while everyone else scores 10 to 12 points a game. They're probably not far from a playoff berth and a first-round exit — all straight out of the Grunfeld playbook.

Click here for more....

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/6685360/view/full/grantland-nba-draft-lottery-preview

Seems like Kanter is the player the Wiz covet. Draft Express and Walter Football both have him going at 4.

I can't shake the feeling we end up with a boy named Jan.

God I wish I had not seen this. A skinny Euro named Jan? Aaaaarggggh!

The Curse

I think it started in the 1985 draft when we passed on Karl Malone and instead chose Kenny Green with the 12th pick. The Jazz selected the Mailman with the 13th pick and the rest is history.

Bernard King became an all-star, then injures himself after the break and essentially never playing for the Bullets again.

Four-time all-star Mark Price came to town in 1995 to be the point guard the Bullets needed before suffering injuries that would limit him to a total of seven games here.

Then there was John "Hot Plate" Williams, the 6-foot-7 phenom out of Louisiana State whose game was so sweet he made Magic Johnson rave . . . until Williams ate himself out of the league. "Dinner Bell" Mel Turpin did the same. Kevin Duckworth seemed to weigh about 280 when the Bullets acquired him, but got up to 325 or so before training camp.

The Bullets were poised and ready to draft Reggie Miller out of UCLA in 1987, but the Pacers unexpectedly snatched him and the Bullets wound up with Muggsy Bogues . . . for a year until he left in the expansion draft. Gheorghe Muresan appeared to be the giant centerpiece for a pretty imposing front line with Chris Webber and Juwan Howard, except that Muresan hurt his back filming the movie "My Giant" with Billy Crystal over the summer after that 1997 playoff appearance and for all practical purposes was done. Webber, who represented as much hope as Arenas and Butler together when he arrived in 1994 and wasn’t smoking pot and having run ins with the law on the way to practice, suffered a shoulder injury and went off to titillate other teams with playoff runs there. Even when Howard remained with the Bullets, via a David Stern mulligan, his $105 contract turned the town against him. He was also arrested on a drunk driving charge.

Terry Davis, Tim Legler, Jeff McInnis and Ben Wallace were traded to the Orlando Magic for Ike Austin. ike Austin! He averaged 6.7 points and 4.8 rebounds over 59 games while Ben Wallace made four NBA All-Star teams and had four NBA Defensive Player of the Year awards.

The franchise finally gets the No. 1 pick in the draft -- and the only thing worse than having the No. 1 pick in a year when there's no great franchise-altering player, is taking a high school kid. Kwame Brown turns out to be the worst No. 1 overall pick since LaRue Martin in 1972. Michael Jordan, the second greatest winner in league history after Bill Russell, turns out to be a HORRIBLE evaluator of talent.

Then came the Rip Hamilton and Rasheed Wallace trades. Andray Blatche got shot before he played his first game. The stupid one year rental of Randy Foye and Mike Miller.

And now the Wiz fall from 4th to 6th and are likely to draft a Euro named Jan. Just shoot me now.

It's quite unlikely that we finish 7th. That would require THREE non top 3 teams to move up ahead of us, something that I don't think has ever happened.

I don't see us picking fourth either. I expect one team behind us to move into the the top 3.

I think we either pick 5th or we move up into the top 3.

These are our lotto odds for this season:

Hey bro, where'd you get those odds from?

Well the draft lottery selection is tonight. It's on at 8:30PM on ESPN (for those too lazy to look it up.)

We have about a 10% chance at the # 1 pick and can finish no lower than 7th. :fingersx:

I really like how they incorporated the Washington Monument in the "d" in Wizards and "h" in Washington.

Good call Beast. I heard the announcer say they were there but I hadn't seen them until you pointed out where to look.

Love the home unis. They are sweet,

So anybody watching this morning?

I almost spit my coffeee out when I read these words. Juwan Howard.

Also if you want to attract a star you won't do it with a thin lineup and anonymous depth or with a completely unproven roster.

But maybe the best point guard prospect the league has seen in a few years?

Well thank God that is over! I appreciate Flop pulling the starters in the 4th quarter so we could finally tank something. I would have preferred the 3rd most ping pong balls (if we had lost the Celts game like we should have) but 4th is pretty good.

And did someone say the Hawks pick is already slotted at 18? I though the playoff bound teams picks hadn't been decided yet.

We'll see how the lotter goes but we'll get a good player with our first pick.

The ****in' Wizards. They lose when you want them to win and they win when you want them to lose.

Right now we have the 4th most ping pong balls but I just know we are going to beat Cleveland Wednesday night.

Now Minnesota. That's a team that knows how to tank the rest of the season.

sacramento & toronto both won tonight

I saw Toronto won (Thank God) but I didn't know Sacramento won too! That's schweet. I assume we'll beat Cleveland so it's crucial we lose to the Celts tonigh to wrap up having the 4th most ping pong balls.

toronto may be in full blown tank mode, they were down big most of the game to cleveland last night

our last 4 games are against better competition than their last 4 games

cle/minny have the top 2 opportunities wrapped up, I prefer to end up 3rd

I think the Raptors are tanking it big time. Same with the Timberwolves. I know Toronto has one more winnable game against the Nets and I don't think we will win another with the exception of the last game of the year versus Cleveland.

With Cleveland winning last night here are the chances of getting the # 1 pick in the draft through today

1. Cleveland or Minnesota 250 combinations, 25.0% chance

2. Cleveland or Minnesota 199 combinations, 19.9% chance

3. Washington or Toronto 156 combinations, 15.6% chance

4. Washington or Toronto 119 combinations, 11.9% chance

5. Sacramento 88 combinations, 8.8% chance

Chances of getting the # 1 pick in the draft through today

1. Cleveland 250 combinations, 25.0% chance

2. Minnesota 199 combinations, 19.9% chance

3. Washington or Toronto 156 combinations, 15.6% chance

4. Washington or Toronto 119 combinations, 11.9% chance

5. Sacramento 88 combinations, 8.8% chance

Man I wish the Wizards would quit ****in' winning!

OK so now the Wiz don't have to worry about having the worst record in franchise history (19-63) and they won't have the worst road record in NBA history (1990-91 Kings were 1-40 and the 1997-98 Denver Nuggets went 2-39) so for God's sake quick winning already!!!

All we're doing at this point is screwing up our lottery chances.

Wall gets suspended and Z gets just a fine? I'm calling bull**** on that!

James complained later that Washington’s Maurice Evans should have been called for a flagrant foul.

“I don’t know if Mo Evans intentionally wants to be dirty. I watch a lot of basketball. I see a lot of basketball every day, and anytime when someone gets grabbed around the neck, it’s an automatic flagrant-1. If I’m wrong, tell me I’m wrong,” James said. “Sometimes it’s unfair, because of how strong I am, you know. I can take the punishment of course, but at the same time, I think it’s unfair sometimes.”

Lebroni is still a ***** I see. And his number of championships remains at ZERO. I heard Evans gave him a hard fould but I didn't see it.

We flat out stole Crawford from the Hawks.

Nice surprise when I woke up this morning. Looks like Crawford had a couple of big steals and, am I mistaken, or is Wall learning how to get points on the nghts they need scoring?

19 is the worst win total for the Wiz in franchise history and they have 18. Hmmmmm. This could get interesting.

Is there anything worse than writing a long post (esp on the cell) and then getting a "Page Not Found" when you hit submit? Lose the whole damn thing, ugh.

Anyway, Thornton got bought out McQueen. He's with Golden State now.

Thanks. I did not know that. With no Blatche, Howard, Young, Martin, Lewis it's hard to keep track of where any of the veterans are.

17 wins on the season. 19 wins is the worst record all time for the Wiz. Can the Wiz win 2 of the next 14 to not be the worst team all time?

Bibby's is a free agent in 2012 just like Kirk Hinrich. He's cheaper over all however. He's scheduled to make:

2010-2011: 5,564,767

2011-2012: 6,217,617

Hinrich was scheduled to make:

2010-2011: 9,000,000

2011-2012: 8,000,000

Maurice Evans (to the Wiz) and Hilton Armstrong (to the Hawks) are both on the last year of their deals.

Jordan Crawford is signed for a long time but is cheap:

2010: 1,042,320

2011: 1,120,440

2012: 1,198,680

2013: 2,162,418

2014: 3,206,866

For next year the Wizard drop 8m and add 7.3m plus a first round pick.

Thank you. A salary dump and a 1st round pick? Yup.

Good news on Crawford's contract.

It seems the general consensus is good trade by EG.

Anyone know how the contracts / salaries shake out?