Going Commando

Yeah I agree that I don't really think Saunders is the man for the job. It's clear he doesn't make sense for us. We need a patient coach who's willing to suffer growing pains gracefully and a guy with a track record of working well with foreign players. I have no stake in Saunders whatsoever. But I thought for that game alone, our bench finally got involved, and perhaps even outperformed the starters. Wall probably could have kept going despite the pain in his foot but he was wisely pulled. He's hit the 44 minute mark this season, that's far too much time and I wouldn't be surprised to see him slump in a month or so as the grind of the NBA season gets to him. We haven't given him any chance to adjust hardly. And Blatche's conditioning is notably poor, giving him as much time as he's been getting means we're getting an ineffective player by the end of the game. The problem with our youth is where it's concentrated. Outside of Wall, it's almost entirely in the front court as Hinrich, Arenas, Young, Howard, and Thornton bring the age on our roster up quite a bit. Armstrong gets so much PT because Yi, Booker, and McGee are all so young, not to mention a bit undersized. Same for Seraphin who's what, 20? Blatche is by far our most experienced big at 24 years old. It kind of sucks having so little experience in the front court because those positions seem to take the longest to adjust to the NBA. In view of that, we'll probably be a poor rebounding and defensive team for a while as this group of players grows together. One thing's for sure, we won't become a significantly stronger and tougher team until Seraphin and Booker start getting a lot of time. One thing I'm confused about though is why we've stacked the PF position with so many young prospects when we've already got a 24 year old incumbent with a lot of time left on his contract. Why trade for Yi and then trade for the rights to Seraphin and Booker all in the same offseason following the breakout year of Blatche? We're hedging our bets so thoroughly for a good backup PF? That's simply a foolish team-building strategy unless you trying to get quite a few high draft picks in a row.

The bench actually got a fair bit of playing time last night. Arenas got 32, Armstrong 18, Booker 19, Jianlian 13, and Young 19. Armstrong also grabbed ten rebounds which was good for the team lead. I'm not sure what he brings to the table in the long term, but he had a decent game last night. For the most part the bench played fairly well. I think our starters were the ones who got the worst of it. FWIW, Wall's minutes were also down to 31 last night. They were definitely too high in the past, I believe he had 44 the night before.

Let's get a petition started and sent to ESPN that using the nickname "J-Woww" for John Wall by an ESPN anchor is now grounds for summary dismissal and loss of pension. This needs to end now. Also, has anyone else noticed that McGee leads the league in per minute blocks by quite a bit? He's at almost six--about a full block higher than the next guy. At least there is something positive to take away from McGee's play so far. Also, interesting stat from last night: The Wizards had 8 free throw attempts, the Bulls had 34... Whatever happened to home town officiating? Edit: I'm dumb. I see the game was away. Nevermind.

Possibly. I'd have to look into the nuances of the CBA agreement and see if the draft would even be held. The NBA is a different animal. I'm not sure if the owners are built to weather a lockout like the NFL owners are. DeMaurice Smith said the NFL owners will still make 5 billion dollars next year from their TV contracts after their renegotiations in '07 and '08 so they can take the hit from not playing at all. I don't know if the NBA could lockout the entire season. If that's the case, then draft picks will probably still get contracts. Plus their contracts are guaranteed in entirety so there isn't the same climate of uncertainty surrounding the sport as in the NFL. Underclassmen in basketball also declare in much higher percentages for the NBA than they do for football, where at least 4/5ths of players drafted are always seniors. Last year set the record for most underclassman entrants into the draft at 53. 255 players were drafted. In the 2010 NBA draft, only 17 out of 60 players drafted were college seniors, and only four of them were taken in the first round (none in the lottery). And another thing that might be an issue for NFL rookies but not NBA rookies is the contract negotiation process. They aren't very contentious in the NBA because there is a pay scale in place and usually contracts straightforwardly adhere to it. The loss of a season won't really change the type of deals that the rookies ask for and receive. That probably won't be the case in the NFL. I don't think there will be a shortage of underclassmen declaring for the NBA draft this year. Some will probably stay in school because of it. But I expect potential lottery picks planning on coming out will do so anyway.

Well lost in the middle of such a bad game were Yi's six blocks. For those of you scoring at home, that's 10 blocks in his last two games. That has been the most surprising stat for me over the past two days. Maybe this big Chinese dude can play? I can honestly say that these sorts of losses don't bother me that much as long as our young guys handle themselves well. Last night was probably Wall's worst game so far, but he's still improving because his assist/turn over ratio has gotten better by leaps and bounds. Perhaps things are starting to slow down for him a little bit. Our rebounding is pathetic though. Kevin Love pulls down 31 boards and I find myself thinking we need a powerful, impactful presence like that in the paint to fight for possessions and stop these athletic forwards like Wallace and Thomas from picking up so many rebounds on the offensive end. Too often, I find myself asking why isn't McGee a better rebounder. With his reach and athletic gifts, he should be an automatic double double. Maybe we could have more success by going out and getting our own dominant rebounding cornerman. As the college season progresses, I'm going to make it a point to watch UNC and Baylor. If we keep losing and end up with a top two pick, I'd be pretty excited about selecting Barnes or Jones. Also if Arenas does get traded, we could look for a good two guard if there is one.

Certainly. And he'll get more comfortable shooting off the dribble just by doing it in practice and games. All it takes is time and repetition. I think he's already an elite scorer when he attacks the rim and he's a much stronger finisher than I expected. I expected to see a skinny 20 year old kid who was more comfortable passing but he's pretty strong.

Wall just got a triple double with rebounds as one of the stats. His rebounding is fine. As for his shot blocking, Sam Cassell said Wall had a chance to lead the team in blocks this season because he's so good at it. Seeing as how Javale is a top 5 shot blocker in the league, I don't think that's likely. But the point is that Wall has the ability to become an ELITE defender and he's already leading the league in steals 6 games into his career. Then you talk about assists and the ability to be pass first. He's fourth in the league in assists with his name inserted firmly in the middle of Jason Kidd, Chris Paul, and Deron Williams. Only his supporting cast isn't as good as any of those other guys and I'm not sure we've got a guy who can reliably nail open shots now that Arenas looks like a shell of his former self. And as someone else pointed out, Rondo gets so many assists largely because he gets to play alongside four other 20,000 point scorers who've got about 50 all star appearances between them. He's an experienced player who's playing on an experienced team filled with great players. Rondo the rookie didn't do **** though. Finally you talk about leadership and the ability to be confrontational. How about in his FIRST summer league game when he got in McGee's face about rebounding? A fresh faced rookie in his first professional moment telling off a third year veteran is impressive. Nevermind he also led a young Kentucky team to the final four as a freshman, which is a hell of a lot more than say, Michael Jordan did his freshman year. Kevin Martin specifically said after the triple double game that (paraphrasing slightly), while you couldn't call Wall a great leader yet, the leadership ability is definitely there--implying that he'll be a great leader one day. The only pronounced flaw in Wall's game right now is his tentative shot. His offensive repertoire shooting from the floor is still developing. That's it. But it will improve and the seeds of a good shooter are definitely there. Everything else will probably improve and be at a high level by the end of the season--his defensive awareness, his turnover rate, etc. I think the shot will be there by year two or three.

Barkley too. Dr. J wouldn't have ever won one if it weren't for Moses Malone. The dad thing was completely offensive and shows, once again, how little class the piece of **** has (TPOS is how I'll refer to him from now on). Why don't we take a look at this dramatization of his father figure during his birth: He's contemptible. Let's treat him with contempt and ignore him.

John Wall is an anomaly too. He has 6'9 reach. He'll be a very good rebounder. I'm not sure how Cowherd can criticize him for rebounding. Really there is nothing to criticize Wall over. Pretty much he is as great as a rookie PG can be. Cowherd is just a stupid, worthless piece of ****. That's all that needs to be said about him. Let's not do ourselves the disservice of actually paying attention to his tripe.

Does anyone pay attention to ESPN's rookie rankings? They've got Wall ranked #2 behind Blake Griffin right now. WTF?!? And those rankings were published today no less, so they have to take into account Wall's historic achievement last night. Let me get this straight. John Wall is leading the league in steals, is fourth in assists, and averaging more PPG than Griffin despite being the chief facilitator for his team. He's already had two historically good games in his first six as a rookie. Wall is 26th overall in scoring, Blake Griffin is 50th. How the **** is he not miles ahead of everyone else?

He's not getting enough minutes to average 10+ rebounds a game. If you look at his per 48 minute numbers, they're like 13 rebounds a game and 5 blocks. If he got about 32-33 minutes a game, I bet he could get there. Right now he's getting playing time commensurate with a top backup. Also keep in mind that his rebound numbers will be vultured by having Blatche, Thornton, and Wall on the court--each of them good rebounders themselves. I'm not worried about McGee's shot. I'd rather see him develop an actual post game and become more of a presence in the paint. He's offensively gifted, we could ramp up his scoring quite a bit by having him and Wall run a fast break offense constantly just like the Suns used to.

Dwight Howard is definitely a center. He's got the same build as David Robinson plus about 35 pounds of muscle. And he has a post game. He stacks up well with any other center in league history. Yao was a great center when he was still alive. There are actually a decent amount of exciting young centers in the league right now. Andrew Bogut and Brook Lopez are already producing good numbers and they have long careers ahead of them. DeMarcus Cousins was a great prospect and he'll be dominant once he develops. Gasol is a pretty good center too even though he can run like a power forward. He's a force in the paint. Stoudemire is an original prototype center who is an elite scorer in transition. There are more good 7 footers in the league than ever. A lot of them, like Nowitzki, end up settling at power forward because they can run and shoot. In the 80's and early 90's, that wouldn't have happened. They'd have been pigeonholed into playing the low post because there weren't enough 7 footers to go around.

He's actually shooting really well from the floor. .615 is nothing to sneeze at.

Wall's post game interviews are almost as great as watching him play. This kid has some real media savvy and he says all of the right things all of the time. He has historic achievements in his first six games and then talks about what he needs to do to improve afterwards. Most people would be completely overwhelmed in his shoes but he looks like he was born for this role. I've never been so excited about a player before. I also like how well Thornton is responding to all of these minutes he's getting. He's not a world beater but he looks like a quality starter to me who's given a consistent effort each night. Blatche has also been on fire the past several nights giving us back to back double doubles. He needs to improve shooting from the floor but that will come when he gets back in the swing of things. Between him and Wall, that's a really nice foundation to build upon. I understand Jianlian showed marked improvement tonight but his per minute numbers still aren't all that great. We knew Yi was a good shooter, but I am surprised by his level of athleticism. The four blocks tonight are nice and suggest he brings value above the rim too. But I still don't know if his play warrants the kind of minutes he receives. He could just be a late bloomer though. Maybe once he finally gets comfortable he'll justify himself and become a scoring machine. I think the potential might be there. But on the flip side, Javale still isn't getting enough minutes. I don't understand what the problem is. His per minute numbers are excellent and he's shooting 61.5% on the season. His per 48 minute totals are about 14 points, 13 rebounds, and 5 blocks. He needs to get more time. I want to see the endless highlight reels of alley-oops between him and Wall that I was promised. One thing that doesn't bode well for me is that Nick Young can't get on the court. Kirk Hinrich is not very good and Gilbert hasn't looked the same. If Young can't beat out either of them for more time, that doesn't speak much of his ability. If by some miracle we're actually able to trade Arenas before the ice caps melt, we're going to need to find a legit two guard. If I were looking ahead to this year's draft, I'd say our biggest need is for a swing man or elite scoring wing. Getting a great center would be nice, but it seems we've got a bit of a logjam for PT in the post. Thornton has been good, but I would love to have either Harrison Barnes or Perry Jones.

Don't forget the block and the two three pointers. He also shot 50% from the floor which is beautiful. My one quibble is his missed free throw which brought his FT % down to 50%. Yes, John Wall is on two of my fantasy teams. I'm thinking about trading for him and adding him to my third.

Yeah that's what the 80's taught us. Jordan could win MVPs but he couldn't unseat the Pistons, Lakers, and Celtics until he had another top 50 all time sidekick to help him out. That's not to take anything away from him. No great player has ever been able to consistently win without another Hall of Famer or top 50 player to work with. Or at least they've needed a supporting cast involving multiple current all-stars like Tim Duncan's or 2000's Detroit. Bird had McHale, Parrish, and Walton Kareem had Magic and Worthy Havlicek had Cowens, Russell, and Sam Reed Dr. J had Moses Malone Hakeem had Drexler Isiah had Dumars Chamberlain had Jerry West, Hal Greer, Elgin Baylor, and Billy Cunningham Shaq had Kobe and Wade That's about all I can think of. It seems that all great teams require multiple great players, or at least 4 or 5 very good players. In that regard, I think it's misleading to use championships as a measure of individual success or else Bill Russell would look like the greatest in NBA history. If you focus on just individual achievements, I think Kareem's are the most impressive in the history of the league and I think he did a lot to change the nature of both his position and the sport back in the time when it was still kind of a niche league. Kareem was one of the main faces that brought the game into the mainstream--not to take anything away from Chamberlain, but I don't think he had the same kind of lasting imprint on the sport. And Wilt's star turn in the second Conan, awesome though it was, wasn't as awesome as Kareem's cameo in Airplane.

McGee is a small forward in a center's body. In terms of his ability to block shots and grab defensive boards, he's top five in the league (if he gave consistent effort). Howard is probably the only other seven footer with better athletic ability. Maybe Amare Stoudemire does, although he's not much of a defender either. With better focus and mental discipline, I think McGee could grow into an elite defender. He's still a bit skinny to be a tough low post presence, but he's got the feet and length to stifle. Offensively, McGee strikes me as what we in tennis call a "shot artist." He's only happy when he gets to get creative with his shots in transition. He wants to show off his athleticism and throw down dunks and he gets bored and loses focus when he can't do this. Developing a post game is very hard and it takes years to do. A lot of players never do it. But McGee needs to show the willingness and work ethic to get there and I'm not sure he has so far. The thing to keep in mind with McGee is that he's only 22. Center has the steepest learning curve and McGee still has plenty of time to prove himself. But damned if he doesn't do enough stupid things to make you think he'll never figure it all out. Speaking of centers, check out this Andre Drummond kid from New York. He's 17 and already in the 6'10 - 260 lb. range with the likelihood of ending up well over 7'. He runs like Amare Stoudemire too. He looks like the next big thing.

Wall has all of that though. I think he's even more firey than Durant is. Durant had a bit of a slow start as a rookie and Wall comes in producing at a high level (top 5 in steals/assists) when he hasn't even scratched the surface of his potential yet. Wall's a smart guy--he says all of the right things, has a great attitude, and has a great understanding of the game already. He shocks me with how precocious he is. He was born to play this game.I love Durant. I love his game and he's an awesome guy--Redskins fan, humble, likeable. Rare as he is, I don't think he's as rare an individual as Wall. He started slower, seems more shy and less vocal. And his position hurts him in regard to how rare he is. Good wing players come out every single draft. Take this year for instance--Harrison Barnes is just as skilled as Durant was as a college freshman. Perry Jones is even more of an athletic freak than Durant (faster, taller, similar reach, stronger). Neither are quite the complete package that Durant is, and these guys may not pan out, but they illustrate that the league is crowded with guys in the 6'7-6'9 range and will always be. I disagree here. I think it's Robertson who never would have won a ring without Kareem, not the other way around. Robertson spent a decade in futility with the Royals, then he got one in his first shot with Kareem. Kareem was a champion going back to his UCLA days where he won one each of his three seasons. Magic was also the second banana on those Lakers teams behind Kareem, probably up until the very end when Kareem was about 40. I'd say the torch wasn't really passed until the '86 season.No player has ever consistently won on his own. Say what you want about Jordan's determination and leadership, but he didn't win anything until he had Pippen. He might have gotten a ring in a down year, but that's about as far as I think he'd go. The greatest winners in NBA history have always needed another great to accompany them. But both Jordan and Kareem were the clear best players on their team while they were winning. Then stack their achievements up side by side, they look about the same--6 time champion, 6 time MVP (Jordan had 5), Kareem was a 19 time all-star and 11 time NBA all-defensive team player so on longevity he thumps Jordan. On positional value, Kareem wins by a wide margin. Center and PG are your quarterback positions. Their value can't be overstated. To put it in football terms, I'd look at it this way. Jordan is the Jerry Rice of basketball. Arguably the greatest individual player in the history of the sport, head and shoulders better than anyone else who's ever played his position. Kareem is the Joe Montana of Basketball. If you're trying to build a championship team, you take Montana over Rice. Just for fun, Bill Russell is the Otto Graham. Robertson is the Dan Marino. Stockton is the Steve Young. LeBron will go down as the Jim Brown (unprecedented physical freak of nature at his position). You've got a point about the age. But OKC wasn't good until last year and Durant has a better supporting cast around him now than Wall will have for the forseeable future. And Durant didn't single handedly win us that FIBA championship. He was playing along side the brightest young stars in the NBA-Rose, Evans, Gordon, Curry, etc. And we can be gracious to the competition all we want, our second stringers on the world team own a massive talent advantage over every other country's A side, especially since most of the best foreign players in the world sat this tourney out. Durant was clearly the best player on our team. But he wasn't the only one who got us there. There are more elite wing players in the NBA than there are elite PGs. Paul and Rondo are great and each bring some of the skills to the table that Wall will eventually have (length and ability to play above the rim for Paul, shooting for Rondo). But neither are the complete package like Wall. I also think you could add Rose and Deron Williams into the category with Wall to make a big five. A solid second tier of true PGs would be Curry, Harris, Westbrook, Conley, and maybe Aaron Brooks. Evans is a combo guard and not a true PG, on our team he would be a wing. (I also left out Nash, Kidd, Miller, and Parker because they'll all retire within the next few years).For wing players, I think LeBron is actually more talented than Durant is. Following those two, I don't see a big dropoff to Carmelo, Kobe, and Wade. That's your big 5. After them, you've got a strong second tier of Rudy Gay, Monta Ellis, Paul Pierce, Brandon Roy, Joe Johnson, Danny Granger, and Gerald Wallace. Give me Wall and any one of those second tier wing players, and I think you've got a better team on your hands than Durant and a second tier PG provided the rest of the supporting cast is identical. Howard has his weaknesses, namely shooting. But I think he alters your opponent's game plan more than anyone else in the league. How many teams in the league can single guard him? I think the Celtics are the only one. And even if you do, he'll still get decent numbers and play dominant defense. Only a handful of guys in the league can play above the rim like him. That said, I think Javale McGee is one of them. If he could ever put it all together, man he'd be good. Haha, no it's all good. Thanks for the kind words. I really enjoy reading your opinions about the Wizards and I think you bring a lot of knowledge to the table.

I'd settle for the first or second pick. I think we're probably bad enough to deserve them. Barnes would be great, and I think he makes the most sense for us at the top of our draft board from a need/talent consideration. UNC does a good job of holding onto their star players though, and sometimes their freshmen can have a hard time getting minutes. I like Perry Jones though. He kind of reminds me a bit of Durant in how freakishly long he is for his position. He's the type who could be an absolute beast of a wing player with a PG like Wall to facilitate him. Plus he gives you the ability to play in the post a bit too when Blatche and McGee sub out. With all three of them out there, you'd have a ton of size on the floor. That'd be a nice team. If You can get 14-16 points a night from McGee and Blatche, that would probably give us enough to win with alongside Wall's production and Jones' 25 points a game. I would still prefer we ended up with an elite center though. Has anyone heard about this kid Andre Drummond from Mt. Vernon, NY? He's only a HS senior this year, so he won't be available until 2012. If we were going to win the lottery again, I wish it would be the year he comes out.

I think we used up a decades worth of Karma winning the lottery for Wall. Knowing our luck, we'll need about 50% of the lottery balls to get the first overall pick. Even if we won it, who do you take? This strikes me as a year where most of the top players are going to be freshmen. Who knows if the top pick won't be another point guard or something? I have a hard time pinning down our needs. Every time I think we could use a perimeter scorer or another big man, McGee and Blatche have good games and Thornton looks great. Then when I think we've got something great with them moving forward, they'll struggle. What do you see being our biggest need?

Jesus. It's been worse for Arenas than I imagined. It might be a little while before he gets his mind right again. Now would be a good time for someone to step up and guide him back into the fold. He's a sensitive guy and he just seems to be flailing around trying to get back into the swing of things. One of the bad things about having a team as young as ours is that Arenas is our veteran leadership. Hopefully Wall can step up and be the leader we need him to. Arenas needs to find his confidence again.

Never underestimate Cowherd's stupidity. But in regards to the part I quoted, put the debate this way: Durant might go down as the best combo 2/3 ever, second best perimeter scorer ever. Wall has the ability to go down as the best pure point guard ever. Now thinking about it like that, which one would you rather take? I think positional importance has to figure strongly into the equation. Perimeter scorers who can give you 24+ points a game are a dime a dozen. There's never been another player like Durant before, but you can get a guy who'll give you close production nearly every single year. PG and C are the two most valuable positions you can build around and there are swarms of good 2s and 3s in the league right now. If I were building a team with the ability to choose from every player in NBA history, my first pick would be Kareem and not Jordan or Bird. Point guards with no weaknesses and freakish athletic gifts (speed, length) like Wall are extremely rare. Also factor in Wall's youth, precociousness, and leadership skills. He's captaining a team as a 20 year old rookie, two years removed from high school. I think he's the most desirable building block in the league outside of Howard.

Great post. I saw Wall make those comments to Van Pelt this morning. Yeah a real selfish guy... There's not a chance in hell I would trade John Wall for Rajon Rondo. Rondo is a good pointguard if he never has to shoot the ball. Give Wall a year or two and he'll have no weaknesses whatsoever. Besides, I wonder if Cow**** realizes what a huge inadvertant compliment he paid to Wall in that he's trying desperately to defend Rondo against a comparison to Wall after his third ****ing game. What an idiot.

Yeah it's undoubtedly lame. But what can you do about it? Rivalries don't mean as much when the seeding is done by conference and the divisions are ceremonial. You need post season chicanery to really develop a rivalry. We had a chance at that with the Cavaliers, but that's pretty much over now. We'll develop it with other teams in time because I think we're on the path for post season runs for the next decade. I don't mind the crossovers between DC franchises. It'd be super lame if they were trying to channel a completely unrelated rivalry like Yankees--Red Sox. At least they got the Redskins part right. I don't take it necessarily as the Wizards being a second class franchise to the Redskins, although they probably are. I take it as the Wizards and Redskins sharing a fandom. Personally, I'm a newer Wizards fan since, growing up a basketball player, I followed players and not teams. I've been a Redskins fan all of my life. Incorporating that into the Wizards experience can make the transition to fanhood easier or more natural for people like me. Like it or not, people like me will form the majority of new Wizards fans and its a segment of the fan base that Leonsis has to mobilize: Redskins fans are loyal and they are spenders.

Hit him a second time for me. I hate that piece of **** and have since what he said what he did about Sean Taylor after his murder. The irony here is that Cowherd is absolutely the kind of **** eating attention whore that he's trying to paint John Wall as. Cowherd is the goatse.cx of sports radio. He's a disgrace.