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The Official Washington Basketball Thread: Wizards, Mystics etc


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3 minutes ago, StillUnknown said:

Whiteside is doing whatever he desires at the moment, almost a double double after 1 quarter

Miami scores 35 in the 1st

Back to focusing on defense they said....lol

Sato with some nice, sharp passes out there.

Edited by STBonecrusher21
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Tomas has to survive the grind.  It's one thing to play preseason ball, another to learn to sleep on a plan because you're in three cities this week and getting more minutes than you've ever had in your life.  And against bigger, stronger, faster competition.  He does look like an NBA player though.  One that needs to hit the weight room, but he doesn't look like it's too big for him. 

Being new to the NBA must be a shocking experience physically and mentally. 

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Sato is better than I expected.  Up and down defensively, but you can see he's got some pretty nice potential on that end.  He's smart.

The 24 second violation he forced was nice.  I watched him the whole possession and it was just heads up positioning and communication after he initially took himself out of the play by gambling.

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So do we all agree Oubre is a 3&D player at this point, maybe a guy that moves without the ball?  I know he scored well tonight but he doesn't look like he's got an NBA offensive game the moment he dribbles the ball.  

Sato has impressed me defensively.  He looks bigger than I expected but moves his feet pretty well.  

A lot of off ball movement from the Wizards tonight.  Feels strange.  Maybe the offense is getting an upgrade after all.  

15 minutes ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

Yeah Sato is going to have to get a lot stronger.

Who the heck is Johnny O'Bryant?

I agree with both of these things. :)

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Sato looked decent. At the very least he looked capable enough to replace Sessions. Outside of that, this team again looks like a group that will be carried by John Wall heroics. Watching Marcin grab the ball at the elbow and proceed to try and shoot over Whiteside repeatedly was cringe inducing. As I've said for the past year, we should have moved Gortat and tried to sign Hassan as priority no.1 over Durant. I mean, the dude eviscerated our interior without a single post up or play call. It was just dribble towards the basket and throw it up for him to yam it.. They didnt even try to have an outside game.

Smith looks like a bum who looks good for 4 minutes against 3rd stringers during a blowout. Which is just about exactly what he did in Orlando. As for Nicholson... I have never really see him play before, but if his game is to go inside and throw up a hook with lackluster D, we should have kept Seraphin. At the very least he could hit that shot with great efficiency.

Morris looked good. Otto looks like he is finally starting to fill out the frame. He put some work in.

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Nicholson is a wash.  Good offensive player, lousy defender.  The first team interior defense was pretty bad last night.  The second team interior defense was horrible.  It will never be good with Nicholson at C.  But he's at least a good finisher.  Trey Burke and Oubre are going to have to figure out how to move the ball and work with him.  Because if last night was any indication, those two freeze their teammates out way too often and the second unit is going to have trouble moving the ball around.  Thornton is a chucker too.

Lot of new faces on the team.  Our starting five knows how to play together now, but we're going to suck when they sub out.  Especially early on.

Keef did look good.  He is such a good passer that I think you almost need to stagger his minutes with the starters so that he can play with the second unit guys and bring a little ball movement to that group.

Eddie doesn't do a whole lot.  I don't expect him to beat out Thornton for minutes at this point.  He's basically a spot shooter and nothing more.  Spends a lot of time running around on offense, but he doesn't look for the ball and doesn't have a scorer's mentality.  He seems like he's just happy to be here and he's only going to get in games if there are injuries in front of him.

Oubre has talent and an assertive mentality that makes him special.  But man he makes some dumb plays with the ball in his hands and he is a horrible passer.  He basically has to play with Sato, I'm not sure he is going to thrive with Burke.

Sato is pretty good.  He's a high IQ player who is mentally ready for the league I think.  Just a matter of getting experience and getting used to NBA speed and how to handle all of the situations that are going to come up for him as a primary ball handler.  But he doesn't look ready physically.  He tried posting up and fighting for position last night and just could not get any push at all.  He's going to have a hard time finishing through contact too.  You could tell he was getting a little flustered and worn out over the course of the game.

Burke is flawed.  Good shooter and a good ball handler.  And I know he can run pick and rolls well from watching him play at Michigan.  But he just doesn't demonstrate good court vision or a feel for pacing a half court offense.  I think he needs to play off the ball a lot more than he will as the PG for the second unit.  Having Sato at SG next to him should help, assuming they trade lead guard duty on our possessions regularly.  But bottom line, he needs to not call his own number early in a possession, without anyone else touching the ball.

I think that, at some point this season, we're going to figure out that our best minute allocation is a true ten man rotation where Gortat plays a true 50/50 timeshare with Mahinmi and Beal has his minutes staggered so that he spends a lot of time with the second unit.  That means, our two most frequent line ups will look like this:

  • PG: Wall
  • SG: Burke
  • SF: Otto
  • PF: Keef
  • C: Gortat

 

  • PG: Sato
  • SG: Beal
  • SF: Oubre
  • PF: Nicholson
  • C: Mahinmi

 

Beal playing with the reserves and Sato being the lead guard keeps the second unit offense good whereas a Burke/Sato/Oubre perimeter is going to be painful to watch.  The second unit defense would be outstanding too.  In fact, maybe you would be better off starting Mahinmi over Gortat since he's the stronger defender to try and bolster the interior D of the first unit?  He's not as good a PnR finisher as Gortat, so you're losing some offensive synergy there because Wall and Burke are good PnR ball handlers.  But it could be worth it to strengthen the D.

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37 minutes ago, Fergasun said:

1 preseason game in and posters in this thread are in prime form... just one question, how did the team respond to Scott Brooks?

 

I'd love for the Wizards to prove us all wrong, but im holding my breath. The returns look like what we said earlier. Its another year of Wall being superman, hoping Otto makes a leap, and hoping Beal stays healthy. 5th times the charm though, right? Honestly, unless the FO changes, nothing will change. Scott Brooks doesnt know what he signed on for. I hope for the best though, as always. I just dont think other fans understand how lucky and relieved we all are that Snyder brought in Mccloughan. The black hole of cerrato might be one of the few equivalents of the teflon don.

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