Etan Thomas waxed poetic. He audaciously spoke out against the war. He stumped for Obama. He got huffy on the Huffington Post. For his social involvement, he’s a commendable guy. Vastly different from many of the NBA’s young money millionaires.
But when it comes to the goal of winning as a team, Etan’s social activity, which assumingly had a bearing on his locker room inactivity, need not apply.
The Wizards are much better off now that he’s gone.
Step aside Brew City, Cleveland is more boring than you. The city that LeBron James may or may not leave in the future has been named the most boring city in America by a TripAdvisor survey of over 3,400 respondents.
It’s popularto associate the Wizards’ second round pick with pictures of cash these days.
straight cash homey - flickr/Steve Wampler
For the second year in a row, the Washington Wizards sold their second round draft pick. Good move? Bad move? It’s Washington Wizards Point, Counter-Point.
On draft night, there were many frustrated rumblings on Bullets Forever over Ernie Grunfeld failing to land (or go after) Vince Carter. Not only that, but Carter was allowed to go to the reigning Eastern Conference champion Orlando Magic.
With Hedo Turkoglu opting out, unlikely to return to Orlando, who knows if the Magic will be better off with Carter … many assume yes. I’ll be curious to see if Stan Van Gundy uses Carter similarly within the offense as he did Turkoglu, creating for others off the high pick and roll.
Running down the best of what was said about the Washington Wizards and the 2009 NBA Draft …
“We wouldn’t have done anything different. The only player I would’ve been upset if he slipped to five was Blake Griffin, and he went No. 1 overall obviously,” [Ernie] Grunfeld said. “We wouldn’t have taken anybody but Blake Griffin if it came to this pick. Ricky Rubio, Tyreke Evans, James Harden – we liked all those players, and everybody else did. But if we had a chance to get Miller and Foye in exchange for that pick, there was no question about it.”
I found it quite amusing that the player most experts had slotted as the second-best talent in the draft slid all the way down to fifth. It was eerily similar to the Wizards drop on the night of the draft lottery, when they had the second-best chance of winning the top pick and dropped down to No. 5. On that night, Rubio didn’t seem like a possibility. Now his career will forever be linked to the Wizards, much like Devin Harris, who has blossomed into an all-star in New Jersey.
To be a proverbial fly on the wall of the Wizards’ draft ‘war room’ Thursday night when Rubio was available at the fifth spot. Grunfeld’s face probably looked like he just swallowed an entire egg filled with arsenic, knowing that at some point the shell would crack and it’d be worse than fecal matter hitting the fan.
Hello gang … as promised, the True Hoop Network NBA Draft Night 2009 Live Bl0g/Chat is here.
It looks like things are starting to get kicked off. I’ll be “officially” on around 6:30 pm, but might check in a couple times before then.
If you have a question, comment, or concern, feel free to join the chat, or tweet me @Truth_About_It, or just send me an email to truthaboutit[@]gmail[dot]com.
After the trade, NBA Draft Thursday lost a great deal of luster for Washington Wizards fans … we should be used to this, it’ll be the sixth straight year the team is not retaining a lottery pick.
3) This site will be taking part in the ESPN True Hoop Network Live Blog-o-Rama-(Rama), organized by the good folks of Hardwood Paroxysm.
‘Cover It Live’ will be embedded here at Truth About It, so you’re welcome to stop by and check out commentary by NBA team bloggers from across the True Hoop Network … while dropping down some thoughts of your own.
On the eve of Mike Miller and Randy Foye becoming distinguished gentlemen for the Washington Wizards, I’d toiled over a ‘should the Wizards trade Brendan Haywood post‘. It began …
on a mission (question mark) - flick/Keith Allison
“Everyone likes Haywood.
Hell, I like Haywood (now), and recently challenged someone to name five better ‘Centers’ in the East. They couldn’t.
Championship teams need a guy like BTH. He’s in a contract year, motivated to work hard and make a strong comeback after missing an entire season. Perhaps most of all, Haywood knows enough to not be a stalwart in a free-flowing Flip Saunders offense. More and more, somewhat evident through his blogging, he’s acquired leadership maturity.
And remember, Ernie Grunfeld is likely not done dealing … especially judging by his quote in USA Today: “We might get out of (the draft) altogether. Very seldom do you get a 32nd pick who’s going to come right in and help a veteran ballclub.”
Of course, this could mean drafting someone and selling them for cash (as the case with Billy Walker to the Celtics last season), or packaging it with Mike James’ expiring contract for some sort of help down low (please be the latter, please be the latter).
the prose of the poet is due north - flickr/robbed
brendan haywood was never 'that' into poetry - flickr/Keith Allison
Brendan Haywood and Etan Thomas have had a welldocumented tumultuous relationship.
Now that Haywood’s braided ‘buddy’ is being shipped off to cleanse himself in the waters of Lake Minnetonka, is the Wizards’ blogging big man shedding any tears?
Mike Miller has a monkey … or at least he used to.
Back when he was with the Orlando Magic, Miller had a Java Macaque, which is one of those tiny lil’ monkeys that’s almost like having a kid. Miller would change its diapers, attempt to wean it off the bottle and onto people food, etc.. The monkey, Sonny, had his own mini-playground and would sleep in the bed with Miller every night. The story on the Orlando Magic website even says that Java Macaques can grow to have the intelligence level of a six year old human baby … strange.
But alas, don’t expect to see ‘Sonny’ at Ben’s Chili Bowl or sitting on Abe Lincoln’s lap any time soon. True Hoop’s Henry Abbott, who wrote about Miller’s monkey long ago for HOOP magazine, reported on TH in December of 2007 that Miller had to let Sonny go because he was trying to raise two real babies, his sons Mason and Mavrick.
With Washington sending Darius Songaila, Etan Thomas, Oleksiy Pecherov and the 5th overall pick to Minnesota in exchange for Mike Miller and Randy Foye being reported by Chad Ford of ESPN, and both Wizards beat reporters, Mike Jones of the Washington Times and Michael Lee of the Washington Post, it’s time to get some initial thoughts blogged out.
If I know Ernie Grunfeld, he’s not done. Hell, he better not be done.
The drama is kind of exciting, knowing the President of Basketball Ops I’ve come to trust probably has more tricks up his sleeve. Judging by the roster after the trade, we might be calling Gruns “Mr. Wizard” if he pulls off something else nice to make the team complete (more on ‘complete’ in a second).
On another note, Thursday just lost a ton of luster … hey, at least the 25th is my birthday. Read more »
Ernie Grunfeld held a 2 pm presser this afternoon …. nothing ground-breaking. It can basically be summed up by:
“Hello press, we will be potentially drafting a player on Thursday and I’m not tipping my hat, but we’re going to do what’s best for the team.”
However, in the spirit of providing those who could not afford to listen to the WashingtonWizards.com streaming video-cast of the presser, I’m providing a bulleted account (before the video and sound cut off for me with about two minutes left).
Oh, and the ‘reporters’ asking questions didn’t have mics …. so that was kind of annoying. If only Dave Johnson were around to eloquently work the room like he did for Flip Saunders’ meet-n-greet night.
Some of these are quotes, and some are paraphrased thoughts/ideas/statements of Grunfeld. Evidently the Wizards website will have a complete video posted later today. Until then ….
On preparing for the draft: “You always have to assume you’re going to [keep the pick].”
The Wizards are still having conversations on what the pick can bring them in a trade.
5 or 6 players will be available the draft … they really like 3 or 4.
Grunfeld seen Rubio twice in person and has a “real good handle” on his ability, but doesn’t want to get into any specifics about him (or any other particular player in the draft).
On workouts: “Bringing players into your own building is just a process … if one doesn’t come in, it doesn’t meant you’re not going to take him, or you’re not familiar with him.” (Grunfeld cited that JaVale McGee did not work out last year.)
Grunfeld doesn’t put much stock in workouts (especially in terms of if a player works out against others or not). He sees them as an extra opportunity to see the players’ skills and meet them.
On the quality of the draft: “[This is] one of the strongest PG drafts in a long time … [they] could makeup half the lottery.”
Teams that are ready to complete now are in a different mode (as far as cutting salary via trades around draft time) … the Wizards are obviously in a ‘compete now’ mode.
Grunfeld likes his core, he’s trying to put a solid team around Gilbert, Caron, Antawn, and Brendan.
On the team he has: “We’re a pretty deep team and we feel like at the 5 spot, we can get a pretty solid player.”
On the salary cap: “We’ve been over the cap … the pick is slotted in, we’ve had it in our budget for years already.” (thought this was a curious statement – he could have misspoke, I could have misheard)
On if he and Flip are on the same page in terms of what they want to do: “Exactly on page 1.”
Antawn Jamison is out of his cast from ankle surgery and will begin running next week.
DeShawn Stevenson is still not full speed from back surgery but he’s been working with trainers on a daily basis.
On ‘The Plan’: “I’m going to do what’s best for this team short term and long term.”
Grunfeld doesn’t know why rumors that the Wizards looking to cut salary are out there, and says “that’s not the case.” He then referred to the opportunity the Wiz had to shed salary at the trade deadline.
On roster size: “When I played we had 11 players on the roster and we did okay.” Grunfeld doesn’t know how many players the Wizard will have on the roster.
On moving up in the draft: “We’ve had some conversations about the possibility of moving up in the draft.” (among every other scenario, of course).
On his mood this week: “Usually I’m in a pretty good mood [around draft time] because this is all about preparation.” Grunfeld went on to say that there won’t be any arguments on who to take in the waning minutes. They have their order pretty much figured out and will go with the best available.
The Grizz don’t know what they want to do. ESPN’s Ric Bucher tweeted that Grizzlies scouts want Hasheem Thabeet, GM Chris Wallace wants Ricky Rubio, and Coach Lionel Hollins wants Stephen Curry. However, according to reports, Thabeet (insinuated by a cancelled workout) and Rubio might not want Memphis back. Wallace says he could care less about a ‘Spanish-Stay-Away’ order, but probably really does.
During his meet-n-greet with fans, Flip Saunders said, “I still think [Rubio] is going to get taken two. I think someone will make a trade when it comes down to trying to get him because he has that type of impact.”
