If Andray Blatche didn’t break his foot, his summer league reign might have continued. Instead, he handed the crown to Nick Young, who on Monday evening in Las Vegas, Nevada announced that he is retiring his summer league jersey after just one appearance in 2010.

One day Young will in turn bestow the same honor to someone else (JaVale McGee, perhaps?) … the use of “Summer League” as a moniker, or crown, or title — as in, “Hey Summer League, pass me the ball,” or “Man, Summer League let Marc Gasol score 10 points on him in the first 6:12 of the game.”

In the Wizards’ 84-69 win over the Los Angeles Clippers, Young carried the torch and he went out on top. He scored 18 points on 6-11 from the field and 4-7 from long distance. Young only committed two turnovers in his 28 minutes of play, also notching a block, two steals and a whole rebound, but nary an assist.

Last summer Young averaged 23.8 points, third most in the league, on 50% from the field and 0.8 assists in four games. In 2008, he averaged 11 points on 35.2% shooting over five games. In 2007, Young averaged 14.8 points, second on the Wizards to Oleksiy Pecherov’s 15.2 points, on 38.8% from the field with 0.6 assists per game.

Young strove for accomplishment in his lone 2010 appearance, and succeeded at that. From his post game interview, you can deduce three things: 1) he understands John Wall can be a blessing to his game; 2) the corner three can become his niche … and it’s the closest three point shot in the league, so keep getting at it Nick; and 3) the gravity of a contract year is realized and if Young changes his defensive mindset, making more consistent the glimpses of hustle we saw last year, he could at least warrant an extension of the $3.7 million qualifying offer next summer. Read more »

Hamady N’diaye only played eight minutes, 37 seconds in his Summer League debut with the Washington Wizards. He barely made an impression on the box score. He took one shot, missed it, had one rebound and one turnover. “H” almost had a sweet dunk, but got excited and traveled. He also got a 3-second defensive lane violation called on him.

Most would look at the box and think “Yuck, but that’s a late second round pick (No. 56 to be exact) for ya.” So why do I like Hamady so much? Let me explain.

No, N’diaye didn’t ‘wow’ me yesterday. And it’s just one Summer League game on his long journey to become a contributor on the court. But if my observations are true, Hamady has a solid foundation constructed in just over six short years of playing competitive basketball.

First, as much as I bragged about John Wall’s communication, I should do the same with N’diaye. I’m willing to bet that four years spent at Rutgers, where he acquired a degree in communications, helped him hone his verbal skills. He knows that it’s the center’s job to be that defensive anchor, to see what his teammates might not see and to let them know.

“That’s natural to me. I want to talk and make sure everyone follows the example,” said N’diaye after Sunday’s game. “That’s the one thing I can do is really play defense and one thing defense is you gotta talk. If I start talking I know the rest of my teammates are going to follow and I want to make sure I’m the loudest on the court.”

Read more »

Sneaker heads, this post is for you … what the Wizards Vegas Summer League players wore for their debut.

JaVale McGee

John Wall

Sun Yue

Read more »

John Wall had the jitters before the game.  I had goosebumps, but only because I had just settled down to watch Wall’s debut in the 63-degree chill of my basement.  I grabbed a blanket; it was showtime.

The Wizards put on a pretty good show en route to an 84-79 win over the Golden State Warriors. Wall and JaVale McGee made their presence felt in the first quarter, which could be viewed as a microcosm of the game as a whole.  Highlights below:

John Wall ended up with 24 points (7/15 FG), 8 assists, 8 turnovers, and 2 steals.  Six of those assists were alley-oops to McGee, who finished with 21 points (8/12 FG), 12 rebounds, and 2 blocks.

Ten things you should know: Read more »

[This article originally appeared on ESPN's Daily Dime for July 12, 2010, click for the full version.]

Wall talks to teammate JaVale McGee after a missed rebounding assignment.

He wasn’t just vocal on both ends of the floor in his Summer League debut, an 84-79 Wizards win over the Warriors, he was loud. If his teammates don’t hear his instruction, it’s not his fault. They aren’t paying attention. And he doesn’t just use his vocal chords, pointing to talk is just as much a part of Wall’s game as that extra gear of speed he has over all others on the court.

Want more talking and leadership? When out of the game, Wall placed himself toward the front of the bench, talking with assistant coach Ryan Saunders, talking to his teammates, yelling out instruction toward the floor. Over the course of the game, you’re looking at 30 minutes if you total the amount of time Wall spent talking with Sam Cassell, who is heading the Summer League coaching staff for the Wizards. Okay, that might be an exaggeration, but you get the point, Sam I Am is always in Wall’s ear and Wall is always listening.

“Just listening to him is going to be a great experience because he’s been in this league a long time and he’s a vet,” Wall said after the game.

Read more »

What most impressed me about John Wall in his debut? His leadership. In fact, I wrote a whole piece about it for ESPN’s Daily Dime … and I’ll link that at some point soon. I’ll also have a bunch of pictures as I sat on the baseline to catch the experience of the game. There will be a bunch more to come on Wall and the Wizards, but until then, there’s a video below of post-game interviews featuring Flip Saunders, Sam Cassell, and of course, Wall (who was rather hard to get to … there was a TON of media in a small, concentrated area trying to interview him. To call it a circus wouldn’t exactly do it justice.) As usual, enjoy.

Made it to Vegas safe and sound and just got finished watching the Lakers and Nuggets square off. I said it on draft night and now I’ll say it again, the Lakers did very well to pick up Devin Ebanks and Derrick Caracter. Ebanks has a lot more smoothness on offense than you’d anticipate and Caracter’s body can’t be handled. On Friday Caracter had 20 points, 10 rebounds and today he put up 17 and 12 to go with four assists.  Ebanks notched 21 points on 9-16 from the field on Friday and 24 points on 8-16 shooting on Saturday. But it’s also summer league, folks.

Okay …. John Wall time. He and the Wizards are set to face the Golden State Warriors (who are playing the Detroit Pistons as I type) at 5 pm Vegas time tomorrow (8 pm on the East Coast). Set your dials and DVRs. But until then, here’s something to tide you over … a compilation of clips from scrimmaging at the end of the first day of Wizards mini-camp last Thursday evening. While you’re waiting for John Wall, a little John Wall. Enjoy.

Checking in from the Atlanta airport (the people watching is great, as usual) on my way to Las Vegas for the NBA Summer League. I’ll be out there covering John Wall and the rest of the Wiz Kids until the 18th. I know, a long time to be in Vegas. But I’m good at staying out of trouble.

On Friday Wizards assistants Mike Wells and Ryan Saunders took rookie Kevin Seraphin through an individual workout as he continues to rehab a previous knee injury that will keep him out of summer league action. The 20-year old from Cayenne, French Guiana officially became part of the Wizards on Thursday when the Kirk Hinrich and 17th pick (Seraphin) acquisition in exchange for Wizards 2006 second round draft pick Vladimir Veremeenko was completed. Glad the Wiz didn’t give up a future second rounder.

Ernie Grunfeld spoke briefly about Seraphin on Thursday (covered in this post) and indicated that Seraphin’s buyout from his club in the French League, Cholet Basket, still needs to be worked out, but that he plans to have him on the roster next season. Check out some clips from Seraphin’s individual workout below … there are a couple dunks at the end. That shooting form needs a lot of work, but he sure is a wide-bodied player.

After the Wizards’ second day of mini-camp, young JaVale McGee messed around a bit with old Sam Cassell for a couple rounds of one-on-one. Let’s check that real quick.

Otherwise, Epic Vale is working hard. And on Friday he was all tuckered out, needing to bend over when initially speaking with the media after the session. He even later Tweeted: “Man … tired ain’t the word … I’m tired as a house.”

Not sure what ‘tired as a house’ means. I imagine that the partied out house of a Miami Heat fan on a celebratory bender is pretty tired right now. Maybe McGee is that tired, except the basketball equivalent.

When speaking about JaVale this afternoon, Flip Saunders twice mentioned that he needs to work on his defensive rebounding. Seems like a pretty big emphasis. Last season, according to 82games.com, the Wizards team defensive rebound percentage was 65% when McGee was on the court. That shot up to 71.6% when he was off the court. So that can’t be good.

Saunders went on to say, “As much from a strength standpoint, going against main type centers, he’s not as strong as some of those guys so he gets pushed around. What happens is he gets in foul trouble so quick and that takes him out of his game. He’s going to have to learn to play at our level and be able to play as far as from the beginning.”

This we knew. The Washington Examiner’s Craig Stouffer followed up by asking Flip if that’s something he thinks McGee can develop this summer. The coach simply replied, “He’s going to have to.”

Read more »

If I had to place Trevor Booker somewhere on the scale of out-going personalities entering the NBA (with 10 being Omar Samhan and 1 being Jarvis Varnado), I’d give him about a 3. John Wall would get a 6.5/7 if you must know.

Not a knock on Booker, he might have tremendous upside personality potential … or he just might be shy in front of media cameras … or maybe he just likes to give very brief answers with little inflection in his voice … or maybe he’s just too cool for school.

In any case, it doesn’t really matter. It’s all about what the guy can do on the court. And from the looks of a brief glimpse at a mini-camp scrimmage Thursday evening, Booker is not afraid to make his presence known.

Actually, maybe Trevor should get boosted to a 3.5 … he did give the media a laugh by saying that John Wall still isn’t faster than him.

Via the WaPost’s Michael Lee on June 27th: Read more »

Al Thornton is back in D.C. folks, playing with the kids in mini-camp to “show some support,” he says. He’ll also be out in Las Vegas during summer league to practice and hang with John Wall and the gang, and to build some team chemistry (excellent!) … but he won’t be playing. Nick Young, on the other hand, might play, even though he wasn’t on the released summer league roster. We will see.

When I asked Al about what part of his game he’s trying to improve upon this off-season, he said he’s really working on getting in shape and eating right. Thornton admitted that he was a little overweight last season. I guess if he’s going to be running the floor with Wall, he better get that conditioning right. Those transition points can really boost stats, especially in what essentially amounts to a contract year for Thornton.

Thornton also had some compliments for young Wall, whom he worked out with for a bit in Los Angeles earlier this summer. Al calls the rookie “special” and in particular acknowledges his decision making on pick and rolls. Let’s check out what Al had to say in the video below.

[Below are some quick notes from Ernie Grunfeld's Q&A with the media on the first night of Wizards mini-camp. Video of the session is at the bottom of this post.]

[Kevin Seraphin]

Bullets on Kevin Seraphin

• Grunfeld gave a scouting report on Seraphin, crediting him for having good hands and for being light on his feet.
• He springboards that into talking about the transition the team is going through. “We’ve been a predominantly perimeter oriented team and a finesse team and I just felt like we needed some more physicality,” said Grunfeld.
• It’s been known that Seraphin will miss the Vegas Summer League because of a left knee ligament tear he experienced in the French League playoffs. Grunfeld said he expects him to be back on the court running full contact drills in August.

Ernie wants a small forward and a big man

“If we can pick up a small forward along the way, that’s a position we’d probably look at.”

Read more »

“Having been from Cleveland and everything we’ve gone through, you’d like to see your hometown do well, so I’m disappointed from that standpoint.”
-Flip Saunders

Yep, ol’ Flip is from Cleveland. But you probably already knew that. The high school All-American and 1973 Ohio Class A Player of the Year averaged 32 points per game during his senior year at Cuyahoga Heights, a school located in the burbs of the Mistake By The Lake.

Actually, my bad. I shouldn’t make fun of Cleveland. Even though Cavs fans lined up by the miles to witness and laugh at the Wizards after the Arenas gun fiasco and the rest of the implosion (including gladly taking the Gentleman Jamison), I cannot laugh at them at this moment. I feel very, very bad for those guys. And with that I say, ‘Join me people of Cleveland, in your distaste for Lebron.’

One quick question … who’s now more indefensible, LeBron or DeShawn Stevenson?

What? Too soon?

Meh, here’s video of Flip Saunders talking about Cleveland and the whole James ordeal.

Read more »

Dammit. I did it. I used that LeBron fella’s name in the title of this post. I know, I know … I shouldn’t have.

If it’s any consolation, I refused to watch the “decision” when the option was offered to the awaiting media to do so in the Wizards’ family room (the usual press lounge was unavailable).

Oh, the “awaiting” media part … well, yea, we were all waiting to speak to John Wall after he’d gone through his first day of mini-camp with the Wizards. The team’s opening session went from around 6:30 to 8:30 pm on Thursday; it was well after 10 pm before Wall spoke. Can’t blame him, he had to watch his buddy Bron Bron and then ice down some sore muscles.

Which makes me step back and think … back in February, would you have ever imagined that by July Cavs fans would (likely) want to trade places with Wizards fans?

Okay, back to Wall and mini-camp. He looked impressive during last 15 minutes of scrimmage the media was allowed to watch, or at least several notches above whomever was guarding him (okay, that was mostly Sun Yue and Abdulai Jalloh). On defense Wall struggled to fight through a couple picks, but Flip Saunders said he has a chance to be an “outstanding defensive player.”

Read more »

Flickr/next2landon

OVER THE PAST SEVEN YEARS, you’ve accomplished some incredible feats.

You are a two-time league MVP; you won NBA Rookie of the Year; you’re a six-time NBA All-Star; a NBA Scoring Champion; one of five players in NBA history to average over 25 points, 7 rebounds and 7 assists in a season – which you have done four times; one of just three players in NBA history to average at least 40 points, 10 rebounds and 7 assists in a postseason series; and you hold the record for the most consecutive points scored for a team in a playoff game with 25 straight hero-points against the Detroit Pistons in 2007, just to name a few.

(For additional ego-stroking, click here)

If you would allow me to speak freely, you should stay far, far away from Miami.

For starters, oil from the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe (surely, you’ve heard of this) is likely to keep moving east because of the so-called “loop current,” according to NOAA officials.  To make matters worse than they already are, the likelihood of the Gulf oil spill hitting the Keys and the southeastern coast of Florida is greater than the likelihood of you making a free throw (80 percent)!  I know.

And then, there is Bosh.  John Krolic of CAVS: the blog reminded us that he has fewer player of the month awards than you have MVPs.  You’re not even in the same league as Bosh. In fact, he has become part of the “LeBron-Wade-Bosh” trinity, triumvirate, chimera, in large part because he doesn’t have Amar’e Stoudemire’s baggage.  Bosh has also been adamant about his desire to play power forward, but on this Heat team, he is the default center.  Oh, and Brendan Haywood has been locked up by Dallas for years.

Read more »