Posts for category ‘brendan haywood’

Flip Saunders on preparing for the last game of the preseason, the ‘Swine Flu’ back-court he will start against the Bulls on Friday, and getting Andray Blatche into his role of coming off the bench.

Brendan Haywood on getting Gilbert Arenas and Mike Miller back from the flu and the Wizards’ ‘Window of Opportunity’.

Caron Butler on his defensive progression

“So far so good. You know, still gambling a little bit after looking at some film. But, it’s still preseason … just trying to focus in on the rotation for the most part, getting to spots, talking and communicating as much as possible. And … so far so good.”

Narrowing down the rotation & JaVale McGee stealing jerseys

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Last Monday’s Washington Wizards media day seems like such a long time ago.

In addition to me being there, blogging about DeShawn Stevenson’s new tats, the musings of Gilbert Arenas, and the ‘consistent’ goals of Andray Blatche, there was a ton of great coverage from Hoops Addict, Wizards Insider, Wizards Outlet, and Bullets Forever.

Now, after transcribing all of my interview recordings, I wanted to share some of the quotes/pictures that have been relatively unheard/unseen.

{Note: I will be in Richmond for training camp on Saturday and Sunday. There’s limited media access, but I’ll be updating some of the goings-ons via Twitter}

When I first saw the above video of Brendan Haywood training, I thought, ‘Hey, he and JaVale McGee both like to workout to the mellow sounds of Drake, Lil’ Wayne, and Trey Songzzzzzz just wanting to be successful’. Don’t believe me? Just watch … (well, until some facist decided to disable the audio on McGee’s workout vid because they probably believe in protecting the money going towards more Lil’ Weezy face tats and Drake eyebrow waxings more than they believe in an open source world … oh well).

Then I watched Haywood’s Workout Part II: Jump Shots Juice from Concentrate …. and said, ‘Hey, I recognize that workout guy, he’s The Hoops Whisperer’.

The Hoops Whisperer aka Idan Ravin is a guy based out of Washington, DC who used to be a lawyer, but is now a famed NBA basketball trainer, a job he just kinda fell into. Oh yea, he also runs ethnic dating sites such as Ethiopian Personals and Eligible Greeks in his spare time. No really, he does … go check a pretty good Wall Street Journal profile on Ravin. Too bad Oleksiy Pecherov is gone, maybe Ravin could have hooked him up via a future venture called ‘Ukrainian Ill Na Na’ dot com.

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First the site news …

As the reach of Truth About It.net grows, especially since joining ESPN’s True Hoop Network in June, it’s becoming more important to expand coverage to include more diverse perspectives other than my own.

Well, I’m here today to announce that TAI has made a very welcome addition to the roster. I’ll let him introduce himself ….

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flickr/Keith Allison

In one clip [Stephon Marbury] cries uncontrollably for 5 straight minutes with no shirt on while his homeboy rubs his shoulders – why, I don’t know?! In another clip, he eats Vaseline, claiming his throat is sore and that this would solve the problem. Not to be outdone, he has another clip where he dances to a song called “Barbie Doll!” That was very disturbing. If I was on his team, there’s no way I’m getting undressed in front of him after watching that…

When Brendan Haywood blogged the above quote a couple weeks ago, it struck me as something that could be interpreted as slightly homophobic. But at the time, no one really caught on.

Since the comment seemed relatively subtle, I withheld from drawing conclusions, wondering if it would eventually garner more attention … likely unwanted attention. Perhaps leading Brendan to conclude, like his teammate Gilbert Arenas, that blogging can be a “double-edged sword.”

Well, it happened. Haywood couldn’t resist, once again playing a two-bit comedian in the crowded line to pile on Marbury.

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flickr/Keith Allison

Haywood is a non-starter for 20 NBA teams.

by spurchief on Jul 26, 2009 4:00 PM EDT

Is that so?

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From the going-ons of Dinner Bells, Transformers, bidding adieus, and locker room clowin’ on this site, below are your hump day links from the Wizards world wide web in the past week or so.

• As of right now, the Wizards will be paying $6 million in luxury taxes.
  [Wizards Insider]
• Caron Butler grew up with a rapper named ‘Mr. Wicked’ who used to say “NBA” to him every day in the hallways of high school.
  [Hoop Doctors]
• Is Antawn Jamison the next Alex English?
  [The Secret Weapon]
• Is Nick Young a goner?
  [Bullets Forever]
• Ernie Grunfeld went on the radio with some junkies.
  [Krem's Sports Blog]
• ‘How To Make A Dagger’ by Steve Buckhantz.
  [DC Sports Bog]
• What did the Wizards sell for $2.5 million?
  [The Secret Weapon]
• Are the Wizards jogging in place?
  [Stet Sports]
• Andray Blatche has a new nickname: “Summer League”
  [We're Off To See The Willards]
• Tom Hammonds scores 24 points in a game? This has to be some sort of fantasy.
  [Bullets Forever]
• It’s a landslide, the Wizards should go back to wearing Amercia’s colors.
  [Mr. Irrelevant]
• The Wizards radio will be moving from the Danny Snyder controlled WTEM 980 to the CBS controlled 106.7 WJFK — not sure what this means, but it’s probably a good thing.
  [DC Sports Bog]
• “Mission Accomplished” for the Washington Wizards?
  [WashingtonWizardsBlog;  mission accomplished comedy via @matthartwig]

Finally, Brendan Haywood is blogging again … this time bidding farewell to Michael Jackson. He writes:

He came along at a time when African-Americans weren’t accepted in the main stream media and forced society to look at us differently. Without Michael Jackson, there may not have been a Michael Jordan. He, along with guys like Jackie Robinson and Muhammad Ali are true pioneers who broke down racial barriers and allowed young African-American entertainers to be as successful as they are today.

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flickr/Keith Allison

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.

Think what you want about Brendan Haywood’s failure to give Thomas his proper sendoff while Antawn Jamison did. Haywood can say what he wants, doesn’t necessarily mean he’s a good or bad guy.

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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.

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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 well documented 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?

Not likely.

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As if it was ‘Blog About Brendan Haywood‘ week … but as you’ll see, it’s not all about him.

Haywood had an online chat session via ESPN last week and took the opportunity to subtly call out a couple of the Wiz kids. And what would be a Wizards offseason without hoping that certain someone finally gains some maturity?

When asked how he could help the young bigs, specifically Andray Blatche and JaVale McGee, Haywood responded, “Both those guys have the skill but it comes down to being in shape and wanting to do it. Nothing I can do to help them, they have to want to do it on their own.”

Blatche’s career issues have been well documented. From getting shot during a car-jacking, purportedly set-up by gold diggers after a night of clubbing, to sleeping at the arena because he couldn’t pay rent, to snacking on nachos before a game because he didn’t think he’d play, to soliciting an undercover D.C. cop posing as a prostitute, to getting arrested for reckless driving and driving on a suspended license (three times over), Andray has had plenty bumps in the road, somewhat validating why he was overlooked by many GMs en route to slipping to the second round out of high school.

Blatche also hasn’t shown the improvement expected of him on the court. Despite claims of being more mature and “hungry” before ’08-09, which was snicked at by Haywood and Antawn Jamison, Blatche’s flashes of brilliance have been plagued by long spells of inconsistency, which can be mostly attributed to his poor conditioning, and general lack of focus. He’s even been named to the NBA All-Scapegoat team (ok, well … nominated by me).

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Blogging ain’t easy. Just ask Gilbert Arenas, who stopped his contributions to ‘Agent Zero: The Blog File’ on NBA.com (so he says) because blogging turned into a “double-edged sword.”

Now, a newbie to web-logging his thoughts, Brendan Haywood, is just trying to get his feet wet and learn the ropes.

In his first post on Yard Barker, Haywood threw some digs in LeBron James’ direction, saying “I think we all know that anytime you touch LeBron James, you’re going to be sent to the showers! You accidentally bump into him and you’re going to be “rub-a-dub-dubbing” in the locker room bathtub!”

For more of my thoughts on the subject, you can head to NBC Washington, “Haywood Tired of LeBron’s Superstar Treatment.”

But just as we were digesting the initial post by Haywood made only yesterday, Yard Barker is sending out email alerts that BTH has posted another blog entry today. Huh? Guess the guy is full steam ahead with his contract year media campaign.

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Did the Caps depress you this weekend? Did you spend time drinking on it?
Sorry.
The series isn’t over,
but you’re always welcome to pull up next to a Wizards fan at the bar.

First a couple Wizards-related pieces I wrote for NBC Washington (shameless self promotion):

“[Ernie Grunfeld is] panicking and that whole franchise is panicking, they are a dumb blockbuster trade waiting to happen,” said ESPN columnist Bill Simmons.
ESPN Columnist Wants To Fleece Wizards [NBC Washington]

From Miami, to throwing the opening pitch at a Nationals game, to La-La Land, Caron Butler is on a tour, going each and every place with a mic in his hand .
Caron Butler’s Championship Campaign [NBC Washington]

Speaking of … in case you missed Butler’s redemptive throw [via DC Sports Bog]:

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I really don’t care for Reggie Miller…..the television commentator. I certainly appreciated Reggie when he took down the hated Knicks with playoff heroics, once giving ol’ Spike Lee the choke sign, telling him to shut the eff up.

But Reggie on TV is just a spiraling, gangly, screeching, whiny sac of hot mess, and he’s often wrong too (well, maybe not often, but surely much more than should be allowed for someone in his position).

Reggie is no Mark Jackson, Doug Collins, Hubie Brown, or even his sister, Cheryl Miller, who is much, much better at her job.

I’ve heard some refer to Reggie as a “turd” and a “weenie bag”…and that’s just the censored opinion of the one person audience who is the tenant of my apartment.

Reggie Miller has frustrated many before, and he lived up to his reputation this past Thursday as the Cavs and Wizards matched-up on TNT.

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pic via DC Fab

Having a tight hammy, and thus leaving last Friday’s Magic game at half, wasn’t going to stop Caron Butler from donning a secret service outfit, diamond encrusted wrist bling, and celebrating his 29th birthday at one of his favorite spots, the Park at 14th.

From Wizards Outlet:

He said that he was feeling pretty good the last week after sitting out three games the previous week, but when he made a move to the basket against Orlando, the hamstring clinched up. He’s been getting treatment ever since then and it has yet to improve. Here’s to hoping it’s nothing worse than just the tightness it has been classified as.

Butler is scheduled to have an MRI on his bothersome hamstring today, so his status for even traveling to Utah this afternoon for the upcoming four game road trip is seemingly up in the air.

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