Posts for category ‘detroit pistons’

You think watching the Pistons run over the Wizards with little resistance was hard, try starting to watch it on a two-hour delay (sometimes college basketball takes precedent, especially at this time of year), then accidentally finding out the score, and then watching the second half the next day. Boy it was ugly … but at least it kinda/sorta made for quick work. Below are a couple notes I took from witnessing the carnage.

The game starts with Wizards TV guys Steve Buckhantz and Phil Chenier talking about Gilbert Arenas‘ jersey number change from #0 to Mike Miller‘s current #6. Let’s pick up on their conversation …

Buckhantz: “…. Agent Zero will be no longer, we’ll have to come up with something else.”

Chenier: “New identity.”

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The above image is iconic in the history of the Washington Wizards/Bullets franchise. The 7’7″ Manute Bol, the 5’3″ Muggsy Bogues … it’s easy to see why.

And while the image below of the 7’7″ Gheorghe Muresan reaching out to slap fives with the 5’5″ Earl Boykins isn’t even close to being as iconic, it’s still pretty damn adorable.

Unfortunately, this scene had to come after yet another Wizards loss, their 24th of the season. The look on the kid’s face to the right says it all … notice his less than half-hearted attempt to give the Wizards a hand slap as they exit the court.

Washington has lost two games since, four in a row overall, and head into tonight’s game against the Sacramento Kings with a record of 12-26. Flip Saunders is still searching for his 600th career win. I’m at the Verizon Center to cover the game and I’ll be rooting for him. Read more »

Remember when this team just had to worry about Antawn Jamison’s injured shoulder and finding themselves in Flip Saunders’ offensive system? Seven wins to 10 losses seems like a pipe dream now. Wizards fans would probably even trade these times for the 2007-08 sans Agent Zero playoff season. At least hope still existed then.

Unforgiving circumstances don’t even begin to describe what has transpired around this basketball team. Saunders must employ assistant coaches just to field a 5-on-5 scouting report. Players have to leave the practice court to give testimony that could land their teammates, their friends in jail. And then to go out and perform under these circumstances? Can’t be easy. Yes, they are paid millions to play a game, but that doesn’t make it any easier to perform under such pressure.

Then again, the basketball court is supposed to be an escape, right? Most of the Wizards act like they’re stuck on Alcatraz with neither vessel nor the ability to swim. Well, with the exception of Jamision, who had 31 points (11-19 FGs) and 10 rebounds in a whopping 45 minutes. The Gentleman has been playing his 33-year old ass off and often is the only Wizard doing do. Flip Saunders feels bad for Jamison. I know because he said so. I feel bad for Jamison too, resigning myself that he, more so than Wizards fans, deserves something better.

When Mike Jones wrote, “The right thing for Wizards to do is move Jamison,” I didn’t want to accept the idea, even if in the back of my mind, I knew it was the honorable thing to do. Now I wholeheartedly agree. I would have liked to see Jamison retire in Washington and I’m sure he imagined himself doing the same. But the situation calls for both him and Wizards fans to swallow a large, bitter pill. Antawn has done as much as he could for this franchise and continues to play with unabashed pride. Of course, such mercy idealism doesn’t take away the unsettling nature of Jamison being an absolute “perfect” fit in Cleveland. Him helping the Cavs win a championship is worse than kissing your sister, it’s damn near the entire Aristocrats act.

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flickr/gerlos

The Wizards still can’t find a way to make things work. And there’s only so much tinkering/adjusting which can be made to a team that plays like they can just fix things in the next game and doesn’t understand the need to play with a sense of urgency in the now.

Is it time to stop searching for a way to make the current situation work and look in a another direction with a significant shake-up? Believers in the constancy of the Arenas/Butler/Jamison Big Three are dwindling faster than Social Security.

Not long ago, Flip Saunders said the time to truly give his team an initial once-over would be after the first twenty games. The Wizards will enter game number twenty on Thursday with a .368 winning percentage in a prime-time national television match against the Eastern Conference co-leading Boston Celtics.

I won’t pull a Jim Zorn and say that things look bleak, but they don’t look promising. With the Redskins talking about being cursed, it’s probably only a matter of time until Tony Kornheiser does a ‘find and replace’ and recycles an old “Curse O’ Les Boulez” column.

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Here I am to finally write a post about Saturday night’s 106-103 loss to the Pistons. Seems a bit tedious to do at this point. But I have a story to tell, so might as well get it out.

I like to think of myself as a pretty  optimist … well, “guarded optimism” was the term I often used prior to the season. Guess I threw that ‘guarded’ part into the wind when I predicted 55 wins. Really? What was I thinking? … but that’s neither here nor there at this juncture. To put it plainly, early in the fourth quarter, when the game had become a back-and-forth battle, I caught myself thinking that the Wizards would find a way to lose. And they did. From predicting 55 wins to the point of reasonable doubt … boy did that escalate quickly.

Flip Saunders used a slightly different term after the game, saying, “It’s like we’re inventing ways to put ourselves in a hole.” This was his response was to a question about DeShawn Stevenson’s ‘away from the play’ foul with 16 seconds left, giving the Pistons a single free-throw and the ball. Ben Gordon, one of the best FT shooters in the league (sixth best percentage among active players), easily sealed the game’s fate, putting Detroit up four with 14.4 seconds left. But Saunders also cited Brendan Haywood’s ‘moment of confusion’ travel at the 2:35 mark of the fourth as another invention of wizardry … among other items of note; 20 Pistons points off 16 Wizards turnovers sounds like it’d fit.

And “inventing” is probably the more apt term to use. “Finding” something can be left completely to chance if you are not looking. You “find” a penny on heads, or rather in the Wizards’ case, a fly in the ointment. An invention is left to your own creation, a self-inflicted device. Sure,  inventions can be accidental, but I guess those would be more like “discoveries.”

The Wizards certainly didn’t mean to commit such game influencing gaffes … or score only one meaningless field goal in the game’s final five minutes. The mental lapses, the game slippage as many coaches like to call it, created an environment conducive to loss-inducing invention. It wasn’t an instance of the Wizards “finding” themselves in a hole, they were handing out shovels to each other for digging.

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A scene from glorious Grand Rapids, MI - {flickr/OZinOH}

Listening to basketball on the radio is hard … damn hard. Hard like drinking warm milk and eating boiled eggs in the hot July sun while getting bit by mosquitoes and suffering from a tequila and red wine hangover.

Ok, well maybe it’s not that bad. Wizards radio guys Glenn Consor and Dave Johnson do a helluva job keeping team faithful updated with developments.

Still, when I hear Consor officially declaring Gilbert Arenas to be “back”, indicating that he hasn’t felt this way about the guard’s preseason cameo appearances up until now, I feel pretty deprived from not being able to see the moving pictures.

But the Wizards’ second unit held on late to win 101-98, and Arenas scored 24 points in just under 28 minutes (along with 5 assists to 6 turnovers). This team is getting their ‘LA Looks’ on and starting to gel. And hey, looks like they figured out a way to play some okay defense without Brendan Haywood (Fab Oberto led the Wiz with a plus-13).

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Ya’ll heard Gilbert Arenas came back?
Naw really….no April Fools.

Well, in case you missed it last Saturday, I outsourced some screen shots and they just arrived from Bangalore. Enjoy.

He hugged out all the troubles of the world today with ‘Sheed.

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My first thought was: Are you effing kidding me?

As rumors about Gilbert Arenas’ possible return to the basketball court leaked via a supposed text message from Arenas to Comcast’s Chris Miller, then to the world wide web via a Twitter tweet from Comcast’s Andy Siegel, which was ultimately picked up by Mr. Irrelevant and the DC Sports Bog (twitters…internets…boy, if you were ever looking for more signs that newspapers are dying).

“Ur the first to get the truth,” Arenas texted to Miller.

Of course, Gil then told the Washington Post’s Dan Steinberg, “It’s only true if I play on Saturday. If I don’t play, it ain’t true.”

Ahh…if Gilbert only knew what the “truth” was….instead, he offers to play his basketball life out in a comedy of errors.

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Q1

Butler hits a tough falling shot to begin….Steve Buckhantz and Phil Chenier relate that Tapscott wants to get the star forwards (Butler/Jamison) off first…..but why?

Seems like those two should be able to get going at any time…it’s the scoring from the rest of the team which has been the concern.

Caron Butler is trying to do too much…..make, miss, gets caught in the air and has to pass to Blatche with one second on the shot clock — bad decision.

Tapscott says that Mike James is the type of player who “needs” minutes and that’s why he is starting….whatever that means on a 4-18 team.

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In anticipation of tonight’s match-up between the Wizards and Pistons, the third on the season, Jessie from the Pistons Nation agreed to answer a couple questions I had about his team. Read on….

1) The Pistons have gone 9-9 since Iverson has taken the court…..meanwhile, Mr. Big Shot and the Nuggets are 16-4….care to offer any hindsight on the trade?

• Did you like it in the first place?
• Would you do it differently?
• Prior to trading Chauncey, did you seriously think that Detroit had championship material?

Personally I’m not a huge fan of the trade on the hardwood. Chaunce was my favorite Piston, and I’ve never been a big fan of AI’s improv stylings. I don’t believe he fits the team, and it shows on the floor.

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Hey…..did you guys know that the Wizards beat the Pistons [game blog on Bullets Forever]? In the midst of yesterday’s trade frenzy, I was unable to get down any thoughts on the game.

Once again, the Wiz had to claw their way back. In the first meeting with Detroit, they had to fight back just to be down 10, 31-21, at the end of the first quarter (the Wiz had been down 17 at the 3:30 mark). So, after putting themselves in a 29-14 hole after one quarter on Tuesday, you’ll have to excuse me if I wasn’t exactly confident in the ability to get a win.

But the team kept fighting, and that’s the main reason why people are saying that the Wizards are a much better team than their 4-15 record.

The Washington Post’s Ivan Carter especially noted Darius Songaila’s bucket to put the Wiz up 6 with 2:08 in the 4th as the turning point. I guess timeouts work because it wasn’t 20 seconds prior that the Pistons got three chances at the hoop, converting on the third, capping a quick 8-2 run in 2:15 to bring the Pistons within two points. But Tapscott halted play, Wes Unseld Jr. drew it up, and D-Song came to the rescue.

To withstand a final push from the Pistons and live to tell about it was huge for the psyche of the team.

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Maybe Rodney Stuckey’s foul on a driving Antawn Jamison was a just call, maybe it wasn’t. But in Antonio McDyess’ opinion, a missed FT means that the ‘ball don’t lie’ no matter the case.

When will these Pistons stop assuming the reasons behind what the ball do and don’t do? Sure AJ bricked it, but I know one thing that never lies…….Score, Board. (yes, a fan of a 4-15 team talking trash)

Not an ideal moment to have the camera pan on Nick Young…..Comcast shows a clip of Young talking about being “prepared” to guard Richard Hamilton. Then, Steve Buckhantz even brags about how Young did come prepared to play.

But alas, the camera catches Young, not with his ears burning, but his mouth open and yawning. What makes the scene weird is Young sitting right next to a 12-year old girl in a Pistons uniform. If I had to guess, I bet they talked extensively about Nickelodeon and unicorns……play it cool, hotshot.

Walter Herrmann on Fire – flickr/Vedia

Flickr tells me that the above picture is none other than Walter Herrmann….and I have to believe it. Something tells me that old school Walter Herrmann would totally have a hair-doo like Guile from Street Fighter only to go with the ‘Fabio’ look we’re graced with today.

So a guy with a pony-tail goes off on the Wizards and everyone becomes a drama queen. I mean just look at the picture….the guy is about to dunk with a ball on f-ing fire! It’s no wonder that Herrmann was hitting trey balls and finger rolls on the Wiz. For all we know, he could be the Argentinian Chuck Norris.

Plus, the dude has been through a TON in his life that not many can imagine. In July 2003, Herrmann lost his mother, younger sister, and girlfriend all in the same car crash. Exactly a year later, he had one of the best games of his career, 38 points and 11 rebounds, in leading Argentina in the South American Championships. After the game, he found out that his father had died of a heart-attack.

So, from a guy who almost quit the game of basketball, but was encouraged not to by his older sister, to starring in the NBA today. If such a game had to happen against the Wizards, then so be it.

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Detroit Skyline – flickr/Joseph.S

If the Wizards would’ve shot better that 37% against New Jersey, they would have won, right? Yea…..who knows. When it comes to winning and basketball, no two areas are preached more about than defense and rebounding, no matter what pulpit the message is coming from. So against the Pistons, for game blog purposes, I’m going to ignore the offense and concentrate on defense and rebounding. Not all boards are attainable, and you can play great defense and not stop a bulk of an opponent’s shots from going in. That being said, I’m going to attempt to selectively focus on the particularly great or horrendous occurrences in those areas.

Q1

10:48: Ron Thompson mentioned that transition D would be key in the pregame show…here, Billups brings it down the middle in off a Wizards turnover (Etan had great position in the lane, just lost the ball). Amir Johnson comes to screen Antonio Daniels just inside the three point line. Jamison is laying back a little to protect the basket, but there’s just too much space, AJ needs to be closer to help on Chauncey. Billups takes one dribble off the screen and gets an easy jumper on the left elbow. Johnson’s screen was semi-illegal….but this is the NBA. 4-0 Detroit.

10:23: Next time down, Amir Johnson gets called for an illegal screen…..laid his butt into DeShawn.

9:35: Wiz get caught standing and confusing assignments for boxing out….can’t see whose fault it is because of the camera angle, but Prince sneaks for an offensive board and the Pistons get 2nd chance points. 6-3 Detroit.

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