Time to #ReFollowNBA?

Well, not so fast. Both sides have to vote on the deal. And you know what happens when people start voting…

Nonetheless, here’s a checklist of things the Washington Wizards should starting doing, as it pertains to their current(ish) players, STAT! In terms of free agency? Well, there will be plenty of little time to discuss that. GO FORTH NBA!

Find Andray Blatche.

Not sure where he is, how he is doing, and if he was continuing to workout in Miami as it looked like the reality of a season was falling apart (in addition to handing out turkeys). But somebody find Blatche, quickly. I’m assuming you will need to following: a hose, several scrub brushes with long handles, industrial strength anti-bacterial body wash, some Asian flu masks, and probably a team of scientists.

John Wall.

Have you rested at all this summer? Training camp could be less than two weeks away (give or take, tentatively scheduled to start December 9th), and rumor has it that your groin has been bothering you.

Read more »

While some Wizards are attempting to eat spoonfuls of cinnamon… While some NBA players, including John Wall, are avoiding bullets at a place called the Juliet Supper Club in New York City… While Ted Leonsis welcomes the “buzz and interest” created by a show making fun of the Wizards team name (but don’t ask him about changing it, he’ll get annoyed)… While Jan Vesley returns to the Czech Republic to contemplate his basketball life… While real estate sites are getting in on the lockout action by posting about NBA player and owner housing…

While NBA players seem rather frustrated about the Lockout, but doing alright nonetheless, the rest of us have done… Not much, aside from being working-stiffs, or in school, or entrenched in unemployment, or perhaps involved in a myriad of issues more concerning than the NBA Lockout. Some days for some of us are good, some days for some not so much. Maybe all is not that bad… unless you’re a Redskins fan in a rainy and foggy District of Columbia the Monday after the football kicker couldn’t pull it out against the rival Dallas Cowboys in overtime.

Perspective. No one on either side, players or owners, seems to have it. Fans, especially those who will inevitably come back to the NBA game anyway, are left with a feeling of helplessness. We are often only left, in the midst of this NBA Lockout, with social media and online pictures. Could you imagine if this happened in 1998? The game and its players would’ve disappeared from our visual pixels exponentially.

I can’t even begin to try to name all the states in which John Wall has played exhibtion basketball this summer – Maryland, Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Nevada, Washington, California, New York, Kentucky, and the District of Columbia (there were events in Minnesota and Connecticut where he didn’t show up). I’m likely missing several. He’s been playing basketball overseas as well. Trips to Paris, France.

For the most recent exhibition event, the ‘Good Squad Classic’ held on the campus of UC-Davis outside of Sacramento, Wall showed up, but didn’t play. Jonathan Santiago of Cowbell Kingdom writes, “I had overheard some chatter about his groin giving him some issues, forcing him to sit out the contest.  Donté [Greene] told me that that Wall was indeed injured because he had been playing overseas and that the Washington Wizards guard wanted to ‘rest his body’.”

Read more »

Representatives of the owners and players emerged from the umpteenth NBA lockout negotiation session on Wednesday (actually, Thursday — this one was of the 12-hour variety, 1 pm to 1 am), with an agreement to continue to negotiate on Thursday. Neither black nor white smoke emerged, but rather a bunch of smoke blown up our collective butts. That and the telltale sign from covering media via Twitter: ‘Two different press conferences, you know what that means.’ It means no basketball.

No news is not good news, it’s no news. Yet, people are forced to look for silver linings, some citing the mere fact that NBA commissioner David Stern “stopped the clock” (his words) on a previously given ultimatum of a 5 pm Wednesday deadline (for a player acceptance of the owners’ offer) as a positive sign. Afterward, neither side could publicly say whether progress was made.

“I can’t characterize whether they showed flexibility or not in certain system issues,” said player rep Derek Fisher. “Nothing was worked out today,” said Stern. Media sources have, however, indicated a semblance of progress. “Progress was made on three system issues,” wrote the Twitter account @WojYahooNBA.

When asked by Howard Beck of the New York Times if the NBA was in a position where they could give the players some semblance of what they want (in terms of in exchange for a 50-50 Basketball-Related Income (BRI) split) Stern said, “I don’t know how you would define ‘some semblance’.” Exactly.* Nothing appears as it seems, or vice versa.

There are no indications optimism nor pessimism the Commissioner told us. So into an uncertain tomorrow (or later today) we go. The mystery on the evening/morning, however, might not be the details of the negotiations, but why player union rep and Washington Wizard Mo Evans seemed unable to restrain chuckles on several occasions. I like to imagine that Dikembe Mutombo was sitting in the front row with a dry erase board drawing pictures of things that would like to sex him. Read more »

A D.C. pic, links, other pictures, commentary, video, etc.

[Down 14th St. from Red Derby - NW Washington, D.C. - photo: K. Weidie]

LINKS.

> John Wall, in this photo, seems kinda bummed without the NBA.
[via irockcollege.com]

> Go check out some Goodman League gear on sale for charity. #DMV
[HoopSpeak.com]

Read more »

Sit back folks. I know it’s hard to digest losing the opportunity to watch John Wall, Jan Vesely, usually JaVale McGee, Trevor Booker, Jordan Crawford, Nick Young, Chris Singleton, and others play basketball for the Washington Wizards. It’s the pits. On the other hand, I shrug my shoulders. What else are those who will inevitably return to the game when they start playing again supposed to do? We get ready for the long haul.

But don’t worry folks, this site will carry on just fine. Friends have asked me what I’m going to do during the NBA Lockout. One, I’m going to miss taking pictures at games. There’s nothing like being right there, and photography from the baseline has, at least for me, allowed for new ways to express basketball from different visual perspectives. I’ll also miss the ability to interview players about things that don’t necessarily pertain to basketball or the game at hand — Christmas presents, nicknames, clothing/shoes, and those who never made it being some of the topics.

And that’s what this Wizards-related website often is all about… an outlet for creativity, no matter the pixel medium. So while there will be no games for a long time, it seems, basketball doesn’t go away. There’s history, there’s some old games to break down, there’s forgotten about projects that deserve attention. Of course, all of this as time with regular life allows. But to exist, we certainly don’t need NBA basketball. They’ll be back, one day.

Dave Stallworth

Dave Stallworth was born in Dallas, Texas on December 20, 13 days after Pearl Harbor. He is one of the all-time greats out of Wichita State. Better than Xavier McDaniel, once wrote Bob Lutz of The Wichita Eagle. For that matter, I suppose, better than Antoine Carr, Cliff Levingston, and Cheese Johnson, who is not to be confused with Cheese Wagstaff.

Read more »

It’s not like the Washington Wizards official website was ever a beacon of circus fun where you’d lose hours of your life trapped in an Internet conundrum of entertainment — where food, water, family members, and bathroom breaks have no bearing on quality of life. Nope, it was not like that at all.

And in this post-lockout world that NBA fans find themselves in, buried under the fecal matter of rhetoric from both sides of the aisle? Well, the Wizards website looks a bit different, much worse, and now most aptly compared to the sports fandom of an 11-year old girl (no offense, 11-year old girls).

You see, with this lockout, NBA teams have been required to scrub all images of their players from their http:// (there are legalities involved, etc. — read this report by TrueHoop’s Kevin Arnovitz) — the imagerial evisceration of post-suspension Gilbert Arenas seemed to develop over days, this other thing… overnight (although, after weeks of planning).

Let’s take a screen-shot review…

TOP STORY! G-Man goes to China.

Read more »