Posts for category ‘sam cassell’

At the conclusion of an afternoon session on day five of training camp, Washington Wizards assistant coach Sam Cassell cracked smiles while rebounding for John Wall, Jordan Crawford and Shelvin Mack as they performed a shooting drill. Cassell is about to begin his third season on the bench for the Wizards. Forever known for his personality, he doled out positive instruction to the young guards, sharing stories with Wall about a certain game in his playing career where he “killed it” and got the win. Cassell also proclaimed Crawford as the funniest dude he knew, the camaraderie among the trio being rather overt.

The three-time world champion with 15 NBA seasons under his belt is essential to the development of both guards. He’s constantly teaching the young Wizards moves and positioning. Even though Flip Saunders had this to say after practice,:

“Sam does a good job because he has good knowledge as far as played the position. One thing that’s a little bit different is that Sam played a lot different than these guys. And sometimes you have to talk to Sam because the things he wants them to do, as far as shoot mid-range shots and those type of things, that’s not what their game is. Sam’s speed has definitely never been close to those guys. So that’s one thing we gotta watch out a little bit. But he’s got a good knowledge of what to look for.”

Either way, certainly the athletic can learn something from the tactics of the non-athletic. Cassell has also enjoyed past friendly battles of one-on-one with the likes of John Wall, Nick Young and JaVale McGee. Something left in the tank is sometimes best spent on education.

Cassell’s strengths are his bubbly personality, ability to relate to young players and cerebral understanding of what it takes to succeed in the NBA. And that’s not just from 136 playoff games and numerous big shots, but he’s also played under accomplished coaches such as Rudy Tomjanovich, George Karl, Cotton Fitzsimmons, Doc Rivers and Flip Saunders. For those participating in a ‘NBA Coaches Sam Cassell Played For’ Jeopardy category at home: Jim Cleamons, John Calipari, Don Casey, Kevin McHale, and Mike Dunleavy.

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From FreeDarko’s Undisputed Guide To Pro Basketball History:

“Madison Square Garden, the game’s most hallowed arena, is the Mecca of Basketball. But this nickname had little to do with devotion to the sport; it was borrowed from the Shriners’ Mecca Temple, a venue that hosted boxing and wrestling matches in the ’20s and ’30s.”

Don’t forget to go buy that book, here’s a reminder why.

So, what happens when some of the Wizards’ big men go through their pre-game warm-up routine while some of the Knicks City Dancers do the same, on the same court? Or when Andray Blatche keeps loose with a game of one-on-one with Sam Cassell?

This video:

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From entertainment to education, there are a lot of benefits to having Sam Cassell on an NBA coaching staff, not to mention that he has relevancy to today’s youthful players — as in, they’ve probably seen some of his games on television, in color. Hence, Cassell can still conduct live demonstrations of his knowledge.

We’ve seen ‘Sam I Am’ go against the likes of Nick Young and JaVale McGee in post-practice battles. On Monday, Cassell and John Wall took to each other in the low post. The Washington Post’s Michael Lee has the words describing the scene on the Wizards Insider. You’ll find video below …

I’ve taken a bunch of pictures while at summer league. The more the merrier is what I say. And I’ll have more to come soon, but the one below is my favorite so far. It was taken just after the Wizards played their second game against the Clippers. The photo is a little blurry because it was taken with more motion (from me and the subjects) than I’d planned for, but I think it turned out just fine. Notice the serious looks on the faces of Flip Saunders on the left and Sam Cassell to the barely right, as if “it’s just summer league.” And then notice how John Wall is just enjoying life.

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.”

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On Thursday, the members of the media were treated to a spirited match of one-on-one between Sam Cassell and Nick Young … well, “spirited” only really reflects one side of the battle, obviously coming from the entertaining Sam I Am.

I didn’t see every possession, but as it’s been reported before, the old man still has it.

The game of one-on-one was of the casual variety that you usually see pro or college basketball players play … mostly jump shots induced by a variety of moves that serve no real purpose of ‘getting to the basket’ productivity.

Young did get his shot to fall a couple times. But for the most part, Cassell was getting the best of the kid with some veteran trickery, craftily adjusting his shot near the basket and using some below the waist leverage to gain an advantage on defense, especially when Young was trying to go up for a shot.

Not only was Cassell talking smack to Young, but he managed to get Brendan Haywood involved as well. At point point after a Young miss, Cassell said something in Haywood’s direction to the effect of “Can’t finish … This is the Wizards … Good first half team, but can’t finish.”

The whole scene left the entire media contingent in stitches and the newly acquired Earl Boykins smiling and shaking his head at the antics of Cassell as he and Gilbert Arenas left the practice court.

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Success of the Wizards is contingent upon the court leadership of Gilbert Arenas. This is not a ground-breaking concept. Despite looking “back” in Dallas, he’s still rusty, and he and the team have a good deal of the development “process” to go.

Nothing could have more exemplified this than the first quarter in Atlanta. As I wrote in the previous game post, Arenas had eight points, one turnover in the game’s first 6:20 and one point, five turnovers in the remainder of the first half. When the offense started to get sloppy, Arenas did not exert control on this situation to calm his team down.

Mike Prada did a good job of breaking this down on Bullets Forever:

A large part of the problem was that Arenas was breaking a lot of plays to drive to the basket.  Yes, it’s true that you want Arenas to be aggressive, in particular because it would wear down Joe Johnson.  However, that has to come more in the flow of the offense than it did tonight.  Arenas kept calling his own number instead of letting the offense run itself and then dumping the ball to another scorer.  The rest of the players were often not prepared for Arenas’ decisions and didn’t get in position to defend in transition.

The strive to achieve more balance is new to Arenas. It’s gonna take some time. All Wizards fans can do is have faith that the experience of Flip Saunders will work to correct these issues and the desire of Arenas to be a better player will make him wholly receptive to the process.

Let’s also be glad that Sam Cassell is around to put some flavor in Arenas’ ear.

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As the dust settles from the “it’s a done deal” to the “it’s official” phase of hiring Flip Saunders as the next coach of the Wizards, I find it hard to form a solid opinion on perhaps the most important aspect of transforming this team from mediocre to championship contender (aside from health of course).

I still subscribe to the thought that players are on the court, playing the games, and thus hold the ultimate responsibility for winning and losing. But a good coach…well, he can be a difference maker.

Not to say I’m apathetic towards the hiring of Saunders. If I had to rank, I suppose he would have been my number one choice, with Mark Jackson being a sleeper pick (he is a minister, and could surely preach on it….plus, his NBA analysis on ABC/ESPN is on point….but he lacks significant coaching experience).

I might have taken Avery Johnson over Jackson…but over Saunders? I’m not so sure…..in fact, I doubt it. So Saunders it is, and I’m okay with that….but not exactly thrilled. Then again, the stink of this season hasn’t been laid to rest, and that certainly has something to do with my mundane attitude.

Michael Wilbon, whom I’ve taken to task before because of generic columns, when it comes to the Wizards, that scream lackluster effort of trying to cater to the masses instead of a knowledgeable fan base, actually wrote an astoundingly astute column on the Wiz coaching situation. However, I don’t exactly agree with his sentiment.

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LeBron James’ words to his mother: “Sit yo ass down.” Sure, she didn’t have to be as involved in a LeBron-Paul Pierce off-the-court, wrap-up-foul scrum. And of course LeBron was in the heat of the moment. Still, he barked at Gloria with the command of a bread-winner. The thing is, any mom might have been concerned and up in the mix, but not any son would tell her to sit her ass down (perhaps moms was simply under the influence). Even K.G. was like, “Hey man, you can’t be talkin’ yo mama like that.”

Back to the baby who needs to be put in the corner.

Them folks at WIZZNUTZZ got the whole L-Baby-J tee-shirt thing going on….check them out and get you one. My fav:
LeBron’s dunk over Kevin Garnett in Cleveland’s game four win, tying the series, will no doubt be part of NBA playoff lore, especially if the Cavs go on to win the series.

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Wizards Insider reported that Caron Butler will probably sit out the NBA All-Star game. And Comcast SportsNite did, indeed, just report that Caron won’t play in the NOLA. Good. For selfish reasons, I’d rather him not play because I’ll be on a plane during the NBA All-Star game and I want to be able to see Tuff Juice play when he really shows out on the big stage…..after all, he was 1-7 with 2 points last year. But really, the rest will be good for him. He will be revitalized and motivated for the post-break. Plus, snub amends can be made with a replacement. It should be Hedo Turkoglu.

Onto tonight’s game, I’m excited about it. This team, despite 6, 7 game losing streaks, did come out to play in the last two games against two very good Western Conference teams. Yea, it didn’t turn out how we would like. The Wiz made some bonehead mistakes, but I recognize the effort. I’d say about 20 other NBA teams, if faced with a similar situation, would have folded.

Should the Wizards get mad and pick a fight? [SVP Style]

ME: Of course I would like someone to bust Stephen Jackson straight in the jaw, especially for something like this. But I like this Wizards team not trying to act like the Warriors; their bitching and moaning during that game was a little too much.

Did Eddie have nothin’ left or was his team not listening? [My Swog Is Phenomenal]
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The tale of two men,
Sam Cassell and Dikembe Mutombo,
wearing Wal-Mart shirts with double-breasted pockets,
and their journey of what could, should, might be their last NBA season
…..all while dealing with the one white arm of Cassell.

And now for a Bucket List of Links:

>> I can’t stress enough how cool this project from Jason of Ball Hype is. Are you raising a kid? Do you want him or her to play sports? (and by “sports”, I mean Basketball, Baseball, or Football — sorry hockey, no offense…..you just weren’t included in this project) If you want your kid to play against the best of the best around….and if you want nothing to ever get them down….then consider moving. The link will help with your decision where.

>> Malcolm Gladwell has a couple interesting posts on his blog about sports and artificial enhancement. You should probably start reading with this one, then this one…..and then go back to these two: 1 2.

>> Ahhh….Duke giving us more reasons to hate Duke…..I mean, Dook. Hey, thanks guys! [Señor Irrelevant]

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