Flip Saunders and I may have different perceptions of the Wizards. And for good reason, we are different people. He’s a professional, experienced coach. He sees countless things  I don’t see when observing his team. But I’m stubborn in my opinion that derives from the things I see. Agree to disagree if you will. For instance, let’s look at the quote below from Michael Lee’s story in Monday’s Washington Post:

Despite their 1-3 record, the Wizards (8-17) still believe they made progress on the trip, with Coach Flip Saunders and several of his players commenting on how the team could’ve easily won two more games if a few more breaks had gone their way.

The Wizards have recently patted themselves on the back for not quitting and being in close contests. “Breaks” … sure, Michael Lee’s words, but the franchise has conveyed the ‘if only a couple of plays’ argument, as if some fate has intervened.

I’m under the impression that if the Wizards wanted it a little bit more, especially on defense, if they had just a bit more focus, determination, hustle, you know, all of those intangible sports clichés, then they could have notched a couple more wins.

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Why is Gilbert Arenas always so ready to give up a foul after he or his team commits a turnover?

Why is Caron Butler always shuffling/switching his pivot foot when he catches the ball, leading to a travel?

Why are the Wizards entrenched in bad communication, often running into each other on pick and roll defense?

This team is surrounded by a lot of questions, these are just some examples. The quandary of this bad Washington Wizards team won’t simply be resolved by ‘when Mike Miller becomes healthy’, ‘when Gilbert Arenas gets his mentality back’ or ‘when Flip Saunders is able to reign in his players to properly run his offense’.

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I seriously contemplated whether I should ever watch the Wizards-Suns game. It’s not like I didn’t know the 121-95 outcome or was unable to witness the Wizards constructing a Brick City that would make Redman proud. Instead of dedicating my Saturday night life to the Wizards at home, I ventured out in the D.C. snow to meet some friends at a bar for drinks, darts, and sports on TVs. Between the activities, I couldn’t concentrate on watching the Wizards much, but the futility was made crystal clear in the glances I was able to get.

This team has no moxie. With the persistent problem back-to-back games pose, there’s ever-increasing skepticism and little hope that they will ever change course for the better. There are a ton of excuses for why this team is falling way short of expectations, a lot of them seem to stem on more time and patience. But how do you get a team to play with energy and focus like they care?

So, I put my blues collection on shuffle and spent the better part of my Sunday watching the Wizards-Suns with focus … and boy did I learn a lot about this team. I was able to capture the essence of the game in the nine frames below, but I’ll have much more to come in the future about the less desirable aspects of the Flip Saunders’ team.

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Caron Butler is not all bad and he’s no scapegoat, but he’s also having the worst season of his career (aside from his second year in the league).

Sure, a new system is tough. But Butler sells himself as a pro’s pro, a vet’s vet. And not to say he doesn’t possess those qualities, but he still has a big step to take to be a ‘next-level’ player and not some flash-in-the-pan two time All-Star.

Flip Saunders has implored Gilbert Arenas to push the ball and attack the basket. With that, offense should be created. Caron shifting his role back to number two, where he’s rightly supposed to sit in the team’s pecking order, shouldn’t involve him fading into the background, nor should it involve him forcing it.

This season, Caron’s game has been everywhere on the spectrum except balanced. He needs to adjust his offensive approach to create for the team, and not just for himself. The him-first approach is why he is averaging a career low 1.7 assists/36 minutes and why he has a 41.4 FG% that’s only better than his sophomore slump season in Miami, Dwyane Wade’s rookie year.

Sure Arenas cools down many buildings in which he plays with 40.2% from the field, and sure the Wizards have 99 problems … but Caron Butler is one.

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Despite what anyone might say, the game wasn’t on one man. It hasn’t been on one man all season. Not Caron Butler. Not Antawn Jamison. Not Gilbert Arenas. Not Flip Saunders. Not, etc.

The Wizards win and lose as a team.

[via @MikeJonesTWT]

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I don’t think the Wizards have ended a game with turnover this season yet. Chalk another one up in the ‘Inventing Ways To Lose’ tally. Although, turning the ball over to lose a game isn’t a new invention, it’s just what bad teams do. What more can I say?

{fact}

Four of Gilbert Arenas’ six fouls came immediately after a turnover. Three of those turnovers were committed by Arenas himself, one by Caron Butler.

{wizards vs. clippers: 11 frames}

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NOTE: I’ll be chatting about tonight’s Wizards-Clippers game on www.CSNWashington.com at 10:15 pm. Come by and hang out if you’re up … and by “up” I mean both awake and down to watch the Wiz.

I’m doing this post for a couple reasons: I can’t escape the carnage of Saturday night, and in his post-game interview, Brendan Haywood mentioned some repeated, successful plays run between Earl Watson and Tyler Hansbrough. I wanted to investigate further.

“We didn’t make defensive plays at the end of that game. They ran the same play with Earl Watson and Hansbrough three, four times in a row … didn’t make an adjustment, no help on the weak side, nothing was done.” -Brendan Haywood

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In my initial Wizards-Pacers game post, I was completely remiss in not mentioning the foul with 0.5 seconds which gave Mike Dunleavy the game winning free-throws.

In his post-game interview, Brendan Haywood cited the defense allowing Earl Watson and Tyler Hansbrough to do whatever they wanted in preceding key possessions as one of the main causes of defeat (along with a horrendous second quarter), but I got the feeling that most everyone on the team felt they got cheated out of a win because an unjust foul was called.

Is that so?

“The call … I looked at it ten times, that call at the end. They called the foul on Brendan Haywood. If the foul was called on Brendan Haywood, the game was over … so that was a bad call.” -Flip Saunders

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{keys to win vs. raptors}

Active Hands

… especially from Jamison and Butler, the latter racked up three steals. As a team, the Wizards had 10 steals (their second highest total of the season), and held the Raptors to only two. Against the Suns, the Wiz had 12 steals, but they also had 17 turnovers. The team only turned the ball over 10 times last night.

Pushing Tempo

… even after the Raptors made shots, the Wizards pushed the ball up the court without deliberation, giving the recently stagnant offense more time to get something done.

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On one hand, you have arguably the best game of the year. Dallas is the only other in contention (even though the win against Cleveland was nice, it wasn’t the best).

On the other hand, you have arguably the worst … but there are far more in the conversation (Indiana, Oklahoma City, San Antonio).

Part of me wants to vote for the loss to Charlotte as worst because it’s still fresh. And then there’s this:

Charlotte’s 1st Road Win

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