Don’t let the Washington Wizards fool you on occasion, they are still a highly dysfunctional team. But they are our Wizards, and we wouldn’t have it any other way, right? There are signs of improvement… kind of like running Anacostia River water through a colander. You’re definitely going to filter out a boot, perhaps a used condom or two. No, the water isn’t now drinkable, still very tainted – Washington needs several Brita filters on their roster — but hey, progress.

In Washington’s 111-108 overtime win over the Toronto Raptors on Monday, the starting backcourt of John Wall and Nick Young set the tone — Wall with aggressive drives to the basket, and Young with his excellent ability to make rhythm shots that the offensive system provides for him. The duo combined for 60 points (31 from Wall, 29 from Young). Of course, as he’s apt to do, Young regressed over the course of the game. His points and field goals per quarter: 1st (11 pts, 4-7 FGs); 2nd (7 pts, 3-5 FGs); 3rd (5 pts, 2-6 FGs); 4th (4 pts, 0-1 FGs); OT (3 pts, 0-1 FGs). Toronto adjusted their defense to what Young was doing earlier in the game and he succumbed to it.

Afterward, Randy Wittman didn’t name names (he could’ve been talking about several of his players), but it was clear Young was the main target of his words.

“Do we have things to clean up? Absolutely,” said Wittman. “We still have to realize, when you’re a scorer in this league, and you are scoring, that the other team scouts just like we do. They’re going to get the ball out of your hands, and we have to be willing passers when that happens. That’s a compliment… that’s a compliment. They are doubling you for a reason, and now all we gotta do it make the simple plays,” continued the coach, speaking of how he decided to keep the ball in Wall’s hands toward the end of the game, heaping praise on his point guard for making a simple pass to Trevor Booker out of pick and roll action.

“You’re not going to dribble out of the double team more times than not,” Wittman later reiterated. ”You’ve just got to accept it, move the ball, make plays. Because then, when you do that three or four times early in that fourth quarter, they’re going to say, ‘We can’t double anymore and we got to play our own.’ Now it opens things back up again. We never made that adjustment, I thought, in that fourth quarter.”

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Here we go again… Tonight’s Wizards-Raptors game is the third of four meetings between the two clubs. Washington and Toronto have split the 2011-12 series thus far, each team celebrating a decisive victory over the other — the average winning margin is 16 points. Although the Torontonians have been more successful on the road (5 wins) than the D.C. locals have been at home (3 wins) this season, the Raptors haven’t won a game at the Verizon Center since 2009. Consider heading to the game if you have a couple of hours to kill tonight: tickets can be scored for a buck! Raptorholic Sam Holako (@RapsFan) of ESPN TrueHoop/Raptors Republic joins TAI’s John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend) and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It) for tonight’s 3-on-3 roundball roundtable. Three questions, three answers starts now…

#1) Fact or Fiction: Rashard Lewis will score four or more points tonight, joining Jason Kidd and Paul Pierce as the only players in NBA history to have scored at least 15,000 points, grabbed 5,000 rebounds and hit 1,500 three-pointers in their careers. [UPDATE: Lewis is out versus the Raptors due to what is being called a sore right knee; Chris Singleton replaced him in the Wizards starting lineup.]

HOLAKO: Fact. If Rashard can’t score 4 points against the Raptors, then he probably doesn’t deserve to be in that company. On a side note, I was hoping Lewis had more gas in the tank after the ‘steroid’ incident. I’m a big fan of his; undeserved massive contract not withstanding.

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The Washington Wizards are a mess. They can team worse than they are, but the only one is the Charlotte Bobcats. They’ve, in brief times, competed against good teams, but always lose. They’ve given the Oklahoma City Thunder an anomaly to everyone’s surprise. They’ve gotten demoralized by teams very good, good, and mediocre, the LA Clippers working to migrate from good to very good status in their 107-81 blowout win over Randy Wittman’s team on Saturday night.

Washington has youth making lesson-learning mistakes, but they also have youngish mid-range veterans who continue to not “get it.” JaVale McGee, for instance, has more minutes of on-court development over his career than the likes of Ryan Anderson, Serge Ibaka and DeAndre Jordan. Yet those players, picked after McGee’s 18th position in the 2008 draft (21, 24 and 35 respectively), have developed into more indexed team intelligence for their franchises.

Jordan Crawford, age 23, is in the second year of a career that could go in a number of directions. Right now on a team like the Wizards, most of those don’t show a ton of promise, but there are glimmers. Nick Young, age 26, continues to show why he’s just another in a long line of capable NBA scorers who can’t do much else. In his fifth NBA season, he helps his team embody this quote said by Wittman after the loss to the Clippers:

“You have to read the situation and what they’re doing and not just play the play that’s supposed to be… they take this away, we’ve gotta do that. I don’t think we did the second part of it. They took this away and we just went ahead and tried to do it anyway.”

Sounds like mumbo-jumbo, but its essence conveys that the Wizards are still a first offensive option, me-first team; they have those kind of players. These efforts are led by the no longer fresh-faced players brought in by Ernie Grunfeld who were supposed to help establish new traditions — the McGees, Youngs and Andray Blatches of the scene – long before it became a catch-phrase motto for this season under Ted Leonsis.

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Twenty-two games, one-third of the season, is over for the Washington Wizards. To say the least, it’s been tough on this rebuilding team. And to stress that “team” part, let’s see which combination of players has been working the best together, and which combinations haven’t.

According to BasketballValue.com, 177 different five-man units have seen action for the Washington Wizards this season. 177 sounds like a lot, but only 54 of those units have seen more than five minutes of court time together, so this post/results will focus on those, i.e., no need to include units such as John Wall, Jordan Crawford, Roger Mason, Rashard Lewis and Jan Vesely, who have seen a total of 0.03 minutes on the court together.

Five units have seen 31.75-percent of the total action. Those five units are:

1. Wall – Young – Lewis – Blatche – McGee (10.44% of court time, 110.25 minutes)
2. Wall – Young – Singleton – Booker – McGee (7.1%, 74.97)
3. Wall – Young – Singleton – Blatche – McGee (5.81%, 61.37)
4. Wall – Young – Lewis – Vesely – McGee (4.46%, 47.1)
5. Wall – Crawford – Lewis – Blatche – McGee (3.93%, 41.55)

Of those 54 “five minutes or more” lineups, these are the top five in Offensive Rating (an estimation of points scored per 100 possesions):

1. Mack – Crawford – Mason – Lewis – Seraphin (158.82 Off Rtg; 9.58 minutes)
2. Mack – Young – Singleton – Booker – Seraphin (140; 5.27)
3. Wall – Crawford – Young – Vesely – Blatche (137.5; 8.28)
4. Mack – Young – Singleton – Booker – Turiaf (136.36; 6.07)
5. Wall – Young – Booker – Lewis – Seraphin (136.36; 5.62)

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Continued success in team sports is achieved through sacrifice; the best squads accept this, understanding that individual achievements must sometimes be tabled for the betterment of the team—roll tape of Michael Jordan deferring to Steve Kerr in Game 6 of the 1997 NBA Finals.

When great players are unwilling to make sacrifices, Jordan has confessed, individual goals and accolades are even tougher to achieve. So why do the stubborn Wizards, selfish by self-description, refuse to play team basketball? The better question asks what can be done to change their approach.

The answer might surprise you: ramp up competition for individual rewards.

As explained by Brian Mossop, former neuroscientist and current community editor at Wired: Read more »

The Washington Wizards talk about fourth quarter full-court pressure defense against Chicago, which helped make the 10 point loss a little more interesting, to say the least…

If anything, Randy Wittman has proven that he’s no Flip Saunders, past his own claims of the two being “polar opposites.” No, it’s not about wins and losses (beating the Bobcats twice? please), at least for the rest of this season. Yes, outcome is important and positive outcomes are nice, but ask a fan about winning or losing, and the Wizards can’t win. From moral victories to lottery losses to scoreboard reward, not many can be satisfied in this current state of four victories and 17 losses.

Wittman is willing to try more new things, starting Jan Vesely at the four over Andray Blatche for example. Or, down 78-63 to the Chicago Bulls on Monday night with nearly a quarter left to play, throwing a full court press after a Chicago timeout allowing Tom Thibodeau to insert M.V.P. point guard Derrick Rose back into the game. It’s not like Saunders didn’t reach deep into his bag of gimmicks, responsiveness from his players was clearly the issue.

“I was a little hesitant to really do what we did there in the fourth quarter,” said coach Randy Wittman at the end of the night, “because… [chuckles]… we hadn’t worked on it, but I said, ‘Let’s go, guys, we got one chance here to make this a ball game.’”

Washington responded immediately — with a unit of John Wall, Jordan Crawford, Nick Young, Trevor Booker, and JaVale McGee – racing to a 15-8 run in fewer than four minutes. Thanks to the pressure, the Wizards trimmed their deficit to eight points. A Nick Young three-pointer capped the comeback, with Wittman afterward stomping his feet all over the hardwood floor to remind Young to not bask in his offense, but rather to find the shooters and pressure as necessary. Chicago answered by finally breaking Washington’s full-court defense with ease, ending the Wizards run with a Carlos Boozer dunk, holding their lead at 88-78.

“Our point guards Shelvin [Mack] and John are picking up 84, 94 feet… Book [Booker] has to ability to really cover a lot of ground, and I thought he did a heckuva job of trying to get the ball out of Rose’s hands early, make [Joakim] Noah and those guys make a play,” said Wittman. “JaVale… there’s a little technique being the last man standing back there with what you have to do. You know… he didn’t know. We haven’t been able to work on it. He came away from the basket a little bit too much — a couple drop-offs to [Carlos] Boozer where you got to make Noah, the 7-foot center, make plays driving down the middle of the floor.”

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Chicago Bulls in town, not the Charlotte Bobcats. Derrick Rose and Richard Hamilton? Back for Chicago. Luol Deng? Out for a bit. Andray Blatche? Questionable. President Obama? Nope. The last time people expected Washington to lose this much (aside from pretty much all the time) was the Oklahoma City Thunder game. The Wizards somehow won that one. Chicago is favored by nine points on the road this evening. Should you get any ideas? Probably not. Chicago has the second best Defensive Rating in the NBA (97.4 points allowed per 100 possessions)… the Philadelphia 76ers are best (94.6 DRtg), and we all know how games against the Sixers work out for Washington. Nonetheless, let’s do the 3-on-3 drill… featuring Beckley Mason of HoopSpeak.com along with TAI’s John Converse Townsend and Kyle Weidie. Three questions, three answers starts now…

#1) Derrick Rose will be walking into the Verizon Center with the weight of Sunday night’s loss to the Miami Heat (partly due to his missed free throws) squarely on his shoulders. Not only will John Wall have to face off against a motivated Rose, but he’ll most likely have to face off again John Lucas, who had a career game against him on January 11 (25 points, 8 assists and 8 rebounds — although backup Bulls PG CJ Watson, unavailable in the previous meeting between these two teams like Rose, is also back).  Who has a better game tonight, Wall or Rose?

MASON: Rose has the better game because he’s the better player playing on the better team. Especially troubling for Wall, who struggles with turnovers in pick and roll sets, is that the Bulls play awesome, suffocating pick and roll defense. I think the only way Wall has the better game is if it becomes a real up-and-down contest.

TOWNSEND: John Wall has flirted with triple-doubles for the past month; the numbers might convince you that Wall will get lucky tonight. But then you remember that Wall’s career averages against Chicago are, well, average — 13.3 points and 4.3 turnovers. Reality sets in: It’s Derrick Rose, not Wall, with the No. 1 stitched on the back of his jersey, and it’s Rose who has learned to bend the laws of physics, and it’s Rose who wins the game.

WEIDIE: Dare I say Wall? (For dubious reasons…) Rose missed the initial meeting on Jan. 11, then came back to play against Boston and Toronto (both wins for Chicago), then missed the Bulls’ next four games. He’s played in four games, 156 total minutes, since coming back exactly one week ago, and saw 45 minutes of action against the Miami Heat on Sunday in a game where both teams were clearly tired toward the end. Even if the Bulls really need him, and I doubt that they do, I’d expect Rose’s minutes to be limited in Washington… You know, the team opponents with nagging injuries to stars are always delighted to play.

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 20 contributors: Adam McGinnis, Rashad Mobley and Kyle Weidie.]

Score

Washington Wizards 102 at Charlotte Bobcats 99 [box score]

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Wizards-Bobcats Part II within about 72 hours of each other… the two worst teams in the NBA and truly the polar opposite of a #LeaguePassAlert. Washington is not without a plethora of questions from game-to-game, as goes their perpetually inconsistent state. If wouldn’t be any fun otherwise… you know, if they were just bad and not like a bunch of breakable eggs on the court each time. In any case, let’s begin the 3-on-3 drill featuring some of the most disgruntled Wizards bloggers out there… Sean Fagan of Bullets Forever along with TAI’s Adam McGinnis and yours truly, Kyle Weidie… Let the three questions, three answers begin…

#1) Randy Wittman surprised by starting Jan Vesely over Andray Blatche in Houston. What does he do tonight against the Bobcats? Or rather, what starting lineup would you like to see?

FAGAN: Last night, we saw a type of pedal-to-the-metal play that I think the team should continue for the rest of the year, because for at least the first two quarters, the team appeared to be having fun. Against the Bobcats, I think this type of controlled disorganization has a greater chance of success than of failure. The game might resemble more of a scrum than actual basketball, but I’ll take wins over aesthetics any day of the week. A guy like Vesely, who is everywhere at once, is integral to this type of play. He isn’t AK-47, but he is whatever the slightly cheaper Czech knockoff of that weaponry might be. As such, your starting lineup should be: Wall, Young, McGee (if I had my way, Turiaf would heal overnight), Vesely, and Singleton.

McGINNIS: At 3-16, no one’s starting spot should be secure. My issue with McGee and Vesely as your front line starters is that neither are scorers. I would expect Randy to change it up again as he appears to sending some messages to players because honestly, he has nothing to lose at all. The team stinks and it’s highly unlikely the organization will fire him before end of season, so why not keep throwing different lineups out there? I would roll with Wall, Mack, Singleton, Booker, Vesely. Those five will play hard and leave it all out on the court.

WEIDIE: The Wizards really don’t have anyone who can score in the post. People say Blatche is the best at doing this, but what’s the point? Here is my ‘screw it’ lineup: Wall, Singleton, Vesely, Booker and Seraphin. OK, but somebody has to score… So, Jordan Crawford instead of Singleton at the 2-guard. I’m wearing of Crawford regressing if he’s thrown back in the starting lineup, but I think he deserves more of a chance than Nick Young, who should be preparing for a future role off the bench anyway.

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 19 contributors: Sam Permutt, John Converse Townsend and Kyle Weidie.]

Score

Washington Wizards 76 at Houston Rockets 103 [box score]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 17 contributors: Markus Allen, Adam McGinnis and Kyle Weidie.]

[NOTE: Per news, Flip Saunders has been fired, and Randy Wittman will replace him. The content below doesn't not reflect knowledge of that, and only pertains to last night's game. The TAI crew will be ready with thoughts on this coaching move by the Wizards at some point soon. Also note: Markus Allen is from Severn, Maryland, has been a Wizards fan since the early 2000s, and is currently attenting Mississippi State University. This is his first contribution to Truth About It.net.]

Score

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Close game, different locker rooms, opposite outcomes… but they are all professional basketball players. The Washington Wizards and Boston Celtics said WHAT?

Jordan Crawford‘s thoughts on the double-technical foul called on him and Paul Pierce midway through the third period… Pierces “thoughts” as well… Rajon Rondo‘s intricate and insightful opinion on the differences in John Wall’s game from Sunday’s contest and when these two teams met earlier this year on January 1 and 2… And other general game thoughts, i.e., Paul Pierce sentiment, from Nick Young, John Wall, Doc Rivers, Flip Saunders, and Ray Allen, with a camero appearance from Kevin Garnett.

[footage shot by TAI's Kyle Weidie and John Converse Townsend]

[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 15 contributors: Rashad Mobley and Adam McGinnis with first-hand coverage, and Kyle Weidie watching from afar.]

Score

Washington Wizards 104 vs. Denver Nuggets 108 [box score]

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At every buzzer, there are key points you can look back on when considering the outcome — a game-changing instance, a slept-on moment, an initial reaction to the final score. Sure, in a contest of ebbs and flows, moments can be subjective, but it doesn’t make it any one less important than others. In a Wizards 108-104 loss against the Denver Nuggets on Friday, these were some of those moments…

[Sam Cassell to John Wall, pregame encouragement.]

 Rashad Mobley:

“He’s maturing. Things are, you can just tell, in disarray, not with the organization, but the players on the court … He’s fighting through it. Eventually he’s going to get some players around him and show exactly how good he is.”
-Ty Lawson on John Wall

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 14 contributors: Kyle Weidie and John Converse Townsend with first-hand coverage, and Sam Permutt watching from afar.]

Score

Washington Wizards 105 vs. Oklahoma City Thunder 102 [box score]

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