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 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. Click here for cumulative DC Council 3-star ratings over the course of the season. Game 24 contributors: Adam McGinnis (@adammcginnis), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

Score

Washington Wizards 81 vs Los Angeles Clippers 107 [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 23 contributors: Adam McGinnis (@adammcginnis), Arish Narayen, and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

Score

Washington Wizards 89 at Toronto Raptors 106 [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 18 contributors: Adam McGinnis, Arish Narayen and Kyle Weidie.]

Score

Washington Wizards 92 vs. Charlotte Bobcats 75 [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 11 contributors over television screen: Rashad Mobley, Arish Narayen, and Kyle Weidie.]

Score

Washington Wizards 89 at Philadelphia 76ers 120 [box score]

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[Editor's Note: Truth About It.net is trying something new with its game coverage this season. Of course, we will be honing this series as we go along, but here's the gist: relevant pre- and post-game quotes/analysis from those in attendance covering the game (last night it was Rashad Mobley and Adam McGinnis); D.C flag 3-star ratings for the Wizards starters and bench from three people able to watch the game (live or on television -- we will keep a running tally on the ratings); thoughts on the environment and slept-on moments; and finally, fan tweets, scenes from the game, and anything else that would be fitting to include in "The Rundown" (which totally might not be the final name of this series, especially since it's also the name of a movie featuring "The Rock" and Seann William Scott... and Rosaio Dawson, don't want to forget her). In any case, here goes... -Kyle W.]

Score

Washington Wizards 78 – Philadelphia 76ers 103 [box score]

Quick STAT: The Wizards had 20 turnovers and 10 assists; John Wall: 6 TO, 3 AST

Scene of the Game

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Andray Blatche pounded his chest as he strutted off the practice court at training camp Wednesday evening, mean mugging and dripping with sweat.

“That’s one, that’s one, Dray,” shouted assistant coach Gene Banks from under one of the main baskets. “You’ve got one more!”

Banks was overseeing a heavyweight battle between Blatche and second-year bruiser Kevin Seraphin, and tried to persuade him to run it back for a best-of-three series. Blatche, unconvinced, waved a flippant hand in the direction of his coach before proclaiming, “I won. I just won. Gosh!”

It was surprising to see from a player who has reportedly stepped into a leadership role. To be fair to Blatche, however, he definitely got the better of Seraphin, and the scene described above was probably nothing more than an unflattering training camp snapshot. Surely, it can’t be indicative of his approach to the 2011-12 season; not when trainers, players and coaches are all singing the same tune — the big guy is poised to have a breakout season. And yet I wonder: are we still watching the Blatche of Christmas past?

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On Saturday, December 10, the Washington Wizards went through their second day of training camp, fielding an incomplete roster of 16 invitees. Ronny Turiaf was acquired, but had yet to arrive; Hamady N’diaye was signed the next day, Sunday; and the statuses of Nick Young and Maurice Evans continued to be in limbo. The media was given access to the very latter portion of the day’s work, past 8 pm on a Saturday evening in Chinatown as the Wizards prepared for their first NBA basketball game action since April 13, a preseason match this Friday, December 16 against the Philadelphia 76ers in Washington.

The session open to media on the Verizon Center practice court involved two small sets of scrimmaging. One pitted a White team of John Wall (#2), Jordan Crawford (#15), Rashard Lewis (#9), Andray Blatche (#7), and Kevin Seraphin (#13) versus a Blue team of Mike Wilks (#29), Mardy Collins (no number), Larry Owens (#32), Aaron Petway (#52), and JaVale McGee (#34). The second featured a white team of Wall, Roger Mason Jr. (#8), Owens, Blatche, and Petway versus a Blue team of Shelvin Mack (#22), Crawford, Lewis, Jan Vesely (#24), and Chris Singleton (#31).

Things you will see in the video below (in relative order of appearance):

• John Wall working on his jumper.
• JaVale McGee still developing awareness in the post (especially when Jordan Crawford aggressively double teams).
• McGee working on a spinning baseline lefty hook from the left block — it comes up short, but now is the time to work on such moves. Not many will be able to contest if he can progress in jump hook shot comfort with both hands.
• Crawford hitting a running hook in the lane over McGee.
• Shelvin Mack working on his decision-making. One mistake: passing to Crawford in the left corner with the lane open for him to penetrate to the hoop. Crawford made the tough corner step-back over Roger Mason Jr. anyway.
• Jumpers from Larry Owens, Rashard Lewis (“Sweet Lew!”), and Mason Jr.
• Kevin Seraphin trying to learn court vision from the post (he makes a turnover on a cross-court pass), and trying to learn how to balance spacing and a power dribble on a pick-and-roll.
• Andray Blatche trying not to lose the ball in the post, and then showing off his usual passing skills to Aaron Petway for a dunk.
• Mack using a hesitation dribble against Wall, using a slow-down dribble to get the defender on his back, and ultimately finding a cutting Chris Singleton, who draws a foul attacking the basket.
• Wall finding Blatche for a cut and dunk against Singleton.
• Mardy Collins splitting Seraphin’s weak help on a ball screen and finding Petway for a dunk.
• With the blue team down 12-11 in the final scrimmage, Shelvin Mack missing a jumper at the buzzer.

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Best of Wizards/basketball-related links, in bullets. But first, John Wall’s glasses help him and DeMarcus Cousins see into the future…

John: “I see the future, and I’m going to have my own candy bar.”

DeMarcus: “I want to be a candy bar for Halloween in my future.”

John: “That guy in front of me has a sneeze in his future.”

DeMarcus: “My future is an All-Denim Party… even want the toilet paper to be made of denim.”

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Sometimes you hear about guys playing overseas, especially young guys, and most reports involve limited minutes and much time on the pine. Their Euro-stats are weird, you have to adjust for them. Other fast-traveled messages more recently have informed us of the struggles of economic basketball defectors Deron Williams and Ty Lawson with their respective teams in Turkey and Lithuania. Overseas ball seems more like yard work than a day at the park for some of these NBA guys.

Kevin Seraphin seems to have ignored perceived tradition in not approaching his Euro assignment with a meek demeanor, surely making Wizards brass and fans alike proud that more toughness is in the future. Seraphin’s temporary Spanish team, Caja Laboral, opened their season this weekend with a 73-60 win over Cajasol; and Seraphin is making his presence felt, bloodying fools up.

Seraphin started the game, played 30 minutes, and finished with 11 points (5-6 FGs, 1-3 FTs), oddly enough only one rebound (on the offensive end, told you the stats can be weird), to go with one assist, one steal, three fouls and three blocks. His 11 points tied with three others for second most on his team. But proof is in the pictures. In the embedded game highlight video below (linked here if that doesn’t work; H/T: Ball In Europe) you will notice:

• 0:18 - Not two minutes into the game Seraphin takes it strong to the hoop and ends up bloodying the nose of his opponent, Canadian Carl English;
• 0:27 - Big block by Seraphin, but Cajasol gets the offensive rebound put-back;
• 0:56 - Seraphin lets former Wizard and former Millionaire Match-Maker participant Paul Davis lose him with a spin move for a lob basket, which is essentially the equivalent of a teenager falling for an exaggerated head fake where nothing else moves from his 70-year old grandpa;
• 1:07 - Seraphin throwing a powerful dunk And-1 on Tomas Satoransky;
• 1:18 - A reject of  Guillem Rubio and at 1:25, a block of Txemi Urtasun;
• 1:34 - Seraphin catches a lob dunk over everyone.
• 1:41 - They do that thing where they clap their hands high in the air to the crowd after a win.

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

[Mt. Pleasant Day 2011 - Washington, D.C. - photo: K. Weidie]

Do we even know this John Wall kid?

Watching him play at exhibition games this summer, he doesn’t seem like the guy I saw make his pro debut at the 2010 Las Vegas Summer League, much less the player who dazzled us all during an injury-affected, frustration-filled rookie season.

The one potential problem I see with all of this (there’s always a “problem,” isn’t there, pessimist?) is that with the seemingly enhanced offensive and athletic ability over the 2011 Summer, is Wall, as a point guard, setting himself up to take matters into his hands too much if his teammates fail him?

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Links, commentary, fodder, beef…

Andray Blatche had himself a chat on ESPN.com Wednesday. Normally, would that even happen? Doubt it. The assumption is that this is more the doing of him deciding to re-acquire an agent this summer. Now that power-agent Andy Miller is on the scene — clients of his include: Trevor Booker, Kevin Garnett, Jared Jeffries, Kenyon Martin, Chauncey Billups, Brendan Haywood, Roger Mason Jr., Andre Miller, Michael Ruffin, Sebastian Telfair, Antonio McDyess, etc., etc. — Blatche is hitting the circuit of pumped positivity. And thus here we are.

Anyhow, nothing provocative or ground-breaking in his chat; it totally fits within the norms of prosaic NBA player media & PR fare. The highlights include: when asked about how his roll [sic in a very Ledell Eackles kind of way] has changed over his years with the team, he chats about, “listening to guys like Antawn, Brandon, Caron” … which actually got me very close to seeing if a “Brandon” ever played for the Wizards on Basketball-Reference.com before realizing that he was talking about Brendan Haywood.

Quick flashback: in January, Blatche said this:

“When I do lift, I’m the type of person, I don’t see results at all. I mean, I tried everything, man. I got a chef so I could start getting as healthy as I could eat. I don’t know what it is, man. I’m trying.”

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EuroBasket 2011 is going on and several current, ex, and loosely connected to the Wizards are involved. Let’s go…

Darius Songaila – Lithuania

[via EuroBasket 2011 profile]

Here’s the point: LOOK AT THAT BEARD!

Digest it, behold it, listen to it whisper to you.

In terms of D-Song, well, he’s doing D-Song things: He’s ranked second at EuroBasket in fouls with 4.2 per game. Otherwise, he’s shooting 48.7-percent from the field, surely on long pick-and-pop jumpers just inside the three point line. His 3.3 rebound average per 15.2 minutes a game would be 9.9 rebounds per 45.6 minutes. So typical of Darius.

It’s also cool that Lithuania is 5-1, beating Serbia 100-90 on Wednesday, D-Song only nabbed two points, a board and four fouls in nine minutes. However, in their win against Turkey Songaila tallied 12 points, five rebounds and two assists in 22 minutes. A big offensive rebound and put-back late in the game was highlighted by NBAPlaybook.com:

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[via thebasketballchannel.net]

I did a preview of Capital Punishment for ESPN Los Angeles with a run down of several participating players from each of the Goodman and Drew rosters. So check it out please.
[ESPN LA]

Nick Young won’t be playing, via Michael Lee.
[Wizards Insider]

But here’s a fun video of Nick dunking, as part of the Nick & JaVale Show…

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Hi there Internet. Why yes, this here site has doled a lot of criticism toward JaVale McGee in the past X amount of time. While some of it has certainly been flagrant, it is not baseless.

However, one might counter that we have not given young McGee enough praise. This may be true and to that we will say this, he is a keeper… despite all the basketball disruption that his alter ego, I’m assuming his name is “Pierre,” has caused to the playpen of team functionality and trust. He’s not a bad kid. He is young, after all, but many times disappointingly young in comparison to some contemporaries. Still, no one said an investment in youth is easy, but it’s usually always worth it, especially given McGee’s athletic parameters.

Speaking of… let’s get back to that reported/tweeted rumor the other day from Jonathan Givony of Draft Express:

Sources say Washington & Phoenix have been the most active teams trying to trade up for Derrick Williams. T’Wolves want a “veteran big man.”

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