[Below are some quick notes from Ernie Grunfeld's Q&A with the media on the first night of Wizards mini-camp. Video of the session is at the bottom of this post.]

[Kevin Seraphin]

Bullets on Kevin Seraphin

• Grunfeld gave a scouting report on Seraphin, crediting him for having good hands and for being light on his feet.
• He springboards that into talking about the transition the team is going through. “We’ve been a predominantly perimeter oriented team and a finesse team and I just felt like we needed some more physicality,” said Grunfeld.
• It’s been known that Seraphin will miss the Vegas Summer League because of a left knee ligament tear he experienced in the French League playoffs. Grunfeld said he expects him to be back on the court running full contact drills in August.

Ernie wants a small forward and a big man

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“Having been from Cleveland and everything we’ve gone through, you’d like to see your hometown do well, so I’m disappointed from that standpoint.”
-Flip Saunders

Yep, ol’ Flip is from Cleveland. But you probably already knew that. The high school All-American and 1973 Ohio Class A Player of the Year averaged 32 points per game during his senior year at Cuyahoga Heights, a school located in the burbs of the Mistake By The Lake.

Actually, my bad. I shouldn’t make fun of Cleveland. Even though Cavs fans lined up by the miles to witness and laugh at the Wizards after the Arenas gun fiasco and the rest of the implosion (including gladly taking the Gentleman Jamison), I cannot laugh at them at this moment. I feel very, very bad for those guys. And with that I say, ‘Join me people of Cleveland, in your distaste for Lebron.’

One quick question … who’s now more indefensible, LeBron or DeShawn Stevenson?

What? Too soon?

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[Editor's note: This is the second piece on TAI by John Townsend, check out his first one here.]

photo courtesy of K. Praslowicz (Sjixxxy)'s Flickr - www.kpraslowicz.com

“Just because you have money doesn’t mean you should overspend on someone that won’t be a part of your long-term future.  If the right opportunity comes along, I think you want to look at it, but I’ve said all along that we might save our powder for down the road, to see what the new CBA brings, to see if there’s a hard cap or a soft cap.  We don’t really know all the rules going forward, so just because you have the cap room doesn’t mean you should go out and spend it if it’s not for the right player.”[1]

These were wise words spoken by Wizards GM Ernie, a new herald for operational procedure and organizational preparedness, at a press conference on June 10.  As a long-time Green Bay Packer fan (my first memories of football were watching Packers games at 4am in New Delhi, India with my Wisconsin-born dad), I understand and fully endorse building a team through the draft.  There seem to be philosophical parallels between Grunfeld and Packers GM Ted Thompson, who firmly believes that the most effective way to build a winning football team is through the draft.  Thompson sees free agency as a complementary tool which can be used to add the types of players to a roster that may otherwise be difficult to find. In practice, this means that the Packers re-sign as many of their own players possible.  Rebuilding post-Mike Sherman, the Packers made 14 draft-day trades, all but one of them down, turning 31 picks into 44.  The Packers’ picks filled the roster with solid “glue guys” and have been able to add impact players including QB Aaron Rodgers, FS Nick Collins, OLB Clay Matthews, TE Jermichael Finley, WR Greg Jennings, and NT BJ Raji.  The result? The Packers are a team poised to make deep playoff runs every winter and are near the top of the NFL in just about every statistical category.[2]

Ted Leonsis, the Wizards new majority owner, made public his commitment to building a “generationally great team” that will ultimately win a championship.  Under new management, the Wizards will aim to hit their targets in the draft, spend prudently, create a competitive, cohesive team on the court that plays with an identity and within a system, and (most importantly) win games.[3] In an open note to Wizards fans, Leonsis also dismissed the generalized notion that the franchise was unwilling and averse to bringing in free agents.  Leonsis noted that that teams must consider using all of the tools at their disposal: the draft, free agency (small, medium, and large), rookie free agency, waiver wire pickups, developmental league players, and finding players in Europe.

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We’ve heard it from Ernie Grunfeld before, most recently in an interview by Mike Prada of Bullets Forever.

We were the first to make a move, so everybody’s following us (chuckles).

True, the Wizards were the first to strike when they landed Mike Miller and Randy Foye. But it’s hard to laugh, or continue to pridefully boast about the move, when the cream of the Eastern Conference crop keeps passing the Wizards by.

Let’s quickly go through what the top three teams in the East (Orlando, Cleveland and Boston), have done this off-season. Read more »

Mike Jones of the Washington Times reports that, according the league sources, Ernie Grunfeld has four players targeted near the center of his dart board: Rasho Nesterovic, Channing Frye, Jason Collins and Jamaal Magloire.

While none of these big men are the ‘sexy’ pick fans desire, each might be serviceable for the current amount of minutes Grunfeld is pigeon-holing the potential addition into. And each, according to Jones, might have to settle for the veteran’s minimum in the current economic environment.

Of course, with whispers of Nesterovic returning to Europe, I would not be surprised if he spurned the NBA to play for more money overseas. Nonetheless, Jones is usually spot-on with his reporting, so there’s a fair chance one of these guys will be joining the Wizards in the future. Let’s learn a little bit about each:

Rasho Nesterovic

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I was on a break outside the other day, catching some fresh Penn Quarter air, taking a stroll around Freedom Plaza, when this little kid came up to me, and said, “Hey Mister … don’t you know that the Wizards need another big man? Haywood, Jamison, Blatche, McGee, and McGuire aren’t going to cut it.”

“Easy lil’ fella,” I told him. “We’ll keep looking around to see if we can add someone else, but we feel comfortable about what we have currently and the depth of our ballclub.”

The kid then kicked me in the shin and ran away.

I suddenly woke up from my slumber and realized those weren’t my words, those were Ernie Grunfeld’s words. I had a mission …

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Gentleman Jamison securing his Wizards legacy?

Isn’t the information age amazing? Faster…..less clicks…..aggregators…..email updates…..knowledge is flying in front of our eyes like the bugs surrounding stadium lights. One way or another, we are all receptors of the information dissemination. But where does the information come from, and how does it vary so much?

EuroBasket may or may have not given us the impression that Spiros Vondas and the Greeks were after Antawn Jamison. Then, around 85% of Wizards fans on Bullets Forever believed that there was a 70% or greater chance that Jamison would be back with the Wiz. Seemed like the sensible move…..some even have said yes to Jamison and no to Arenas. AJ is that important.

Then came the eve of NBA free agency. Mike Jones of the Washington Times started at 1:55 pm reporting that Jamison would get a 4-year deal averaging $11 million per season ($44 total). The Washington Post’s Ivan Carter got in on the action around 4:42 pm; his sources said Jamison was close to reaching a 4-year, $48 million deal. ESPN’s Mark Stein was in on the game too, outlining plans for a 4-year, $50 million contract. The Times and the Post quickly followed suit with $50 million updates.

However, Ivan Carter’s update on Wizards Insider said: Read more »