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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 32 contributors: Markus Allen (@mayminded), Adam McGinnis (@AdamMcGinnis), and Rashad Mobley (@Rashad20).
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[Randy Wittman could see it coming.]
When preseason theories spoke of young legs benefiting the Wizards in a lockout-shortened season, my thinking was different. They needed all the training camp and preseason they could get, and the lack of it showed many ways in the season’s early going. Now they are starting to play better, more as a team, sharing the ball, and understanding complete effort. Big road wins in Detroit and Portland gave the young Wizards confidence going into Wednesday’s game with the Clippers. But they endured for just over 32 minutes in Los Angeles until tired legs, and more prevalently, tired minds, took over. The home team on rest with more shooting focus after a tough loss in Dallas, along with the capabilities to get shooters open shots, took the game over Washington by 18 points, 102-84. There were a couple game-deciding moments.
With 3:25 left in the third quarter, John Wall assisted a Nick Young 3-pointer for the third time in less than four minutes. Young hadn’t scored a single point in front of his hometown crowd until that first three; suddenly he had nine points. Steve Buckhantz and Phil Chenier were openly commenting on television how most of Young’s shots looked to be pressing the issue too much, but when Wall started setting him up, it looked like the Wizards would make it a game. The Wizards tied the score at 66 with that third Young three. Within the spurt, Young also had one assist, almost two had JaVale McGee not missed a shot at the rim. Oh what a dream sequence. But then what happened?
Blake Griffin went over McGee’s back for an offensive rebound, came down, gathered himself… monster dunk, 68-66 Clippers. Could the whistle have been blown against Griffin? Possibly. Physicality in the paint can be like refereeing holding in football, it can be called just about every time. The many areas of gray mean more subjectivity comes into the equation. Did McGee even try to box Griffin out? Yes, more so than usual. Other circumstance includes McGee’s lack of help on the defensive boards by the likes of Young, Jordan Crawford and Rashard Lewis.
On the other end, as the Clippers sagged off a Lewis screen for Wall, Kenyon Martin and Chris Paul ended up with a switch, Paul covering Lewis in the paint. In a perfect world Wall hits the wide open shot that Martin left him when he didn’t care to press up, paying attention to Lewis instead. In the Wizards world, McGee waited too long to clear the paint so the Wizards could best iso Lewis against Paul. Then the timing was thrown off when Wall waited too long to pass, and Lewis couldn’t hold a seal. The result was a Wizards turnover, and the Clippers went demoralizing the other way with a Paul alley-oop to Griffin that the athleticism of Wall unsuccessfully tried to get too. John was high but far short. Some photographer has a great one of that play. Washington called timeout but didn’t score for the rest of the period. They went into the fourth quarter down 74-66 thanks to an 8-0 Clippers run.
Not all was lost for Washington in those moments, however. With 10:12 left in the fourth, Wall hit a 17-foot jumper thanks to a broken play and what could’ve been called a moving screen on Lewis. The Wizards were down just 75-72. It was close, but just about inevitable at that point. On the other end, Jordan Crawford left too much space between himself and Randy Foye — made 3-pointer. Can’t exactly blame Crawford for over-helping off of Foye on a drive; it was Randy Foye after all. But blame Crawford for hijacking the offense on the other end and missing a tough shot. The Clippers scored against tired legs in transition and then Young took a turn hijacking the next offensive possession, missing, but the Wizards got the offensive rebound. But then Kevin Seraphin committed an offensive foul. If there’s a reason Seraphin has been getting less time lately, he showed it versus the Clippers — missed shots at the rim and general trouble with awareness.
[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 28 contributors: Rashad Mobley (@Rashad20), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]
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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…
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.
[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).]
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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).]
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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 21 contributors: Markus Allen (@mayminded), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]
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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.]
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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.]
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Advice? “Be yourself,” said Randy Wittman after winning in his Wizards head coaching debut on Wednesday. But did the Wizards players need a new voice? “I’m just here,” said Nick Young, while teammate Andray Blatche’s response was, “I can’t honestly say that we needed a new voice, we just needed… somebody to actually check us like Wittman did.” And the erudite JaVale McGee? “Whatever [Ernie Grunfeld] explained was the reason why he fired Flip, was the reason that he fired Flip.”
The Wizards? They still don’t know what they want, or who they are, or if their new coach is going to slap the proverbial taste of nicotine out their mouths. It’s like the rest of this season is an in-game training camp. The Wizards were already a statistically fast-paced team under Flip Saunders… Screw that, says Randy Wittman (paraphrasing here)… I’m going to run you guys even more. And at that… John Wall, the fastest athlete? Well, I’m going to call him out for conditioning (along with Nick Young) and sub them back into a game really, really late during a blowout. ”Be hard on the leader and the rest will follow,” is presumed to be Wittman’s interim idea, as I wrote on ESPN’s Daily Dime about this latest new change with the Washington franchise.
The Wizards said WHAT? Well, that’s what they said. Randy Wittman, Nick Young, John Wall, Andray Blatche, JaVale McGee and Rashard Lewis speak on it in the video above.
[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.]
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[A pic of Wizards rookie Chris Singleton, a check-in on DC Council 3-star ratings to-date, and shared bullet links from the web.]
Thirteen games are in the books, just under 20-percent of the 66-game season, and the Washington Wizards have a 1-12 record to show for it. For each excruciating contest, the gang at Truth About It.net has produced D.C. Council posts, where a combination of three contributors each rate all five starters, the coach and the bench unit on a 3-star scale. Each contributor also nominates a sub of the game. With a fifth gulped down, it’s time to check how the star ratings add up so far (running season totals can be found here).
Eight different Wizards have been in the starting lineup this season. Starters are ranked by average stars per start (out of three), and include number of starts, games, best start (out of nine stars from three contributor totals), and worst start. Coach and bench totals are also included.
D.C. Flag 3-Star Ratings |
[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 12 contributors: Adam McGinnis and Kyle Weidie with first-hand coverage and John Converse Townsend from watching on T.V.]
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The hope is that young Wizards, especially the likes of John Wall, Chris Singleton and Trevor Booker, never get used to losing. That the current doldrums are helping shape their future focus toward doing the little things to win. Of course, in the interim, in the locker room environment after loss eleven in a 12-game old season, defeat seems to be more and more accepted than frustrating.
There’s talk of trust, talk of turnovers, talk of John Wall getting down on himself. “I get down on myself for making a mistake, but I know how to move on to the next thing, just keep playing basketball. It’s just tough when you make three or four in a row,” said Wall after Saturday night’s 103-90 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers. What’s unknown at this point is how much Wall openly getting down on himself after mistake one or two affects the rest of his team. Maybe they take cues from him, maybe they are getting down on themselves for their own mistakes.
“He’s our point guard, we gotta feed off of him. He’s the guy that leads this team almost like the captain of a boat. We have to feed off of him, and he has to get everybody involved in the game as well as get himself involved,” said team veteran Rashard Lewis, a guy who could stand to get himself involved as well in hitting open jump shots to help Wall’s cause. Lewis is 6-26 from three-point land this season, a 23.1-percent that’s his career worst, aside from his rookie season when he went 1-6 from deep as a 19-year old. “He’s still a young player learning how to play the game, but at the same time, he’s the floor general,” said Lewis of Wall.
“When you get your butts kicked pretty bad, and we’ve lost a lot, the tendency is sometimes you start feeling sorry for yourself,” said coach Flip Saunders.
“You got to find something to get your spirits going and stay focused out there, because ain’t nobody going to take it easy on us if we’re pouting,” said starting guard Nick Young.
[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.]
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