Posts tagged ‘rasheed wallace’

The Wizards have zero chance of landing the fourth overall pick in tonight’s draft lottery. But the last time the team did have the fourth was in 1995 when they used it to select Rasheed Wallace out of North Carolina.

Those were the days when dreams were big and aims were high — ‘Sheed, Juwan Howard and Chris Webber, a murder’s row of bigs. But instead of success on the court, we are left cherishing the video clip below when Webber (not playing and suited) put a “I’m a rookie, kick me!” sign on Wallace’s back during a game (also not playing and suited). Ahh, the memories. Gheorghe Muresan is also shown not playing and suited.

[via A Stern Warning]

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Note: I’ll be chatting/answering questions on ESPN’s Sunday Dime Live during tonight’s Wizards-Celtics game. Join me for the start at 8 pm eastern, keep scrolling for more on the Wiz.

The Wizards play the Celtics tonight … on ESPN. “Great.” Words like “bloodbath” have already been thrown around. The WaPost’s Michael Lee is baffled that the game continued to be on the national television schedule after the dismantling of the team, including Josh Howard’s knee injury. But Boston is a big ticket market, so probably still worth including on the NBA Sunday slate. The only other game that will be going on at the same time will be the Thunder and Kings, which starts at 9 pm eastern. I’m sure people would love to see Kevin Durant and Tyreke Evans, but again, it’s Boston.

So Wizards fans, I guess you have to choke down the embarrassment of the forthcoming unwanted national attention and how the pundits will likely be talking bad about the franchise you love. And if you’re a Wizards fan watching the game at this point, you do have a true love for the team.

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{Sam Cassell measures Earl Boykins next to a kid}

The Wizards have found a lot of ways to lose games this season. Monday’s 99-88 loss to the Boston Celtics wasn’t as disheartening as most of them. So, I guess you can chalk up another moral victory on the penitentiary walls of your Washington Wizards basketball fandom. Congrats.

Most fingers are pointing toward the fourth quarter and justifiably citing it as the main culprit. In the period, the Wizards only mustered 10 points to the 25 of the Celtics. Rasheed Wallace scored eight points by himself, and combined with Tony Allen, the duo put up 14 points and seven rebounds in the final period. Starters Paul Pierce (ankle injury) and Kendrick Perkins didn’t play in the last 12 minutes and Rajon Rondo and Kevin Garnett only played six minutes apiece in the fourth.

The Celtics bench came alive to save the day. Otherwise, Boston looked sloppy and old. Cherish that 2008 championship Celtics fans, it will be the only title you see from your current squad.

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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 »

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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flickr/The CJM

On draft night, there were many frustrated rumblings on Bullets Forever over Ernie Grunfeld failing to land (or go after) Vince Carter. Not only that, but Carter was allowed to go to the reigning Eastern Conference champion Orlando Magic.

With Hedo Turkoglu opting out, unlikely to return to Orlando, who knows if the Magic will be better off with Carter … many assume yes. I’ll be curious to see if Stan Van Gundy uses Carter similarly within the offense as he did Turkoglu, creating for others off the high pick and roll.

And if Rasheed Wallace goes to Orlando (which probably means that baby ‘Sheed is backing off demands of $8 million a year), they could be very scary. Tumultuous with Wallace the home-wrecker, buy scary nonetheless.

But in terms of the Wizards, should Grunfeld have gone after Carter?
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Like user ooba on Bullets Forever, I attended the Flip Saunders meet-n-greet with season ticket holders at the Verizon Center on Wednesday night. I didn’t intend on going (nor did I really know about it), but my boy Donte invited me that day, so big thanks to him.

Luckily, I had the room bugged beforehand so I could get some prime quotes from Flip … well, if ‘bugged’ means a small recorder I happened to have with me.

It’s kinda funny, I didn’t mean to be the sneaky blogger recording people’s conversations, or a coach talking to a practice court filled with 200-250 people (not sure if I’m a good crowd estimator or not), but like ooba, I just want to relay interesting team news, notes, and Et ceteras to those who weren’t able to attend.

Of course, one must wonder if Saunders was more candid speaking in front of fans, working under the assumption that no one was ‘covering’ the event, than he would have been with members of the main-stream-media.

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Wizards player evaluations for ‘08-09 continue, up third is Etan Thomas. My thoughts are below, you can check on the full report on Bullets Forever.

[Previously: Oleksiy Pecherov | Juan Dixon]

What can I say about Etan Thomas’ season? Well, at least he has intelligence and social involvement to fall back upon.

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The friendly bloggers (and their fans) at the Cleveland sports-based Waiting For Next Year have taken upon the task of creating a Mark Price-themed t-shirt (h/t Sporting News).

Price, the current Atlanta Hawks shooting coach, may still be right for Cleveland Cavaliers fans, but that’s far from the case for Wizards/Bullets fans.

A reminder of how the Cavs fleeced former Bullets GM, John Nash (from this May ’08 post):

Ya’ll heard Gilbert Arenas came back?
Naw really….no April Fools.

Well, in case you missed it last Saturday, I outsourced some screen shots and they just arrived from Bangalore. Enjoy.

He hugged out all the troubles of the world today with ‘Sheed.

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