Posts tagged ‘steve nash’

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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From the Wizards’ perspective, you’ll hear sentiment such as, “We just turned into our old selves in the third quarter,” courtesy of Andray Blatche in the quote mix video above. He also said that too many players were trying to put things on their own shoulders and that there were no Kobe Bryants or Dwyane Wades in the locker room.

Regarding the offense, Rashard Lewis said in the first quarter the Wizards moved the ball side to side, but later in the game, they often utilized only half of the baseline to halfcourt plane.

John Wall cited lack of heart and fight … hero ball.

Nick Young said that they have to find ways to get people open, saying Grant Hill was talking to him during the game, telling him that the Suns were reading every play the Wizards called.

JaVale McGee walked out of the training room with just compression shorts and headphones on after the game, jamming to some tunes and asking a member of the media he knew for a box score.

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{Steve Nash all alone. - K. Weidie}

The last game was played in Milwaukee, and this one was played in the friendly confines of the Verizon Center.  The Bucks were missing three starters, and the Suns had a healthy roster at their disposal.  The Wizards are a putrid 0-20 on the road, and they went into last night’s contest with 12-8 home record–including four straight wins at home.  You get the point here, there were plenty of differences between last night’s game against Phoenix and Wednesday night’s game against Milwaukee.  Still, it played out exactly the same.

In both games, the Wizards played flawless first quarter basketball, only to see their hard work come unraveled in each quarter after that, leading to a double digit loss.

The Wizards shot 53-percent in the first quarter, and they were mainly led by Nick Young (11 points) and Andray Blatche (10 points).  John Wall did not do much damage scoring-wise (two points), but he managed to dish out a whopping nine assists, before he was subbed out for Kirk Hinrich with 3:49 left in the period.

Meanwhile the Suns only shot 34-percent in the first, they committed nine turnovers, and they lacked any sort of energy and rhythm.  During one stretch, when the scored was tied at 14, the Suns turned the ball over twice, and had a shot blocked by JaVale McGee the next time down the floor. The Wizards turned that into into 11 consecutive points (and five assists by Wall).  The score after one in Washington was 33-22.  The score after one quarter in Milwaukee was 27-19.

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{flickr/Keith Allison}

I managed to catch up with LeBron James in the visitor’s locker room before tonight’s Wizards-Heat game. He had plenty to say, on topics ranging from the Orlando Magic, to Justin Bieber, and even Yao Ming.

His most interesting answer was just one word — two letters. When asked if winning games will ultimately change people’s perceptions of both LeBron and the Miami Heat, LeBron responded:

“No.”

Well, I guess not everybody loves a winner. What can he do? What should he do?

Here are more sound bites from the King himself…. Read more »

[As it turns out, Hakim Warrick's monster jam on Yi Jianlian at the end of the first half was a sign for things to come for Washington in the second half.]

There was a battle for momentum toward the end of the second quarter during Sunday night’s Wizards-Suns game. Steve Nash had just penetrated the lane (as he did with ease all night), and dished off to Hakim Warrick (again, as he did all night) for a thunderous slam, and there were just four seconds left on the clock.  John Wall then took the ball, ran down the court and launched a shot from just inside the three-point line.

After Wall’s attempt went in off the glass just before the buzzer, Channing Frye looked in disbelief and then ran towards the locker room.  Wall briefly looked at the crowd, tapped his chest twice, and then he too ran off the court.  His shot had cut the Suns lead to three points, and momentum seemed to be firmly on the Wizards’ side.

In the first 90 seconds or so of the third quarter, it seemed like the Wizards were up to matching the Suns’ intensity.  Jason Richardson and Channing Frye both scored off passes from Nash, but the Wizards countered with scores of their own courtesy of two free throws from Wall and a dunk from Alonzo Gee.  At that point, the Wizards were still within three points.

But then the Steve Nash show really started to kick into full gear. The Wizards could not keep pace and things began to get out of hand. Nash was either scoring or dishing on every basket, and each of Phoenix’s other four starters (Grant Hill, Channing Frye, Richardson and even Earl-freaking-Barron) scored within the first six minutes.

The Wizards weren’t nearly as fluid.  Gee took and missed two three-pointers, which really isn’t his shot, while JaVale McGee and Wall took turns turning the ball over.  Andray Blatche, who started quickly with 12 first quarter points, went almost half of the third quarter before he scored a basket, but at that point, the Wizards were already down 85-73.

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[Steve Nash lures John Wall with a back dribble, then changes pace to attack the open lane while keeping the ball away from JaVale McGee with two hands before sliding in for a layup.]

This Wizards team is hard to dissect, and I don’t mean “take apart,” as Steve Nash did on Sunday evening on his way to captaining his Suns to a 125-108 victory.

The Wizards are hard to dissect in the sense of separating individual parts to determine why the team continues to lose in the worst of ways (and win by the skin of their teeth). Anything and everything could go wrong on a given night.

On offense, in general, the team wastes too many possessions with bad shots. Pretty simple to conclude that they could use a lot more discipline in this regard. On defense, it comes down to focus and will, something several Wizards have major issues with. When you combine the overall effect that has on the team with the stylings of the two-time MVP in Nash, you have a recipe for the Suns to have their way with the Wizards.

Nash was often seen casually strolling through the paint, slicing through defenders as shown in the above GIF on Sunday night. But really, there was nothing casual about it. Well, unless you’re talking about the Wizards’ defense.

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On Thursday, June 17, Andy Rautins (G, Syracuse, 6’4, 195 lbs.) worked out for the Washington Wizards along with Chas McFarland (C, Wake Forest, 7’0, 245 lbs.), Kevin Palmer (G/F, Texas A&M-CC, 6’6, 205 lbs.), Dexter Pittman (C, Texas, 6’10, 290 lbs.), Terrico White (G, Mississippi, 6’5, 213 lbs.) and Darington Hobson (G/F, New Mexico, 6’7, 205 lbs.) (Note: Hobson actually did not work out for the Wizards because he tweaked his ankle). Get the run-down on Rautins and check his post-workout interview video below…

Another guy who also worked out on June 17th that I didn’t mention above is John Wall. But he was all by his lonesome for an 11 am session, Rautins started with the rest of those guys around noon.

By the time I arrived at the Verizon Center just after 11 to catch a glimpse of the end of Wall’s workout, Rautin’s name had already become a punchline several times over.

“You here to see Andy Rautins?,” came from several mouths in the press lounge packed with excited media members anxiously waiting to see Wall. A light chuckle with a side of ‘yucks’ usually followed.

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Why is Gilbert Arenas always so ready to give up a foul after he or his team commits a turnover?

Why is Caron Butler always shuffling/switching his pivot foot when he catches the ball, leading to a travel?

Why are the Wizards entrenched in bad communication, often running into each other on pick and roll defense?

This team is surrounded by a lot of questions, these are just some examples. The quandary of this bad Washington Wizards team won’t simply be resolved by ‘when Mike Miller becomes healthy’, ‘when Gilbert Arenas gets his mentality back’ or ‘when Flip Saunders is able to reign in his players to properly run his offense’.

Running the offense is one glaring problem because this team was supposed to be able to score. Screw the offense for this post, let’s talk defense.

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I seriously contemplated whether I should ever watch the Wizards-Suns game. It’s not like I didn’t know the 121-95 outcome or was unable to witness the Wizards constructing a Brick City that would make Redman proud. Instead of dedicating my Saturday night life to the Wizards at home, I ventured out in the D.C. snow to meet some friends at a bar for drinks, darts, and sports on TVs. Between the activities, I couldn’t concentrate on watching the Wizards much, but the futility was made crystal clear in the glances I was able to get.

This team has no moxie. With the persistent problem back-to-back games pose, there’s ever-increasing skepticism and little hope that they will ever change course for the better. There are a ton of excuses for why this team is falling way short of expectations, a lot of them seem to stem on more time and patience. But how do you get a team to play with energy and focus like they care?

So, I put my blues collection on shuffle and spent the better part of my Sunday watching the Wizards-Suns with focus … and boy did I learn a lot about this team. I was able to capture the essence of the game in the nine frames below, but I’ll have much more to come in the future about the less desirable aspects of the Flip Saunders’ team.

Well, the Wizards certainly played better against the Suns than they did against Indiana last Friday. But this time, they simply lost to a better team. It’s another day, another loss … the Wizards’ fourth in a row with their record now standing at 2-5. One would hope that this doesn’t become routine, but that didn’t keep members of the media from groaning “feels like last year” as they made their way to the media room to wait for Flip Saunders’ press conference.

Of course, I wasn’t operating under an “official” media capacity last season, but I can imagine letting out a sigh, shrugging my shoulders, and wondering what to ask Saunders as I did on Sunday. But this isn’t like last year. There isn’t a sense that losing is inevitable. This team conveys a strong belief that everything will come together with time, health … and more trust on offense.

The Wizards started against Phoenix not necessarily lacking energy, but were plagued by defensive mismatch problems  … a theme that’s not unique to this one game. While Fabricio Oberto concentrated on Amar’e Stoudemire, Brendan Haywood had to worry about Channing Frye and his three-point shooting, spreading the court ways. Frye finished 4-8 from deep.

Haywood seemed to have trouble moving his feet fast enough to cover all the offensive looks from the Suns. At times, the spinning and turning Haywood was doing on defense looked to be some sort of interpretive dance in the paint. The Wizards center was curiously limited to 11 and a half minutes in the first half, but finished the game as a rebounding (10) and shot blocking (5) presence in his 32 total minutes.

Many of the issues can also be attributed how tough it is to guard Steve Nash. Often, it wasn’t the guy setting the screen and rolling who caused trouble for the Wizards. Rather, it was the secondary cutter who broke free as the Washington help defense became focused on Nash and the screener. Nash finished with 17 assists, two more than the Wizards’ team total … which became a primary topic of discussion after the game.

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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):