On draft night back in 2010, the Wizards and the Sixers were two bad teams who felt like they had received significant upgrades with the additions of John Wall and Evan Turner respectively.  Turner still comes off the bench, but the addition of Doug Collins along the maturation of Jrue Holiday, helped the Sixers reach the playoffs last year, along with a strong 7-3 start this year.  The Wizards were back in the lottery last year, and are far and away the worst team in the NBA this season.  To put it mildly, the Sixers have passed the Wizards by.  These two polar opposites will clash in Philadelphia tonight, but before that Truth About It writers Kyle Weidie and Rashad Mobley, along with the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Sixers beat writer (and former Wizards beat writer for the Washington Times) John Mitchell answer three questions…

#1)    In Kate Fagan’s well-written blog entry on Monday, she broke down the reasons why Philadelphia is playing so well offensively this year.  One of the main reasons for the offensive efficiency, is that Doug Collins and his coaching staff realized that his personnel excelled at running the pick-and-roll, and he needed to customize his offense to match their strengths.  Given that the John Wall is struggling offensively, and the Wizards as a whole are struggling on offense—they scored just 64 points in a loss to Chicago—should Flip Saunders look to make adjustments to the offense? Or are the Wizards just in a bad shooting slump?

MITCHELL:   I honestly don’t know what Flip can do to ignite the offense. John Wall is an electric talent, but he probably played with better talent at the collegiate level than he has in Washington.  Nick Young, allegedly and offensive player, was reportedly seeking $9 million annually yet he’s back in Washington hitting just 38 percent of his shots. With the Wizards, the ball too often sticks. That’s not a good thing.

MOBLEY:  The Wizards are in a bad slump but it has nothing to do with shooting, and everything to do with where they are mentally.  John Wall and Andray Blatche are missing baskets at point blank range.  Nick Young, as many times as he keeps the Wizards in the game with his scoring, is still forcing shots.  There have been very few possessions for the Wizards this season, where precise passing and patience led to any easy score.  If Flip can somehow get this team to do that, the offense would be more efficient.

Read more »

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?
Read more »