The Wizards matched-up against each other for two segments of 5-on-5 action in front of season ticket holders and media on Thursday night. That it was just the third day of training camp was clear, as jumpers on offense tended to clang and more experienced defense usually won out. A white team featuring A.J. Price, Bradley Beal, Trevor Ariza, Trevor Booker, Emeka Okafor, Cartier Martin, Brian Cook, Earl Barron handled a blue team featuring Jordan Crawford, Martell Webster, Chris Singleton, Jan Vesely, Kevin Seraphin, Shelvin Mack, Shavlik Randolph, and Steve Gray  32-14 — the white team won each scrimmage segment 16-7. Below are the video pixels and scenes.

Beal And-1

In this first clip, Okafor gets a relatively easy post catch against Seraphin, turns, and hits a soft-appearing but slightly flat jumper over Kevin. It’s a shot Okafor needs confidence to take. On the inbounds, Booker puts defensive pressure on Crawford and Vesely. Booker is a big guy, but Crawford barely makes an effort to create space, and then he gets on Vesely because he doesn’t initially execute the tough pass. Once on the other end, Booker steps up to help with Crawford’s dribble penetration — Booker and Ariza together make an intimidating defensive combination. The clip ends with what appears to be a very poor entry pass from Crawford into the post (the play is obscured by a coach on the sideline). The blue team turns it over, Beal picks up the leftovers, and he takes it the length of the floor to draw an And-1 against Crawford.

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Jordan Crawford and Cartier Martin work on their corner 3s during a post-practice shooting drill after the morning session of Washington Wizards training camp day one.

Last season the Washington Wizards attempted 329 corner 3-pointers, 16th most in the NBA. The Atlanta Hawks led the league with 464 3-point attempts from the corner and the Spurs were next with 453 attempts.

Washington made 132 of their corner 3-point attempts, good enough for 40.1 percent and seventh best in the NBA. Atlanta made 39.7 percent of their corner 3s and San Antonio made 41.9 percent; the Golden State Warriors led the league in shooting 45.6 percent on corner 3s.

One could easily deduce: Hey, the Wizards need to shoot more corner 3s. From a tweet of NBA.com’s John Schuhmann (@johnschuhmann) in September:

Here’s a fascinating one: The league leader in assists on corner 3s was, by far, John Wall (77). Rondo was next w/ 59.

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In 2009 training camp, Flip Saunders gave his Washington Wizards hats and t-shirts emblazoned with the slogan “Our Time.”

In 2010, “Back to Basics” was the training camp tagline of choice.

Prior to a lockout-shortened season in late-2011, Saunders balked at tying words to an abbreviated camp. Instead, he handed out a Wizards logo hard hat at the end of practices. Later in the season, gold coins with “Game Changer” on them. Yes, It’s true.

Randy Wittman, before his first season as Wizards head coach, was asked about a slogan for this year’s training camp on Wednesday.

“You know, I’m kind of old school,” he said with a shrug of the shoulders. So old school that the first slogan which crossed his mind arose from the depths of 1979.

“‘We are fam-i-ly’ … I don’t know if you guys remember the Pittsburgh Pirates…”

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At the conclusion of an afternoon session on day five of training camp, Washington Wizards assistant coach Sam Cassell cracked smiles while rebounding for John Wall, Jordan Crawford and Shelvin Mack as they performed a shooting drill. Cassell is about to begin his third season on the bench for the Wizards. Forever known for his personality, he doled out positive instruction to the young guards, sharing stories with Wall about a certain game in his playing career where he “killed it” and got the win. Cassell also proclaimed Crawford as the funniest dude he knew, the camaraderie among the trio being rather overt.

The three-time world champion with 15 NBA seasons under his belt is essential to the development of both guards. He’s constantly teaching the young Wizards moves and positioning. Even though Flip Saunders had this to say after practice,:

“Sam does a good job because he has good knowledge as far as played the position. One thing that’s a little bit different is that Sam played a lot different than these guys. And sometimes you have to talk to Sam because the things he wants them to do, as far as shoot mid-range shots and those type of things, that’s not what their game is. Sam’s speed has definitely never been close to those guys. So that’s one thing we gotta watch out a little bit. But he’s got a good knowledge of what to look for.”

Either way, certainly the athletic can learn something from the tactics of the non-athletic. Cassell has also enjoyed past friendly battles of one-on-one with the likes of John Wall, Nick Young and JaVale McGee. Something left in the tank is sometimes best spent on education.

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In the midst of training camp, just three days since it commenced, four days until the first preseason game, and exactly two weeks until the beginning of the regular season, the Washington Wizards are running toward the beginning.

Rashad Mobley, John C. Townsend and I represented Truth About It.net in an ESPN 5-on-5 regarding the Wizards today. Along with Brett Koremenos of HoopSpeak.com and Mike Wallace of ESPN.com, we attempted to answer five questions:

1. For which Wizards player is the 2011-12 season most important?
2. Who is the most intriguing player on the Wizards’ roster?
3. What’s the most surprising take in John Hollinger’s Wizards profiles?
4. Based on Hollinger’s profiles, what do the Wizards need most?
5. Will a shortened season help or hurt the Wizards?

Click here to read the ESPN.com 5-on-5 about the Wizards, and then vote in the poll below for which player has the most important upcoming season.

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Washington Wizards coach Flip Saunders made his official return to the Verizon Center press table on Friday afternoon to speak with the media. He made some statements, he made some observations, he set some goals, and he dished out a couple zingers. Afterward, a handful of media members assembled in an impromptu huddle to comment on how much Flip seemed ready to talk. Hey, the man is just glad to have a season and a team to coach. For now, if media ears are around to listen, well, they come with the blissful territory. Let’s run through Flip’s Top 11 quote tid-bits…

#11 On areas of improvement…

“We need to be better offensively, as far as on turning the ball over. That cost us a lot. I always believe that if you don’t turn it over you’re going to have a chance to win.”

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“He’s just Superman, jumps over cars I guess.”

-Flip Saunders on Al Thornton

I was minding my own business last Thursday evening when I noticed a tweet from Wizards forward Al Thornton:

“This may sound crazy but I just literally got hit by a car walking.. Wtf.”

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Slow news day out at Wizards Training Camp on Thursday evening as practice had concluded by the time the media was let in to observe. The highlight was definitely the presence of Bullets/Knicks Legend Earl “the Pearl” Monroe, who also took time to answer a few questions about this year’s team. Flip spoke briefly along with Sean Marks, Hilton Armstrong and an under the weather JaVale McGee.

Video recap of the interviews:

Monroe also earned the nicknames “Black Jesus” and “Black Magic” from his street ball days in Philly, which was famously described by Denzel Washington in the movie “He Got Game.”

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[Wizards 2010-11 Player Preview Index: Gilbert Arenas, Hilton Armstrong, Andray Blatche,
Trevor Booker, Kirk Hinrich, Josh Howard, Yi Jianlian, JaVale McGee, Kevin Seraphin,
Al Thornton, John Wall, Nick Young.]

The Summer.

-by Kyle Weidie

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In case you haven’t heard, the Wizards added some more bread filler to their training camp crabcakes with the signing of Vincent Grier and Paul Davis. But these are just test crabcakes, when the season starts, they’ll be much more potent.

Vincent Grier

Grier, who spent last year playing in France and has previously made off-season appearances with the Miami Heat (2006) and Minnesota Timberwolves (2008), seems to be one of those ‘dime-a-dozen’ swingmen.

Here’s a synopsis of what I was able to gather via Grier’s Draft Express profile (written in Feb. 2005):

He’s an explosive lefty slasher who can score in bunches, take smaller guards in the post because of his size (6’5″, 200 lbs. or so), and rebounds well. However, he can be out of control on offense, his jumper is inconsistent, and his handles are shaky. He can uses his muscle to play decent defense, but doesn’t necessarily have lateral quickness.

Grier has no chance of making the team. But as goes common knowledge, his simple association with an NBA team might help with a contract down the line. If anything, Flip Saunders seems to be doing his fellow University of Minnesota alum a solid. Seeing the meager client list of Grier’s agent Mark McNeil, they could use the extra help.

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