Mustafa Shakur, Othyus Jeffers, Hamady N’diaye, Kevin Seraphin and Cartier Martin.

Those were all of the players available for the Wizards off the bench last night in Utah. Shakur didn’t play (coach’s decision being the given reason), and N’diaye tallied just three minutes in the box score, nothing else. Jeffers, Seraphin and Martin combined for 18 points on 6-14 from the field and 17 rebounds, five offensive thanks to the bruising workmanship of Jeffers. The numbers of the bench squad with the most unique set of names ever weren’t astounding, but the Wizards made it work in their somewhat shocking 100-95 overtime win over the Utah Jazz on Monday night.

Sure, Utah was missing Devin Harris and Andrei Kirilenko from their starting lineup, instead putting out a unit of Earl Watson, C.J. Miles, Raja Bell, Paul Millsap and Al Jefferson. But a Wizards starting five of John Wall, Jordan Crawford, Mo Evans, Yi Jianlian and JaVale McGee didn’t have a chance of feeling sorry for the Jazz, or themselves.

Jazz fans, however, may be feeling sorry for themselves … enough to boo their team at intermittent times throughout the game as Washington fought to gain control early, and then tried their best to relinquish it late, despite Utah’s best effort to not take advantage. It was odd to hear the Wizards television team of Steve Buckhantz and Phil Chenier recount just how far the Utah franchise has fallen in the year 2011. The Jazz were 27-13 when they made an east coast trip in mid-January, beginning with a game in Washington on the 17th.

Jerry Sloan’s team proceeded to lose to the Wizards on Martin Luther King Day, and then they lost five more in a row. Barely a month later, Sloan resigned after a 23-year run with the team and star point guard Deron Williams was traded to New Jersey. Now the Jazz are left in a vastly uncertain rebuilding mode with Tyrone Corbin as their coach, a six game losing streak (including last night’s take down by the Wizards), and a 36-39 record that looks to keep them out of the playoffs for just the fifth time in the last 28 years (also the fifth time in the last eight years, to be fair).

Yesterday was Jerry Sloan’s 69th birthday. Yesterday was also the first time Washington completed a season sweep of Utah since 1997. Yesterday things were a bit different for all.

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Did you watch the Wizards play the Nuggets in Denver on Friday night? Didn’t think so. Well, if you didn’t sit through the loss, you’re in luck, because below is a recap of words, moving pictures and still pictures.

1st Quarter

10:30 - JaVale McGee chases down a long loose-ball rebound, the Wizards were scattered in their transition defense after a wide-open Denver missed shot. Upon securing the ball, McGee really has only one Nugget in front of him, Kenyon Martin. You don’t mind the breaking attempt so much — one man to beat, open court, why not? The manner is the other side. McGee contorted his body, tried to twist around Martin and made life more difficult than it should have been, as opposed to if he’d just gone strong to the rim. Martin intimidation or self preservation, after McGee missed, he loafed a bit which immediately prompted Sam Cassell to jump off the Wizards bench and yell, “GET BACK!” with a wave of his arm. Denver scored on the other end. 4-2 Nuggets.

9:52 – Nene plants himself under the rim as Danilo Gallinari misses a layup, gets the offensive board and gets fouled on the floor. It’s evident that the Wizards need to have people on the court who can clear space. Yi and McGe don’t do that.

9:07 - You can quickly tell that the high altitude is getting to McGee — him expending a lot of extra, unnecessary energy at times doesn’t help. Combined with his asthma, you got to feel for his situation. He fouls Gallinari who makes one of two free-throws. 6-4 Denver.

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Blake Griffin is not perfect, you know. He has the makings of just about every other great, but young player. After he does something, anything on offense (because he can often be seen lazily swiping at the ball from behind or watching the action on defense), Griffin trots down the court with a look on his face somewhere between a smirk and stoic, but more subtle.

Other times he glares at opponents (evident by the above picture of him staring down Yi Jianlian after the Wizard tried to take a charge against one of Griffin’s teammates, followed by Blake verbally encouraging Yi to, “Get the f*ck up”).

Griffin often hangs his mouthpiece from his lips and chews on it as he runs the floor or during a stoppage in play, the gnawing and teeth aiding the menacing conveyance Griffin seems to go for in order to counter his over-grown schoolboy looks. In a sense, Blake Griffin is kind of a dick.

But this is nothing out of the normal, superstars being dickish. Kobe will tell you. Jordan will tell you. Kareem will tell you. The persona on the court comes with the territory, and there should be no qualms with calling a spade a spade, nor calling Griffin a star in this just his second season in the NBA, first actually playing.

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Randy Wittman seems to be a guy who likes to color within the lines. And sure there is an occasional twitch, a little jerk that sends his coaching marker beyond expectations – take for example his colorful exchange with JaVale McGee, which left both men red in the face.

But slip-ups like that, at the very least, let you know that the guy is human.

“Trust me, I don’t want to be standing here talking with you guys,” he said with a smirk before Wednesday night’s game versus the Golden State Warriors, filling in for Flip Saunders, who was with his ailing mother who recently passed away. Even with his disarming smile, you could tell that there was a fire in Wittman’s words, a communication of purpose. Such passion is expected from a man who has lived and breathed basketball since the ’70s, I imagine.

“The effort has to be better, obviously,” said Wittman during his pregame presser. “It can’t fluctuate. […] To win in this league and be a winner in this league you can’t have fluctuations in your effort, energy, and desire playing. Chicago kind of took that out of us … they kind of took the will to win away from us and that can’t happen.”

He went on to say that effort — effort! – must be a point of emphasis for the team over the rest of the waning season.

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The picture show run down from last Saturday’s Wizards game versus the Atlanta Hawks…

The Wizards organization hands out free 3D glasses to fans so they can enjoy the 3D pre-game introductory montage that’s shown on the jumbo-tron for select home games.

The team sometimes has a random fan shag balls during warm-ups,
and I can only imagine the excitement of this youth throwing the ball to John Wall as he dons his jersey.

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I spent some time last night charting the Wizards responsible for each point scored by the New Orleans Hornets as Washington fell 97-89, putting their road record on the season at 0-25. Some of the blame assignment certainly comes via judgment calls, but from watching some plays countless times, I think the chart below gives an accurate survey of the landscape.

As you can see, exactly which Wizard was responsible for how many points a specific Hornet scored is listed. The PA column indicates how many total points were allowed by each Wizard on the night; PPM indicates the points allowed per minute of court action — sure, points per possession might paint a more accurate picture, but all Wizards fans have is time … so seeing what a player does with his time on the court defensively still tells a story.

[Link to Wizards defensive charting vs. the Hornets, 2.1.2011]

Things to note: not all defense allowing points is “bad” defense.

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When the name Denny Green is mentioned, the first image that comes to mind is the one you see above, and with good reason.  He’s flustered, he’s angry, he’s mumbling, and after 40 seconds or so, he stomps away from the podium.  But five years before that outburst, Green had every reason to be just as angry when he was fired by the Minnesota Vikings, despite leading them to the brink of the Super Bowl just three years earlier.  However, at his I-just-got-fired press conference, Green displayed nothing but class (with a splash of third person):

“If you’re looking for Denny Green, look on the high road, because that is where I’ll be.”

The same concept applies when examining the Washington Wizards 24th straight road loss to the Dallas Mavericks last night. It is easy, and dare I say lazy, to focus on the list of errors that led to their 102-92 defeat.  Everyone saw their 61.3-percent free throw percentage (Dallas shot 67.6-percent), the poor shooting nights for Andray Blatche and Nick Young (a combined 10-37), and the lack of a consistent go-to guy in the fourth quarter.  Those shortcomings, and others very similar to them, have been present throughout this road losing streak.

That being said,  there were plenty of positives to take away from last night’s loss, and if they are bottled up and carried into tonight’s game in New Orleans against the Hornets, perhaps the Wizards can get a win before they get loss number 25.  So join me on the high road as we examine a few positives a bit closer.

John Wall.

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[Yi Jianlian thwarts a Ty Lawson foray into the lane.]

“From the standpoint of what we’re trying to do — it’s tough to say when you’ve lost 24 in a row — but we’re doing things because we know where we were when the season started. We’re doing things based on where we’re going to be next year and in two years.” -Flip Saunders after losing to the Dallas Mavericks on Monday, putting his Wizards at 0-24 on the road.

“We’re going to get one, hopefully sooner than later,” the coach eventually concluded in his post-game session with the media, as seen on Washington’s Comcast SportsNet. The Wizards are building hope on a 0-24 road record, but it is worth taking a closer look at some nuggets of development from the Wiz Kids.

Trevor Booker struggled in the stat sheet with early foul trouble in the Wizards’ 102-92 loss to the Mavericks. But he was assigned to guard Dirk Nowitzki, so 11 minutes, zero points, three rebounds, four fouls is understandable since he held his defensive ground on several possessions (but the two free-throws he missed didn’t help). Hopefully “Cook Book” added some new recipes to his defensive capability after matching up against the German All-Star, who scored 24 points on just 11 shots, because the Wizards are expecting Booker to be able to guard anything from a 3-man to versatile bigs like Nowitzki, and more. Overall, Booker’s 33 points on 14-19 shooting with 24 rebounds, three turnovers and 10 fouls over the first two games of the current four-game road trip (against Oklahoma and Memphis) is an encouraging sign toward his development and could be a threat to Andray Blatche’s minutes.

And as Blatche begins to play hurt, but sometimes make nice plays, but often regress, and usually take bad shots, but still give decent effort, sometimes, another Wizards big man has started showing up with opportunity and confidence fueled by minutes. Read more »

“Synergy” is an over-used buzzword, but it’s also a damn fine NBA statistics web site. So let’s use Synergy Sports Technology to take a quick snap-shot of some Wizards numbers to date.

This season, the Wizards’ defense has often been better than the offense. With the ball, on plays that have ended in a FGA, TO or FTs, Washington has tallied 0.89 points per possession (PPP), ranked 27th out of 30 NBA teams. They score 42.9-percent of the time and turn the ball over 13.7-percent of the time in these situations.

Washington’s overall offensive rating (ORtg – points produced per 100 possessions, which is calculated differently and likely includes other factors outside of plays that end in a FGA, TO or FTs) sits in line with these focused numbers; their 102.6 ORtg also ranks 27th.

The Wizards are particularly bad at scoring on post ups — which comes as no surprise considering the roster construction — chalking up a measly 0.70 PPP over 318 opportunities, a rate that’s ranked dead last in the league. Andray Blatche has produced 0.64 PPP on 121 post up opportunities, JaVale McGee has produced 0.66 PPP on 64 post ups, Yi Jianlian 0.50 PPP on 28 post ups … you get the point, the cupboards are bare, the well is dry and the children are starving.

In contrast,  the Wizards fare above average (at least in ranking comparison) on Pick-and-Roll ball handler plays on offense, producing 0.82 PPP over 567 possessions, which is ranked 12th in the NBA. John Wall clearly needs some work in this area, producing just 0.69 PPP as the offensive P&R ball handler, which ranks 106 in the league. Kirk Hinrich, on the other hand, produces 0.95 PPP as the P&R ball handler, ranked 17th. This is simply a difference in seasoned decision-making that will eventually come for Wall.

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Some leftover pictures, commentary, and links at the bottom…

Kevin Seraphin.

At some point during the Celtics game, mid-third quarter, John Wall expressed dismay about a questionable call that didn’t go the Wizards’ way … that’s a $50 fine face, perhaps.

On Boston’s subsequent out-of-bounds play, Wall did what he usually does in bouts of heightened emotion, good or bad … he pulled his shorts up.

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It didn’t seem like a winning night for the Washington Wizards as they prepared to face the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday. The movement of the team during warm-ups, the faces of the players, you could tell it was their fourth game in five nights. They weren’t exactly physically weary or mentally downtrodden in appearance, but the air of the team reflected the atmosphere in the Verizon Center, dead … like that oddly quiet elevator ride. Even Baltimore’s Carmelo Anthony being in town barely drew a response from fans, most electing to give him the Prokhorov treatment.

Toss out the box score from the game. The final was 120-109 Denver, but I could convince you otherwise. Washington led 56-46 in points in the paint, 32-8 in fastbreak points, they shot 51.2-percent from the field and made 23 of 27 free-throws. The Wizards were only out-rebounded by three (39-36), all in the defensive boards category, had the same amount of assists as Denver (23), and two less turnovers (15-13). Washington blocked nine shots, which may have contributed to the Nuggets’ 13-2 lead in second chance points, because both teams pulled seven offensive rebounds. Andray Blatche’s first quarter shot chart even looked like this:

Too bad after going 6-8 from the field in the first period, Blatche went 2-6 over the rest of the game (9-9 in free-throws on evening, though, for 25 total points).

The Wizards lost because they were the worse team. Denver was able to move around at will for the duration, earning themselves 12 made threes out of 23 attempts … essentially the difference. Washington only made two out of their 13 three-point attempts. The Nuggets always had the game in hand — winning the first quarter 33-26, the second 35-30 and the third 28-23 — because the Wizard were never really mentally around in the first place. Yi Jianlian and Nick Young each had ten points a piece in the fourth as Washington “won” that final period 30-24.

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[Editor's Note: Beckley Mason provided Verizon Center coverage of Saturday night's 98-95 Wizards win over the Toronto Raptors for TAI. You can usually find Beckley at the TrueHoop Network general NBA blog, HoopSpeak.com. You can also find him on Twitter: @BeckleyMason. -Kyle W.]

“Yi has a great set of skills. When he dunked it tonight I was like ‘OK China.’” -Andray  Blatche

On a night when the entire NBA was dwarfed by the NFL playoffs, the Wizards’ nondescript three point win over the Raptors was overshadowed by Chipotle’s burrito giveaway extravaganza.

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The most frustrating part about the Washington Wizards is that on the road, their main, young players often lose so much focus, concentration and aggression … and it clearly affects the team as a whole. Guys like Andray Blatche, Nick Young and JaVale McGee are young — 24, 25 and 23 respectively — but they’ve now been in the league a considerable amount of time and should not be going through break-downs so frequently and consistently.

One reason I think Wizards fans are tired about hearing excuses about age is that you have guys like Kevin Durant (22), Russell Westbrook (22), Al Horford (23), Kevin Love (22), among others, around the league playing at much more solid, dependable levels. Is it the type of mental player Ernie Grunfeld is drafting? Is it the player development? And none of this is to say that these players haven’t made improvement over the years, but it’s been a very painstaking process. Does the scouting process need to be re-evaluated? Is it already being re-evaluated? One can only wonder if the correct calculations are being made between the potential a talented prospect might bring and hubris notions from team management that they can change the mindset of such talent that might actually have a longer struggle on the path of mental development.

In any case, pounding on the mental rocks of those Wizards is starting to ache in the heads of those having to watch the games.

I used to frequently do game blogs (or game accounts) on this site. I stopped doing them so much because they can be tedious and long. On Sunday, I meticulously watched a recording of Saturday night’s Wizards-Bobcats game in several chunks, re-watching most all plays multiple times and documenting what I saw. Hopefully it will give a good depiction of what went on in the game beyond the box score and other game accounts. Unfortunately, it’s the chronicling of the Wizards’ eighteenth road loss of the season in 18 tries, a 104-89 defeat at the hands the Charlotte Bobcats without Gerald Wallace.

>FIRST QUARTER

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People like to compare the hard times, and the glory, of one professional sports franchise to the next, especially the hard times. It seems to be an inherent need for humans make comparisons, however irrelevant they may be. Think of the females, and males, going out to a club or a bar who are unnecessarily judging each other by looks, good and bad. With so many pheromones in the air, the nightlife chase can be just as much of a sport. So when competition comes into play, we compare even more.

Are the Portland Trailblazers going through a more rough time than the Washington Wizards right now? Perhaps, because the expectation of their success was higher, but I don’t buy the excuse of getting spoiled by continued playoff appearances. Or the LA Clippers, the oft-compared West Coast counterpart of the Wizards? The toils of Los Angeles’ other team have been just as painful, except if Dan Snyder were the owner of the Wizards. Actually, Donald Sterling is probably worse than Snyder. Imagine that. What about the Houston Rockets? Had they come to grips that Yao Ming would never be the same only to have him suddenly gone for good as Wizards fans just experienced with Gilbert Arenas? At least Washington got … Rashard Lewis.

It’s hard to compare the strife of one team to the next because those situations have nothing to do with each other. They have to do with the fans and those in the affected city. So Washingtonians, raise a toast to Portlanders and Houstonians and some Los Angeleans, and vice versa, and also to all those maligned fans of other hapless franchises. And while you’re at it, raise a toast to China, where millions have perhaps lost a basketball icon in Yao … and are left with a currently injured Yi Jianlian to carry to torch. Before Saturday night’s game versus the Miami Heat, Yi spoke on the injury of his fallen comrade.

It’s hard to hear Yi in the video below, but he says that the broken foot Yao recently suffered, ending his season and potentially his career, was pretty upsetting. But Yi says that Yao is also tough with a strong heart and that he doesn’t think he’ll just walk away from the game. When asked if he thinks Yao will come back, Yi says, “I hope so.”

Two initial thoughts upon hearing “strong” Gilbert Arenas trade rumors (via: Yahoo!, Orlando Pinstriped Post, Washington Post):

1) So what? If he’s traded, he’s traded. If he’s not, he’s not. Arenas has had a colorful past in D.C. that will always be remembered, mostly good … but it wouldn’t be colorful unless there’s some bad, and that will be remembered too.

Gilbert has come back relatively quietly this season (aside from emo acts, the fake knee injury, or shoe poop stories). Whether truly humbled, who knows, but he’s at least playing the part. The struggle with whether he should stay or go should now be released, regardless of if the rumors become true or not. People will surely struggle with how to remember him, many will dramatically paint broad pictures with broad brushes … just remember him.

It reminds me of a fight I once had with my girlfriend. It got pretty heated, and in a dead serious moment she looked up at me and said, “I hate to get all Mike Miller on you, but it is what it is.” And then the fight was pretty much over. I cracked up because she had the perfect way to break the tension, and get my attention, rending the conflict silly in the big picture. Then we moved on.

Otherwise, I know everyone would’ve liked to have that 2009 fifth overall pick and Ricky Rubio or Stephen Curry, but without Mike Miller, we wouldn’t have been able to add the absurdity of a repeated sports cliche as a way of moving on into the lexicon of this basketball franchise’s history and beyond. Thanks Mike Miller, thanks a lot.

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