Wednesday Wizards Report
After a six game lay off the Wizards returned to action last night against the Toronto Raptors and man was it ugly. No one on the team outside of Bradley Beal and Martell Webster looked ready to play and the end result showed just that in a 96-88 defeat. Beal and Martell combined for 41 of the 88 Wizard points. The third pick in this year’s draft tallied 25 points after going 3 of 6 from 3-point land and Martell poured in 16 points while shooting 3 of 5 from downtown. Outside of those two the Wiz shot 16 of 50 from the field, which translates to 32%, which also translates to a loss. And to top it off we got to witness what is surely to be the last time Steez wears a Wizards jersey. After pouting on the end of the bench the entire game with a towel over his head, Jordan Crawford threw his jersey in the crowd on his walk off the court. If that’s not a signal for the end, I don’t know what is.
John Wall had his toughest night of the year, finishing with nine points, six assists, and seven turnovers going a dismal 1 for 12 from the field. It was ugly plain and simple, but don’t put too much stock into this game Wiz fans. He’s played a total of 19 games with this squad after coming back from a several month injury and coming off a six day layoff. Yes he played bad, but I highly doubt this will continue. The real issue to take from this game is the horrid coaching and what to do with Jordan Crawford.
Randy Wittman’s fourth consecutive DNP for Crawford was the final straw that broke the Steez’s back. He finally showed how disgruntled he is with the current situation and it pretty much sealed his fate in Washington. The bad part about last night’s shenanigans is that it certainly did not help Crawford’s trade value. What team is going to give away something of value for a player who if he doesn’t have his way pouts on the bench and throws his jersey in the stands? Let’s see what Ernie can pull out of his bag of tricks this time. Hopefully not Brian Cook.
Wittman also had a terrible night, as he sat Bradley Beal, our leading scorer, for the first seven minutes of the fourth quarter. Pretty smart move heading in the final period down by eight points. I mean at this point none of us know what runs through Randy’s head, but it definitely isn’t intelligent basketball rotations. Yes a majority of the team played bad, but with some different rotations and coaching, one would think the Wizards would have had a better chance to win last night.
With the trade deadline less then 48 hours away, let’s hope it’s a for sure thing that we make at least one move. I’ll be back Thursday to give you all a Wizards wrap-up of our trade deadline moves. Hopefully it will be positive things to write about. In what will probably be the last time I can use this tag line, Stay Steezy my friends.
3 Comments
Beal, Webster, and Okafor stepped up from the starting line up.
As you said the two guys we need the most Wall and Nene had horrible nights and as we’ve learned all season, as these two stars go, so go the wizards!
Then, Booker looked good off the bench but he’s the only one who looked good. It was nice to have his toughness and energy back in the line up, it’s needed.
You know? It’s time to question Whitman’s rotations again. Crawford should be playing over AJ Price, there is no question in my mine Crawford brings more to this team with his versatility to play not only his natural position of Sg but to also play some minutes at PG to give Wall a rest.
I don’t blame Crawford for being frustrated with not playing, because he’s our 5th or 6ths best player and he’s our 3rd best scorer. He needs minutes. What Whitman is doing to Crawfors is similar to what he did with Singleton earlier in the year and neither make a lick of sense to me.
As I said when we were talking about trading Crawford a few weeks back, we need him and he can be an important piece to this team as the 6th man, playing behind Wall and Beal. He can be our Microwave like Lou Williams and Jamal Crawford are. It’s a DAMN shame he’s not getting playing time because his coach SUCKS!
Fire Whitman now!
Couldn’t agree more Adam. Wittman needs to go. I would love to see what this team could do with a decent coach. Im praying for a first round exit for the Grizzlies so John Hollinger and his calculations will fire Lionel Hollins. Because I would love to see him coaching the Wizards next season.
I still want Avery Johnson with Sam Cassell staying on as his assistant. Those two pg’s will get the best out of Wall and Beal