Some late-afternoon links to read

I am so tired of how Washington fans view it as a personal failure or character flaw every time someone gets injured. Blatche was working out and got hurt. End of story. Athletes who are working out hard all the time are usually sore all the time. It’s often tough to determine the difference between an injury that needs attention, a minor injury that will just go away in a few days (especially when you are young and most of your “injuries” seem to disappear quickly) and just general muscular soreness.

Mobley makes a very good point about having Arenas around. As much as the Wizards want Wall to be the face of the franchise, being that face carries with it a lot of responsibility and obligations. And at 19, with all the pressures of being the #1 pick, I’m sure Wall wouldn’t mind the media shoving microphones in someone else’s face once in a while (and with Gil around, you know they will). Recall Blatche saying that after Jamison left, he realized all the demands and burdens Jamison carried (being the team spokesman for the media, etc.). And I think we all recall how well Blatche handled all that attention (his blowup with Flip, his “underpaid” comments, etc.).

Also, speaking of mentors, who better to teach Wall how to utilize his blazing speed to get past defenders than Gil, one of the best in the league in that department?

Better get his chance to show his skills

I have never considered Ernie to be a mastermind GM, but he is definitely smarter than the average one. I’m sure people will point to what has been happening in OKC or perhaps ATL and say, “why can’t we have good young teams like the GMs there have built?” Well… years in the lottery will get us there. While we were making it to the playoffs, they were in the lottery year after year.

Back to Ernie…
He knows how to build a very good team without obliterating the salary cap. However he also, makes the occasional bad decision (who doesn’t?). Moreover he depends on the coach + fitness staff to get the most out of the tools and materials he provides them with He, like the rest of the franchise has had some bad luck.

Was bringing Arenas here a bad decision? no, that paid off dividends and although he embarrassed us, he brought some of the best basketball washington has seen in decades
Was resigning Arenas a bad one? for the amount he did, yes…. but i think this was more Abe’s influence than anything else.
Trading for Jamison? perfect!
Trading Jamison away? ehh, that’s tough considering this was more about loyalty reciprocation
Getting Butler? spot on
Drafting and resigning Blatche? awesome
There’s pros and cons to the various other pieces he has brought in and sent packing, but that’s getting down into the weeds. For the most part, the man has put the pieces in place for our beloved franchise to succeed.

Ernie can’t receive all of the blame our team not succeeding. Plus, I doubt Ernie has the same autonomy he once had under the Polins. I imagine a lot of these moves he has made are at the request or instruction of Leonsis. The guy strikes me as a very hands on owner (A more grounded Mark Cuban). Also, how many team owners or company owners for that matter would allow a single person to invest 10s or hundreds of millions of their dollars in someone without their input? very few…

Championship gms are few and far between and usually reside in major media markets and the fairytale nonexistentsalarycap land.
Ernie has exploded everything he built previously, and we’re starting over with a pretty good core that he has built. I say we give him a chance to finish rebuilding and if two years from now we see no progress (doubtful), then we can revisit.

1-What exactly is WASH supposed to do w/ Arenas? Wave bye-bye and send him away w/ his remaining contract paid in full? That’s brilliant. Trade him for a pair of used Chuck Taylors? That’s all he’s worth at the moment. Break the contract? Can’t be done, Der Fuhrer Stern saw to that. Options? One: tell him to shut up, keep his nose clean, and play his ass off. He does his job, those Chuck Ts may become brand new. You can blame Grunfeld for signing him to begin with (I certainly do), but he can’t do anything now.
2-Hinrich…If I’m not mistake, the Wiz have 2 guards under contract- Arenas and Nick Young. Arenas will most likely be gone at the trade deadline, and Young isn’t setting the world on fire. Yeah, it’s a horrible idea to have some maturity and experience on a team sadly lacking in them. Esp. when his contract becomes so very sexy after this season.
“Quality rotation guy. We don’t need more combo guards. Gilbert Arenas has got the Wizards covered in that department.”…OK, so Arenas plays 48 minutes every night? He’s doing good to make 48 games a season.
3-Shaun Livingston…ROFL! Why not just load the entire roster with serious injury histories. I hope the guy can play and stay healthy, but I’d rather another team takes that chance.
4-“John Wall is a natural winner. He’s mature beyond his years.”…Yes, Wall needs no guidance. Hell, he doesn’t need a coach. How old is Wall, maybe a year older than Kwame Brown was when drafted? How’d that work out? Please, let’s do absolutely nothing to try and prevent history from repeating itself.
5-"Kevin Seraphin. This is a player described by Draft Express as “far from a finished product,” who played all of 16 minutes per game in Europe this past year.“…If you paid as much attention as you pretend, you’d realize 16 minutes on a Euro team, at his age, is pretty damn good. And Heaven forbid WASH stash a prospect for a couple years, that thinking has never helped anyone cough SPURScough Yep, horrible idea.
6-”Couldn’t the Wizards have pulled off a similar deal, offering either the 30th or 35th pick in the draft?"…How do you know they didn’t try? If Miami thought they’d do better dealing w/ WASH, don’t you think they’d have tried?
7-It’s easy to talk about rebuilding from scratch. In an ideal world, I’d keep Wall and seriously consider ditching everyone else. NEWS FLASH: This isn’t an ideal world, and Mr. Wall is only going to sell so many tickets. Even if you are willing to “tank” a season from day 1, you can’t tell that to DC fans. That might work in places like OKC or Utah, where the NBA is the only game in town. In DC you need to give the appearance of progress, whether you make any or not. You know, exactly like the US government.

Ernie Grunfeld June 10
"Just because you have money doesn’t mean you should overspend on someone that won’t be a part of your long-term future. If the right opportunity comes along, I think you want to look at it, but I’ve said all along that we might save our powder for down the road, to see what the new CBA brings, to see if there’s a hard cap or a soft cap. We don’t really know all the rules going forward, so just because you have the cap room doesn’t mean you should go out and spend it if it’s not for the right player."

all i am going to say there is no clear, articulated vision that match his actions. and that is enormously frustrating for a fan who has watched this franchise make it past the first round of the playoffs once in thirty years- and they lost in the second round that time.

thanks MR. when u read this do you think ted is talking about a backup guard- who happens to be paid more, is not a recognized leader, and competes for playing time?

but it also reinforces my point. i believe this was communicated via ted’s blog originally. ernie’s comments, were made in a press conference two weeks before the draft.

and those two statements are not in sync. unless you happen to think the heinrich IS the right player…

the most optimistic way to look at this trade is 17mm for heinrich less 3mm cash less 3mm for 17th pick = 11mm for heinrich or 5.5mm per year. certainly not insane and would help if we can move arenas.

if we cant move arenas, then i think he found his “right” player at the wrong position! we have cassell on staff and comes much cheaper and does not compete for mins

if we can move arenas for v carter and then can move carter for anything (esp a 1st round draft pick) then i really like the trade.