Are you not entertained?
Losing Andray Blatche as a starter may make the Wizards a worse basketball team, but they get a whole lot more watchable. Everyone gets more effective scrutiny whether or not that's exposing someone suddenly without their protective scapegoat, or watching rookies get enough leash to make mistakes and remind us what they were drafted for.
Ted talked about being the team no one wanted to play and if our guys make a habit of muscling up hard on guys like Blake Griffin, we're going to be on our way towards building the rough and tumble defensive identity you can build a playoff team around Hell, even Yi Jianlian got into it with a man-sized hack on the league's media darling.
There were more Russell Westbrook-engineered breakdowns on transition defense than I want to think about, but there weren't many instances where our guys quit fighting. There was an electrifying series where Kevin Durant stripped John Wall and sped down the court only to have John and Javale double team him and strip it back. It was off to the races and while John failed to convert at the rim, he got to the line. These are the kinds of individual trials that give me hope we're going in the right direction.
Of course, it wasn't just John. Kevin Seraphin and Trevor Booker were going for it. Hamady N'Diaye gave us the best minutes of his career. Jordan Crawford displayed better shot selection scored at a better clip than usual. If John had his unpredictability...and did anyone notice that Book and Razorblades had only one foul between them in 61 minutes of play? Of course the Thunder shot 21 free throws on 13 personal fouls...but that also means we fouled them so hard they couldn't make their shots. It sounds like the young Wizards have finally figured out that since they're not going to get the calls, there's no need to play nice.
The veteran discussion continues, but the rookies are showing us what they need to, and that bodes well for the future.