ESPN East Projections - Wiz #7

[closg00]

We were projected at 7 WITH Gilbert, barring a major trade, you have to say that we will be fighting for that 8th play-off slot.

Question. Do we have the money to offer Juan Dixon the vet minimum? We could use a spark off the bench. A Streak-shooter like Juan could help us.

[doclinkin]

Hollinger hates on the Wiz again. Predicting 4th in the SouthEast, 11th in the East: 36 wins. And he seems to think Pecherov is a key player for our success.

While he makes an occasionally cogent point, when it comes to the Wiz, Hollinger is consistently a dingleberry.

[miller31time]

According to Hollinger, Haywood had a "fluke" regular season.

Really, John? What was flukey about it? He didn't rebound much better than normal. He didn't shoot from the field much better than normal. His defense has always been spectacular.

Is Hollinger expecting Haywood to significantly regress in free throw shooting (the main reason for his career high in PER)?

It's weird. Hollinger is basically spot on for the entire article, but then he throws that piece of garbage out there. He also says Arenas is out half the year or longer.

Now, I'm not saying Arenas is definitely coming back in the 1-month time period he says he will, but it's one thing to have a haunch Arenas will be out longer than first reported, and it's another to say he definitively will. That's what Hollinger did, and he predicated his record-guess on it.

Very interesting.

[dandridge 10]

Hollinger does make a few blunders in his analysis, but overall I think he is pretty spot on. I think his record prediction is also low, but not suprisingly low given all the question marks going into the season. Let's face it, in order to meet or surpass last season's record, we will need the starters to remain healthy and just as productive as last year, Blatche to step up considerably, and at least one of Young, Dixon, or Brown to give the consistent production that Mason did on BOTH ends of the court. Those are a lot of big IFs. I also don't like some of the talk coming from EJ, like pairing Young and Dixon together. Yes, they can each score big on any given night, but neither handles the ball well, plays smart, or demonstrates any propensity to play any defense whatsoever. For once, maybe all the stars will align this year and we will finally make it to at least the second round. However, I think it is at least equally or even more likely that we don't make the playoffs or make an early exit in the first round after narrowly squeaking through.

[JWizmentality]

This is the same guy who gave us 33 wins last year...with a completely healthy team!! Nice to see he bumped us up 3 wins.


Seriously...the frikkin Bobcats beats us?? Holly boy will keep on degrading us until he finally gets it right.

[doclinkin]

Hollinger always predicts low for the Wiz. There's something about his metric that doesn't account for the Wiz' style. He's wrong every year, or the Wiz overacheive every year. To do so once is a fluke, to do so 4 times is a trend and if you're an honest statistician you take a second look at yourself. What bias interferes with my accuracy.

NO knock on the guy, Hollinger attempts a colossal task, to assume comprehensive authoritative knowledge about every team in the league without actually watching them or knowing much about them. To do so he relies almost exclusively on stats. He'll tend to miss details. Overstate some angles and make a wild guess at the cause of a statistical relic he dug up.

[pancakes3]

ditto, but a quick glance reveals biggest stregnth: perimeter scoring, biggest weakness: backcourt. ironically somewhat correct.

to be continued...

[MJG]

Unlike last year's prediction, which was utterly asinine, I'll say that I consider this one somewhat valid as a worst-case scenario. Baby steps, Hollinger.

ditto, but a quick glance reveals biggest stregnth: perimeter scoring, biggest weakness: backcourt. ironically somewhat correct.

I laughed when I first saw that. I mean, it's true - much of our perimeter scoring doesn't necessarily come from our backcourt - but it just sounds funny.

[closg00]

I appreciated Hollingers in-depth analysis, at-least he does his research .

[nate33]

The way I see it, this team is better than last year's team:

Improvements:
1/2 Arenas >>> No Arenas
Etan > No Etan
2008 Blatche > 2007 Blatche
2008 Young > 2007 Young
2008 DMac > 2007 DMac

No change from last year:
2008 Haywood = 2007 Haywood
2008 Butler = 2007 Butler
2008 Stevenson = 2007 Stevenson
2008 Jamison = 2007 Jamison

Where we've lost a bit:
2008 Daniels < 2007 Daniels
Dixon < Mason

By my reckoning, we stand to be a better team this year than last year. Even if we accept Hollinger's premise that we were really only a 39 win team last year going by on/off differential, I don't see how we fall to 36 wins. The East has improved, but not by THAT much. (And I don't accept the 39-win premise because our on/off differential was obliterated due to a handful of games where we were woefully injury depleted. As long as Butler can stay healthy for the first 30 or so games while Arenas is out, we should always have two of our Big Three on the floor.)

[doclinkin]

Okay, here's a pack of quibbles, scattered, but relevant:

Etan has nothing to do with the Wiz' three point defense. Opponents hit threes whether or not a Big was in the game-- there was no especial jump in 3pt tries when Darius and Dray were in the game. The Wiz were't really forced to double Bigs-- in fact opponents were more likely to take three point shots when Brendan was in the game since the paint was filled with an intimidating defender. Driving lanes were cut off. The decent 2pt FG% and lowered FT totals hints at the real reason: the team made a choice to emphasize defending the paint to the exclusion of all else.

There's a reason for that: the Wiz starting line-up lacks large long instinctual and athletic defenders in most positions. They defend with their hustle not superior length, which will tend to tire you out -- collapsing then closing out on shooters all game long. This is one reason why Wiz players could turn up the defense at critical times, and why the defense was better early in the season, but why they can't sustain it longterm, or past December.

This plays into the team's anemic point differential. Year after year the Wiz play in (and win) far too many close games. What's accounting for that? Pretty simple answer: Too many minutes by starters, -- plus-- piss poor back-ups. This becomes a team constantly losing leads off the bench, no 48 minute domination, no games over by halftime so the starters can rest for the next game on the road trip. There's too much fighting to regain lost leads or clawing back into games. The team steals more than it's fair share of Wins, yes, but it exhausts the team in the second half of season, and don't leave no "'nother level" for postseason play.

Compound with Fatigue, borne of that short rotation. Which leads to injuries. Now consider a team trying to rely on an active roster composed of ~25% Rookies averaging heavy minutes, teh team will tend to suffer.

What's the cure? How can the team keep players fresh? See above-- "active roster composed of [high % of now ex-]rookies, averaging heavy minutes" on a winning team, gaining valuable experience.

Hollinger banks on players declining, but rarely makes allowances for player improvement. Keep waiting on Jamison to drop off the table, John.. but if you check your stats you'll see he has _increased_ his PER, EFF/40, and 'Win' scores etc every year he's been here. Ditto Caron. Ditto Mason. Gil before injury. Larry Hughes...

On the one hand: Daniels & Songaila may slide. On the other: Dom and Nick will likely improve. (And it's hard to imagine that Pech would get any worse, for instance. Though for some reason Hollinger fixates on him as our only hope). Then you add a player like Dee Brown, who was showing solid improvement late in his rookie year. (Take a look at April 2007, where he had a few games wracking up assists. In one game notching 9 dimes in 15 minutes). The probability is he improves as well.

BUt key among them is a young player in his third full year, when traditionally players begin to come into their own. Last year's back-up Center, this year's probable first forward off the bench. Andray Blatche has been improving steadily every year in every metric. Already this past year he had a better than NBA average 15.5 PER (compared to Darius' 12-ish), the year before that: 12.1; before that: 9.9-- shoot if he keeps that up he'll tally a PER of 19+ this year like Andris Biedrins, Paul Pierce, David West...

So we lose 10 pts a game of Roger Mason. There's no chance we make up that difference with better performance out of improved ex-rookies + Blatche?

Now consider the cascade effect of a young big high energy uptempo bench. Most teams add one rookie who might play, and a round 2 guy who probably won't. Few winning teams have a roster of young talent as apprentices on the bench. Our starters sit, we dump out:

--One Man fast break
--Best athlete in his draft class Nick Young to finish on the break
--Rebounding Prodigy Dom McGuire, with a developing jumper
--Multitool Manchild Andray Blatche
--The Resurrected Etan Thomas playing with a frenzy

(Or the genetic experiment of ideal Big Javale McGee, athletic 7 foot freak of NBA breeding program. Or Pecherov. Like he said).

They don't even have to be good, just active and full of energy and willing to foul and run run run run run.

None of these are players who have been conclusively proven to suck on their own merit (see 'Hayes, Jarvis' and 'Ruffin, Mike') all are likely on the upslope of improvement. So even if they played the exact same minutes as last year, the probability is they each produce a little more until their talent is completely maxed. However low that max may be. But ya never know, with so many yougn active Bigs, we may end up able to make a trade one of these years to add depth in that backcourt or whatever. Even if you don't trust Juan Dixon or whomever.

Just saying, Hollinger only studies the '20 minutes and up' players, and 1st round picks, and assumes the snapshot of last year's stats tell the whole story. And in the case of the Wiz he seems to think it's a fluke every year that they win despite questionable FG efficiency -- as though they don't consistently rank highly in Offensive rebounds and turnover differential. That's what this team does. The fluke is that Arenas has been injured so long. And that our FT totals are down.

Plus hey, never know, we might get Gilbert back this year...

[BigA]

If Butler can stay healthier maybe 2008 Butler>2007 Butler, or at least the production is spread more evenly through the year, rather than concentrated before Feb. 1. To the extent that playing fewer minutes can contribute to that, the development of the younger players will be key.

[doclinkin]

The way I see it, this team is better than last year's team:

Improvements:
1/2 Arenas >>> No Arenas
Etan > No Etan
2008 Blatche > 2007 Blatche
2008 Young > 2007 Young
2008 DMac > 2007 DMac

No change from last year:
2008 Haywood = 2007 Haywood
2008 Butler = 2007 Butler
2008 Stevenson = 2007 Stevenson
2008 Jamison = 2007 Jamison

Where we've lost a bit:
2008 Daniels < 2007 Daniels
Dixon < Mason

And let's not forget:
Dee Brown >>>10 days of Mike Wilks.

Though:

2008 Songaila =???= 2007 Songaila.

He's been steadily declining over his NBA career, but this is the first year he didn't have a heavy offseason workload /surgery. Hollinger neglected DSong in the 'seven man rotation' because he earned just under 20 mins a game (19.somthing), therefore doesn't exist in Hollinger's viewscreen. But he was a significant player for us last year, especially late-season. Teh questionis how many of his minutes Dray takes away from him.

And roster/minutes juggling overall.

[LyricalRico]

^ Doc, your post was too long to quote but you're almost making me optimistic...almost.

[doclinkin]

^ Doc, your post was too long to quote but you're almost making me optimistic...almost.

I know, right? If only we had a coach who was worth anything...

[pancakes3]

interesting theory on the lack of 3 point difference, but wouldn't collapsing on defense signal a lack of faith in the bigs, namely jamison to stop the threatening PF? I think our lack of 3 pt defense has a lot to do with us doubling down when when the ball is being thrown in the post and not able to recover quickly enough. However, the lack of recovery isn't due to the lack of length of the perimeter guys but rather committing too early on the double and giving the post player time to react. Daniels and Stevenson stand at 6'4 and 6'5 respectively, which is decent size for perimeter players. They can usually contain their assignments but lose

i actually agree with Hollinger's appraisal that EJ likes to set traps in his defense and have help defense rotate and sometimes gamble for the haphazard outlet pass. This was best exemplified during Larry Hughes's DPOY campaign back in 04'05... has it really been 4 years already?

hmmmmmmmm... LH's contract expires in 2 seasons... maybe we can get him to come back after a couple seasons average 12ppg and swapping out a done-zo AD. Long term planning, that's what's up.

[LyricalRico]

However, the lack of recovery isn't due to the lack of length of the perimeter guys but rather committing too early on the double and giving the post player time to react.

I agree with this. They double too early in the shot clock and they are too obvious with it. And then the double teams aren't all that aggressive. So we get a double whammy - a half hearted double and an open shooter.

hmmmmmmmm... LH's contract expires in 2 seasons... maybe we can get him to come back after a couple seasons average 12ppg and swapping out a done-zo AD. Long term planning, that's what's up.

Sign Hughes to be our backup point in 2010? I wouldn't be against that. The depth of the FA pool that year might even drive down his value. Anything below the MLE for Hughes on a 2 year deal (to coincide with the end of Jamison's contract) would be good signing IMO.

[doclinkin]

Yeh I had a long discussion about this over at Bulletsforever. (Was off work today, had spare brain cells to babble).

'Collapsing' is the wrong word, covering/recovering is better. Essentially I pin it on Jamison. The team has developed gimmicky zones/schemes to cover for his particular deficiencies, and it's since become a bad habit even when he's not the problem. (Compounded when Gil is in and not focussed).

Bumping him to SF will make a difference, at least a few minutes a game. As will adding size throughout. But even simply adding decent back-ups will help the overall fatigue level. We've seen the team clamp down on the opponent and double/recover effectively. Trap at the top of the key and drop back into the paint quickly. Etc. If we keep fresh legs over the course of the season that'll make a difference both in team scheme and Man defense. And the second line possibilities can really beat the crap out of an opponent with just a little improvement from the talented young pups.

[LyricalRico]

Haywood out and likely to lose his starting job to Etan whenever he gets back + Jamison with a bum knee + Gil probably not coming back till the All Star break = no playoffs. Wiz are now 9th or even 10th in the East.

[closg00]

Has anyone here been tracking the other Eastern teams during the Pre-season? The Miami trio has been looking pretty potent, and NJ looks improved also. Like Rico, I gotta put us at 9th or 10th in the East.