'Zards Sign Jannero Pargo

[tontoz]

Pargo's career TS% is 47.7% which just so happens to be the same as Crawford's. he should fit right in here.

[Nivek]

Wiz could have done worse -- by my estimation, Pargo was more productive last season than any of the other PGs the Wiz have on the roster. Wouldn't have minded if they'd gone younger -- Scott Machado would've been a nice signing earlier in the offseason. Still, not a bad signing -- probably a pretty good one given what's available at this point.

[closg00]

Wiz could have done worse -- by my estimation, Pargo was more productive last season than any of the other PGs the Wiz have on the roster. Wouldn't have minded if they'd gone younger -- Scott Machado would've been a nice signing earlier in the offseason. Still, not a bad signing -- probably a pretty good one given what's available at this point.

Ideally, we would have locked-up Machado earlier and signed Pargo instead of Price. Perhaps Pargo's status was not clear at the time we signed Price. That's what I would have done anyway (after waiving Mack )

[MJG]

Seems a little weird to me that it took a Wall injury to sign someone like Pargo. He's nothing special, but I mean, he's going to be our best PG on the active roster opening night. Better than the guy we signed earlier in the summer. Oh well, better late than never I suppose.

[rockymac52]

I'd like to add that I'm also a fan of Machado, and wish we would have snatched him up after the draft. At that point we only had Wall and Mack, and we clearly weren't very impressed with Mack in his first season, seeing as we ended up signing Price, and eventually Pargo. That means we wanted a better backup PG. I understand if we preferred a veteran over a rookie because having a rookie PG (especially a 2nd rounder or an undrafted FA) can be incredibly frustrating and team-killing. We couldn't put too much faith in Machado even if we signed him. He'd be able to play with us in the summer league and train with us at camp, where he'd be battling for a spot on the team, and also potentially the backup PG job, if he showed he was already good enough. But whatever, we didn't sign Machado for one reason or another, and that's life.

I didn't understand the Price signing when it happened, and I still don't. I just don't see the value or upside. If we wanted a veteran backup PG who we could rely on, at least somewhat, to do an adequate job, then we could have done a lot better than Price, IMO. While Price has been around for a few years (still not that many), he hasn't shown anything yet. At least not to me.

We clearly didn't view Price as good enough that he could fill in as the starting PG if Wall was injured or needed rest, seeing as we just signed Pargo right after the Wall injury announcement. I suppose there's still a chance that Price could end up starting at PG at the beginning of this season, but I'd be fairly surprised if that was the case at this point. Likewise for Mack. Unless we don't want Pargo and Crawford starting together, since they're both chuckers, and it would make sense to split them up. So maybe Price does end up starting, I'm not sure yet. But if Price starts, it's only because we simply have no better options, or that we prefer the better option to come off the bench and provide a spark of sorts.

So why not sign Pargo a couple months ago instead of Price? The indication is that we probably see Pargo as a little bit better than Price, and more likely to get more minutes at PG. But does anything change when Wall comes back, or if he never was hurt in the first place? Wall starts at PG and gets 34-36 MPG. That leaves 12-14 MPG at PG up for grabs. Did we feel that in a smaller role, getting those 12-14 MPG off the bench, that Price would have performed better than Pargo? I find that hard to believe.

Maybe there's more to it (of course there is), and Pargo wasn't willing to sign for the minimum a few months ago, or he wasn't willing to sign with us, or who knows what the issue may have been, but maybe we just signed Price for no good reason. I don't know what we saw in Price, and what we were expecting to get out of him. It was a very lackluster signing that had no foreseeable upside or value as far as I'm concerned. We need to stop making those types of moves. No, not all 15 players on our roster need to be good players or possess remarkable upside, but they should at least bring something unique to the table. Price is just... bleh.

[closg00]

Rocky - You know what the problem is don't you? It's trying to apply logic to the way Ernie Grunfeld manages this basketball team. The logical mind assumes that we did try to sign Pargo before Price, but with Ernie you never know. From the press accounts it appears we did not pursue Pargo until after Wall went down.

[DCZards]

Is Pargo really a PG or is he more of a SG in a PG's body...similar to Juan Dixon. My recall is that Pargo is a shoot first guard and not someone who is particularly good at running a team's offensive. I wouldn't be surprised if A.J. Price starts while Wall is out since he's probably the most natural PG currently on the roster. And Crawford may be #2 in that regard.

I do like the Pargo pick up though. He's an experienced player and a very good shooter.

[rockymac52]

Is Pargo really a PG or is he more of a SG in a PG's body...similar to Juan Dixon. My recall is that Pargo is a shoot first guard and not someone who is particularly good at running a team's offensive. I wouldn't be surprised if A.J. Price starts while Wall is out since he's probably the most natural PG currently on the roster. And Crawford may be #2 in that regard.

I do like the Pargo pick up though. He's an experienced player and a very good shooter.

Although their reputations are in line with what you described, the stats show that Pargo's game isn't all that different than Price's. Similar high usage rates with below average offensive efficiency and below average defensive efficiency, thanks to below average shooting efficiency. See where I'm going here? They're both bad.

But it's interesting what you said about Price starting because he's the most natural PG (let's ignore what I just said about him actually being a shoot-first player for argument's sake). In general, I'd tend to agree with that philosophy. If we have one traditional PG and one shoot-first one (who might be a little bit better than the other), I'd probably want the traditional PG to be the starter, and the shoot-first one can come off the bench and provide that "spark".

It seems as though we couldn't afford to play Crawford and Pargo, the shoot-first PG together, because then we'd have 2 guards on the floor who are ballhogs and will chuck up inefficient shots and miss plenty of them, leading us to misery and losses. So it would be a good idea to split the two of them up, in theory, right?

But then again, I'm inclined to want to keep Beal next to the more traditional PG. I want Beal to be able to play the game like he would normally be playing it given his skills and role on the team. I'm scared to see him have to deal with a shoot-first PG who can't run an offense. It's like when we threw Wall out there his rookie (and sophomore) year, surrounded by a bunch of talent-lacking idiots with low basketball IQs. Obviously it wasn't going to work, and it probably didn't help Wall's development very much at all. It probably hindered his development. I'm not sure if this is actually the same scenario, but I don't want that to happen to Beal, even if it's only for a month.

[doclinkin]

I didn't understand the Price signing when it happened, and I still don't. I just don't see the value or upside. If we wanted a veteran backup PG who we could rely on, at least somewhat, to do an adequate job, then we could have done a lot better than Price, IMO. While Price has been around for a few years (still not that many), he hasn't shown anything yet. At least not to me.

As I recall, advanced metrics and the Wiz' big picture film analysis deally seemed to suggest that AJ Price significantly helped his teams defensively. Here's Ted:

BF COMMUNITY: You've spoken a lot about the importance of the team's investment into new technology and advanced statistics. (Editor's Note: also from the Washington Post interview). Can you elaborate on some of the ways the organization plans to use these tools? For example, will SportVU and Joe Still be used more for scouting other teams, looking at future draft picks, evaluating the existing talent to determine their market value in future contract, or a combination of all of these areas?

TED LEONSIS: The sort of technology that you have referenced is relatively new to most teams, and we are learning as we go. We are in the process of building our database with our players as well as players around the league, and eventually this technology will help us in determining player and even team tendencies.

For example, we will be able to determine statistically when a player may excel -- or struggle -- against an opposing player. We will be able to isolate the highest probability of success for a given play based on the personnel on the court.

We also use this information when evaluating players on other teams as we contemplate acquiring a player through free agency or a trade. Recently we signed A.J. Price to add some depth to our backcourt. We used our statistical analysis to determine that when Price was on the floor for Indiana, the Pacers were No. 1 in NBA defense efficiency. When he wasn't on the court, the Pacers fell to 16th in defense efficiency. So that gave us some additional important information when we were doing our due diligence prior to signing him.

Linker.

[Nivek]

I'm hoping Ted got some kind of exemption from the league so that Price will have to play only defense with the Wizards. Because last season, the Pacers were indeed better defensively when Price was on the floor, but they were also worse offensively by a wider margin when he played. Maybe the Wizards could just do a line change.

[doclinkin]

Sure. skepticism is warranted. Nevertheless seems to me the team benefits by having Wall learn how to attack a player like Price in practice, and again in absorbing defensive tips and tricks from him.

At the time we were expecting Price as deep bench player anyway, useful in defensive substitutions in end game situations or when a key opposing PG was ripping a hole in the squad and needed to be slowed down. I have no problem adding a cheap roleplayer like Price to a team that was looking to make its bones with stops that turn into a transition attack. We're banking on Wall, without him we have opportunity to land another lotto pick, with him Price wouldn''t have played much anyway.

[Ruzious]

Sure. skepticism is warranted. Nevertheless seems to me the team benefits by having Wall learn how to attack a player like Price in practice, and again in absorbing defensive tips and tricks from him.

At the time we were expecting Price as deep bench player anyway, useful in defensive substitutions in end game situations or when a key opposing PG was ripping a hole in the squad and needed to be slowed down. I have no problem adding a cheap roleplayer like Price to a team that was looking to make it's bones with stops that turn into a transition attack. We're banking on Wall, without him we have opportunity to land another lotto pick, with him Price wouldn''t have played much anyway.

I'd go back to Kev's last post. Unless the NBA puts in a new rule allowing platoon basketball, defensive substitutions at PG are of very minimal value.

[Nivek]

I'm really just responding to the team's latest fetish for acquiring specialists -- or, as payitforward has posted, abstractions. Acquiring a player because he's a good defender is...well...incomplete thinking (at best) in a game where players have to play both ends of the floor. Price may indeed be a first-rate defender. But, using the same data that Ted mentioned as a reason to acquire him, we find that Price's team was even worse offensively than they were improved defensively. Meaning the team was net worse off when Price was on the floor.

In basketball, you don't get to buy just the specialty -- you have to take the whole player. Maybe Price helps the Wizards by being a pain in Wall's ass during practice. Maybe Wall gets a little better than he would've been otherwise. But, maybe the Wizards would have been better off all the way around to be a bit less clever in buying specialities and instead signed a better all-around player.

[DCZards]

I don't expect Price to do much scoring when he's on the court. However, I do think he'll be solid and smart running the offense. As for what A.J. will apparently contribute on the other end of the court, as they say, "offense wins games, defense wins...."

[Nivek]

All of those "offense does X while defense wins championships" sayings are wrong. It takes both. Always has, always will.

[DCZards]

Yup, it takes both. You certainly need a balance of O and D. But it seems to me that sometimes you can win it all if you have great "D" and just enough "O" to get it done. Exhibit A is that Ravens team that won with Trent Dilfer at QB.

Offense gives you the excitement and the ESPN highlights (see the Gil, Jamison Zards' teams), but I'll always believe that it's the grit and grind of tough D that will carry the day.

[Ruzious]

Price is kindalike Ed Reed and Ray Lewis rolled into a bad backup point guard.

[DCZards]

Price is kindalike Ed Reed and Ray Lewis rolled into a bad backup point guard.

Hey, I'm a Skins fan...but I'll take a player with Reed's and Lewis's mentality on my team anytime, any sport.

[Nivek]

You're welcome to believe whatever you want. Here's some information.

NBA Champions since 1977 (36 seasons):
- average offensive rank: 5.9
- average defensive rank: 5.2
- offense ranked higher than its defense: 17
- defense ranked higher than its offense: 15
- offense and defense having the same rank: 4
- offense ranked outside the top 10: 6
- defense ranked outside the top 10: 2
- lowest ranked offense: 16 (1994 Houston Rockets)
- lowest ranked defense: 21 (2001 LA Lakers)

Runner-Ups since 1977:
- average offensive rank: 7.9
- average defensive rank: 6.5
- offense ranked higher than its defense: 16
- defense ranked higher than its offense: 19
- offense and defense having the same rank: 1
- offense ranked outside the top 10: 11
- defense ranked outside the top 10: 8
- lowest ranked offense: 26 (1999 New York Knicks)
- lowest ranked defense: 17 (1981 Houston Rockets)

So, there's some justification for defense being important -- perhaps slightly more important than offense. However, there is one principle that I'm sure we can agree on: you won't win many games when your team allows more points than it scores. I'm all in favor of having an excellent defensive team. But, it's also important to be good on offense.

[Ruzious]

Speaking of scoring more than your opponent, strange things happened in baseball this year. Tampa Bay had the largest run differential in the majors, and they're not making the playoffs. Baltimore, which had a negative run differential until recently, is in the playoffs.