Countdown to Ernie Grunfeld Firing (Part 2)

[noworriesinmd]

Someone posted that Saunder's hates the Wiz and I was trying to figure out why. That would disqualify us from the Love sweepstakes.

Then I got this gem:
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-ball- ... 24538.html

Isn't it amazing that after three seasons we are still arguing if Ernie is competent.

I hate being negative, but I can't believe we are still having this discussion.
At first I thought maybe there was a vocal minority that wants EG gone, but this was a national story written three seasons ago.

[payitforward]

...As for these domino effect re-drafts and trades, where does that get you? Is the team better? Is there better chemistry?

End up with Drummond, lose Beal. Do the Wizards make the playoffs with Drummond and Faried but no Beal or Gortat?

Dude, you asked who would have been better draft picks; I answered you. And if you don't think we'd have been a better team last year with no Beal but with Kawhi Leonard, Kenneth Faried, Chandler Parsons -- and Gortat (why would we not have Gortat in this scenario?) -- you are talking from a cracked mirror. I wanted Beal at #3, and I think he's a terrific young talent. But he's not that good -- to want him instead of Leonard, Faried, Parsons and Drummond!

Everybody wants these kids y'all whining about Ernie not drafting but where are the vets? Cleveland has a bunch of youth. Philly too. Detroit. Where were last year in the weak east, tanking. How long will it take for those teams to develop, if they ever do? Where will they be next year? Sure the Wizards can play the lottery game year after year...

You left out Orlando.

What kind of point are you trying to make? No one wants to be in the lottery year after year. Which we were for what 5 years in a row? The question was about making the right picks -- in the lottery, out of the lottery, in Round 2.

You might want to watch Orlando and Philly over the next few years. They have good young GMs.

Ernie ..messed up bad. Then he tore it down.

Then he got lucky and got Wall. Luck not skill. Then he had the 2011 draft. Then messed up a high R2 pick in '12. Ditto in '13. Signed Maynor... oh it's a waste of time to talk reality....

...Wizards have to retain Gortat and Ariza, and they bring back a team on level with at least Indy. There 2 best young pieces are Paul George and Hibbert. Oh yeah, Ernie missed on Paul George too but nobody is whining about that.

No, we are not a team on Indy's level. I mean... they just beat us, Brenice. You are really working on fumes here!

No one would have picked Paul George #1 in 2010, but he might turn out to be the best player out of that draft, not Wall. For that matter Stephenson looks to be in the top half dozen players out of the same draft -- and he went #40 (largely because he was thought to be a bad citizen; his talent was pretty obvious).

[closg00]

It appears that Bernice and Millie are the same person, they both use the same torturous logic to protect Ernie.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

[hands11]

Ugh I'm sorry, I can't continue to argue with these Ernie supporters over the same damn thing we've been arguing back and forth forever. Makes me want to slap the taste out someone's mouth lol. No one's position has changed nor is it going to... except hands11 but that's a daily occurrence.

Like what ? That's a crock.

Really? Do you still think as follows:

Vesely is our franchise player?

Singleton has what it takes to be a productive NBA starter as a rookie?

Jordan Crawford would have been terrific if handled correctly? (is he even still in the league...?)

Wittman is a terrible coach? (recently you wrote that he "may be better than we thought." The usual weaseling out a first-person admission, but you are part of that "we.")

Ernie Grunfeld should be let go as GM? -- you've written that a dozen or more times.

Jannero Pargo is a good NBA player?

Kevin Seraphin is (i.e. was) going to have a breakout season in '13-14? (and in the previous year, btw)

Maynor signing doesn't make me think less of our off-season moves?

And those are just some, not all, of the things that jump into one's mind. I'd hate to think what one could find by taking the time to scour your 22K+ posts.

I'll assume you will ignore the above list -- of course you will; you have every previous time such things have been pointed out to you.

Now go do the same for every other poster on the board including yourself. Because it wouldn't take much grabbing little one liners and bombarding any poster here with them. Now that would give board some fun reading. I come across this stuff all the time. I just don't endless flame people with it. Oh sure, I post something there and there, but its like all you do. The way you do it is called being a troll if you didn't know.

You think I'm going to waste my time dealing with your non sense line by line? There would be no point in trying to explain any of that with you because there is never any point in it. I tried before.

Dude, get real. Still bringing up the Ves line when I addressed that in detail 100 times.

If that isn't proof, I don't know what is.

[hands11]

Still didn't answer my original question about McGee and Nick.

Did you even read what I wrote, Brenice?

I put aside '07. There were plenty of better players than Young, as it turns out, but I'm not dealing in hindsight. (Marc Gasol also would have been a "dramatically" better pick in R2 than Dominic McGuire -- but I wasn't calling for Gasol, so I didn't bring him up).

I explained exactly what I would have done in '08. In case you haven't noticed, btw, DeAndre Jordan is widely regarded as one of the top 5 Centers in the league -- and for good reason. Batum is one of the best 3s in the league. And Mario Chalmers is flat out a winner.

Oh, and it's ok w/ me that we don't go back to '06. After all, no way Rajon Rondo is "dramatically" better than Oleksiy Pecherov, right?

Or, that you don't want to mention '09 either -- no way Stephen Curry is "dramatically" better than a rental year of Miller and Foye, right?

Now go GM by GM and compare all the picks and players they missed on.

[hands11]

Someone posted that Saunder's hates the Wiz and I was trying to figure out why. That would disqualify us from the Love sweepstakes.

Then I got this gem:
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-ball- ... 24538.html

Isn't it amazing that after three seasons we are still arguing if Ernie is competent.

I hate being negative, but I can't believe we are still having this discussion.
At first I thought maybe there was a vocal minority that wants EG gone, but this was a national story written three seasons ago.

Wow. I figured Flip would be happy to be out. He played the good solider, but didn't sign up for a rebuild. And he got paid anyway didn't he ?

What would he be upset about ?

But here is another take.

http://www.bulletsforever.com/2014/5/21 ... -offseason

Even taking Grunfeld to task for the roster construction issues several months ago, I found it impossible to ignore the storybook similarities between the 1998-99 Knicks and 2013-14 Wizards. What we don't know is what happened next, because Grunfeld was 'temporarily relieved of duties' before those Knicks made their historic run to the NBA Finals. He did preside over a largely inherited Knicks Finals squad in 1992-93 under the guidance of Pat Riley, but the 98-99 squad was his as the 13-14 Wizards are his and that's really the point.

In the end, Grunfeld will do what Ted Leonsis tells him to do. That's why I'm issuing a request: Turn him loose, Ted. You retained him when you took over, you re-signed him. Part ways if you don't believe in him. But this guy has survived a long time trying to build a year-in/year-out contender. Empower him to go after big names, or sign someone you believe can do that better.

[Benjammin]

It's never a good sign when you have three straight posts in a thread

[montestewart]

Still didn't answer my original question about McGee and Nick.

Did you even read what I wrote, Brenice?

I put aside '07. There were plenty of better players than Young, as it turns out, but I'm not dealing in hindsight. (Marc Gasol also would have been a "dramatically" better pick in R2 than Dominic McGuire -- but I wasn't calling for Gasol, so I didn't bring him up).

I explained exactly what I would have done in '08. In case you haven't noticed, btw, DeAndre Jordan is widely regarded as one of the top 5 Centers in the league -- and for good reason. Batum is one of the best 3s in the league. And Mario Chalmers is flat out a winner.

Oh, and it's ok w/ me that we don't go back to '06. After all, no way Rajon Rondo is "dramatically" better than Oleksiy Pecherov, right?

Or, that you don't want to mention '09 either -- no way Stephen Curry is "dramatically" better than a rental year of Miller and Foye, right?

Now go GM by GM and compare all the picks and players they missed on.

And when you successfully complete that task PIF, hands will have another assignment for you. Just when you thought you were out, he pulled you back in.

[noworriesinmd]

Someone posted that Saunder's hates the Wiz and I was trying to figure out why. That would disqualify us from the Love sweepstakes.

Then I got this gem:
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-ball- ... 24538.html

Isn't it amazing that after three seasons we are still arguing if Ernie is competent.

I hate being negative, but I can't believe we are still having this discussion.
At first I thought maybe there was a vocal minority that wants EG gone, but this was a national story written three seasons ago.

Wow. I figured Flip would be happy to be out. He played the good solider, but didn't sign up for a rebuild. And he got paid anyway didn't he ?

What would he be upset about ?

But here is another take.

http://www.bulletsforever.com/2014/5/21 ... -offseason

Even taking Grunfeld to task for the roster construction issues several months ago, I found it impossible to ignore the storybook similarities between the 1998-99 Knicks and 2013-14 Wizards. What we don't know is what happened next, because Grunfeld was 'temporarily relieved of duties' before those Knicks made their historic run to the NBA Finals. He did preside over a largely inherited Knicks Finals squad in 1992-93 under the guidance of Pat Riley, but the 98-99 squad was his as the 13-14 Wizards are his and that's really the point.

In the end, Grunfeld will do what Ted Leonsis tells him to do. That's why I'm issuing a request: Turn him loose, Ted. You retained him when you took over, you re-signed him. Part ways if you don't believe in him. But this guy has survived a long time trying to build a year-in/year-out contender. Empower him to go after big names, or sign someone you believe can do that better.

I read the article a few days ago and I thought it was interesting. I'm firmly in the camp that EG has done enough to be let go. You can point to that Knick's team, but it ignores the Milwaukee team. How do our friends in Milwaukee view EG? Was he one season away? Besides the NY Post article, how many New Yorker's are clamoring for "our genius" to come back?

No matter what I say, he'll be back next year...so I accept that. He is tied to THIS team.
I have to give Ted credit, the mandate was to get to the playoffs this year....no matter what.
EG's three year deal prevents overextending the team for one season...just to let it implode the next. EG went all in this season and now can we improve or stay the same? There are a lot of unknowns right now and I'm just eating my popcorn watching EG squirm.

[dckingsfan]

Did you even read what I wrote, Brenice?

I put aside '07. There were plenty of better players than Young, as it turns out, but I'm not dealing in hindsight. (Marc Gasol also would have been a "dramatically" better pick in R2 than Dominic McGuire -- but I wasn't calling for Gasol, so I didn't bring him up).

I explained exactly what I would have done in '08. In case you haven't noticed, btw, DeAndre Jordan is widely regarded as one of the top 5 Centers in the league -- and for good reason. Batum is one of the best 3s in the league. And Mario Chalmers is flat out a winner.

Oh, and it's ok w/ me that we don't go back to '06. After all, no way Rajon Rondo is "dramatically" better than Oleksiy Pecherov, right?

Or, that you don't want to mention '09 either -- no way Stephen Curry is "dramatically" better than a rental year of Miller and Foye, right?

Now go GM by GM and compare all the picks and players they missed on.

And when you successfully complete that task PIF, hands will have another assignment for you. Just when you thought you were out, he pulled you back in.

Actually, that assignment was done:
http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10711 ... executives

[closg00]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

[montestewart]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

Terd wants a GM he can Depends on.

[verbal8]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

Usually a GM with an expiring contract and surprisingly good play-off run is a hot commodity.

[dckingsfan]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

Usually a GM with an expiring contract and surprisingly good play-off run is a hot commodity.

That's because he is the Eric Maynor of GMs

[Brenice]

Then he got lucky and got Wall. Luck not skill. Then he had the 2011 draft. Then messed up a high R2 pick in '12. Ditto in '13. Signed Maynor... oh it's a waste of time to talk reality....

...Wizards have to retain Gortat and Ariza, and they bring back a team on level with at least Indy. There 2 best young pieces are Paul George and Hibbert. Oh yeah, Ernie missed on Paul George too but nobody is whining about that.

No, we are not a team on Indy's level. I mean... they just beat us, Brenice. You are really working on fumes here!

No one would have picked Paul George #1 in 2010, but he might turn out to be the best player out of that draft, not Wall. For that matter Stephenson looks to be in the top half dozen players out of the same draft -- and he went #40 (largely because he was thought to be a bad citizen; his talent was pretty obvious).

First of all, I've said if I were Ted, I would have fired Ernie when I took over the team. I am not an Ernie fan. I'm a Washington fan. Let's be clear.

Now, I've said all along that Ernie has some misses. I understand that a top 3 pick is usually a blind woman can usually make so Ernie should not get credit for Wall or Beal in general, but they were not as clear cut as picking Shaq, Duncan, etc. I wanted to draft Wall, but Ernie could have drafted Evan Turner and got that wrong too, but he didn't. Turner was considered a legitimate potential #1 #1 in that draft. Same for Beal. There were other options at #3. As of right now, as well as Beal has played, it is still debatable whether Beal was the best pick at #3, but Beal is not a bust. Ernie should get partial credit fr getting them right. Paul George could be in Philly instead of Indy. Somebody got that WRONG. BIG TIME. Vesely, is a miss. But he is not a I could have had Wade or Melo or Bosh miss like Detroit and Darko. So with that, I give him a "miss" on that, but I also see why he swung for the fences.

Now, what makes San Antonio's GM good is the non-lottery picks, finding the diamonds in the rough. Ernie is terrible at that. I understand that. But those diamonds don't win championships without the LUCK of being able to draft Duncan. Ernie has not had a Duncan or someone on that level ever. So you can bring in the Spurs front office and the Wizards will be better, but without a LeBron, Durant, Shaq type player, and I'm starting to question Durant, you are still falling short of championships. Why do you think a Phil Jackson has all those rings? LUCK in the names of Jordan, Kobe, Shaq. When he left Chicago, he sure in hell wasn't going nowhere without a player who is not one of the top players in the NBA. Why do you think Riley has his reputation? LUCK in the names of Magic, Ewing, Wade, Shaq, LeBron. Know you tell me what they did that was so smart? Why did Riley not have a ring in NY? Because Jordan was not playing in New York. Oh the bad luck. Hell, the reason LeBron went to South Beach in the first place was to play with Wade.

You tell me when Ernie missed on one of those level of players.

As for my saying the Wizards, if they brought Ariza and Gortat back next year would be on Indy's level, has to do with next year, not this year. Sure they beat us this year. Wall and Beal will not be playoff rookies NEXT YEAR. That's the point of THIS YEAR. Indy is also a team without one of those top players. They are "hoping" Paul George is one, just like we are hoping Wall or Beal are one. Darn it Ernie. We

Ernie wouldaCouldaShoulda...blah blah blah. Darn you Ted, you should have fired Ernie. He should have drafted Harrison Barnes, DeMarcus Cousins, Kahwi, Steph, and Faried cause there isn't a domino effect when you change history and the Wizards would be champions. Yeah right.

[montestewart]

Then he got lucky and got Wall. Luck not skill. Then he had the 2011 draft. Then messed up a high R2 pick in '12. Ditto in '13. Signed Maynor... oh it's a waste of time to talk reality....

...Wizards have to retain Gortat and Ariza, and they bring back a team on level with at least Indy. There 2 best young pieces are Paul George and Hibbert. Oh yeah, Ernie missed on Paul George too but nobody is whining about that.

No, we are not a team on Indy's level. I mean... they just beat us, Brenice. You are really working on fumes here!

No one would have picked Paul George #1 in 2010, but he might turn out to be the best player out of that draft, not Wall. For that matter Stephenson looks to be in the top half dozen players out of the same draft -- and he went #40 (largely because he was thought to be a bad citizen; his talent was pretty obvious).

First of all, I've said if I were Ted, I would have fired Ernie when I took over the team. I am not an Ernie fan. I'm a Washington fan. Let's be clear.

Now, I've said all along that Ernie has some misses. I understand that a top 3 pick is usually a blind woman can usually make so Ernie should not get credit for Wall or Beal in general, but they were not as clear cut as picking Shaq, Duncan, etc. I wanted to draft Wall, but Ernie could have drafted Evan Turner and got that wrong too, but he didn't. Turner was considered a legitimate potential #1 #1 in that draft. Same for Beal. There were other options at #3. As of right now, as well as Beal has played, it is still debatable whether Beal was the best pick at #3, but Beal is not a bust. Ernie should get partial credit fr getting them right. Paul George could be in Philly instead of Indy. Somebody got that WRONG. BIG TIME. Vesely, is a miss. But he is not a I could have had Wade or Melo or Bosh miss like Detroit and Darko. So with that, I give him a "miss" on that, but I also see why he swung for the fences.

Now, what makes San Antonio's GM good is the non-lottery picks, finding the diamonds in the rough. Ernie is terrible at that. I understand that. But those diamonds don't win championships without the LUCK of being able to draft Duncan. Ernie has not had a Duncan or someone on that level ever. So you can bring in the Spurs front office and the Wizards will be better, but without a LeBron, Durant, Shaq type player, and I'm starting to question Durant, you are still falling short of championships. Why do you think a Phil Jackson has all those rings? LUCK in the names of Jordan, Kobe, Shaq. When he left Chicago, he sure in hell wasn't going nowhere without a player who is not one of the top players in the NBA. Why do you think Riley has his reputation? LUCK in the names of Magic, Ewing, Wade, Shaq, LeBron. Know you tell me what they did that was so smart? Why did Riley not have a ring in NY? Because Jordan was not playing in New York. Oh the bad luck. Hell, the reason LeBron went to South Beach in the first place was to play with Wade.

You tell me when Ernie missed on one of those level of players.

As for my saying the Wizards, if they brought Ariza and Gortat back next year would be on Indy's level, has to do with next year, not this year. Sure they beat us this year. Wall and Beal will not be playoff rookies NEXT YEAR. That's the point of THIS YEAR. Indy is also a team without one of those top players. They are "hoping" Paul George is one, just like we are hoping Wall or Beal are one. Darn it Ernie. We

Ernie wouldaCouldaShoulda...blah blah blah. Darn you Ted, you should have fired Ernie. He should have drafted Harrison Barnes, DeMarcus Cousins, Kahwi, Steph, and Faried cause there isn't a domino effect when you change history and the Wizards would be champions. Yeah right.

"I understand that a top 3 pick is usually a blind woman can usually make"? What is it with the pro-EG camp and comments derogatory to women? Oh well, I made an agist Depends comment, I guess we're all a bunch of bigots.

As to the rest, I believe PIF peremptorily addressed the "domino effect" you raise, clouded as it is in the strawman contention that he (or any large contingent on this board) asserts that a championship would have been guaranteed by these alternative paths.

Better drafting, as suggested by PIF and others, clearly would have produced a more solid young core, even if it some of the names changed, and without the rush to fill in the gaps with so many high-priced veterans (Miller and Gooden as perfect examples of solid veterans that do not coast $13 million a year) the team's ascent might have been the same, leaving them with the same picks, an excellent young core, veteran presence, and cap space to leverage trades.

You can disagree that this path would likely have produced a better result, but to dismiss it as simply impossible, repeatedly voicing objections based on contentions that few if any here have ever made…well, that's why these threads are so entertaining.

[Jay81]

pacers got Paul george in the 1st round and Lance stephenson 2nd round in the 2010 without having a top 5 pick. We suck

[montestewart]

Well, maybe Jay81.

[hands11]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

You probably should find another team to follow. Ted is likely talking the option year on EG so there won't be anything joy for you here.

[montestewart]

A fair barometer of Ernie Grunfeld's value as a potential GM hire, is the fact that no NBA team with a management vacancy, sought permission to interview him when his contract was renewed two years-ago (they aren't clamoring for him now either). Instead teams hired younger assistants. Gerrson Rosas was hired- away from Daryl Morey. Orlando's GM Rob Hennigan is a former Spurs assistant. Phonix hired Ryan Mcdonough.

All of these^^ guys are under 35. Ted prefers old, stale, and "steady" to young, hungry, and visionary.

You probably should find another team to follow. Ted is likely talking the option year on EG so there won't be anything joy for you here.

closg00 loves wins as much as the next fan. He just wants them more.