Un-Player of the Game Thread, OKC vs. WSH

badinage · Post #1 » by **badinage** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 4:11 pm

Beal.

Beal lost them the game. Simple as that. Ugly offense in the final quarter. Ugly. Get-mine ball, everyone standing and watching. No movement. And so no tight-knittedness and commitment on the other end, no camaraderie and fight-through. Doesn’t matter that he got some big buckets; very nice; we needed them. But he absolutely killed — kills — team spirit.

The Sullen Priss must go.

FAH1223 · Post #2 » by **FAH1223** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 4:50 pm

Beal lost them the game? That’s totally unfair.

DCZards · Post #3 » by **DCZards** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 4:51 pm

badinage wrote:Beal.

Beal lost them the game. Simple as that. Ugly offense in the final quarter. Ugly. Get-mine ball, everyone standing and watching. No movement. And so no tight-knittedness and commitment on the other end, no camaraderie and fight-through. Doesn’t matter that he got some big buckets; very nice; we needed them. But he absolutely killed — kills — team spirit.

The Sullen Priss must go.

BB’s coaches and teammates looked for him to score down the stretch…and, as you say, he got some big buckets. Not sure what your problem is with that.

Would you have a different take today if SGA hadn’t hit that 3 and Beal’s jumper with 6 seconds left turned out to be the game winner? Or would you have preferred to see BB pass the ball instead of taking (and making) that shot?

Post #4 » by **nate33** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 4:57 pm

I don't know what game you people were watching. I thought Beal was quite good. He was terrific in the 1st and 4th quarters. He hit a cold stretch in the 2nd/3rd, but it wasn't like they were bad shots. He had 6 assists, 6 boards and only 1 turnover on the night. He played within the system for the first 3 quarters, and took over in the 4th. And that's with one of the better perimeter defenders in the game draped all over him (Dort). What more were you expecting? If Beal plays like this every night, I'm a happy camper.

Halcyon · Post #5 » by **Halcyon** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 7:41 pm

I blame WUJ the most. I don't think he's handling being the head coach too well right now.

AFM · Post #6 » by **AFM** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 8:14 pm

I think the Beal hate is of course because it was his first game back and we snapped a winning streak. Of course.

badinage · Post #7 » by **badinage** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 9:28 pm

It’s because the brand of ball on offense in the fourth was not the brand of ball that this team has been playing, and playing well, and winning with — a brand of ball that gets guys juiced to commit to D, to help on D, to fight for one another. Didn’t see that in the fourth. Saw standing around on O, saw complacency at times on D, saw ugly ball. Ugly, boring Bradball. (Which isn’t entirely an indictment of Brad Beal. It’s an indictment also of Wes, for not insisting on ball movement, on cutting, on sharing.)

In soccer, they speak of “the beautiful game,” when a team is playing cohesively and with geometric understanding and sharing. I want my basketball team to play that way. Play that way, and I can take some losses. Because the fundamentals are there. But not just the fundamentals — because the beauty is there; because it’s aesthetically pleasing. Because it gives me joy. I don’t need dunks and oops — whatever. (I know the yahoos at Cap One go in for that, even oohing over the opposing team’s players. Ugh. Have some sense of pride and self-worth as a fan.)

What I need is beautiful basketball. And if my team is going to be around .500 or below, it’s all the more imperative. I will not watch this team play ugly Bradball and lose. I just won’t.

badinage · Post #8 » by **badinage** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 9:35 pm

DCZards wrote:
badinage wrote:Beal.

Beal lost them the game. Simple as that. Ugly offense in the final quarter. Ugly. Get-mine ball, everyone standing and watching. No movement. And so no tight-knittedness and commitment on the other end, no camaraderie and fight-through. Doesn’t matter that he got some big buckets; very nice; we needed them. But he absolutely killed — kills — team spirit.

The Sullen Priss must go.

BB’s coaches and teammates looked for him to score down the stretch…and, as you say, he got some big buckets. Not sure what your problem is with that.

Would you have a different take today if SGA hadn’t hit that 3 and Beal’s jumper with 6 seconds left turned out to be the game winner? Or would you have preferred to see BB pass the ball instead of taking (and making) that shot?

Absolutely I would have the same take.

Again: beautiful basketball.

Ideally, we’d have championship-level basketball, but until then I need to see beautiful basketball. (Most championship-level basketball is beautiful basketball. The Lebron Heat teams. The Spurs last title team. The Kobe Lakers with Gasol. The 80s Lakers and Celtics … But not all championship-level basketball is beautiful basketball. See: the ‘90s Knicks.)

queridiculo · Post #9 » by **queridiculo** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 10:00 pm

badinage wrote:Beal.

Beal lost them the game. Simple as that. Ugly offense in the final quarter. Ugly. Get-mine ball, everyone standing and watching. No movement. And so no tight-knittedness and commitment on the other end, no camaraderie and fight-through. Doesn’t matter that he got some big buckets; very nice; we needed them. But he absolutely killed — kills — team spirit.

The Sullen Priss must go.

Wizards outscored the Thunder in the 4th, doesn't take a genius figuring how they lost looking at the box score.

badinage · Post #10 » by **badinage** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 10:29 pm

I just looked it up. Not sure I’m seeing what you’re getting at.

I did see that OKC shot a high pct. from the floor, while the Wizards outrebounded them and had more assists.

(And yes, they outscored OKC by 1 in the fourth, but it wasn’t as if they were some juggernaut that couldn’t be stopped.)

A higher pct. from the field corresponds to my point. They might have fought harder on D in the fourth, hustled more, if Bradball hadn’t been in full effect. One stop + one deflection-cum-turnover — that’s all that was needed — and that’s a W and not an L.

Halcyon · Post #11 » by **Halcyon** » Thu Nov 17, 2022 10:57 pm

They lost the gigantic lead they had initially when WUJ inexplicably went with a full 5 man bench lineup. Dude is a like a robot with his rotations sometimes, he has no feel for the game.

Jimmy Recard · Post #12 » by **Jimmy Recard** » Fri Nov 18, 2022 12:03 am

I thought Beal was fine on offense for the most part outside of some hero ball. The problem with him is on the other end.

dckingsfan · Post #13 » by **dckingsfan** » Fri Nov 18, 2022 1:07 am

Mine was the Deni body language...

queridiculo · Post #14 » by **queridiculo** » Fri Nov 18, 2022 9:27 am

Halcyon wrote:They lost the gigantic lead they had initially when WUJ inexplicably went with a full 5 man bench lineup. Dude is a like a robot with his rotations sometimes, he has no feel for the game.

The +/- for the bench players paint a pretty damning picture. Not sure I've ever seen a box where the starters all had a positive and lost the game.

What struck me was that the Wizards were doing fine with a shortened 8 man rotation on their streak, and how much the all bench units struggled even before it.

Perhaps Unseld's problem is that he's too much of a nice guy and he's trying to find minutes for everybody.

Sheppard needs to consolidate the roster and make a few hard decisions is my read.