Frichuela wrote:Pistol King wrote:The Wizards are like a G-league team, where almost each player is playing for his own numbers and for his next contract, when nobody gives little **** about winning, and the coach watching all of this mess on the sideline and not only he's not asking to change this style of play, he actually encouraging it. I've counted something like 35-40 times when the offense was about giving the ball to KP or Kuz, everybody standing still and watching them taking the shot. Zero ball movement, zero sense of playing for each other. This is not the way to tank. This is not how you develop young players. This is not how you develop a future.
What Deni, Kispert and Goodwin gonna learn from this style of play when Kuz, KP and Barton and co. get the green light to chase their shots at the cost of winning? they learn that playing a winning team-ball is meaningless in this organization. They learn that they must be selfish and think only about their own stats if they want to survive in this league. I'm so sad to watch this style of play the Wizards encouraging. Instead of experimenting the high upside of 6'9" Deni as the actual PG while Morris is out, asking him to initiate and gain momentum with the ball, instead of sharing this duty between him and Goodwin, two guys who give all their heart on the defensive side and playing 'the right way' and deserve being rewarded, WUJ parking him the entire game in the corner and asks him to watch the KP, Kuz and Barton's show while playing 26 off-ball minutes when the team is anyway losing. I seriously never seen a worse development.
Agreed. I am afraid Wes has lost the team. We know how cheap Turd is but at some point you need to replace the coach with someone who encourages the team to play the right way.
Depressingly our only hope is for Beal to request a trade, which leads subsequently to Tommy trading Kuz and Porzingis for whatever draft capital and young prospects he can get…
I've been preaching this. This brand of basketball WUJ let's them play is neither any of: (1) sustainable towards a winning record, (2) forms good habits, and (3) encourages player development. I get KP, Beal, and Kuzma can do some really cool stuff on the court, problem is that they are are given a pass far too often on really bad decisions and plays they make as well. There is no accountability once you've reached a certain level on this team, and if you don't think those players don't know that, you are painfully naïve.
Now your hope would be that some of your best players would show leadership and hold themselves accountable, but we all know Beal will never be anything close to resembling a leader other than his contrived, cream puff interviews he tries to convince folks to take him serious, Kuzma ain't it, and KP, despite a seemingly something nice guy, likely suffers from the entitled feelings since he came into the league dubbed as "The Unicorn."
I haven't seen one shred of evidence that WUJ is willing to challenge his players. Challenge not just the ones that are easy to challenge because of their perceived status in the league, but also the guys were it takes some guts to do so. He hasn't shown a willingness to be malleable and shake things up, he just goes with the status quo and all too often looks like he is more concerned with optics and politics instead of staking his claim as a legit head coach.
To go further, WUJ wants to run an offense like Denver does, but fails to realize that what makes Denver by way of Jokic such a potent offense, is that their lead player wants to get people involved, share the rock, let everybody eat. At the same time he doesn't expect that from his top players. With that, we have WUJ/"Big Three" apologist that keep saying the same old tired "who else is going to take the shots," "no one else is capable of making those shots," "the rest of the team are just 7th and 8th options," and so on and so on.
I'd rather watch Kispert, Deni, Gafford, Goodwin, Davis, and Rui at least get the chance to fail, than continue to watch us foster a brand of basketball we all know is doomed for failure. With that said, I also understand that Beal, KP, and Kuzma are also on the roster. I'd be fine with them being them all staying as the focal points of the offense, if they were willing to sacrifice some shots and a little bit of energy on the offensive side of things for the greater good of the team. Problem is none of the three to varying degrees are willing to buy into a more cohesive, team-oriented brand of basketball, because it isn't asked, expected, or required of them.
Scotty Brooks 2.0, full stop. I was really hopeful when he came in too.