Met Tapscott Last Night, his answers to our questions posted

[He Hate Me]

Yeah post them here. I'll see what I can do.

[CaPtaiN eYeSaNo]

just print out this thread....

http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=888645&start=15

[yungal07]

Who massages his balls the best...Stevenson or Mike James N?H?

Sorry, don't ask him that.

[dobrojim]

please play Javaris Crittenton more. Even if Mike James is 'on', winning that
particular game is not as important at this time as the future development
of JC. He should never play less than 20 min and should generally play
closer to 30.

Ditto McGee.

[MJG]

I'd print out the latest Insider article and ask his response to it.

[fishercob]

I'd respectfully ask him why Caron, Antawn, Songaila and James are playing such big minutes when we're 15-50. The latter two are taking time away from kids who need development. The former are risking injury/breakdown, and we need to be fully healthy next year.

[ZonkertheBrainless]

Yeah, he needs to put a 35 minute ceiling on Jamison and Butler's minutes, principles be damned. Let minutes be determined by the performance of Dmac, N1, Blatche, and JC relative to Songaila and James. Don't include Jamison and Butler in the competition for minutes, because we need them for next year. Risking a season long injury by giving them an extra two hours of floor time for the rest of the season is not worth it.

[miller31time]

I'd respectfully ask him why Caron, Antawn, Songaila and James are playing such big minutes when we're 15-50. The latter two are taking time away from kids who need development. The former are risking injury/breakdown, and we need to be fully healthy next year.

A legitimate question, to be sure, but is it one you think we'll get a satisfying answer on?

His response will be as follows: "This team is in need of heady veteran leadership. The young players need to learn that nothing is guaranteed in the NBA and that their minutes need to be earned."

[fishercob]

I'd respectfully ask him why Caron, Antawn, Songaila and James are playing such big minutes when we're 15-50. The latter two are taking time away from kids who need development. The former are risking injury/breakdown, and we need to be fully healthy next year.

A legitimate question, to be sure, but is it one you think we'll get a satisfying answer on?

His response will be as follows: "This team is in need of heady veteran leadership. The young players need to learn that nothing is guaranteed in the NBA and that their minutes need to be earned."

Indeed an unsatisfying answer. But perhaps -- our satisfaction be damned -- it's not without merit.

Listen, I wish Songaila and James were playing 15-20 mins a night and Caron and Jamison were playing 30-35. But the marginal benefit of having the kids playing those minutes pales in comparison to the benefit gained by the kids growing up (physically and mentally) from the simple passage of time.

Further, Nick's going to grow a lot more playing next to Gilbert. McGee's going to grow a hell of a lot more playing next to Haywood (and against him in practice). It's frustrating watching the vets get run into the ground, but in all likelihood, it's not going to hurt the long term prospects of this team.

[He Hate Me]

ok ill check this one more time around 430 than i'm off. will post any good answers later tonight/tomorrow.

[Soup's Uncle]

Ask him what he's gonna do for a job in a few months...I KID...cus he'll probably go back to being personnel.

Uh...like he other guys are saying, ask him to respond to Michael Lee's post on WI today.

ASk him what he thinks of Haynesworth being indicted today.

[He Hate Me]

yeah so I will probably be asking him what he thinks a 100% healthy wizards rotation would look like, and if he gives a bad answer i will probe deeper and ask who the primary backup pg would be, MJ or Critt, what the wing rotation would look like (Deshawn status) and how he plans to integrate Blatche and McGee with a healthy Haywood.

I will also ask him what type of player the wizards are looking to acquire in the draft bc we are weak at sg but really need to address other issues first.

[DAGGERRR]

Why doesn't he give Young and McGee more minutes?!

[He Hate Me]

So I actually was able to have a decent conversation with Tapscott and the head trainer about the team. It was cool, saw the locker room, met the assistant coaches and took some shots on the Verizon court.

General Observations:
Our weight room is pretty cool. There's a big vibration machine that the players stand on for about a minute right before the game. It vibrates your entire body pretty intensely and when you get off you feel very light and it seemed to a couple inches to my vert. It gives your whole body, especially your calves that feeling you get right after doing a set of lifting exercises.

The locker room was standard, I bet many of you have seen it. Caron Butler's locker is COVERED in straws, and there were straws laying around everywhere in the training room. Gilbert has double locker in the corner with lots of clothes and an Obama poster. Opec's sandles looked like canoe paddles. Domonic and Jamison are apparently good friends have lockers next to each other and are the two hardest working players on the team according to the trainer. In general Tapscot and the trainer have big mancrushes on Jamison, and call him the best professional they have ever worked with both as a player and person. Serious bromance going on there.

I asked about pretty much everything I could think of, here's a basic breakdown of their replies to my questions.

Q: Will Gilbert be healthy next season, where is he now in his training, and what do you expect the PG rotation to be when he is back starting?

A: Gilbert is definitely going to be 100%, he's in the 90s now. Mike James will be our backup PG next season and Critt is a 3rd stringer. We like him on the 3rd string but he has ALOT of work to do. He has shown no ability to run a team, and is not a pure point, he just has no shot so he always defers.

*I was really surprised by the candor he showed me in this response, I could tell I would get some good insider knowledge when he started cutting down Critt, who I actually like.

Q: Why aren't McGee and Young playing more minutes? Don't you think Jamison and Caron could give about 30 minutes a night and that extra time could go to McGee and Young?

A: Jamison is in perfect health and is not in danger of being injured. We play them big minutes because we want to win basketball games. Last night we got booed at home, and that is a very hard thing to endure. If we play our young guys we'd lose by 30 points. So the booing hurts our pride and we approach every game looking for a win. McGee doesn't stay in because he doesn't understand how to rotate defensively and tries to block everything leading to foul trouble. In the start of the season he was getting great blocks but now teams have gameplanned him and realized that if you jump into him they'll get the foul call, so we really can't put him out there and do well on defense. He has a lot of work to do. Nick Young has a future in the league and is our best athlete. He has a standing 42 inch vert, and can really do some amazing things athletically. His problem is his confidence and his lack of team defense. Both of these guys kill us defensively, which is why Dom plays so much, he gets it.

*apparently McGee's nickname is SuperRook in response to Jamison being known as SuperVet

Q: What type of player are we developing Dom into?
A: We think he can be a really efficient defender in the mold of Jared Jeffries with the toughness of Najera. They actually seem to really like Jeffries and talked about him being one of the most efficient defenders in NBA history with his ability to switch off guarding Yao Ming to someone like TJ Ford.

All I can think of right now.

[Benjammin]

Thanks for getting those answers. Now I'm really depressed if he actually believes that crap, and more importantly if EG does.

[ZonkertheBrainless]

Ok. I guess the next step is to try and corroborate his statements with statistical evidence. I seem to recall +/- numbers for McGee that seems to back up what he's saying...

[He Hate Me]

Oh I almost forgot, they really like RICKY RUBIO, and seem a little down on Blake Griffen due to his height.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Just goes to show you don't have to know what you're talking about or do a good job to be an NBA head coach.

By the same criteria (height) that's how the Wizards drafted Pecherov over somebody like Millsap.

Rubio I guess will be the Wizards pick so they have an excuse not to pay his salary while he's overseas.

[crackhed]

his analysis of jcritt seems a little off to me too..

[Wizardspride]

his analysis of jcritt seems a little off to me too..

Frankly, I don't care what Tapscott's opinion is.

The only opinon that matters is Mr. Grunfeld.