Are the Wizards a Playoff Team This Year?

[Illuminaire]

I've been on the fence with predicting the Wiz this year... I mean, how many times have we been teased, only to get burned?

But... I'm buying John Wall. I'm drinking the "he's a winner!" coolaid. I think his leadership and mentality will have an even greater impact than his actual basketball skills on a squad of young, boneheaded underachievers. I don't see Wall letting us stay below .500 - it's just not in his DNA. 42 wins or bust, go Wiz!

[fishercob]

[

I'm still holding off on a final prediction, because I've only seen 1 pre-season game and a few highlights, but how everyone isn't over the top optimistic right now I have no idea. That was a championship contender on the road in Dallas and the Wizards ran them off the floor, despite it being obvious that John Wall will be much better very soon. But my 42-47 win range and a playoff berth from earlier this summer still looks good to me.

But taking all the other reasons out, I'd say most if not all of you are discounting the impact that John Wall will have right off the bat. Despite his learning curve, he has "it" that goes beyond any skills or athletic ability. He's just a winner. 35-3 at Kentucky. 4-1 in Summer League. 2-0 in preseason. Sure, let's see what happens in the regular season, but at some point all that winning is not a coincidence.

John Wall and the cast of misfits that ended last season might have been a .500 squad.

After 4 preseason games, Wiz kids are 3-1 and except for a letdown on the back end of a road back-to-back, the Wiz have been up by 20 against 3 separate opponents, two of which fancy themselves contenders. Like I said before, at some point this is not a fluke and not just pre-season. It's just that our franchise PG is a winner.

I'll be surprised if this is not a playoff team this season. I predict the "Wages of Win" guy will lose all credibility and the Wizards will be an offensive terror with athleticism and talent and matchup problems everywhere. If the Wizards can rebound like they did today 50 wins is a possibility.

[Hoopalotta]

[

I'm still holding off on a final prediction, because I've only seen 1 pre-season game and a few highlights, but how everyone isn't over the top optimistic right now I have no idea. That was a championship contender on the road in Dallas and the Wizards ran them off the floor, despite it being obvious that John Wall will be much better very soon. But my 42-47 win range and a playoff berth from earlier this summer still looks good to me.

But taking all the other reasons out, I'd say most if not all of you are discounting the impact that John Wall will have right off the bat. Despite his learning curve, he has "it" that goes beyond any skills or athletic ability. He's just a winner. 35-3 at Kentucky. 4-1 in Summer League. 2-0 in preseason. Sure, let's see what happens in the regular season, but at some point all that winning is not a coincidence.

John Wall and the cast of misfits that ended last season might have been a .500 squad.

After 4 preseason games, Wiz kids are 3-1 and except for a letdown on the back end of a road back-to-back, the Wiz have been up by 20 against 3 separate opponents, two of which fancy themselves contenders. Like I said before, at some point this is not a fluke and not just pre-season. It's just that our franchise PG is a winner.

I'll be surprised if this is not a playoff team this season. I predict the "Wages of Win" guy will lose all credibility and the Wizards will be an offensive terror with athleticism and talent and matchup problems everywhere. If the Wizards can rebound like they did today 50 wins is a possibility.

That's not really being charitable, Fisher. Joseph's posts are meant to be accompanied by a John Philip Sousa marching beat and can't really be properly measured outside of that context.

[closg00]

I guess we will move up from the bottom of SI's rankings next week.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/w ... index.html

[verbal8]

I guess we will move up from the bottom of SI's rankings next week.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/w ... index.html

I think 20-22 is about right.

[long suffrin' boulez fan]

Let's not get too excited. This team has holes, big ones.

There is the giant hole in the middle. Flip deems Javale as too soft, so he gives major minutes to the softest player I've ever seen -- Yi-vaporate ('cuz a ten point lead quickly dissolves into the ether when he enters).

There is the hole on the bench -- big enough to drop our three big bodied draft projects into.

And, there is the giant a-- hole in the head coaches seat who regularly uses the press to castigate his players.

Having said that... we have one heck of an amazing building block. Wall, if he can stay healthy, obviously has the potential to be one of the best in the game, bringing a combination of blinding speed, leadership and toughness that is hard to match.

[closg00]

Let's not get too excited. This team has holes, big ones.

There is the giant hole in the middle. Flip deems Javale as too soft, so he gives major minutes to the softest player I've ever seen -- Yi-vaporate ('cuz a ten point lead quickly dissolves into the ether when he enters).

There is the hole on the bench -- big enough to drop our three big bodied draft projects into.

And, there is the giant a-- hole in the head coaches seat who regularly uses the press to castigate his players.

Having said that... we have one heck of an amazing building block. Wall, if he can stay healthy, obviously has the potential to be one of the best in the game, bringing a combination of blinding speed, leadership and toughness that is hard to match.

We knew that to start the season, any team that chooses to attack us in the middle is going to beat us, Collins could have done it last night but didn't. I am wondering if we'll see Seraphin anytime, the Celts Turkish center played 15 min last night.

[fishercob]

Erden's also 24 and has been playing pro ball for 5 years. I bet we'll start seeing a bit of Seraphin after the all-star break. Perhaps sooner.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Let's not get too excited. This team has holes, big ones.

There is the giant hole in the middle. Flip deems Javale as too soft, so he gives major minutes to the softest player I've ever seen -- Yi-vaporate ('cuz a ten point lead quickly dissolves into the ether when he enters).

There is the hole on the bench -- big enough to drop our three big bodied draft projects into.

And, there is the giant a-- hole in the head coaches seat who regularly uses the press to castigate his players.

Having said that... we have one heck of an amazing building block. Wall, if he can stay healthy, obviously has the potential to be one of the best in the game, bringing a combination of blinding speed, leadership and toughness that is hard to match.

Really nice, edgy post that says all the controversial stuff that I don't feel like getting flamed for.

Thanks, lsbf.

[pancakes3]

to be fair, yi only got mins because mcgee picked up 2 early fouls. then he picked up a 3rd not soon after he was let back in. it wasn't like flip has mcgee in his doghouse or anything. it's practically auto-coach to pull a guy if he picks up 2 fouls early on in the first half, especially a C. especially a C that's foulprone to begin with and you don't trust him to play conservatively/stay out of foul trouble.

[montestewart]

^
Also to be fair, Yi's =/- numbers the last two games are much better than McGee's. I don't necessarily have any expectations for Yi, hated him being in at the end of the Hawks game, and see McGee (despite his flaws) as the better answer on defense and (hopefully) a much better overall player for this team in the long run, but Yi brings a jumper that sometimes helps offset his other deficiencies, and the team did fairly well the last two games with him getting minutes. McGee's issues have been observed endlessly on this board, and whether Saunders is d**k or not is beside the point. McGee has the tools to earn more minutes. All I can do is watch and hope.

I agree with much of what you said long suffrin' boulez fan, and just hope McGee and Blatche, can progress such that Saunders won't have be faced with those lame choices (or if he's forced to make a choice, it's because Yi progressed too). And I love "Yi-vaporate." I was going with The Big Yi, spoken in a green font.

[hands11]

Yep. If you're going to hope you may as well totally go for it. Wish BIG.

Rather than say 33 wins I chose 43. If EJ can take those limited teams of the past to the playoffs with around 45 or 43 wins, surely Flip Saunders can get this athletic bunch with a tremendous PG to the playoffs. Flip's going to bounce back, I can just tell. I'm not even crazy about the guy but he's coaching very well and handling things much better this season. This young team isn't selfish like last seasons.

Better talent, more coachable, better on defense, much more unselfish, confident PG play, Gil as a SG, three seven footers; this team will rock.

Maybe Flip wasn't the main problem all along and someone(s) were just over reacting.
Maybe is was just all the crazy odd things that happened last year in his first year.
And maybe he gets some credit for them playing hard to together to end the season.

Maybe not.

[Rafael122]

If we get Arenas and Howard back soon, yes. Our lineup is good enough to make the playoffs, and maybe win a game or two. Our bench will be stronger with Young, Hinrich, Thornton, and Yi. That's four offensive weapons on the floor.

Looking at the league right now, and I know I said I wait 10 games to start judging teams but there looks to be some garbage teams of epic proportions this year. We're talking Toronto, Cleveland, Minnesota, Detroit, etc.

[hands11]

Teams that are clearly superior:

Orlando
Miami
Chicago
Boston

Teams that are probably better but we could compete with:

Atlanta
Milwaukee

Worst case scenario thats 6 teams better than us. I think we're definitely going to be better than Indiana, Philly, New Jersey, and Toronto. Cleveland is kind of a mystery, they still have some decent players but without Lebron they'll probably collapse. Charlotte and New York are our biggest competitors for the last two playoff spots.

I'm not conceding much just yet. That looks good for now. We are going to get better as the year goes on. We may only get the 7-8 seed but we could easily end up with a better pure ranking them that. We could end up being the 5-6 best team but the record may not reflect that if we get a slower start.

As is, I'm not seeing us get a slow start. Wall J was one of my keys. I'm feeling more confident that he will be an effective mid range shooter. That changes a lot. That one thing is like a 2x multiplier. It effective a lot of things if he can hit that and it looks like he can.

Just imagine 1-2 years from now. I bet he opens it up to 3 range.

I think I will stick with this previous answer.

2-2 would qualify as a fast start in my book and I could see 3-3 in the cards.

They just need to stick around .500 while they bank some games and gain experience. The longer they can do that, the longer Howard gets to heal and the more likely all our players get some PT to develop.

[pineappleheadindc]

All I have to say is that if the Wiz do not make the playoffs, I want Uncle Ted to have Irene Pollin go to the lottery on our behalf. In that bright yellow jacket of hers.