Ernie Grunfeld Appreciation Thread

[JonathanJoseph]

The team outside of Wall and a few of the vets has the b-ball IQ of trained monkey spinning a basketball on top of it's finger. We've had a terrible since of entitlement amongst the vets that are gone and some of the youngsters that remain that's poisonous. From Gun gate, to C-Butt's "I'm an all-star proclamation", teammates fighting each other in the club, Tom T. vs. Eddie J (That's like the elephant in the room that EG supporters completely ignore) to the consistent problem we've had with players having setbacks rehabbing or playing through injuries. Ernie may be a competent assessor of basketball ability but being a good GM would seem to encompass a much greater scope of accountability IMO.

+1

Blatche's problem is that he plays very little defense and feels entitled to as many shots as he wants whenever he wants.

The problem is that he learned that from Arenas, Butler and Jamison. "The vets" as Ed Tapscott would say. Guess who is still in charge of player development for the Wizards?

Ed Tapscott.

This is the culture that Grunfeld has been responsible for.

[nate33]

We don't know all the details, but I think ownership played a role in most of EG's mistakes. Pollin is the guy who was always in the corner of Arenas and Jamison - allowing them to get away with lackluster D and then giving them huge contracts. (Remember Haywood telling Arenas that his protection was gone?)

Pollin was the guy who sided with EJ and allowed him to essentially veto the Tom Tibbs acquisition.

Pollin stepped in to make sure Etan was repaired.

And it was the transition ownership who called the shots during gun-gate - and they had a motivation to void Arenas' contract.

[daSwami]

In fairness to EG, the franchise he inherited suffered from a lack of strategic vision. (that has changed since Leonsis has taken over). For his first 5 years, he was given the "win now" mandate despite having limited assets to work with. Now that he's been given a license to blow-up and then rebuild the franchise, he should proven again why he was considered to be among the best GMs in the NBA during his tenure with the knicks.

[JonathanJoseph]

We don't know all the details, but I think ownership played a role in most of EG's mistakes. Pollin is the guy who was always in the corner of Arenas and Jamison - allowing them to get away with lackluster D and then giving them huge contracts. (Remember Haywood telling Arenas that his protection was gone?)

Pollin was the guy who sided with EJ and allowed him to essentially veto the Tom Tibbs acquisition.

Pollin stepped in to make sure Etan was repaired.

And it was the transition ownership who called the shots during gun-gate - and they had a motivation to void Arenas' contract.

Very true, except there was no "transitional ownership". It was still owned by the Pollin's and Grunfeld was clearly steering that ship. Even if I'm willing to give EG a pass for many things that should be attributed to Pollin, the Arenas fiasco is 100% on Grunfeld. That is a major career stain for anyone.

[Spence]

What's Kevin Pritchard doing these days? If not him, who would be an improvement over Ernie Grunfeld. [Replying that anyone would be an improvement is a non-answer.]

[nate33]

We don't know all the details, but I think ownership played a role in most of EG's mistakes. Pollin is the guy who was always in the corner of Arenas and Jamison - allowing them to get away with lackluster D and then giving them huge contracts. (Remember Haywood telling Arenas that his protection was gone?)

Pollin was the guy who sided with EJ and allowed him to essentially veto the Tom Tibbs acquisition.

Pollin stepped in to make sure Etan was repaired.

And it was the transition ownership who called the shots during gun-gate - and they had a motivation to void Arenas' contract.

Very true, except there was no "transitional ownership". It was still owned by the Pollin's and Grunfeld was clearly steering that ship. Even if I'm willing to give EG a pass for many things that should be attributed to Pollin, the Arenas fiasco is 100% on Grunfeld. That is a major career stain for anyone.

Consider this scenario:

Abe was dead. Arenas pulled the gun gate fiasco. Abe's children, now running the organization and looking to sell it to Leonsis, instructed EG to follow a course of action that maximized the potential of voiding Arenas' contract and thereby shave off $80M on the liabilities side of the balance sheet. EG was forced to comply or quit his job.

I'm not saying this is what happened. But it could be what happened. We just don't know.

[Rafael122]

What's Kevin Pritchard doing these days? If not him, who would be an improvement over Ernie Grunfeld. [Replying that anyone would be an improvement is a non-answer.]

Not sure. KP was always one of those guys who could build a team from scratch but could never pull off the big move that would push his team to the upper echelon. He always held tight to his young players.

[JonathanJoseph]

Consider this scenario:

Abe was dead. Arenas pulled the gun gate fiasco. Abe's children, now running the organization and looking to sell it to Leonsis, instructed EG to follow a course of action that maximized the potential of voiding Arenas' contract and thereby shave off $80M on the liabilities side of the balance sheet. EG was forced to comply or quit his job.

I'm not saying this is what happened. But it could be what happened. We just don't know.

But I don't think that's a plausible scenario. Everyone knew that Leonsis would eventually become the owner so I highly doubt that Leonsis was not consulted in some form, even if he didn't have final say. Leonsis still had minority ownership rights and there's no way that he wasn't well aware of the status of an $80M liability. And even if the Pollin family wanted it, the smart thing to do would have been to push back and explain the likely and actual outcome, which was that the contract wouldn't be voided, team chemistry was destroyed, the franchise looked cheap and petty around the league and Arenas' trade value would tank.

Grunfeld as team President could and should have easily overridden any such advice which ended up a net negative on team value. The fact is that Grunfeld was looking at voiding the Arenas contract to cover up his own mistakes (even if it wasn't much of a mistake) and used bad judgement in covering for himself. Sorry, but without steady ownership in place that put the onus of responsibility even more on the back of Grunfeld, not less.

[nate33]

They were negotiating on price at the time. Leonsis was presumably of the mindset that the Wizards had less value because of Arenas' enormous salary obligation. The Pollins were therefore motivated to unload Arenas so that they could get a higher price from Leonsis.

Again, this is speculation. But it's not implausible.

[Nivek]

I think Ernie (and the Pollins) reacted emotionally to "gun-gate." Ernie, I think, was hurt that Gil would do something that stupid after Ernie had taken Gil's side so many times. The still-grieving Pollin family reacted in part (I think) because of the guns. Abe changed the team's name because of gun violence, and there it was in his own locker room.

I am convinced that the team would have handled the entire incident differently had Ted owned the team at that time. That said, I don't think Arenas' contract situation had much effect (if any) on the negotiation. Once Ted acquired the team, for example, he could have attempted to void the contract. He didn't -- he worked to bring Gil back into the fold. Right up until Gil made it clear he wanted out by his actions. Then they dealt him.

Also, while Abe definitely made it clear that he wanted a winner, and he did insist on retaining Jamison, from what I understand he imposed no such mandate on the Arenas deal.

I also don't think re-signing Arenas was a "mistake." Arenas had a knee injury that hundreds of players have sustained and successfully returned to action. Whatever the reason (incompetent medical/training staff; Arenas not following the rehab program; the Curse o' Les Boulez), Arenas didn't come back. Re-signing him at that point in his career was a reasonable bet to make. They just lost the bet. "Mistakes" in my mind are more like picking Kwame Brown #1. Or signing Drew Gooden to a $35 million contract. Or signing Juwan Howard to a $105 million deal. Or trading Chris Webber for Mitch Richmond & Otis Thorpe. Or trading Ben Wallace for Ike Austin. Or picking Kenny Green over Karl Malone. To name a few.

[Dat2U]

So basically, what Nate is saying lets take the most unlikely but not totally implausible scenario and use that to excuse Ernie, because well, Ernie has been half way decent since Teddy took over.

Riiiight. Makes total sense.

Again, the standards are so low, it's damn near impossible for anyone to fail. This is like the whole Eddie Jordan argument all over again. If any GM or coach for the Wizards even kisses the underbelly of mediocrity, he basically becomes virtually irreplaceable to most Wizards fans and the local media.

[Nivek]

For what it's worth, I'm much closer to Dat's views on this. I don't think Ernie is a bad GM, I think he's okay. But, I want better than "okay." Were I in Ted's position, I'd clean house after the season -- Ernie and the front office, Flip and the coaching staff. I'd hire Kevin Pritchard* and let him rebuild the front office and hire the coach.

* Well, actually, if I owned the team, I'd can everyone, install myself as GM and hire a young coach I thought could coach up the fabulous talent I'd bring in.

[Dat2U]

* Well, actually, if I owned the team, I'd can everyone, install myself as GM and hire a young coach I thought could coach up the fabulous talent I'd bring in.

[Illuminaire]

In the grand tradition of having my cake and eating it too, I completely agree with Nate's assessment of Ernie.... and with Nivek/Dat2's position of wanting better.

I won't feel like we've lost the universe of EG stays in charge (under Ted), but I think we will maximize our rebuild by bringing in the best person possible, not to mention get rid of the "stink" from past failures.

[montestewart]

The appreciation thread is starting to sound like the gold watch thread.

[FAH1223]

Ernie still needs to be fired, but I'd do it after the lockout

[closg00]

*Bump* Merge these threads mods...please.