Poll: Grade Ernie Grunfeld

[closg00]

maybe comparing vesley to pecherov was bit harsh, but at the 6th pick, i'd rather have more of a sure thing than a athletic euro prospect who has no go to offensive game...he is high energy, hustle and can run the floor, but is very much a long term project. i think for a late round/2nd round pick this is ok. seeing guys like kemba walker and fredette already ball it in their 1st two preseaon games makes me wonder...i know we have wall, but at end of day i want players who have high basketball IQ and can put the ball in the hoop. i'll sacrifice athleticism for bball iq and baskets any day...

Check and Check. How-many projects are we going to bring-in and will Wall want to stick-around to find-out if they are going to pan out? Instead of Mason or Evans on the team, imagine John Wall on the break kicking out to Klay Thompson, or Kemba Walker helping us close-out games, or Ken Faried cleaning-up the glass. Ves is a Hi-BBIQ guy, but we had to hire a shooting coach to try and turn him into a 3. I would have drafted differently.

[Illuminaire]

In Vesely's defense, the /team/ looked better when he was on the court. He likes boxing out, setting picks, and making the extra pass. He may be a project, but he already does a lot of the little things well.

Just trying to stay positive.

[no D in Hibachi]

maybe comparing vesley to pecherov was bit harsh, but at the 6th pick, i'd rather have more of a sure thing than a athletic euro prospect who has no go to offensive game...he is high energy, hustle and can run the floor, but is very much a long term project. i think for a late round/2nd round pick this is ok. seeing guys like kemba walker and fredette already ball it in their 1st two preseaon games makes me wonder...i know we have wall, but at end of day i want players who have high basketball IQ and can put the ball in the hoop. i'll sacrifice athleticism for bball iq and baskets any day...

I see what you're saying about a sure thing at 6th. Maybe EG was thinking he could select the player with perhaps most upside in the draft at 6th and get his sure thing at 18. If he didn't have a second 1st round pick maybe he would have handled it differently. I don't think Walker, Knight, or Fredette were options, nor should they have been. How can you legitimately defend your position as a GM if you take PG's in back to back drafts when you have a roster completely void of talent except at PG? Lastly, I think Vesely was scouted to be a very high-IQ player and I think he demonstrated it last game. He flashed well on PnR defense, crashed the boards well. Seemed like he knew what he was doing.

[Nivek]

Look at draft history and you'll find that there aren't many sure things at #6. The sure things usually go in the first 3 picks.

[nate33]

I've given Grunfeld a pass the first few years but looking at the past 5 drafts and seeing that Wizards haven't improved, I think its time to evalaute Grunfeld has GM. I honestly feel we will be one of the 3 worst teams in NBA this year. And the biggest reason for this is how Grunfeld has built this team. Looking back at the past 5 years, here is my findings:

in 2005, he drafted O. Pecherov w/18th pick. We could've had Rondo or Milsap
in 2007, i won't fault him for Nick Young at 16. But he drafted D. McGwire at 47. We could've had M. Gasol.
in 2008, he drafted J. McGee at 18. We could've have JJ Hickson, N. Batum, S. Ibaka, or Deandre Jordan.
in 2009, we traded our 5th for Foye and Miller who both left team after 1 year..We could've had S. Curry. We also drafted someone by name of J. Taylor at 32. We couldve had D Blair, M. Thornton, or C. Budinger.
in 2010, we made the obvious pick of J. Wall
in 2011, we drafted, J. Vessely and C. Singleton-- jury is still out but my initial reaction from watching the preseason is that Vessely is more a project ala Pecherov. and Singleton although athletic - has no offense whatsoever ala D. Mcgwire. We should've traded both along w/anyone not named J wall for Minny's 2nd.

On an A to F scale, I honestly can't give him anything more than a D. Let me know what y'all think.

Every draft has a few sleepers. If you look only at the late round sleepers, you can justify firing every GM in the league for guys that they miss. Here is a breakdown of EG's picks from a post I made months ago in the Vesely thread:

To be fair, EG has only whiffed once in the first round of the draft: Pecherov. His track record picking for the Wizards follows:

2010
Wall (a no brainer)
Seraphin - jury is out, but nobody clearly better was taken later
Booker - ranked 5th in his draft class going by PER, despite being selected 29th

2009
Traded pick. (I'm not saying EG is smart at trades, just at picks)

2008
McGee - a very good pick at #18. The only guy drafted later who is unquestionably better is Ibaka.

2007
Young - a good pick at #16. A couple of decent players taken 8 or so picks later (Chandler, Brooks, Afflalo) but nobody clearly better, and certainly nobody better on the board near Nick's general draft range. M.Gasol was taken about 40 picks later, but he was a sleeper that everyone missed.

2006
Pecherov - Ugh. Though it was a terrible draft class with Rondo, Lowry, and Millsap as the only guys drafted later who panned out to be starters - and all were taken much later than Pecherov (meaning they were sleepers that most GM's missed).

2005
No pick (relic from Haywood trade). Our 2nd round pick was Blatche, who panned out to be better than every non-lotto pick except Granger, M.Ellis and David Lee (all taken before Blatche).

2004
Traded pick for Jamison

[willbcocks]

And Mcquire is still in the league--he was a decent second round pick.

[JonathanJoseph]

Grunfeld's track record in the draft is actually quite good and let's give Vesely more than 15 minutes in a preseason game before we start judging him, huh?

[7-Day Dray]

Grunfeld's track record in the draft is actually quite good and let's give Vesely more than 15 minutes in a preseason game before we start judging him, huh?

This.

[nate33]

Here's a better post on the subject:

I'm so afraid of what Ernie will do with the pick, last year the choice was obvious for him. Ernie picking 3-5, we'll be sweating it out on draft night.

Meh, Ernie has done a pretty nice job in the draft when he hasn't traded the pick (except for Pecherov). I see no reason to think that he'll screw it up. No GM is perfect, but EG seems better than average - or at least he's been better than many of the guys drafting in the same range where he has drafted.

In 2005, he had no 1st round pick (because of the Haywood trade) and found Blatche in the 2nd round.

In 2006, he whiffed on Pecherov. Though to be fair it was a pretty lousy draft. The next 5 guys drafted were Quincy Douby, Renaldo Balkman, Rajon Rondo, Marcus Williams and Josh Boone. Only one of those guys ever became a rotation-caliber player. Basically, he was destined to whiff on the pick unless he was lucky enough to grab Rondo, which didn't make sense while Arenas was in his prime.

In 2007, he picked Nick Young. The next 5 guys drafted were Sean Williams, Marco Belinelli, Javaris Crittenton, Jason Smith and Daequan Cook. EG easily made the best choice.

In 2008, he picked Javale McGee. The next 5 guys drafted were JJ Hickson, Alexis Ajinca, Ryan Anderson, Courtney Lee, and Kosta Koufas. EG made the best choice again.

In 2009, he traded the pick rather than drafting Rubio. He got back crap in the trade but Rubio hasn't done anything either.

In 2010, he picked Wall - a no-brainer, unless you listen to CCJ. He traded the 29th and 35th pick to grab Booker. Booker ended up with the 5th highest PER of anyone in his draft class.

[no D in Hibachi]

Quoting yourself twice in one day...Love the swag, nate.

[Nivek]

Someplace on these boards I posted a statistical analysis of Ernie's picks. I don't have that spreadsheet with me today, but if I recall correctly Ernie graded out as a bit better than average as a drafter depending on how you look at it. Everyone misses now and then.

[Ruzious]

He did build a rep in Milwaukee for his good 2nd round picks - notably with Michael Redd, and Dan Gadzuric had a decent career - though both eventually turned out to get absolutely terrible contracts with the Bucks - it's funny (in a bad way) how those really good picks eventually turned out to hurt the team - and that's almost happening with Blatche, though not as much - something to learn from, prehaps.

[montestewart]

Someplace on these boards I posted a statistical analysis of Ernie's picks. I don't have that spreadsheet with me today, but if I recall correctly Ernie graded out as a bit better than average as a drafter depending on how you look at it. Everyone misses now and then.

This coveres longer than the EG era in DC, but I thought this analysis of draft picks was interesting, and had the Bullets/Wizards in the top half of draft performance from 1989-2008
http://82games.com/bestdraftingteams.htm

[queridiculo]

Average draft position would probably be an interesting part of that statistic.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Sure, the Bullets/Wizards drafted well but they traded guys like Rasheed and Ben Wallace, and Rip Hamilton for very little in return. They traded Gugliotta and three 1sts for Chris Webber, just to give him away for two old players in Mitch Richmond and Otis Thorpe.

Ernie hasn't drafted as well as he could have by a long shot, but he is really good with second round picks and he has a knack for drafting talented but raw players. I don't like that he hasn't valued character, intelligence, and skill level as much as he might. Under Ted Leonsis, Grunfeld has drafted defensive-oriented picks. He never seems to see the need to fill a need like shooting or rebounding, however, with his picks.

I don't mind EG so much--he's average. Flip is the guy that I don't like so much.

[montestewart]

Average draft position would probably be an interesting part of that statistic.

I thought that too, although the measure seems to be comparing to others at the same position, so a consistently low position could score as well as a consistently high position, merely measured against ohter picks at or near the same draft position.

[closg00]

Sure, the Bullets/Wizards drafted well but they traded guys like Rasheed and Ben Wallace, and Rip Hamilton for very little in return. They traded Gugliotta and three 1sts for Chris Webber, just to give him away for two old players in Mitch Richmond and Otis Thorpe.

Ernie hasn't drafted as well as he could have by a long shot, but he is really good with second round picks and he has a knack for drafting talented but raw players. I don't like that he hasn't valued character, intelligence, and skill level as much as he might. Under Ted Leonsis, Grunfeld has drafted defensive-oriented picks. He never seems to see the need to fill a need like shooting or rebounding, however, with his picks.

I don't mind EG so much--he's average. Flip is the guy that I don't like so much.

Speaking of 2nd rounders, Devin Ebanks just earned the starting SF position with the Lakers. Ebanks was drafted 43rd the year we used two picks to get Booker.

[nate33]

Ebanks was garbage last year. He's starting by default in LA because they have no other swing men on the roster with Kobe hurt and Artest sucking.

[7-Day Dray]

Ebanks was garbage last year. He's starting by default in LA because they have no other swing men on the roster with Kobe hurt and Artest sucking.

He's actually a solid player. Ebanks reminds me alot of Trevor Ariza back when he played for LA. Long, athletic, a developing shooting touch, and unselfish.

[closg00]

Ebanks was garbage last year. He's starting by default in LA because they have no other swing men on the roster with Kobe hurt and Artest sucking.

He's actually a solid player. Ebanks reminds me alot of Trevor Ariza back when he played for LA. Long, athletic, a developing shooting touch, and unselfish.

+1 They are the Lakers, they had options. Kobe & Coach Brown like Ebanks.