12/4/12 GT #15 HEAT @ Wizards 7:00 PM EST

[DCZards]

As loud as the Heat fans were, it was a really good atmosphere at the
phone booth last night. I think most Wiz fans expected a loss all along
so while they were cheering lustily, they were also prepared for the worst.
As the game went on, a glimmer of belief began to take hold.

Those were exactly my feelings as I watched the game from Sec. 102. As much as I wanted to believe the Zards could beat the Heat, I just KNEW that Miami would find a way to win so I didn't want to get my hopes up. Best part was that the Zards had the lead pretty much the whole game and that kept all those Miami fans quiet. It was fun spending the last 3-4 mins of the game on our feet watching the Zards pull out the kind of close game they've been losing this season.

[dobrojim]

I wasn't far from u in 104

I really like the group of season tix holders around me this year.

knowledgeable and funny

[closg00]

Regarding Beal, I have been pretty happy with how Beal has played the game considering he is a rookie, except for one thing. And, unfortunately, that one thing is what he was brought here to do...shoot the ball. All but 2 points last night were from layups in transition. He pretty much bricked his jumpers, which has become a trend. As I said before, good shooters get cold every now and then and some go through shooting slumps. However, good shooters normally don't go cold or go through slumps this long. Beal is getting open looks. He is just not knocking them down. That continues to worry me.

Waiters took a while to get settled, he looked "worrisome" early, now he has passed Beal. I keep thinking that eventually Beal will adjust to the pro game, get comfortable, and start knocking-down some shots reliably. I wish Beal had athleticism as a go-to weapon when his shot wasn't falling. Anyone have his shooting % numbers handy?

Waiters hasn't been good either. In my rating system through Sunday's games, Beal was at 49; Waiters at 56. Average is 100; higher is better. I set replacement value at 60.

I have a piece on Beal coming in the blog today.

Backhanded compliment perhaps, but Waiters has passed Beal, which would be easy to do right now. Waiters is an SG, and a slightly more effective one at the moment. I will be sure to read you piece on Beal.

[GhostsOfGil]

Common pizzaaa

do they have the W + > 100 promo this year?

Yup. This maybe the only time this season its valid.

[Zonkerbl]

Real bad team beats real good team.. Not that uncommon.. Heat overlook the Wiz, play sub par for 48 mins, while the Wiz go in with nothing to lose and end up playing loose and above average.. Maybe they gain confidence from it and go on a run? Highly doubtful, but possible I suppose.. Hope for the best!! Who'd a thunk the Skins would roll off 3 straight division wins? It's pro sports, most anything is possible..

regression to the mean for the Wiz. Hard to argue we're a good team.
But hard for any team to be 1-13.

Zards are only a 1-13 team without Nene. With Nene playing 35 minutes a night they are close to a .500 team. Any game where Nene plays at least 20 mins, zards have a shot at winning.

[dobrojim]

Real bad team beats real good team.. Not that uncommon.. Heat overlook the Wiz, play sub par for 48 mins, while the Wiz go in with nothing to lose and end up playing loose and above average.. Maybe they gain confidence from it and go on a run? Highly doubtful, but possible I suppose.. Hope for the best!! Who'd a thunk the Skins would roll off 3 straight division wins? It's pro sports, most anything is possible..

regression to the mean for the Wiz. Hard to argue we're a good team. YET (added for realism)
But hard for any team to be 1-13.

Zards are only a 1-13 team without Nene. With Nene playing 35 minutes a night they are close to a .500 team. Any game where Nene plays at least 20 mins, zards have a shot at winning.

DEC's schedule doesn't look that imposing. Out of all the games left in DEC, the only
one I would say we have NO chance is @ MIA. That said, we could also easily lose
most all of those games as well.

[I_Like_Dirt]

Waiters actually has the same TS% as Beal (actually ever so slightly lower). Both guys have been pretty terrible thus far with Waiters being better with assists and using more possessions despite his horrible efficiency. Both guys have the potential to turn things around, but if I had to pick one guy who I thought had the better shot at figuring things out, it would be the guy who was a year and a half younger.

[Nivek]

Backhanded compliment perhaps, but Waiters has passed Beal, which would be easy to do right now. Waiters is an SG, and a slightly more effective one at the moment. I will be sure to read you piece on Beal.

The piece on Beal is here. Basically, there still isn't any reason to worry about Beal, at least not yet. Most teenage rookie guards struggle at first, and those early struggles don't say anything about how good they'll be as a pro.

As for Waiters, a) he hasn't performed much better than Beal; b) he's 2 years older and played two years of college ball; and c) he's playing with Varejao who's been one of the league's very best players this season.

Waiters should be better than Beal at this stage, but he's not in any significant way.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Real bad team beats real good team.. Not that uncommon.. Heat overlook the Wiz, play sub par for 48 mins, while the Wiz go in with nothing to lose and end up playing loose and above average.. Maybe they gain confidence from it and go on a run? Highly doubtful, but possible I suppose.. Hope for the best!! Who'd a thunk the Skins would roll off 3 straight division wins? It's pro sports, most anything is possible..

regression to the mean for the Wiz. Hard to argue we're a good team.
But hard for any team to be 1-13.

The Wizards probably should have had 3 or 4 wins instead of one before last night. They could be 4-10 which while awful, would put them well ahead of Detroit, Cleveland, and Toronto in the standings. As it is, those teams currently have as many losses or more than Washington, which is 2-13.

http://espn.go.com/nba/standings

[DCZards]

The Wizards probably should have had 3 or 4 wins instead of one before last night. They could be 4-10 which while awful, would put them well ahead of Detroit, Cleveland, and Toronto in the standings. As it is, those teams currently have as many losses or more than Washington, which is 2-13.

Totally agree. I hate the "coulda, shoulda, woulda" game, especially when it comes to sports, but I can think of at least 3-4 games that the Zards came very, very close to winning. Of course, none of that matters because a L is still an L....but just sayin'.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Backhanded compliment perhaps, but Waiters has passed Beal, which would be easy to do right now. Waiters is an SG, and a slightly more effective one at the moment. I will be sure to read you piece on Beal.

The piece on Beal is here. Basically, there still isn't any reason to worry about Beal, at least not yet. Most teenage rookie guards struggle at first, and those early struggles don't say anything about how good they'll be as a pro.

As for Waiters, a) he hasn't performed much better than Beal; b) he's 2 years older and played two years of college ball; and c) he's playing with Varejao who's been one of the league's very best players this season.

Waiters should be better than Beal at this stage, but he's not in any significant way.

FWIW, espn.com's fantasy expert, John Cregan is not worried about B2, (Bradley Beal).

Toward the end Cregan addresses Beal's good guard rebounding and good blocks. He thinks the shooting woes are pretty typical. Says he thinks Beal will be fine when Wall comes back.

[bigmac(rexdale)ghetto]

Watch+Download here

Code: Select all

http://bigmacsays.blogspot.com/2012/12/nba-full-game-miami-heat-washington.html

[penbeast0]

That was a fun game last night; first time I've been enjoyed being an out of the closet Wizards fan in a while.

[Mickstix]

They did not play sub par. What game did you watch ?

I just looked at the scoreboard.. Heat scored 3.4 less points than their average and gave up 5.1 more than their average.. That's a "sub par" game for them, no? Just sayin..

I dont want to piss on the Wiz though, they won and Im happy like everyone else! Just providing a little reasoning as to what happened, "other" than they finally turned some corner and will now be on a playoff run.. Hope that's what happens, just been a fan of DC sports for 40+ years and seen that movie before.

[Mickstix]

1) What the hell is going on with Wall? Can we get an update on when he'll start practicing? I think it's possible that he'll miss the season at this point.

Just read a 2 hour old quote from Wittman that he has no idea when Wall will be ready to practice, let alone play.. Read it here..
Another bang up group of team physicians out of the DC pro sports scene I suppose, first missing the injury all together, then predicting an 8 week recovery?? The Bullets, Skins and Caps all need to scrap and refresh their entire training/physician staff..

[dangermouse]

They did not play sub par. What game did you watch ?

I just looked at the scoreboard.. Heat scored 3.4 less points than their average and gave up 5.1 more than their average.. That's a "sub par" game for them, no? Just sayin..

I dont want to piss on the Wiz though, they won and Im happy like everyone else! Just providing a little reasoning as to what happened, "other" than they finally turned some corner and will now be on a playoff run.. Hope that's what happens, just been a fan of DC sports for 40+ years and seen that movie before.

But they had a sub-par game, as a team anyway, because of us. We limited our turnovers and played good D, while capitalizing when they turned the ball over. Did you not see LeBron dominate in every facet of the game? Did you not see Wade's scoring outburst in the 3rd? Their big 3 played like a big 3.

[hands11]

They did not play sub par. What game did you watch ?

I just looked at the scoreboard.. Heat scored 3.4 less points than their average and gave up 5.1 more than their average.. That's a "sub par" game for them, no? Just sayin..

I dont want to piss on the Wiz though, they won and Im happy like everyone else! Just providing a little reasoning as to what happened, "other" than they finally turned some corner and will now be on a playoff run.. Hope that's what happens, just been a fan of DC sports for 40+ years and seen that movie before.

Well last time you saw anything close to this movie was the end of last season.

It was a good win. The team has room to grow. Really rough start but also lots of valid reasons for why that happened. Some self imposed. Some not.

Its still a very fragile team. Nothing has clearly been established. Still managing injuries. But, with a little luck, they can play to the expectations some of us had for them... when healthy. They are a unified group. Solid personalities. They are in it together. They have a few leaders and young players that want to learn.

Either way, there some some player I'm looking forward to watching develop right now. Kevin starting to add a post power game has to be at the top of that list. Webster finding his role as a leader is another. Livingston is always a fun story to root for. Singleton developing is also fun to watch. And the day by day health of Nene keeps you on your seat. Nene actually hasn't had a really good game his last 3 games but he is a stabilizing force out there. I just hope he can stay at least that and you have to hope the foot can hold up. If he can get through the season, I think he can get it right over the next summer and come back at full force. Kind of like Garson.

And Price looked so much better last game. He has actually be maturing as the year has gone on. If he can keep that up and Livingston can carry the load with him, I'm actually in no rush to bring wall back. Let him rest up and get his knee right. That would be huge if those two could pull it off. That would take a lot of pressure off the rest of the team. Plus, Randy has been using Crawford as PG some finally. Its a 3 headed monster at PG. Mostly they need one of Nene or Wall to stand a chance. Right now they have Nene.

Mostly, I have felt the biggest problem has been the line ups and Randy seems to be finally getting a handle on that.

[GhostsOfGil]

They did not play sub par. What game did you watch ?

I just looked at the scoreboard.. Heat scored 3.4 less points than their average and gave up 5.1 more than their average.. That's a "sub par" game for them, no? Just sayin..

I dont want to piss on the Wiz though, they won and Im happy like everyone else! Just providing a little reasoning as to what happened, "other" than they finally turned some corner and will now be on a playoff run.. Hope that's what happens, just been a fan of DC sports for 40+ years and seen that movie before.

I think many of us around here would agree: The Wizards winning had more to do with them playing well, not the heat playing poorly.

[closg00]

http://nba.si.com/2012/12/05/miami-heat ... =nba_wr_a3

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

They did not play sub par. What game did you watch ?

I just looked at the scoreboard.. Heat scored 3.4 less points than their average and gave up 5.1 more than their average.. That's a "sub par" game for them, no? Just sayin..

I dont want to piss on the Wiz though, they won and Im happy like everyone else! Just providing a little reasoning as to what happened, "other" than they finally turned some corner and will now be on a playoff run.. Hope that's what happens, just been a fan of DC sports for 40+ years and seen that movie before.

But they had a sub-par game, as a team anyway, because of us. We limited our turnovers and played good D, while capitalizing when they turned the ball over. Did you not see LeBron dominate in every facet of the game? Did you not see Wade's scoring outburst in the 3rd? Their big 3 played like a big 3.

Lebron said the Heat played well enough in the second half to win. Wade said they played the way they've been playing but the Wizards "played a 48-minute game".

I've seen Miami play a few games where they've lacked a killer instinct, but nonetheless defeated teams like Brooklyn and the short-handed Spurs. They wanted to win against the Wizards. James played 45 minutes and put up a strong triple double. When their best players play long minutes and play well, give credit to the other team. Washington beat them.

The teams play again December 15. That game is in Miami and I would expect they want to make a statement.