Official Thread (SFW) -- Wiz at Cs (12/21/13)

[dobrojim]

Sullinger just made Gortat look foolish.

Sullinger was also bullying Nene out of the way at times during the game. I wonder if Sullinger came out if the Wizards would have taken him over Vesely. The Wizards certainly could have found better value but may have been easier to stomach.

Seraphin is the only guy we had that could battle Sully for rump position.
Even Nene can [edit] not body Sully out of the way. Sully's low CoG is hard to deal with.
And he shoots OK on top of that.

Very solid game for Kevin. He is finally not allergic to boards.
Still needs to cut down on TOs. But very solid for our 4th big.

Beal shoots great from 3 and like crap every where else. Hopefully
he's already working on fixing that.

Wall was dominant again. And TA feeds off him well. Very synergistic relationship
for sure.

[dobrojim]

Missed the whole damn game.. Didnt' know they played at 1pm until seeing the final on BSPN..

So, how did Porter look in his 12 mins of playtime?

Who is MBP?

Grats Wiz on another road win!!

I thought Porter actually looked reasonable. Made a couple buckets
and both were just right in the flow kind of plays. OP is lucky to
have the luxury of the team not relying on him and letting him learn
the assoc in little pieces instead of oversized chunks. Especially while
he's getting in game shape. OP looked like he knew what he was doing
on the court.

[dobrojim]

.

Poor Kris Humphries - LOL. Check out the instagram photo link from Kevin Seraphin's tweet (below). Humphries is totally victimized.

[tweet]https://twitter.com/kevin_seraphin/status/414557172547469313[/tweet]

I've been as hard on Seraphin as anyone on these boards. So fairness requires that I also acknowledge that he's been playing pretty well lately. If he could use this level of effort and effectiveness as his floor. Then work hard to continue to improve throughout the season, he's going to see more and more court time and the Wizards will benefit for it.

Couple TOs tonight but other than that, he did well. He totally took advantage of
opp defenses focusing on either Gortat or Nene and scored efficiently and made a
couple of solid defensive plays. He starting to be less allergic to rebounds.

[hands11]

Not liking Randy locking in on that combination vs giving Ves some chances when it makes sense Randy sat by and watched that failed combination tonight. It was clear it sucked from the start. It was only once Kevin S came in that things started to change. Then Nene got on the court and had his effect. Trevor A started to get it going and then Wall did a 180 and joined in.

But then Randy returned to Booker to start the 2nd instead of turning to Ves. They went down again. Booker out, Kevin in and they keep it going. Booker never saw the court again.

Just bad coaching. He isn't nimble enough. Just doesn't have the smarts or balls to make the right move unless forced into it by injury or fouls or similar.

I disagree with this. It reeks of 20/20 hindsight. Booker has consistently been a much better player than Vesely or Seraphin all season long. He's clearly our 3rd best big man and has earned his minutes. If he has a slow start in the 1st quarter, you can't just write him off for the entire game and start mixing and matching other combinations. Players need to know their coaches have confidence in them or else they'll play scared.

Wittman did the right thing, the thing most coaches do. He started Booker who played poorly, and then he went to his bench as usual, inserting Seraphin. Seraphin played well so he rode him longer than usual. He gave Booker another chance in the 3rd quarter, as he should have, and again it didn't work out. So he rode Seraphin longer again.

It looks like Wittman's rotation for the time being is going to be Gortat, Nene and Booker; plus a 4th big. That 4th big is going to alternate between Seraphin and Vesely, depending on the circumstances. Either that, or he's going to stick with his pattern of utilizing 5-game stints where he plays Seraphin for 5 games, and then plays Vesely 5 games.

20/20 hindsight would require me not saying this a head of time. Which I did. Actually I said all of this before the season started.

Play Nene and Okafor at center. After Gortat arrived, same deal. I talked about Nene off the bench a ton. I also offered up Beal off the bench as another option. Start either Booker or Ves at PF but don't get stuck on one. My preference was to start Ves and bring in Booker if he need more power. I like Ves in there first because of his length. Bookers recent play has been very impressive. Thats good. But that changes nothing. He is still going to be killed some night. He just isn't a good match up against a front court of Sully and Base. Have Nene backing up at center and getting some minutes at PF with Gortat. Limit Nene to under 30 but closer to 28. Play Beal no more then 32.

Its not 20/20

Neither Booker or Ves is the kind of star player or high profile young prospect that starting one game or another is going to affect them. Booker should get considered as a resign for 2M as a bench player. No regular minutes. Ves is the one who can still unlock his potential. Give him some burn. Its a coaches job to understand the competition and match ups. Booker is a nice piece. But he and Gortat is not an every day starting from out. Neither is Gortat and Ves. You have to Pop this situation. Do what is right for that game and be nimble enough to adjust. My set play is start Ves with Nene off the bench. But monitor the situation. You can start Booker for a game here and there if you want. Thats fine.

We don't have a staring PF. That would be Nene and he isn't healthy enough to do it and we don't have the right players established yet to have a good bench without one of the starter front court players coming off the bench with Webster.

Randy didn't do the right thing. And we saw the result when he finally got Kevin in to man up against Sully. We never saw Ves so I can't comment on that. He probably would have struggled as well. But at least he is long.

Randy shouldn't be picking between Kevin and Ves. He should be picking between Kevin,Ves and Booker and mostly between Ves and Booker, not Kevin and Ves.

MBP is a big body that can score. He has post moves. And he is Nene's puppy. Pairing the two makes good sense.

[hands11]

.

Poor Kris Humphries - LOL. Check out the instagram photo link from Kevin Seraphin's tweet (below). Humphries is totally victimized.

[tweet]https://twitter.com/kevin_seraphin/status/414557172547469313[/tweet]

I've been as hard on Seraphin as anyone on these boards. So fairness requires that I also acknowledge that he's been playing pretty well lately. If he could use this level of effort and effectiveness as his floor. Then work hard to continue to improve throughout the season, he's going to see more and more court time and the Wizards will benefit for it.

I'll feeling pretty good about Kevin right now since he will get paired with Nene. Also, in his last interview, I noticed he is starting to become a man. It can happy over night with young players. He is just 24 still. You see them show up a kids and we watch them become young men. Then before you know it, they are out of the league. Old at 34. Kevin has a great opportunity right now. He has shown flashes before. He put in a great summer. Now he has an ideal situation to produce being paired with Nene off the bench with Webster out there with them. Hopefully he MBPs his way into steady production. He can be our Bass.

He was the MVP today. He was the one that turned it around with his defense against Sully. Two young bears doing battle. Sully is clearly more polished. But Kevin had an effect that made a difference.

http://www.monumentalnetwork.com/videos ... n-12-20-13

This was the interview I saw. I don't know. Something about what he said and how he talked struck me as different. He is even putting in extra work. His English is getting smoother also.


http://www.monumentalnetwork.com/videos ... e-12-21-13

But Randy ? Its like he is totally unaware of how his different line up affected the game. Is he really that clueless or just deflecting?

[hands11]

Sullinger just made Gortat look foolish.

Sullinger was also bullying Nene out of the way at times during the game. I wonder if Sullinger came out if the Wizards would have taken him over Vesely. The Wizards certainly could have found better value but may have been easier to stomach.

Seraphin is the only guy we had that could battle Sully for rump position.
Even Nene can body Sully out of the way. Sully's low CoG is hard to deal with.
And he shoots OK on top of that.

Very solid game for Kevin. He is finally not allergic to boards.
Still needs to cut down on TOs. But very solid for our 4th big.

Beal shoots great from 3 and like crap every where else. Hopefully
he's already working on fixing that.

Wall was dominant again. And TA feeds off him well. Very synergistic relationship
for sure.

Wall has a great 2nd half. His first half sucked.

[Illmatic21]

I feel like we should be above .500 with the schedule we've had so far. Those Bucks, Nuggets, Hawks, losses really hurt.

We've yet to play a lot of the West Coast heavyweights.. Golden State, Houston, Portland, Phoenix, etc x2. Unlike the East a lot of teams out there are young, fast, and generally terrible matchups for us.. we'll probably finish with a pitiful record against the West.

The good news is that basically every game against the East other than Miami/Indiana is a probable W.

Well, we are tied with San Antonio with the fewest amount of home games this year. The NBA schedule makers did us no favors.

Really? Geez, that sucks...

[stevemcqueen1]

We've got a lot of home games coming up in January and February. Making it out of the first two months at .500 would leave us in a good position.

The only problem is we've got 3 games in 4 days to end December and then January has four more back to backs. We are going to have to be VERY careful with minutes for Nene and Beal.

The second line has coalesced around Nene. He needs to come off the bench for about 25 minutes a night because of his foot. Seraphin plays a lot better beside him. And Webster can thrive on the second line with Nene. Then you can split the other wing spot between Porter and GRJr when he gets back. And give Temple the minutes at PG.

We need to start Booker or Vesely to keep Nene's minutes down and the second line productive.

[payitforward]

Missed the whole damn game.. Didnt' know they played at 1pm until seeing the final on BSPN..

So, how did Porter look in his 12 mins of playtime?

Who is MBP?

Grats Wiz on another road win!!

Arrrgh! Same here! I was playing golf, but I'd have recorded it had I realized -- and there seems to be no "re-run" this morning, as sometimes there is, or I'd watch it... well, the 2d half anyway!

[payitforward]

I feel like we should be above .500 with the schedule we've had so far. Those Bucks, Nuggets, Hawks, losses really hurt.

We've yet to play a lot of the West Coast heavyweights.. Golden State, Houston, Portland, Phoenix, etc x2. Unlike the East a lot of teams out there are young, fast, and generally terrible matchups for us.. we'll probably finish with a pitiful record against the West.

The good news is that basically every game against the East other than Miami/Indiana is a probable W.

Well, we are tied with San Antonio with the fewest amount of home games this year. The NBA schedule makers did us no favors.

Really? Geez, that sucks...

??? Every team plays the same number of home and away games -- actually, if you think about it, it kinda has to be that way doesn't it?

As of now, we've played 11 home games and 14 on the road. We're doing pretty well on the road so far -- way better than in any recent season. If we kept up our current %, we'd wind up w/ 17 or 18 road victories. We have to up our home winning % however: 6-5 isn't nearly good enough.

[Jimmy Recard]

We've got a lot of home games coming up in January and February. Making it out of the first two months at .500 would leave us in a good position.

The only problem is we've got 3 games in 4 days to end December and then January has four more back to backs. We are going to have to be VERY careful with minutes for Nene and Beal.

The second line has coalesced around Nene. He needs to come off the bench for about 25 minutes a night because of his foot. Seraphin plays a lot better beside him. And Webster can thrive on the second line with Nene. Then you can split the other wing spot between Porter and GRJr when he gets back. And give Temple the minutes at PG.

We need to start Booker or Vesely to keep Nene's minutes down and the second line productive.

Yep, i'm all for permanently bringing Nene off the bench from now on. He's clearly our best big man when healthy, but we really need his bball iq and scoring ability in the second unit. I love the balance on the team right now, plus he and Martell have great chemistry when they're on the floor together.

[payitforward]

Not liking Randy locking in on that combination vs giving Ves some chances when it makes sense Randy sat by and watched that failed combination tonight. It was clear it sucked from the start. ...

...Just bad coaching. He isn't nimble enough. Just doesn't have the smarts or balls to make the right move unless forced into it by injury or fouls or similar.

I disagree with this. It reeks of 20/20 hindsight. Booker has consistently been a much better player than Vesely or Seraphin all season long. He's clearly our 3rd best big man and has earned his minutes. ...

...Wittman did the right thing, the thing most coaches do. He started Booker who played poorly, and then he went to his bench as usual, inserting Seraphin. Seraphin played well so he rode him longer than usual. He gave Booker another chance in the 3rd quarter, as he should have, and again it didn't work out. So he rode Seraphin longer again.

This hindsight stuff is classic Hands -- and, I suppose, typical of all of us to some degree. Of all fans.

Booker isn't "our 3d best big man" however. In fact, he's been pretty much our best big man in the minutes he's played. Take a look at the per-36-minutes data at http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/WAS/2014.html and you'll see what I mean. He's our best rebounder overall, and our best offensive rebounder as well. He scores a bit less than Gortat and Nene scores more than either of them. Still, his FG% is quite good.

Booker is exceptionally efficient in ways that people sometimes say "don't show up on the boxscore" -- but in a sense they do. E.g. per 36, Booker misses 5 FGAs but gets 4.4 of them back in the form of offensive boards. Gortat misses 5.3 FGAs, but he only gets back 2.2 of them via offensive rebounds. Nene misses 5.8 and he only gets back 1.3 of them. (And if, in that case, you look at defensive boards as a number on its own, Booker is 2d on the team, right behind Gortat.)

As to Booker's supposed defensive problems, he has the same Ortg (111) & Drtg (104) as Gortat (Nene's are 112 & 103). If you look at Ortg. minus Drtg. (kind of an interesting measure), Nene is +9; Gortat and Booker are both +7, tied for 4th best on the team (Webster is +20 -- what a season he is having!).

Looking at it from a slightly different direction, compare Booker w/ Vesely and Seraphin: at 101 Jan has the best Drtg on the team. But his Ortg is 88 !! Seraphin's Drtg is pretty bad at 107, and his Ortg is 96.

edit: none of the above is meant as a claim that Booker is some kind of star; he isn't. But he is playing exceptionally well this season, and he is healthy.

[dckingsfan]

Nice post PIF - I like the current lineup as well.

[nate33]

Not liking Randy locking in on that combination vs giving Ves some chances when it makes sense Randy sat by and watched that failed combination tonight. It was clear it sucked from the start. ...

...Just bad coaching. He isn't nimble enough. Just doesn't have the smarts or balls to make the right move unless forced into it by injury or fouls or similar.

I disagree with this. It reeks of 20/20 hindsight. Booker has consistently been a much better player than Vesely or Seraphin all season long. He's clearly our 3rd best big man and has earned his minutes. ...

...Wittman did the right thing, the thing most coaches do. He started Booker who played poorly, and then he went to his bench as usual, inserting Seraphin. Seraphin played well so he rode him longer than usual. He gave Booker another chance in the 3rd quarter, as he should have, and again it didn't work out. So he rode Seraphin longer again.

This hindsight stuff is classic Hands -- and, I suppose, typical of all of us to some degree. Of all fans.

Booker isn't "our 3d best big man" however. In fact, he's been pretty much our best big man in the minutes he's played. Take a look at the per-36-minutes data at http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/WAS/2014.html and you'll see what I mean. He's our best rebounder overall, and our best offensive rebounder as well. He scores a bit less than Gortat and Nene scores more than either of them. Still, his FG% is quite good.

Booker is exceptionally efficient in ways that people sometimes say "don't show up on the boxscore" -- but in a sense they do. E.g. per 36, Booker misses 5 FGAs but gets 4.4 of them back in the form of offensive boards. Gortat misses 5.3 FGAs, but he only gets back 2.2 of them via offensive rebounds. Nene misses 5.8 and he only gets back 1.3 of them. (And if, in that case, you look at defensive boards as a number on its own, Booker is 2d on the team, right behind Gortat.)

As to Booker's supposed defensive problems, he has the same Ortg (111) & Drtg (104) as Gortat (Nene's are 112 & 103). If you look at Ortg. minus Drtg. (kind of an interesting measure), Nene is +9; Gortat and Booker are both +7, tied for 4th best on the team (Webster is +20 -- what a season he is having!).

Looking at it from a slightly different direction, compare Booker w/ Vesely and Seraphin: at 101 Jan has the best Drtg on the team. But his Ortg is 88 !! Seraphin's Drtg is pretty bad at 107, and his Ortg is 96.

edit: none of the above is meant as a claim that Booker is some kind of star; he isn't. But he is playing exceptionally well this season, and he is healthy.

PIF, I'm a fan of Booker and a believer in stats, but you can take things too far. Booker is clearly not a better player than Gortat and Nene. You can see that just by watching the games. The issue is defense. You use DRtg to argue that Booker's defense is comparable, but DRtg is a pretty lousy stat that is based more on team defense than individual defense.

When Booker is on the court, the team yields 109.3 points per 100 possessions and opponents shoot 53.7%. When he is off the court, the team yields 104.2 points per 100 possessions and opponents shoot 50.6%.

Booker is way better than Vesely and Seraphin. On that, we both agree. And I think we can both agree that he has earned his minutes and deserves the benefit of the doubt. If he has a slow first quarter, it doesn't follow that Wittman should bench him for the rest of the game in favor of Vesely, Seraphin or Singleton.

[dckingsfan]

Sounds like you agree that he is one of the 3 best front court players. Just seems like the question to be answered is who starts and who comes off the bench.

[hands11]

Not liking Randy locking in on that combination vs giving Ves some chances when it makes sense Randy sat by and watched that failed combination tonight. It was clear it sucked from the start. ...

...Just bad coaching. He isn't nimble enough. Just doesn't have the smarts or balls to make the right move unless forced into it by injury or fouls or similar.

I disagree with this. It reeks of 20/20 hindsight. Booker has consistently been a much better player than Vesely or Seraphin all season long. He's clearly our 3rd best big man and has earned his minutes. ...

...Wittman did the right thing, the thing most coaches do. He started Booker who played poorly, and then he went to his bench as usual, inserting Seraphin. Seraphin played well so he rode him longer than usual. He gave Booker another chance in the 3rd quarter, as he should have, and again it didn't work out. So he rode Seraphin longer again.

This hindsight stuff is classic Hands -- and, I suppose, typical of all of us to some degree. Of all fans.

Booker isn't "our 3d best big man" however. In fact, he's been pretty much our best big man in the minutes he's played. Take a look at the per-36-minutes data at http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/WAS/2014.html and you'll see what I mean. He's our best rebounder overall, and our best offensive rebounder as well. He scores a bit less than Gortat and Nene scores more than either of them. Still, his FG% is quite good.

Booker is exceptionally efficient in ways that people sometimes say "don't show up on the boxscore" -- but in a sense they do. E.g. per 36, Booker misses 5 FGAs but gets 4.4 of them back in the form of offensive boards. Gortat misses 5.3 FGAs, but he only gets back 2.2 of them via offensive rebounds. Nene misses 5.8 and he only gets back 1.3 of them. (And if, in that case, you look at defensive boards as a number on its own, Booker is 2d on the team, right behind Gortat.)

As to Booker's supposed defensive problems, he has the same Ortg (111) & Drtg (104) as Gortat (Nene's are 112 & 103). If you look at Ortg. minus Drtg. (kind of an interesting measure), Nene is +9; Gortat and Booker are both +7, tied for 4th best on the team (Webster is +20 -- what a season he is having!).

Looking at it from a slightly different direction, compare Booker w/ Vesely and Seraphin: at 101 Jan has the best Drtg on the team. But his Ortg is 88 !! Seraphin's Drtg is pretty bad at 107, and his Ortg is 96.

edit: none of the above is meant as a claim that Booker is some kind of star; he isn't. But he is playing exceptionally well this season, and he is healthy.

Except it's not hind sight. This was what I suggested they do before the season even started and have said it lots of times in several threads since then. Hell, I even said it last year and over the summer. Only problem was Nene didn't want to play center and putting him at back up PF to Ves or Booker would have taken some real balls and foresight from a coach.

Question is, is he playing back up center right now or is he backing up at PF. In a way it doesn't matter. We don't have true centers as such. Kind of PF/C hybrids. Its more about getting combined atheism, rebounding, BBIQ, scoring, size, etc out of the two front court player combos. As long as it add up, it works.

Your idea of me having hindsight is you not agreeing with something I posted at the time, it coming true and then me pointing it out. That isn't hindsight my friend.

[hands11]

Sounds like you agree that he is one of the 3 best front court players. Just seems like the question to be answered is who starts and who comes off the bench.

I don't think they need to hard code that.

Booker has looked the best he has in a long time. Reflections of the Booker we had high hopes for a few years ago before all the injuries. When he gets it rolling, he has shades of Faried as a rebounder. And the mid range from him doesn't suck anymore. But I don't see him as an every day starter. I would just let he and Ves battle it out. Give both chances. Ves still the one I has upside so I wouldn't ice him on the bench. Ves just needs to hit those Fing FTs. Like I recently posted, he has the 2nd highest FTr on the team behind Nene. He has also rebounded well this year. Started over the summer. Carried through to preseason and now the reg season.

Booker had a good run and that cranked his numbers up. But he is be miss matched on some night if you put him with Gortat. We saw it last night. Some night they will need Ves. I see no issue with mixing it up between them. Specially since Booker has had health issues. Keep him healthy and fresh. Neither is at Nene's level where they will get insulted if you start them or not.

[payitforward]

...Its not 20/20...

Just about the most perfectly true thing you've said.

How many idiotic predictions do you want quoted back to you, Hands? Starting w/ Kevin gonna have a career season? Nene not a limited-minute risk? Vesely to be our franchise player. Singleton will earn the starting job after a few games his rookie year. Maynor an excellent choice. Al Harrington will be good. My fingertips could add a dozen more before I'd have to start using my head to remember another dozen or so.

I mean... you are right sometimes. Why not? But, you described yourself well with "I like to be right." You might want to start falling out of love with yourself, as you don't really know -- I mean know, not opine -- much.

For example, you seem to think you could get more out of the Wizards as coach than Randy Wittman. You'll have to forgive me if I think that's about as ridiculous a statement as I've ever heard from a fan. Or, correct me, have you been e.g. a major college coach? I mean, would you qualify to interview for the position once Randy's gone?

[payitforward]

Except it's not hind sight. This was what I suggested they do before the season even started and have said it lots of times in several threads since then. Hell, I even said it last year and over the summer. Only problem was Nene didn't want to play center and putting him at back up PF to Ves or Booker would have taken some real balls and foresight from a coach.

Question is, is he playing back up center right now or is he backing up at PF. In a way it doesn't matter. We don't have true centers as such. Kind of PF/C hybrids. Its more about getting combined atheism, rebounding, BBIQ, scoring, size, etc out of the two front court player combos. As long as it add up, it works.

Your idea of me having hindsight is you not agreeing with something I posted at the time, it coming true and then me pointing it out. That isn't hindsight my friend.

Sorry no, but I've said my piece.

I do like your idea of "combined atheism", however!! Typing slips I'll give you -- you get pretty much the best results of anyone here out of those!

[nate33]

Except it's not hind sight. This was what I suggested they do before the season even started and have said it lots of times in several threads since then. Hell, I even said it last year and over the summer. Only problem was Nene didn't want to play center and putting him at back up PF to Ves or Booker would have taken some real balls and foresight from a coach.

Question is, is he playing back up center right now or is he backing up at PF. In a way it doesn't matter. We don't have true centers as such. Kind of PF/C hybrids. Its more about getting combined atheism, rebounding, BBIQ, scoring, size, etc out of the two front court player combos. As long as it add up, it works.

Your idea of me having hindsight is you not agreeing with something I posted at the time, it coming true and then me pointing it out. That isn't hindsight my friend.

I'm not talking about the concept of Nene coming off the bench. We both have advocated that for a long time.

I'm talking about your conviction that Randy should have started Vesely in the 3rd quarter in the Boston game. The 20/20 part is you looking at the numbers after the game, noting that Booker didn't play well, and then asserting that you were right. It could just as easily have turned out that Booker had an awesome 3rd quarter. Randy has no way of knowing that at half time. All he can do is play his better player, and that's Booker.