Countdown to Ernie Grunfeld Firing

[hands11]

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/23 ... d-Contract

Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

So they got a first for Gortat and now they are going back for 2nds

[closg00]

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/231683/Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

So they got a first for Gortat and now they are going back for 2nds

Teams that trade with Ernie Grunfeld not only win the initial trade, but their subsequent moves with Ernie's traded asset(s) seem to reap additional benefits for their org.

[WallToWall]

1. He is a nice guy.
2. he helps other teams succeed.

I'm not going to argue that the sole measure of a GM's success is team record, BUT...Grunfeld isn't the new guy. This is his 11th season. At some point, it's fair to compare the record of teams he built to his competitors.

We all know that if we evaluate Grunfeld based on team record since he came to DC, he has obviously failed.

So, here's the challenge (should you choose to accept it):

Is it possible to construct a metric in which Grunfeld looks like a good GM?

Maybe "good" is too strong. "Average"?

In the 30 seconds of thought I gave these questions, I couldn't come up with one. Maybe you guys will do better.

[payitforward]

If I were Ted, I would look back on EG's tenure with him objectively. EG has managed to put together a decent starting five, more or less. His team has underachieved primarily because of a lack of a bench.

Why is the bench so bad?
1) Vesely is a bust
2) Singleton is a bust
3) Kevin Seraphin is a disappointment
4) Blatche was run off the team - arguably a residual gungate effect. Zards got absolutely no assets in return, except for a little cap space.
5) Jordan Crawford was run off the team - that was blatant mismanagement by EG. Zards got absolutely nothing for him.
6) Javaris Crittendon -- *shudder*
7) Booker -- the only player currently on the bench who can be considered a net positive. And his contribution is barely adequate.
8) Porter -- jury's still out. Props for not selecting whatsisname the huge bust at #1, but why did we skip on Noel?

So, with the same luxury tax restrictions that everyone else has, EG has put together a starting five that, with some help from the bench, may sniff 50 wins someday, but because of his incompetence in the draft and incompetence mismanaging the assets he has, the bench is a huge net negative, resulting in a sub .500 team that will never, EVER contend for a championship.

Ted gave EG the benefit of the doubt and given him a chance to show what he can do. On the plus side, he has swung a few decent trade to surround Wall and Beal with a playoff quality starting five. On the minus side, he flubbed the Vesely pick, possibly flubbed the Porter pick (depending on how Noel turns out), failed to collect any significantly valuable assets among Booker, Singleton, and Kevin Seraphin, and pissed away valuable assets in Crawford and Blatche.

The best team EG can possibly assemble is a sub .500 team. Given the assets he has had to work with, that is a monumental failure. There is no reason this team should not be contending for home court in the playoffs by now. Losing Crawford and Blatche for nothing are enormous, fireable offenses -- those failures are directly responsible for our sub .500 record now. He should be fired at the end of the season.

Bench?? How do you know who's going to be on the bench and/or start when you draft? Our problem isn't that Ernie screwed up the bench, it's that he's screwed up assets that should have, could have, would have yielded some of the best young players in the league.

Instead of, for example, Kawhi Leonard, Kenneth Faried, Chandler Parsons, Jae Crowder (or Draymond Green), Kyle O'Quinn, Nate Wolters (or Jeff Withey), D.J. Augustin (or Kendall Marshall or maybe even Darren Collison), Dejuan Blair, and on... we have Jan Vesely, Chris Singleton, a wasted pick of Mack, the right to Tomas Satoransky, Al Harrington, Eric Maynor and Glen Rice. And a first round pick given away.

Now with the first three of those wasted assets we would doubtless be without Bradley Beal -- we might have been stuck with Andre Drummond instead. And still have Martell (Ernie's one really creditable acquisition -- for which he must be given credit).

All that history of ineptitude w/o even mentioning the idiotic failure to buy out Rashard, acquiring instead Emeka and his likely injuries -- and Ariza, for whom I would have been happy to trade if possible under a different deal. And w/o mentioning the years of wasted time on Dray, and driving down the value of Crawford to nil.

Had the team been run right, built right, players chosen right, who knows who our starters would be? Leonard at the 3 instead of Ariza, w/ Parsons backing him up? Faried at the 4? Drummond at Center?

No, we don't know how it would have turned out. Of course not. I'm just fantasizing. Of course. How foolish of me. As LyricalRico will soon arrive to point out.

Then again, we do know how it has turned out! All in to struggle for average, fabulous.

[Zonkerbl]

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/231683/Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

So they got a first for Gortat and now they are going back for 2nds

Holy mother of frick.

[hands11]

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/231683/Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

Suns-Holding-Valued-Trade-Asset-In-Emeka-Okafors-Insured-Contract

So they got a first for Gortat and now they are going back for 2nds

Holy mother of frick.

I hear ya.

Here, this will make you feel better.

At least we got something out of Leandro Barbosa and Kendall Marshall.

[Nivek]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

[miller31time]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

And this is us going "all in".

Only the Wizards....

[payitforward]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

We're 21-22, meaning we are average. Have we had an especially easy schedule? If so, then I suppose you may be right.

But, if we've had an average schedule (i.e. our opponents are .500 overall on the season), then we can't have an "average group of starters and a bad bench."

Right?

[Illuminaire]

Is it petty of me how much I want to rub in the "I told you so" factor over on the Gortat trade thread?

Or is the truth painful enough for the wide-eyed optimists among us?

[noworriesinmd]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

We're 21-22, meaning we are average. Have we had an especially easy schedule? If so, then I suppose you may be right.

But, if we've had an average schedule (i.e. our opponents are .500 overall on the season), then we can't have an "average group of starters and a bad bench."

Right?

According to ESPN we have the 26th hardest schedule in the NBA so far
http://espn.go.com/nba/stats/rpi/_/sort/SOS

According to DeadSpin (cooler chart) We had the 20th hardest schedule so far, the rest of the schedule is the 27th ranked schedule).
http://regressing.deadspin.com/heres-ev ... 1502304453
A quick read makes me believe the slope plays a role in evaluating a team.

[Nivek]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

We're 21-22, meaning we are average. Have we had an especially easy schedule? If so, then I suppose you may be right.

But, if we've had an average schedule (i.e. our opponents are .500 overall on the season), then we can't have an "average group of starters and a bad bench."

Right?

Your reasoning is correct, but...according to basketball-reference's strength of schedule measure, the Wizards have played the league's 4th easiest schedule thus far. They're 17th in scoring margin (at -0.60)

That said, I haven't run numbers on benches to compare the quality of the Wizards' bench to the rest of the league. When I looked at starters, I found the Wizards were 15th overall, just a shade below the league average in production from starters. So, their bench could be somewhere in the middle, especially since Wittman went to the tighter rotation. I should be able to take a look at this pretty easily. Maybe later today.

[verbal8]

I don't visit the other teams message boards much, but I bet EG excels at having the most posts in his "Countdown to <name of GM> firing thread".

[payitforward]

Something else to keep in mind: folks are heavily focused on how bad the bench is. And, the bench IS awful. But, the starting lineup is mediocre too. So, the Wizards have an average (well, slightly below average, group of starters), and a bad bench.

Quite the roster Grunfeld assembled.

We're 21-22, meaning we are average. Have we had an especially easy schedule? If so, then I suppose you may be right.

But, if we've had an average schedule (i.e. our opponents are .500 overall on the season), then we can't have an "average group of starters and a bad bench."

Right?

Your reasoning is correct, but...according to basketball-reference's strength of schedule measure, the Wizards have played the league's 4th easiest schedule thus far. They're 17th in scoring margin (at -0.60)

That said, I haven't run numbers on benches to compare the quality of the Wizards' bench to the rest of the league. When I looked at starters, I found the Wizards were 15th overall, just a shade below the league average in production from starters. So, their bench could be somewhere in the middle, especially since Wittman went to the tighter rotation. I should be able to take a look at this pretty easily. Maybe later today.

In a way, even more interesting would be to know how our strength of schedule looks for the rest of the season (based on opponents' current records, obviously -- might change some).

Who knows? Maybe it gets easier!!

[Zonkerbl]

So if we've had an easy schedule and our starters are average, that must mean that the reason we have not been able to exceed .500, despite the easy schedule, is the weakness of our bench.

Sad that our starters aren't even above average. That is just flat out depressing.

[Nivek]

We're 21-22, meaning we are average. Have we had an especially easy schedule? If so, then I suppose you may be right.

But, if we've had an average schedule (i.e. our opponents are .500 overall on the season), then we can't have an "average group of starters and a bad bench."

Right?

Your reasoning is correct, but...according to basketball-reference's strength of schedule measure, the Wizards have played the league's 4th easiest schedule thus far. They're 17th in scoring margin (at -0.60)

That said, I haven't run numbers on benches to compare the quality of the Wizards' bench to the rest of the league. When I looked at starters, I found the Wizards were 15th overall, just a shade below the league average in production from starters. So, their bench could be somewhere in the middle, especially since Wittman went to the tighter rotation. I should be able to take a look at this pretty easily. Maybe later today.

In a way, even more interesting would be to know how our strength of schedule looks for the rest of the season (based on opponents' current records, obviously -- might change some).

Who knows? Maybe it gets easier!!

So, I did take a look at the relative quality of the Wizards starters and bench.

What I found: the starting lineup ranks 14th. Their bench ranks 15th.

[Zonkerbl]

Well yeah. Martell Webster and Booker are adequate bench players.

I guess in our minds our bench is Webster, Booker, Maynor, Temple and Kevin Seraphin.

I'm sure if you took the PPAs of the first person off the bench at each position, we'd have a much lower ranking.

[Zonkerbl]

Holy cow, Jan Vesely is at 72?!?!?!?!? IS IT THE APOCALYPSE????

[Zonkerbl]

So what's the average PPA of an all-star starter? I see John only merits about 143.

[tontoz]

■Minnesota has improved, but continues its decades-long practice of not putting an adequate roster around a high-quality PF named Kevin.

Only a guy named Kevin would think of that.