GT: Bucks - Wizards 23.12.16 7 ET

[tontoz]

I bet Beal is missing JJ Redick right now.

Ugly beatdown. It happens. That is why it is best just to enjoy a win like the Clippers win without thinking it is some kind of turning point.

[TheBabyMaker]

Bucks were due to give us a beatdown sooner or later. We have got to best of them (like Orlando) recently so it is what it is. They got smacked move on lets see what Wall and Beal will do Monday. IMO Giannis will be a top player when LeBron retires.

[payitforward]

I'm shocked at the amount of people that won't admit obvious coaching mistakes. BUT ERNIE DID THIS

Sheesh.... Is every loss Scott Brooks' fault?

We got thrashed in all 4 quarters. We've also been playing our starters an ungodly # of minutes. And this was our 3d game of a road trip. Brooks was right to recognize early on that the odds of our coming back to win the game were very long.

In fact, if you extend what the starters produced for another 100 minutes, we still lose the game by a lot. This was a good game for guys to rest and the bench to get 100 minutes.

IOW, it's an example of good coaching not bad coaching. As to who the players on the roster are, that and nothing else is the main factor in every win and every loss. We know who is responsible for our roster, and it isn't Scot Brooks.

[TGW]

Satoransky leading the league in the highly-coveted "assists to the crowd" statistic.

[Meliorus]

I'm shocked at the amount of people that won't admit obvious coaching mistakes. BUT ERNIE DID THIS

Sheesh.... Is every loss Scott Brooks' fault?

We got thrashed in all 4 quarters. We've also been playing our starters an ungodly # of minutes. And this was our 3d game of a road trip. Brooks was right to recognize early on that the odds of our coming back to win the game were very long.

In fact, if you extend what the starters produced for another 100 minutes, we still lose the game by a lot. This was a good game for guys to rest and the bench to get 100 minutes.

IOW, it's an example of good coaching not bad coaching. As to who the players on the roster are, that and nothing else is the main factor in every win and every loss. We know who is responsible for our roster, and it isn't Scot Brooks.

Sometimes I forget that in the summer of 2015, Ernie refused to spend any money to leave cap space open for Durant. So coming off a season where we made it to the 2nd round and was a John Wall injury away from the ECF, Ernie decided to make no roster improvements. Our Front Office literally wasted our 2015-2016 season, basically told the players that it didn't matter, because we were going to get Durant. It's hilarious that Ernie planned for Durant so meticulously that a bunch of our players were on expiring deals (Nene, Temple, Sessions, Dudley). They actually believed we were going to land Durant.

Well, by the time Durant made it known that he hated playing in DC, it was too late. This summer, Ernie began dishing out max money to Horford and Batum, none of whom would sign with us.

In conclusion, we spent no money during the summer of 2015 just to sign Smith, Nicholson, Manhimi, and Thornton. This is not Scott Brooks fault.

[gambitx777]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

[payitforward]

Sometimes I forget that in the summer of 2015, Ernie refused to spend any money to leave cap space open for Durant. So coming off a season where we made it to the 2nd round and was a John Wall injury away from the ECF, Ernie decided to make no roster improvements. Our Front Office literally wasted our 2015-2016 season, basically told the players that it didn't matter, because we were going to get Durant. It's hilarious that Ernie planned for Durant so meticulously that a bunch of our players were on expiring deals (Nene, Temple, Sessions, Dudley). They actually believed we were going to land Durant.

Well, by the time Durant made it known that he hated playing in DC, it was too late. This summer, Ernie began dishing out max money to Horford and Batum, none of whom would sign with us.

In conclusion, we spent no money during the summer of 2015 just to sign Smith, Nicholson, Manhimi, and Thornton. This is not Scott Brooks fault.

Not only "no roster improvements" that Summer -- we got worse. E.g. we weren't able to re-sign Paul Pierce. We had to play Temple 1900+ minutes instead of the 700+ of the previous season, and we gave a very raw rookie, Oubre, almost 700 minutes. The guys we brought in (on 1-year, rent-a-player contracts) -- Dudley, Neal, Anderson, et. al. -- either didn't play or were unproductive. In fairness, we made a good draft day move and pick. Then, things not working out, we traded a high R1 pick for a bad player... sigh.

We only had 5 players, overall, who produced at an above NBA average rate for their positions in 2015-16: Wall, Porter, Gortat, Sessions (who was only slightly above NBA average) and Hickson (who only played 155 minutes). They totaled @9100 minutes on the floor.

The previous year it had been 8 guys, and they played almost 12000 minutes. At the end of that season, I predicted that the team had peaked. I didn't see any practical way for us to get better given how Ernie puts teams together. But I didn't expect him to do as badly as he did!

Then, this year, he did even worse in the off-season! The result is that even with quick development from Oubre and a much better Bradley Beal than ever before, we are still worse than we were last year. No doubt Ted will reward Ernie with a new contract.

[nate33]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

The reason we didn't get Horford is because our franchise has such a reputation for suckiness. That IS Ernie's fault.

Furthermore, once we failed to get Horford, I'd have gone after Biyombo instead of Mahinmi. Biyombo is only 24 and ended up costing just $1M more per year than Mahinmi. If that fell through, I would have abandoned the plan of acquiring a high price starting caliber player and instead would have sought 1-year stopgap deals with a plan to try again in 2017. Would Nene have remained on a 1-year, $6M deal? If he didn't stay, Hickson could certainly have been retained cheaply. Likewise, it was foolish to throw a big contract at a plodding PF like Nicholson. Those types of players are dinosaurs in today's game. Better to find a rangy combo forward if you can. If not, sign a stopgap vet like Brandon Bass on a cheap deal. We probably could have talked a backup PG like Galloway or Sessions into staying on a 1-year deal if we overpaid.

[closg00]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

[Kanyewest]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

Woj at the time said otherwise. Really not sure what to believe since Woj is pretty reputable but I was pretty surprised TBH when Washington was considered one of the final two teams.

[payitforward]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

Woj at the time said otherwise. Really not sure what to believe since Woj is pretty reputable but I was pretty surprised TBH when Washington was considered one of the final two teams.

He may be reputable, but if Horford says that it was between Boston & Houston in his mind then I think he probably has the best inside info!

[DCZards]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

I believe Horford said it came down to Boston, Houston and the Zards. I don't recall him saying whether the Zards or Houston was his 2nd choice.

[Kanyewest]

To be fair I think horford was pretty close to coming here. Horford would have been all 3 bigs we signed So replace ian (has not played) and smit/nicholson (sucked) with horfords production and move morris or gortat to a large bench roll. We would have been much better off, obviously. Now who would we have signed for cheap? IDK. But clearly if we got horford we would be signing a different tune, but I don't think it was EG fault we did not bag Horford.

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

I believe Horford said it came down to Boston, Houston and the Zards. I don't recall him saying whether the Zards or Houston was his 2nd choice.

Well Horford said it here. http://www.csnne.com/boston-celtics/al-horford-recalls-offseason-free-agent-flirtation-with-houston-rockets

I just don't think Horford is that reliable because

1) Horford was visiting Houston when he made this statement. Obviously, probably had an impact on his answer. He said "probably the two teams he considered"; meaning he's leaving room for himself to back off the position.
2) Washington was terrible at this point in the season and he didn't want to look foolish. Conversely the Rockets were/are like the 4th best team in the Western Conference

[montestewart]

This turned-out to be FALSE, Horford in a recent interview said the Houston, not Washington, was his 2nd choice. So to be clear, Ted & Ernie's Wizards, is an orginzation that Top-Tier NBA players do not wish to join outside of being traded here.

I believe Horford said it came down to Boston, Houston and the Zards. I don't recall him saying whether the Zards or Houston was his 2nd choice.

Well Horford said it here. http://www.csnne.com/boston-celtics/al-horford-recalls-offseason-free-agent-flirtation-with-houston-rockets

I just don't think Horford is that reliable because

1) Horford was visiting Houston when he made this statement. Obviously, probably had an impact on his answer. He said "probably the two teams he considered"; meaning he's leaving room for himself to back off the position.
2) Washington was terrible at this point in the season and he didn't want to look foolish. Conversely the Rockets were/are like the 4th best team in the Western Conference

Maybe Induveca could speak to this, but supposedly the Dominican community in and around Boston played into Horford's decision. Washington has a smaller but still present Dominican community, more in the suburbs. Is there a Dominican community of any size in Houston, and/or a prominent Dominican player who might have been speaking up for Houston, in the same way David Ortiz supposedly did for Boston?

[Kanyewest]

I believe Horford said it came down to Boston, Houston and the Zards. I don't recall him saying whether the Zards or Houston was his 2nd choice.

Well Horford said it here. http://www.csnne.com/boston-celtics/al-horford-recalls-offseason-free-agent-flirtation-with-houston-rockets

I just don't think Horford is that reliable because

1) Horford was visiting Houston when he made this statement. Obviously, probably had an impact on his answer. He said "probably the two teams he considered"; meaning he's leaving room for himself to back off the position.
2) Washington was terrible at this point in the season and he didn't want to look foolish. Conversely the Rockets were/are like the 4th best team in the Western Conference

Maybe Induveca could speak to this, but supposedly the Dominican community in and around Boston played into Horford's decision. Washington has a smaller but still present Dominican community, more in the suburbs. Is there a Dominican community of any size in Houston, and/or a prominent Dominican player who might have been speaking up for Houston, in the same way David Ortiz supposedly did for Boston?

I'm not sure but Trevor Ariza ended up going to Houston.

[ducler]

[closg00]

Oops