Post#14 » by lethalweapon3 » Wed Dec 5, 2018 10:20 pm
The darkness in the cellar is broken only by a glaring spotlight. The quiet, interrupted only by a hiss and the sharp, crisp, unmistakable snaps from a cat o’ nine tails. That, the wood creaking from leather boots and high heels, and the periodic whimpering by an unfortunate man tied to a chair.
He would plead further for mercy, but the fuzzy pink handcuffs holding his arms behind the chair make persuasiveness difficult. His moans would translate into intelligible words but for the sizable red rubber ball gag, placed methodically between his teeth and strapped around his head.
The dominatrix holding the whip would have none of his whining anyway. Duct tape lines supplanting areas where his chest hair once resided are a telling testament to that. Shirtless, in pig masks and patent leather chaps, the rogues who abducted and placed this tortured soul in this predicament now surround him from the shadows, following the cat-suited captor’s every command.
One pig-faced man approaches with a bucket, and then the captive’s slick, gray hair gets topped with strawberry sauce and cherry blossoms. The next bucketful of hot fudge, pouring down from his shoulders, elicits a single, helpless gurgle, and a fruitless thrashing about in the chair that is bolted to the floor.
Another portly, porky man approaches. Now, a bucket’s worth of baby dusky gopher frogs hop about in the captive’s lap, the endangered amphibians curious about where their long, strange trip has led them.
As the dominatrix draws away from the spotlight, all the pig men step inward, surrounding their subjugated subject, leaning in behind him. His bushy eyebrows, raised in abject horror, could be mistaken by an unknowing observer as a sense of euphoric glee. A familiar colleague, the only person within miles of this location properly dressed in a suit-and-tie, steps forward to reveal himself.
“Perrrrrrrfect,” the dominatrix purrs. “Errrrrrrrnie, take the picturrrres!” Each snap of the cat o’ nine is answered by the snap from a Polaroid.
Does anyone have a more plausible scenario that explains how Ernie Grunfeld continues to serve at the pleasure of Ted Leonsis and the Washington Wizards?
We’ve passed the point where longtime Squawk readers grew tired of this gamethread writer growing tired of the Wizards, whom the Hawks are tasked with hosting tonight (7:30 PM Eastern, Fox Sports Southeast and 92.9 FM in ATL, NBC Sports Washington) and playing – sigh – three more times between tomorrow and February 4. Self-aggrandizing and oft-aggravating, the Wizards in their current form have worn bare the patience of every NBA fan, and not just their own.
This… team, if that’s what one wishes to call it… sits at 10-14, ten of those defeats by double digits. Yes, they’ve begun to level off after an abysmal 2-9 start to the season. But for all their bluster, they have no business just breaking even. This is supposed to be the Wizards’ big season. This is supposed to be a Finals contender in the NBA East, one which – let’s hear it once more, John Wall and Bradley Beal; louder, for the few people left in the back – no one ever wants to talk about.
Winning three or four in a row versus bad teams isn't supposed to be a big deal. Yes, Washington avenged an earlier loss to the Knicks on Monday. But not before falling behind by 11 after one quarter, then nearly blowing a 15-point lead of their own in the three closing minutes of play.
They’re supposed to win 50 games for the first time since Grunfeld was in his second season as a pro out of Tennessee, in the 1970s. Already, they’re about halfway to failing even that realistic goal, and the calendar just turned to December.
They are supposed to reclaim the Southeast Division banner that they fumbled away with all their internal squabbling last season. It’s the easiest division-winning challenge anywhere in sports, outside of Foxboro. Yet they’re out here making the Orlando Magic look nice.
Forget about proving, Washington is barely showing. Carrying one of the league’s heaviest guaranteed-salary loads, they sit a game-and-a-half below Charlotte for the East’s final playoff spot. As it stands, they’re closer to Atlanta (5-19) than the top 3 teams in the Eastern Conference standings. They’re gonna need the Hawks’ help, tonight and in the coming weeks, to change that circumstance.
Fortunately for them, the Wizards won’t have Taurean Prince to kick them around, not for the next couple of meetings. After getting Zaza’d by Shaun Livingston during Monday’s color-by-numbers, 128-111 loss to Golden State, the Hawks’ third-leading scorer and top three-point-maker will spend much of this month keeping his foot from resembling a regulation-sized football.
Prince’s injury short-circuits coach Lloyd Pierce’s plans to return Kent Bazemore to what should be his optimal situation, as a sixth-man extraordinaire. But it may work out to Atlanta’s benefit, for now, to pair Baze with red velvety-smooth rookie Kevin Huerter (+1.2 points per 100 possessions, Baze’s only positive two-man pair, as per bball-ref) at the outsets of games.
Taurean’s absence momentarily removes his 112.1 defensive rating, the only one on the team worse than Trae Young’s 111.7, and his 0.91 assist/turnover ratio from the equation. And it’s not as though the Bench Baze Bonanza has borne much fruit. Kent has shot 5-for-23 on threes, and 36.2 percent overall, in his five non-starts, while his defensive efficiency (107.0 for the season, as per nba.com stats) only managed to get worse (109.5 last five games).
Despite going 2-3 in the past five contests, since moving Bazemore to the bench, Atlanta’s first quarter net rating of minus-21.9 has been the third-worst in the league. That’s barely better than the minus-21.6 posted in that stretch by the Wizards who, unlike the Hawks, have virtually no excuses. The lackluster play at the starts of Washington’s games chafes everyone’s hide, not just Dwight Howard’s.
With Dwight (backside/rump) out of commission again, coach Scott Brooks turns to Thomas Bryant to man the middle. And why wouldn’t he rely on the second-year, second-rounder, waiver-wire pickup making nearly $1.4 million to start on this roster? Especially given that the alternatives at Brooks’ disposal include the disastrous Ian Mahinmi and Jason Smith, who combine to pull $21.5 million from Leonsis’ pockets this season alone, or the benched Markieff Morris ($8.6 million) when the Wizards need to go small. Say, might these be the fellas donning the pig masks?
Beal’s fellow St. Lunatic, Otto Porter (3-for-4 3FGs, 3 blocks @ NYK; 11.7 PPG and 1.9 APG) is similarly suspicious, needing to produce more consistently at the level his $26-plus million salary commands. Part of the problem is the reluctance of Porter (15.2 usage%, third-lowest of his seven-season career) to demand the ball.
Shots that should be headed Otto’s way, when Wall (32.2 3FG%, career-worst 67.8 FT%; 39.4 assist%, lowest since his sophomore season) and Beal (career-low 32.5 3FG%) aren’t running the offense themselves, get taken instead by the scattershot Kelly Oubre (0.7 APG, 31.5 3FG% on 0.9 more 3FGAs per game than Porter), Austin Rivers (31.0 3FG%, an oink-able $12.7 million one-year deal) and vet-min Jeff Green. None of this is ideal, and the momentary absence of Wall (paternity leave), with Rivers in his stead, won’t help matters much. Perhaps Tomas Satoransky (2.7 APG, third on the team) will look Otto's way tonight.
Much like Fred Hoiberg in Chicago, Brooks is likely to be The Fall Guy, and the only one, if this mismanaged roster manages to slide even more. He’s in the danger zone as the Wizards have trips to Cleveland and Brooklyn on the docket before returning to The Farm on December 18. Drop any of these road games, and their drawers when Boston and LeBrongeles visit The District, and Scotty Scapegoat will likely get the heave-ho-ho-ho before Christmastime.
Atlanta will continue to scratch and claw in hopes of finding wins, especially at home versus their division rivals (2-0 vs. Southeast foes at State Farm Arena). But Hawks fans aren't eager to be vying for ping-pong balls with their regional competitors, least of all the Wizards, whose fans are fit to be tied, no matter who the coach is that tries to whip their team into shape. Ideally, all four of the Hawks' division opponents could somehow wind up 5-through-8 come springtime.
Then again, maybe Atlanta won’t mind if Grunfeld gets a shot at pulling another Jan Vesely out of his hat. Or maybe he’ll squander the pick outright in a deadline trade, in hopes of another Bojan Bogdanovic playoff rental.
How did Ernie get that double-super-secret contract extension last year, again? Hey, Ted… say, “cheese”! That is, if you can.
Let’s Go Hawks!
~lw3
"Dunking is better than sex." - Shawn Kemp, 1996
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