Illmatic12 wrote:Dat2U wrote:80sballboy wrote:The trade never could have been made. Why? The Lakers aren’t taking Wall without a complete physical exam.
I truly question if Wall really shut it down due to injury or due to frustration.
The trade was engineered by Rich Paul, John & LeBron's agent. Apparently John was really pushing hard for this deal to be done.
The Wizards did not want to move Wall.
Wall displays questionable effort ALL season, but against the Lakers he went bonkers, playing with an energy he didn't display in any other game this season. He also didn't stand around on D or off the ball that game. He was completely engaged --- like he was for the playoffs.
This is why I've openly questioned on twitter whether Wall actually quit on the Wizards.
Maybe he was not happy he wasn't going to be traded?
The Lakers game is what I keep going back to. The injury excuse doesn't hold weight when I see the lack of effort before and after that game but he's at max effort in that one game. It simply didn't pass the eye test for me.
You can't fake or fabricate having that kind of injury Wall had.
Anyone with a sports medicine background will tell you that Wall was most likely being given periodic steroid injections to numb the pain in his heel. If you are familiar with the type of injury he had, the average person would barely be able to run - much less play 40mpg of NBA basketball -- without receiving pain injections (which wear off after a several days).
When Wall went 0-5 vs Cleveland on 12/8 and then missed the following game , what do you think happened? You think he went on vacation to the Bahamas? No.. what happened is the team docs shot his ankle up with cortisone and he was able to have 3 good games against Boston/Brooklyn/LAL before the pain flared up again . He didn't just "decide" to show more effort , the reason why his performance fluctuated is because of the pain treatment.
http://www.espn.com/nba/player/gamelog/_/id/4237/john-wallFans don't understand what some of these guys at the professional level really go through in order to play games. It's easy to sit back and pass judgment without really knowing what's going on.
Excuse my language but this is bullspit.
Guys play hurt all the time.
Wall has played hurt a decent chunk of his career. That's commendable. I have no doubt, on many nights during his career, Wall likely played through excruciating pain and played well.
However the way Wall played this season, especially on defense was inexcusable. He literally stopped moving. I don't care what condition your in, if you step on the court you owe it to your teammates to try and it was OBVIOUS he wasnt.
I've watched 35+ years of basketball in my fairly young life. Wall's effort defensively and off the ball was some of the worst I ever watched and we've watchef Kwame, Antwan Jamison, Andray Blatche, Nick Young & Javale McGee for long stretches, so we should know what bad effort looks like.
He's played with this injury for years. I have no doubt the injury exists but IMO the motivation to play through this injury wavered this season.
And coming into camp heavy with a bunch of added weight certainly didnt help his bad wheel. But I don't think he gave that much thought this past offseason.