[B.I.G.]

Plus if LB coach, John Wall would average 10 pts a game

[Hobbs]

They either fire him or make some kind of trade. The team is just too horrid for words at this point and they can't let that fester for a whole season.

Wall is close to tipping over from superstar in the making to the incredible human bad shot and turnover machine. "Watch him take an off balance 30 footer here. See him throw the ball to the furthest reaches of the auditorium. Be amazed at his total indifference."

[Lou Stefanic]

I wonder if Flip Saunders will get another coaching job in this league.

There are a lot of retreads out there, sure, and if guys like Paul Westphal and Alvin Gentry can keep getting jobs, you can't count him out. But I think it might take awhile before someone comes knocking at Flip's door.

[hack]

Stop baiting me!

[Lou Stefanic]

I wonder who will get the next job offer? Flip or LB?

[Stefan S]

I think we need a poll and, of course, some solid discussion concerning the relative merits and demerits of Flip and the Back Stabber.

[Jeff Hause]

Apparently the orders are to play the young guys and take their lumps. LB would have ignored the orders and played the vets, or quit already. I have no idea why anybody would want to coach that team.

Sources: Flip Saunders safe, despite slow start - Wizards Insider - The Washington Post

[Billl]

" I have no idea why anybody would want to coach that team."

Because NBA head coaches make millions on a contract. Once you get your foot in the door, you have a much better chance of getting a second and third try even if your original team stunk.

[Dave Bing]

Yeah. Amazing how the league recycles mediocrity.

[hack]

You have John Wall. You're a ping pong ball away from having a very exciting young core. You want to coach that team.

[ghandi]

Originally Posted by Stefan S

Average for the Back Stabber: 4.5-5
Average for Flip: 6.5

advantage Flip.

Are Flip's numbers from this season counted in??...... IT sounds like he has pretty much been a zero this year as the WIzards are already in disarray.

[Lou Stefanic]

Someone needs to tell Flip that he's gonna have to pack up the white leather man-purse soon:

[Jeff Hause]

Washington Wizards: An embarrassment by design
Washington Wizards: An embarrassment by design - The Washington Post
The bad news for Washington Wizards Coach Flip Saunders? At the moment, his job is not in jeopardy. That means while Washington area basketball fans avert their eyes from the winless Wizards, Saunders is stuck with his front-row seat for the foreseeable future.

Saunders might very well be the wrong coach for a young team, half of whose players have less than two years of NBA experience. The problem, though, is this team isn’t right for anyone right now. Not Hall of Famers Phil Jackson or Pat Riley. Not even fictional miracle workers like Norman Dale of Hollywood’s “Hoosiers.”
The issues facing the Wizards, the NBA’s only winless team, go much deeper than an exasperated parent trying to control his unpredictable brood. There are some things you can’t coach; caring about your job is one of them.

“We have to be real with ourselves,” said veteran Maurice Evans, who organized an air-it-out, players-only meeting a mere six games into the season. “The sense of entitlement that’s here sometimes, I’ve never seen before.”

It’s that bad? Yes, it’s that bad.

Before Sunday’s loss dropped them to 0-8 on their road to NBA infamy, forward Andray Blatche perused the cheat sheet on the day’s opponent, prepared for him by the coaching staff. “Damn,” Blatche mused, “Kevin Love shoots 42 percent from three-point range?”

That’s right: An hour before tipoff, a professional player in his seventh season was just discovering the talents of the man he would be guarding.

This was two days after Blatche’s teammate, JaVale McGee, took a moment following Friday’s loss to the Knicks to remind his Twitter followers, “Make sure y’all go vote for Allstar!”

Sunday afternoon’s game was at home in Verizon Center against Minnesota, a relatively inexperienced team like Washington. The Wizards lost by 21.

During the game, rookie Jan Vesely, whom the Wizards selected out of the Czech Republic with the sixth overall pick in this past June’s draft, had two free throws after being fouled. Standing 15 feet from the basket, he sent his first shot 14 feet. That’s right: He missed the rim, and the backboard.

Less than three weeks into a lockout-abbreviated 66-game season, the Wizards are setting all kinds of firsts.

For example, Blatche became the first player in league history to complain about his role in the offense on the very first night of a season, saying he wanted the ball closer to the rim, that he was tired of being a perimeter player at 6 feet 11. (Never mind that he has spent much of his playing time since launching a plethora of long-distance jump shots.)

Also, no team in NBA annals had ever held a players-only meeting a mere six games into a season. Usually, it takes at least 25 games to reach the kind of futility that demands a closed-door session.

Some of the Wizards’ problems are obvious: Second-year point guard John Wall, the team’s main reason for hope, is off to a brutal start; Blatche, McGee and other key players rarely make good decisions in the fourth quarter; and the team’s overall talent pool is very shallow.

[DYNOMITE]

Flip was going to deal with his team's lack of leadership but he was late for dinner and had to go home.

[Lou Stefanic]

By the way, that reminds me: Is Jan Vesely selling out NBA arenas with his monster dunking ability yet?

[DYNOMITE]

Originally Posted by Lou Stefanic

By the way, that reminds me: Is Jan Vesely selling out NBA arenas with his monster dunking ability yet?

You make jokes, but just last week I saw 3 inner city kids wearing Vesely jerseys. When the economy picks up that kind of street cred will translate into ticket sales.

[Jeff Hause]

... Others are utterly unfixable. The players with the most heart — Trevor Booker and Chris Singleton among them — don’t have enough skill. The players with the most skill — Blatche, McGee and Nick Young — don’t have enough heart. And the wizened veterans such as Evans, Roger Mason Jr. and Rashard Lewis are almost caught in a culture war between their scrappy teammates who care and their more talented teammates who remain clueless.

So if Saunders isn’t to blame, who is? Team President Ernie Grunfeld would be an easy target; after all, he concocted this mess of unpolished youth and old journeymen. But remember: This is what he was asked to do.

Amid this eyesore of bad basketball lately, we forget owner Ted Leonsis’s essential directive to team officials: We have to be really bad before we’re good.

Phase 1 was the fire sale that began in early 2010 with the jettisoning of every starter but Gilbert Arenas off the Wizards’ last playoff team. It continued when Arenas was shipped to Orlando for Lewis in December 2010.

Phase 2 was building through the draft, to the tune of acquiring six first-round picks in two years, and putting the team in a better financial position.

Phase 3: Become the first team in NBA history to lose every game in a season. Okay, we’re kidding about that; Phase 3 is actually supposed to be the payoff, when the young players identified as building blocks are retained and ownership opens its checkbook to acquire a top-tier free agent to join them.

So far, Grunfeld has delivered on two counts. With a contract that expires after this season, will he get a chance at the third?

Give Leonsis credit for transparency: He told us there would be seasons like these. That’s the sad truth that is starting to sink in with each embarrassing loss: This season’s Wizards were supposed to be almost painful to watch.

So as the losses pile up — and with 14 games in the next 22 days, surely they will — and the sentiment that someone must pay grows, consider: This was part of a plan.

That’s why Saunders and Grunfeld and especially Leonsis must stay and endure the pain with the rest of us: to ostensibly see how awfully bad it can be before there’s any hope of it getting good.


For Mike Wise’s previous columns, go to washingtonpost.com/sports.

[DYNOMITE]

A painful season for us. Just when we think we will suck just enough along comes a team(s) that suck so much more.


If ever there was a team ripe for Doug Collins it is the Washington Wizards.

[B.I.G.]

Well we knew it was going to happen but Flip Saunders just got fired.

Washington Wizards fire coach Flip Saunders, sources say - ESPN

[mn3]

We can only hope that Washington's players will get a sudden burst of energy as they try to prove to the new coach and the world that they were only held down because of bad coaching. Perhaps that could be worth 5 victories they wouldn't have had otherwise?

More Ping-Pong Ball city, baby!

[B.I.G.]

Having the worst record will only mean that the Pistons will get unluck and get the number 4 pick. JARED SULLINGER BABY!!!!!

[hack]

I'm with Matt. They'll get the interim-coach boost hopefully. Better were it to have happened in March though.

[Jeff Hause]

They aren't getting a boost. Have you seen them play?

[DYNOMITE]

I heard the final nail in Flip's coffin had to do with his behavior during last night's game. Apparently, after his team went down by 20, Flip's only response was to take out his cell phone and snap some pics of the disaster that was his team.

[Jeff Hause]

Call the imaginary fire department!!!

I did see Flip toss his clipboard when they left Garnett open at the end of the Celtics game. He looked done. It may have been a mercy killing...

[DYNOMITE]

Originally Posted by Jeff Hause

Call the imaginary fire department!!!

He didn't call anyone, he didn't have time. Dinner was ready.

[Jeff Hause]

I don't know what that means, but okay...

[Dave Bing]

Can someone breakout the manpurse-pumproom pic please?

[Lou Stefanic]

[Lou Stefanic]

Originally Posted by DYNOMITE

I heard the final nail in Flip's coffin had to do with his behavior during last night's game. Apparently, after his team went down by 20, Flip's only response was to take out his cell phone and snap some pics of the disaster that was his team.

Funniest post of the year.

[ThaMaestro]

To warm Dyno's cockles

[King Mob]

Once again Flip is Johnny-on-the-spot with his cameraphone.

[ThaMaestro]

Gotta love the guy in the back with the V-neck. #V-necks are not heroic.

[Jeff Hause]

I'd say you're kicking a guy while he was down, but he was actually worse off yesterday...