Should the Wizards Give Wittman A Sympathy Firing?

Here’s how weird things have gotten for me as I follow the Washington Wizards: I feel sympathy for a coach I never would have hired in the first place. Team president Ernie Grunfeld and owner Ted Leonsis awarded the full-time coaching job to Randy Wittman, who’d done a solid job as interim coach when they fired Flip Saunders. According to reports at the time, they neither considered nor interviewed other candidates for the position. Had it been my call…well, Wittman wouldn’t have been the choice.

Despite the howls of fans angered by a three-game losing streak, Wittman isn’t a bad coach. He isn’t a good one either — at least not by NBA standards. He’s standard issue NBA coaching material. Good at some things, not so good at others. On balance, probably on the “below” side of average, but close enough to the league standard that he’s not a drag on his team’s performance. When he gets fired by the Wizards, he could take a year off, go down to college and be great at that level. Sure, a guy like Phil Jackson, Pat Riley or Greg Popovich would win a few more games with the same roster, but a) those guys aren’t coming to Washington, and b) the Wizards wouldn’t be title contenders even with an elite coach.

I’m not saying it would be pointless to fire Wittman and replace him with Someone Else — maybe Mr. Else could get an extra win or two from this team over the remainder of the season. But no coach is going to transmogrify this group into a title contender for one simple reason: the roster is inadequate. They’re good enough to avoid missing the playoffs in the misbegotten East. They might even be good enough to win a playoff series if they’re reasonably healthy and they can avoid a first round matchup with Indiana or Miami. But there isn’t a coach on the planet who could get them further — not with this roster.

As you’ll see in the table below, Wittman has been given a team that’s effectively six deep. Bradley Beal could be a seventh, if he starts performing the way he did in the second half of last season. Wittman’s options are further diminished by minutes restrictions for Beal and (more importantly) Nene.

There are plenty of things I’d love to see the team do differently — starting with taking fewer two-point jump shots. (Umm, fellas — those shots are open for a reason.) Maybe better coaching could change some of those things. But, NBA reality is that everyone knows what everyone else is doing strategically. Coaches come up with stuff to surprise each other now and then, but most games are decided by overall talent and execution.

A coach’s most important job is getting lineups on the floor that maximize his team’s chances of winning. Those lineup decisions have largely been taken from Wittman by the team’s wafer-thin roster. Unless Nene’s Achilles gets better or someone on the Wizards bench radically improves, the coaching staff is stuck with few options to patch over the lack of depth. That this situation was entirely predictable (in fact, was predicted before the season) makes it no less frustrating.

Below is this week’s Player Production Average (PPA) update. PPA is a player rating stat I developed that credits players for things that contribute to winning and debits them for things that don’t — each in proper proportion. PPA is pace adjusted, accounts for defense and includes a degree of difficulty factor. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better and 45 = replacement level.

PLAYER	GMS	MPG	LW	PPA
John Wall	31	37.2	149	147
Trevor Ariza	26	34.2	154	146
Trevor Booker	23	22.0	118	139
Marcin Gortat	31	32.5	130	130
Nene Hilario	24	29.4	132	120
Martell Webster	30	31.2	151	120
Bradley Beal	22	34.9	84	76
Chris Singleton	11	12.9	48	66
Jan Vesely	22	15.8	53	55
Otto Porter	12	12.2	-47	23
Glen Rice	11	9.9	21	21
Eric Maynor	22	9.5	18	13
Al Harrington	7	18.6	6	6
Kevin Seraphin	23	10.0	-15	2
Garrett Temple	29	10.8	-21	-2

Normally, I update weekly, but this one went a couple weeks — eight games total. The Wizards went 4-4 during that stretch, including their current three-game winning streak. The performance levels of John Wall, Trevor Ariza and Marcin Gortat appear to have largely stabilized.

Wall’s “grade” is interesting because it’s at once encouraging and disappointing. On the encouraging side, this is the longest sustained period of well-above average play of his career. So far, he’s the most productive guard in the East. But…his per minute production is still not close to “franchise cornerstone” level. And while he’s the East’s best PG, he still ranks behind nine Western Conference PGs in per minute production.

I have a similar reaction to Gortat’s score. He’s a solid producer, but…he ranks only about 20th among centers. The Wizards need more from him, especially on the boards and on defense.

Ariza is — by some strange coincidence — playing the best basketball of his career in a contract year.

Other positives: Trevor Booker becoming a solid producer upon entering the starting lineup (though his team defense continues to be a problem), Otto Porter improved from a HUGE negative to a net positive, and Kevin Seraphin finally got out of the negative PPA range.

A word on Seraphin — the big man currently rates as the NBA’s least productive center. He managed the same “feat” last season. There seems to be some kind of a message there, but I could be over-thinking things.

Oh yeah, Chris Singleton also showed signs of life with not atrocious play in a couple garbage time appearances.

On the negative side: Nene’s production is (unsurprisingly) down as he tries to play through that Achilles injury. Martell Webster’s play declined significantly this update, as well. And, of course, the Wizards continue to get absolutely nothing from their backup PGs.

With teams now able to sign free agents to 10-day contracts, I’m hoping the Wizards front office will start bringing in D-League PGs for tryouts until they find one they like. I’d also like to see them try some PF/C types in hopes of getting even replacement level play off the bench. They can make room by releasing one or more from the group of Temple, Seraphin, Harrington and Maynor. Yes, I know there’s no way they’d just cut Maynor because of the player option he holds for next season. It could be a correct move, however.

Even 7 Isn’t All That Lucky for Wizards

Short of trading additional future assets, getting lucky with a D-League pickup, or getting radical in-season improvement from one or more players currently on the roster, there just isn’t getting around the reality that this year’s Washington Wizards is solidly mediocre — at best.

I went into this week’s update on the team trying to conjure up a “modest proposal” type of post. Best I could come up with was the notion of shortening the game to 32 minutes so that teams would need to play only their top seven. And, Washington’s top seven is pretty good.

In this imaginary “top 7” league, so far this season, Washington would move up the standings a bit. According to my estimates, their top 7 would rank 4th in the East behind Miami, Atlanta and Indiana.

Overall, their top 7 rates 12th best, which sorta gives some perspective to how weak the East is so far this season. Washington’s seven best players rate as 4th best in the East, but would be only 9th best in the West.

Just to extend the silliness to its “logical” end — in this hypothetical, Washington would win a first round series against Brooklyn only to get bludgeoned in round two by Miami. The West would be a dogfight, but (if my PPA ratings held sway — and in this alternate reality, they do) San Antonio would emerge victorious. That would set up a repeat of last season’s Heat-Spurs final. Which the Heat would win.

Of course, the league isn’t going to shorten the game time anymore than it can guarantee Washington’s top seven can actually stay healthy. The bright side: a fully healthy Wizards team might be good enough to win a first round series if they can make the postseason. The downside: “fully healthy” seems like a fantasy.

To this week’s Player Production Average (PPA) update. PPA is a player rating stat I developed that credits players for things that contribute to winning and debits them for things that don’t — each in proper proportion. PPA is pace adjusted, accounts for defense and includes a degree of difficulty factor. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better and 45 = replacement level.

PLAYER	GMS	MPG	LW	PPA
Trevor Ariza	18	36.1	172	154
Martell Webster	22	33.0	148	151
John Wall	23	37.7	168	149
Nene Hilario	16	32.6	134	132
Marcin Gortat	23	34.6	150	130
Trevor Booker	15	20.1	114	118
Bradley Beal	14	39.5	81	84
Jan Vesely	17	17.6	54	53
Chris Singleton	7	15.6	29	48
Glen Rice	11	9.9	4	21
Eric Maynor	20	10.0	16	18
Al Harrington	7	18.6	7	6
Kevin Seraphin	18	8.3	-32	-15
Garrett Temple	21	10.3	-23	-21
Otto Porter	4	12.0	-70	-47

No real surprises for a team that lost two of three since the last update (and barely won the third). Ariza, Wall and Gortat led the “decliners.” The “improvers” were of the awful to slightly less awful variety — Singleton getting to replacement level, Rice getting out of single digits, Seraphin becoming a bit less negative.

Sorta looping back to the “modest proposal” portion of this post, here’s another look at the Wizards this season — one that shows the hard demarcation between their top 7 and their bottom 8.

Wizards Lack of Depth Continues to Hurt

Get used to repeats of that old Wizards pattern — keeping the score tight (even holding a lead in the fourth quarter) only to lose in the end. The problem isn’t that Washington lacks a mystical “ability to close,” it’s that their bench can’t hold the leads its starters provide, and its starters wear down at the end of competitive games.

This is not the fault of Randy Wittman and the coaching staff. Most of the failing bench players are producing at levels consistent with career norms. Eric Maynor, a fan whipping boy so far this season, is playing worse than usual, but not abnormally so. He’s been unproductive throughout his career — that’s he’s even less productive should surprise no one. The same is true of Kevin Seraphin, Jan Vesely, Chris Singleton and Garrett Temple. They’ve established themselves as unproductive. There’s little reason beyond hope to imagine them becoming productive.

With the “make the playoffs or else” mandate, Wittman has little option but to play his key players heavy minutes and pray they don’t get hurt. And that’s exactly what’s happening. John Wall and Bradley Beal lead the league in minutes per game at PG and SG. Among SFs, Trevor Ariza ranks eighth and Martell Webster sits 15th. Marcin Gortat is second in minutes per game among centers. The fragile Nene plays the 12th most minutes per game for a PF.

If this was the playoffs, there’d be little reason for concern. But there are 62 games remaining in the regular season, and they’ve already sustained injuries to Ariza, Webster, Nene and Beal. Another injury could put the playoffs out of reach. That would be a shame (as would limping into the playoffs) because at full strength, it’s core rotation players could at least put a scare in a post-season opponent. They’ll need to get (and stay) healthy to do that, however.

For a further demonstration of Wittman’s lack of options, peruse the table below, which shows the (approximately) weekly update of Player Production Average (PPA). PPA is a player rating stat I developed. It credits players for things that contribute to winning and debits them for things that don’t — each in proper proportion. PPA is pace adjusted, accounts for defense and includes a degree of difficulty factor. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better and 45 = replacement level.

PLAYER	GMS	MPG	LW	PPA
Trevor Ariza	15	36.1	146	172
John Wall	20	37.8	169	168
Marcin Gortat	20	34.6	152	150
Martell Webster	19	32.5	156	148
Nene Hilario	16	32.6	133	134
Trevor Booker	12	16.5	96	114
Bradley Beal	13	40.2	81	81
Jan Vesely	14	18.1	75	54
Chris Singleton	6	17.5	51	29
Eric Maynor	19	10.3	35	16
Al Harrington	7	18.6	6	7
Glen Rice	9	8.0	-10	4
Garrett Temple	18	10.1	-14	-23
Kevin Seraphin	15	7.9	-27	-32
Otto Porter	2	10.5		-70

Ariza is playing a lot like he’s in a contract year, which is to say — superbly. His production is All-Star level, though it would astonish me if he actually received the honor. But, with Lebron more a PF these days, it’s arguable that Ariza has been the East’s second best SF so far this season (behind Paul George).

Recovered from injuries last season, Gortat is producing at a good level again. Like Ariza, his timing is superb — he’s in a contract year as well.

Wall seems to have settled in at All-Star level production. PPA currently has him rated as the top PG in the East, and fifth most productive overall behind Chris Paul, Stephen Curry, Ty Lawson and Mike Conley.

This week’s update shows Vesely’s production dropping off. Hopefully he can turn things around. Whether or not he does, the coaching staff would be wise to give more minutes to Booker, who continues to be an “about average” producer. That’s nothing to get excited about, but it makes him a solid reserve.

Finally, note that the Wizards have seven players who rate below replacement level so far this season. Collectively, they’ve played 823 minutes — nearly 17% of the team’s total. This is a direct result of the front office’s persistent failure to properly assess players, and their inability to address the team’s glaring need for depth. This misjudgment is costing the team wins now, and could cost them even more as the season wears on.

Wizards Reward For Best Week: Brutal Schedule

The Wizards just had their best week of the season, going 3-1 and seeing PG John Wall receive the NBA’s Player of the Week award. Their reward? Four games in five nights with travel between each of the games. Yikes!

The uptick in Wall’s production was as welcome as it was abrupt. His shooting had been atrocious, but became deadly, and he continued doing a first-rate job of finding teammates for open shots at the basket. His play was similar in quality to his transcendent March — when he performed like one of the game’s top five players.

In other good news for the team, Wall wasn’t the only player who improved. Martell Webster enjoyed his return to the starting lineup, and Marcin Gortat and Nene also seemed to settle into their roles. Bradley Beal boosted his production a bit as well, though the youngster still has a ways to go.

The upcoming week will be a challenge for the depth-starved Wizards. They have the makings for a solid top seven, but everything after that remains a major question mark.

Here’s the weekly Player Production Average (PPA) update. PPA is a player rating stat I put together that credits players for things they do that contribute to winning and debits them for things that hurt the cause (each in regression-analyzed proper proportion). PPA includes defense, is pace-adjusted, and incorporates a “degree of difficulty” factor based on the strength of the opposing lineup. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better, and replacement level is 45.

PLAYER	GAMES	MPG	LW	PPA
John Wall	13	37.8	111	158
Martell Webster	13	31.4	110	144
Marcin Gortat	13	33.5	116	139
Nene Hilario	11	32.5	118	127
Trevor Ariza	8	35.1	123	123
Trevor Booker	8	12.6	110	102
Bradley Beal	13	40.2	71	82
Jan Vesely	7	17.3	95	81
Eric Maynor	12	10.4	66	50
Al Harrington	7	18.6	6	7
Glen Rice	5	6.8	-5	-5
Garrett Temple	11	9.2	-36	-18
Kevin Seraphin	10	8.7	-33	-39

As Captain Obvious said, “The bench remains a major weakness.” Jan Vesely’s effectiveness declined as his playing time increased. Trevor Booker’s individual numbers are good, but the defense is a catastrophic failure thus far when he’s on the floor. Al Harrington was awful before he sat with knee trouble. Kevin Seraphin has been even worse than last season — and last season he was the league’s least productive center.

Guard depth is scary as well. Eric Maynor is drawing ire for his crummy play, but what he’s doing is exactly what fans should have expected from him. His PPA this season: 50. His career PPA before this season: 49. His peak PPA for a season was 57. This is his normal level of play. What’s scary: Temple has been worse.

For now, I don’t envy the options head coach Randy Wittman has. The team desperately needs at least two someones from the bench to step up production — one big and one guard. Unfortunately, the roster assembled by Ernie Grunfeld isn’t jammed with “good bets” on a guy or two who might suddenly start playing better.

I’ve been suggesting since offseason that the team’s best option for depth may be to use SF Trevor Ariza at PF (as a stretch four), especially if injured rookie Otto Porter can give them productive minutes at SF. Ariza is likely to be more productive as an S4 than Harrington has been, and he may provide the opposition with challenging match-ups at that spot.

No matter how I look at the various lineup permutations, the team’s rotation is skimpy — at best. With reasonable health for its rotation, the Wizards should be a playoff team. Lose anyone from the top seven or eight, and the playoffs are dicier, even in the East. And, I don’t think can sustain an extended absence from Wall, Nene or Gortat, however.

The Wizards Under Grunfeld: Month by Month

This is Ernie Grunfeld’s 11th season running the Washington Wizards. During those years, the team has compiled the league’s third worst winning percentage. Wizards fans have long joked about the team’s penchant for getting off to bad starts before winning a string of meaningless games in April. That trend is so entrenched that we dubbed the quintessential Wizard, Andray Blatche, April Fool’s Dray.

But, as with so many things NBA, a comment on the RealGM message board got me wondering… Do the Wizards actually play better late in the season? If so, how much better? So, I looked up the team’s record month by month under Grunfeld’s leadership.

MONTH	W	L	W%	W82
Oct/Nov	47	93	0.336	27.5
December	50	85	0.370	30.4
January	71	88	0.447	36.6
February	46	76	0.377	30.9
March	60	101	0.373	30.6
April	41	55	0.427	35.0

Overall	315	498	0.387	31.8

So, the team’s best month under Grunfeld is January — a time when the Wizards look almost like a playoff team. They’re pretty close in April too, though resembling a 35-win team is even a little less playoff-like.

Here’s what jumps out at me, though: Just how low are the standards of Wizards fans? The April hey, the young guys are playing well and the Wizards are winning some games thing has become an annual ritual. Call it The Coronation of the Scrubs. But even in that “good” month, the Wizards have been a failure. Even if they played a full season at the lofty level of April or January, they’d still be a lottery team.

As Thom Loverro might tweet, a Monumental record.

Wizards Consistent In Futility

In an era characterized by rapid change, it’s good to be able to count on things. When it comes to losing, when it comes to ineptitude, when it comes to futility — Wizards fans have been able to count on the team and its management. Since Ernie Grunfeld took control of the team’s direction in 2003-04, the Wizards have the league’s third worst winning percentage. This season — Grunfeld’s 11th with the team — they’re tied for the league’s fourth worst winning percentage through nine games. Maybe owner Ted Leonsis deems that progress.

How typical is the bad start? Over the past 11 seasons, the Wizards’ record in their first nine games is 30-69. The average start by Washington teams built by Grunfeld 2.7-6.3. That’s a .303 winning percentage. Which is bad. As in, about a 25-win team over the course of an 82-game season.

It’s still early in the season, and I expect the team to improve and make a run at the playoffs, but as the numbers below demonstrate — the team is being hurt by lack of depth and by lack of production from the players who are supposed to be its stars. I’ll get to the “stars” in a moment, but the team’s lack of quality players on its bench was both foreseeable and fixable during the offseason.

Re-litigating the bungled offseason isn’t useful at this point except as a reminder — the roster is the product of front office decisions. Eric Maynor and Al Harrington (the team’s free agent acquisitions) are Wizards instead of DeJuan Blair. The team holds the rights to Tomas Satoransky instead of the production of Jae Crowder, Kyle O’Quinn or Orlando Johnson. They have Glen Rice rather than Nate Wolters.

And this isn’t even going back to 2011, which included gems like picking Jan Vesely AND Chris Singleton ahead of Kenneth Faried.

Trying to look at the bright side, the numbers suggest that the team is getting a bit better than average production from its starters. Bradley Beal is the lone exception — he’s had some good games sprinkled into some real clunkers (about what should be expected from a youngster in his second season).

The problem? The production from John Wall, Nene and Marcin Gortat is perilously close to average. The Wizards need significant production from all three, especially Wall, if they’re going to be a decent team this year. Last March, Wall played like a potential MVP candidate. So far this season, he’s playing like a run-of-the-mill starter.

So, to the first Player Production Average (PPA) update of the season. PPA is a player rating stat I put together that credits players for things they do that contribute to winning and debits them for things that hurt the cause (each in regression-analyzed proper proportion). PPA includes defense, is pace-adjusted, and incorporates a “degree of difficulty” factor based on the strength of the opposing lineup. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better, and replacement level is 45.

PLAYER	GMS	MPG	PPA
Trevor Ariza	8	35.1	123
Nene Hilario	7	30.6	118
Marcin Gortat	9	33.8	116
John Wall	9	36.9	111
Trevor Booker	5	16.4	110
Martell Webster	9	27.6	110
Jan Vesely	3	15.3	95
Bradley Beal	9	40.1	71
Eric Maynor	8	11.9	66
Al Harrington	7	18.6	6
Glen Rice	3	10.0	-5
Kevin Seraphin	9	8.8	-33
Garrett Temple	7	4.7	-36

Back to bright side stuff for a moment — Trevor Ariza, Jan Vesely and Eric Maynor are each out-performing their pre-season projections and their level of play last season.

It’s tempting to brand Ariza’s play as the standard contract-year surge, except that it’s largely in line with his career norms except for a slight uptick in field goal attempts.

In scant playing time, Vesely has done just about everything the team could hope he’d provide. His offense is abysmal, but he does contribute offensive rebounds, which help. He’s also helping on the defensive glass. I anticipate his PPA to decline as he gets more playing time.

Maynor’s PPA is deceptively high. He had an outstanding 14 minutes against Miami — about 15% of his total minutes to date. The rest of his minutes have been bad. Keep in mind that back in September, Grunfeld had this to say about Maynor (h/t to Matt Kremnitzer’s superior Google search skills for the link):

We wanted to upgrade our backup point guard position and Eric [Maynor] has been with us now, three weeks in a row. He’s very solid, very steady. He brings a little poise to the game. He knows how to play. So we feel we’ve upgraded that position.

Basically, that the PPA table is saying is that when the Wizards top players are on the floor, they’re slightly better than average — something borne out by the on/off data. But there’s a big drop-off when they go to the bench. Big drop-offs to the bench aren’t atypical — lots of teams see major production drops when they use reserves. There are often very good reasons why guys are reserves. But, good teams have their starters outplay the opposing starters.

The Wizards starters hold their own, but the team falls apart when they use the bench. That’s not a recipe to reach the playoffs. It’s the recipe for 2-7. It’s the right mix for consistent futility.

And here’s a truly terrifying question for Wizards fans: How bad would this team be if they weren’t in “win now” mode?

Wizards Off To Even Worse Start Than Last Season

If you thought last season’s horrific start by the Washington Wizards couldn’t be duplicated, think again. Through their first three games of the years, the Wizards have been even worse than they were last year.

Season	Ortg	Drtg	Diff	PytW82
2013-14	102.7	112.4	-9.7	18.1
2012-13	92.3	99.0	-6.7	22.5

Change	-10.4	13.4	-3.0	-4.4

Ortg = points scored per 100 possessions

Drtg = points allowed per 100 possessions

Diff = ortg – drtg (scoring/efficiency differential is a better measure of team strength than a team’s record)

PytW82 = “Diff” translated into projected wins if that differential was maintained over an 82-game schedule

As you can see from the table above, the Wizards have been 10.4 points per 100 possessions better offensively this season than last, BUT they’ve been 13.0 points per 100 possessions worse on defense. The net result: through three games, they’re -3.0 in efficiency differential — a change of 4.4 wins over the course of a full season.

Last season, the team was missing PG John Wall. This year, they’re missing both Nene and Emeka Okafor — two of the team’s more important defenders last season. Marcin Gortat, an adequate defender at best, has been slow to grasp the team’s defensive scheme.

Unfortunately, there probably aren’t any quick fixes to the defense. The team emphasized that end of the court during training camp, but it’s challenging to overcome the loss of quality defensive big men — they’re the linchpin of every good defense in the NBA.

Which, of course, leads to the obvious question: Why did the Wizards go through an offseason without addressing the critical need for depth behind its 30+ year old front line?

Which, of course, leads to another obvious question: Why does Ted Leonsis continue to let Ernie Grunfeld run his basketball team?

Projection: Wizards Will Win 43 and Make Playoffs This Season

Will John Wall make The Leap to All-Star status this season?

NBA preseason doesn’t mean an awful lot. It’s perhaps a bit more important for a team like the Wizards — a bad team trying to get into the playoffs for the first time in awhile. But even then the information it provides isn’t all that…informative.

The regular season Wizards will get a significant boost from the preseason Wizards because of their move last Friday to acquire center Marcin Gortat. The veteran takes the spot vacated by the injured Emeka Okafor, who was sent to Phoenix (along with a first round pick).

I’ll get to my projection/prediction for the season in a moment, but first, a look at the preseason numbers. I’m not wasting time with the team-level stuff. The Wizards were terrible on offense and excellent on defense during the exhibition games. That’s theoretically a way to win games — a 68-65 win counts as much in the standings as one that’s 114-111. Still, being good on both ends would be preferable. If there’s any takeaway from the team-level preseason numbers it’s that the team was similar to the one they had last year (not surprising considering their few personnel changes), which was characterized by terrible offense and excellent defense.

Looking at the individuals, I’d conclude that most of the roster underwhelmed. Bradley Beal and Trevor Booker played well; Nene was okay, but not performing at the level he’s maintained throughout his career; and the rest…pretty bad. John Wall, the guy they’re building around, was awful. He shot badly from everywhere (.415 from two-point range; .118 from three-point range; just .727 from the free throw line), and committing 4.4 turnovers per 36 minutes.

Below is a table showing an “estimated” Player Production Average (PPA) for each player. I say “estimated” because PPA is based on league average season by season. That average is fairly consistent year to year, but there are fluctuations. Since it’s preseason, there isn’t enough data to calculate a true league “average” so I use an approximation of league average. Also, full PPA adjusts for pace, accounts for individual defense and includes a “degree of difficulty” factor — none of which I’m including in looking at the preseason numbers. In PPA, average is 100, higher is better, and replacement level is 45.

Player	G	MPG	ePPA	PPA
Bradley Beal	7	30.3	146	92
Trevor Booker	6	20.5	144	96
Nene	5	22.2	118	119
Glen Rice	6	14.0	70
Jan Vesely	7	20.3	67	19
Trevor Ariza	7	23.4	52	108
Martell Webster	6	23.5	49	114
Al Harrington	5	16.6	43	81
Eric Maynor	6	21.0	38	32
Kevin Seraphin	7	25.9	27	22
Garrett Temple	5	15.6	25	60
John Wall	7	28.1	12	139

That last column is the player’s PPA in 2012-13. Except for Al Harrington, who missed most of last season with a staph infection.

Again, don’t read too much into the preseason numbers. The play of Beal and Booker are hopeful signs. Also good to see Jan Vesely doing something positive on the floor — he actually led the team in rebounding in preseason.

I’m not overly worried about Wall’s poor play, although it would have been nice to see him pick up where he left off at the end of last season.

If you’re thinking you’ll see better play from Eric Maynor once the season begins, stop it. At best the Wizards are likely get replacement level production from him.

Other potential cautions: Martell Webster and Kevin Seraphin were bad. Webster’s play is potentially worrisome because he hasn’t established himself to the point where his production level is a given. Last year, he had a terrific preseason, and it translated into a solid regular season. This year? Hard to say.

Seraphin’s preseason performance, is unfortunately matches up with most of the data on him. He was inefficient, turnover prone and rebounded like a SF.

Ariza’s preseason stats don’t mean a whole lot. He’s well-established and fairly consistent. He’ll provide the team with another season of stellar defense and meh offense, which will grade out to about average.

2013-14 Projection

Given the team’s offseason moves, it was clear that the team’s fortunes this season rested on the health of three players: Wall, Nene and Okafor. Now that they’ve traded for Gortat, their fortunes rest on the health of three players: Wall, Nene and Gortat. They don’t have quality depth behind any of these three.

While my projection relies on statistical data, there’s a fair amount of guesswork in divvying up minutes. The table below shows my estimates of games played, minutes played, and PPA. The estimates for games and minutes are a combination of player history, analysis of similar players in the NBA record, and logic. PPA estimates incorporate each player’s individual performance history, analysis of historical similars, and aging effects.

POS	Player	G	MPG	LS	2013-14
PG	John Wall	66	35.8	139	160
PG	Eric Maynor	75	13.0	32	34
G	Garrett Temple	60	10.9	60	45
SG	Glen Rice	42	11.4		75
SG	Bradley Beal	68	34.0	92	108
SF	Otto Porter	41	20.0		75
SF	Trevor Ariza	61	29.6	108	105
SF	Martell Webster	60	24.6	114	97
PF	Nene	62	29.1	119	146
PF	Chris Singleton	34	10.0	24	43
PF	Jan Veseley	60	10.0	19	51
PF	Al Harrington	66	18.0	81	78
PF	Trevor Booker	58	19.7	96	106
C	Marcin Gortat	74	29.0	125	146
C	Kevin Seraphin	69	18.2	22	46

LS = last season, except for Harrington.

My approach projects Wall making The Leap to All-Star level production, whether he makes the team or not. It also projects significant improvement from Beal, although it suggests he’s another year from making The Leap himself. I’m also expecting bounce-back years in per minute production from Nene and Gortat.

I’m expecting regression from Webster both in terms of overall production and in health.

I crunched the numbers on several different scenarios. In a best-case situation that assumes near perfect health, the Wizards could win 48 games. My worst case projection has them at 34 wins.

Final prediction: 43-39, and the Wizards get the 7th seed in the playoffs.

For those who are curious, here’s how the projections looked with the various possibilities between Okafor, Gortat and neither.

Current roster (with Gortat): 43-39
With healthy Okafor: 42-40
Without Gortat or Okafor (no trade): 38-44

Responding to Ted Leonsis “Wizards Add Talented Big Man” Post

Wizards owner Ted Leonsis weighed in at his blog with his thoughts on the team’s acquisition of center Marcin Gortat. As usual, I’m not sure whether Leonsis actually believes what he’s saying, or if he’s merely careless with words, or if he’s applying PR spin, or if he’s being cynical. Either way, I thought some of what he wrote was worth a response:

Leonsis opened his blog posting with this:

The Wizards made a trade to add a talented big man to our roster Friday night — and Marcin Gortat will contribute right away to our team. It was important to our franchise to enter this season at full strength and to have depth and show upside and improvement.

Lots here. Yep, Gortat is talented, and he will contribute immediately. Part of that is because the other guys on the roster at power forward and center are so awful. More on that in a moment.

That second sentence is one of those that make me wonder if he’s being careless with words or whether he’s really that cynical about fans of his team. In sports-speak, “upside” means potential and “depth” means having more than one good player at a position.

Maybe I’m just THAT stupid, but I can’t figure out how trading for a 29-year old center on a one-year contract can count as “upside.” If Gortat does his job, the team will likely get to the playoffs, which won’t mean much unless they re-sign him, which they really don’t want to do because of Leonsis’ previous chest-thumping about signing a “brand name” free agent.

His “depth” comment is a face palm moment. Why wasn’t frontcourt depth important to “show” during the summer? With a solid small forward on the roster for another year (Trevor Ariza) and two more swingmen joining the team through the draft (Otto Porter and Glen Rice Jr.), why spend the mid-level exception on yet another SF (Martell Webster)? With an acceptable backup point guard easily re-signed for the league minimum (A.J. Price), why rush out the first day of free agency and burn the bi-annual exception on a scrub (Eric Maynor)?

As for that “improvement” thing — it’s kinda hard to know what he means. Does he mean the team’s record? If so, then I’d sort of agree. The team should win more games this season. It could be an illusory improvement, however because Gortat and Ariza are on expiring contracts and could depart whether the Wizards want to re-sign them or not. Plus, as mentioned above, Leonsis is hoping to attract a free agent — something that can’t happen if the team re-signs Gortat and/or Ariza.

Moving on:

We traded a protected first round pick to get the deal done. We have many young players on our team today and we believed that using our conditional pick to get the deal done was the prudent move for our franchise at this time in its development. Of our 15 players under contract 8 players have been drafted by us in the first or second round in the last 4 off seasons. We are a very young team still.

We have noted that we would use the draft, first and foremost, to rebuild our team. 8 players and make trades to bring on vets such as Trevor Ariza, Nene, and now Gortat — or free agency such as Martell Webster, Eric Maynor and Al Harrington. We dipped into the D league for Garrett Temple.

This kind of claptrap has me leaning more toward the conclusion that Leonsis is being cynical. Leonsis is suggesting that the team is actually building through the draft and that they’re just bringing in a few veterans here and there to kinda supplement these wonderful young players, who dangit arejust too young to carry the burden themselves.

But let’s go through who these eight draftees he’s talking about:

John Wall — Consensus number one overall pick. Woefully inefficient on offense throughout his career (terrible shooting and lots of turnovers). Had a month last season where he played like a potential league MVP candidate. While he received a maximum salary contract extension, Wall has been more potential than production through his first three seasons.
Bradley Beal — Third overall pick last season. Struggled at first, but played at a borderline All-Star level for a stretch until he had to sit due to a leg injury. His rookie season statistically looked a lot like Ray Allen’s.
Otto Porter — This year’s third overall pick has been injured. In my pre-draft analysis machine “YODA,” Porter rated as a top five pick in most drafts. When he was selected, Cody Zeller and Nerlens Noel rated as better prospects. Porter should be a good pro, however.
Glen Rice Jr. — The team trade two second round picks for the second round pick they used on Rice. His amateur/minor league career has been…interesting. He rated poorly as a draft prospect in college, but played well in the D-League last season. If he’d done in the NCAA what he did in the D-League, he’d have rated as a mid-first round pick. Assuming his off-court baggage is abandoned, he could make for a solid reserve SG/SF.
Trevor Booker — The team made a draft-day trade to acquire him three years ago. The big issue with Booker: health. He’s been solidly productive when he’s played, but he’s missed substantial time due to a series of injuries.
Kevin Seraphin — Obtained in a 2010 draft-day trade, Seraphin’s awful play was a big reason why the team had to trade a future first round pick to get a good player at center when Okafor got hurt. Last season, he was the league’s least productive center (minimum 500 minutes).
Jan Vesely — Chosen sixth overall, Vesely has been an abject disaster. While Vesely has been awful, others chosen later (like Kawhi Leonard, Nikola Vucevic and Kenneth Faried) have thrived. In my analyis, Vesely last season rated as the league’s least productive power foward (minimum 500 minutes).
Chris Singleton — Chosen 18th in the same draft that brought the Wizards Vesely, the team’s braintrust picked Singleton over Faried, Reggie Jackson, Jimmy Butler and Chandler Parsons. This was not a good decision. Singleton has been almost as bad as Vesely. Last season, he rated as the league’s second least productive power forward (ahead of only Vesely).

So, to recap, these young building blocks include a potentially good PG, a potentially good SG, a potentially good SF, a probable rotation swingman, a decent rotation PF, and three of the worst basketball players in the league. And oh yeah, Booker and Seraphin are on expiring contracts, and the team just declined to pick up the fourth year options on Vesely and Singleton. In other words, half of these eight draft picks that make this team so young, will be gone after the season. In effect, the team already released Vesely and Singleton. And, any money they spend re-signing Booker or Seraphin would cut into their salary cap space, which would hinder their pursuit of a “brand name” free agent.

Here are some additional clips regarding the trade.Check them out here,here,here, and here.

Shocking that he didn’t include my analysis.

Gortat Trade Is Culmination of Series of Bad Moves for Wizards

Late Friday afternoon, news emerged that the Washington Wizards had traded injured center Emeka Okafor and a first round pick to the Phoenix Suns for center Marcin Gortat and salary cap ballast. While Gortat is a good player who will help the Wizards more games than they would have with Okafor sidelined, it’s a terrible move for a rebuilding franchise.

Unfortunately for fans who had hoped to see Ted Leonsis and Ernie Grunfeld construct a team that could contend for championships in the near future, it’s merely another example of the team squandering opportunities and mismanaging its assets. In the summer of 2012, for example, the Wizards could have amnestied Andray Blatche and released Rashard Lewis — moves that would have carved out enough cap space to acquire a quality front court player, sign good young players to mid-priced contracts, AND preserved future cap space for possible future free agents.

Instead, they traded for Okafor and Trevor Ariza — both of whom figured to be two-year rentals, at best. While the rebuilding Wizards added a 30-year old Okafor to pair up front with the 31-year old Nene, rebuilding New Orleans used the cap space they’d obtained from the Wizards to acquire Ryan Anderson — a productive 24-year old power forward.

This offseason was even worse. After last season, the team’s biggest need was obvious: front court depth. Okafor and Nene were reasonably effective, but both were 30-plus years old — an age at which NBA players typically see declines in productivity and increases in time missed due to injury.

So, they went into the offseason stocked with these assets:

Promising starters in the backcourt (John Wall and Bradley Beal)
A solid SF in the final year of his contract (Ariza)
The third overall pick in the draft
Two second round picks
The Bi-Annual Exception (BAE)
The Mid-Level Exception (MLE)

They used that draft pick on SF Otto Porter, who should be a good professional player once he’s healthy. In my pre-draft analysis, I had Porter rated in a tie for fourth overall, so picking him third wasn’t much of a stretch. And, the difference between Porter and at least two of the guys I had ahead of him (Cody Zeller and Nerlens Noel) was small enough that reasonable minds could differ on which of the three projected to be the best pro.

They swapped their 2nd round picks to move up a spot and take Glen Rice Jr., which might work out as a decent move. My analysis of his D-League performance suggests Rice may have been worth a mid-first round selection — he could turn out to be a terrific value as a 2nd rounder.

But here’s where things got puzzling. On the first day of free agency, they spent their BAE to sign reserve PG Eric Maynor — a consistently crummy NBA player. Guys who performed like Maynor are ones teams invite to training camp on non-guaranteed minimum salary contracts. The Wizards acted like they were getting a steal.

Weirder yet, they never made an offer to their incumbent backup PG, A.J. Price, who was a) better last season than Maynor has ever been as a pro, and b) would have been happy to get the minimum salary for another year.

Then, with Ariza coming back for another year, having drafted Porter third overall, and having dealt to get Rice (a SG/SF type), Grunfeld gave the full MLE to bring back Webster — yet another SF. Now, Webster did play well last season, and his three-point shooting and heady play was certainly valuable to the team. But, having spent their draft picks on swing men and their BAE on a scrub PG, they still had gaping holes up front, and no way to fill them other than trading or signing minimum salary free agents.

They flirted with San Antonio’s DeJuan Blair, but presented with competing minimum salary offers, Blair chose Dallas. They did manage to sign Al Harrington — one of the more overrated players of the past decade, who was available at a deep discount because he’s 32 years old, coming off the worst season of his career (due to illness), and working his way back into shape after recovering from that illness.

And oh yeah, burning that BAE on Maynor knocked them out of the running for good reserve guards like Nate Robinson and Darren Collison — each of whom signed for the BAE or less.

Taken together, the Wizards spent all of their offseason assets without addressing their single biggest need: depth up front. In effect, they were gambling on the health and productivity of 30-plus year olds, and the insanity of that gamble became evident when Okafor herniated a disk in his neck. With an uncertain timetable for recovery, the Wizards were stuck. The team’s stated goal was to reach the playoffs — something that just wasn’t going to happen if they had to rely on Kevin Seraphin and Jan Vesely, who were two of league’s least productive players last season.

And so, staring into the maw of yet another 30-win season, Grunfeld and Leonsis blinked. They swapped Okafor (who may not play this season) and a first round pick for Gortat, who played at borderline All-NBA caliber a couple years ago. Make no mistake: Gortat is a good player. But here’s the problem — the Wizards spent a future asset on a guy they’re hoping will be on the team for just one year. See, during the summer, Leonsis talked openly about signing a “brand name” free agent. That’s something they’ll need cap room to accomplish, and the only way they’ll have cap space is if they let Gortat depart.

Perhaps the most prevalent counterargument in favor of this trade is that the pick is top 12 protected in 2014 and that good players aren’t usually picked that late in the draft. This is unpersuasive to me because it ignores the reality that in every NBA draft, quality players are selected 13th or lower. Sure, a GM like Grunfeld has a lower probability of finding a good player later in the draft, but that’s a point in favor of keeping picks and acquiring extras, if possible. More picks increase the odds of getting a quality player. Now that’s not even an option.

Another line of argument is that the Wizards could re-sign Gortat, which would make the trade look better for the team. The problem with this thinking is that it would mean the team struck out in free agency (or decided not to even take a swing). Gortat is good, but he’s most certainly not a “brand name” free agent. Plus, Gortat turns 30 next spring, which means he’s more likely to be in the expensive decline portion of his career than he is to remain productive.

It seems like such a classically Wizards transaction. Presented with opportunities to build a potential title contender, the owner and the GM opted to pursue short-term goals that don’t mean much. I find it cynical and disappointing. Makes we wonder why I’m still following this team. But that’s a topic for another day.

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