Wizards / This Has Come to an End

Message to the Readers

This is the end of the first season for my Wizards dynasty. It has ended quite fast, but that was my intention from the whole beginning, the second season will be much longer and I hope more interesting for you and for me too.

I will start with the recap of the off-season, which will include a couple of chapters and articles, in which you will see how the things will work out between Washington Wizards and players with whom they want to extend the contract - Yi, Thornton, Howard. You will see some new players in Wizards uniform too. You will also see which stars will leave their teams to find their luck elsewhere. I have a plan to develop the Arenas-Wall relationship in this story too, so keep following.

If you have any suggestions you want to share with me, please don't be shy and do it, feedback is highly needed here

That's great man...

On-awards: WTF is Durant MIP?

Thanks

It's NBA live...

Laughing with that Season 2 pic

Laughing with that Season 2 pic

Yeah, found it on the internet, and thought, that it fits great for my dynasty

HAHAH nice pic man

HAHAH nice pic man

Thanks

2011 Draft Order



#1 Houston

#2 Toronto

#3 Sacramento

#4 Minnesota

#5 New Jersey

#6 Memphis

#7 Golden State

#8 Cleveland

#9 Portland

#10 Charlotte

#11 Atlanta

#12 Philadelphia

#13 Washington

#14 Denver

A Word from the Scouts

Nenad Marulic
6’6’’ 197lbs

Position: SF
School: Serbia
The best prospect from Europe in this years NBA draft is Nenad Marulic from Serbia. He played SF/PF positions in his previous club Partizan Belgrad, but most probably he will have to stick with only the Small Forward position in the NBA. He averaged 17,5 points last year, helping his team to be one of the best 8 teams in Euroleague. Marulic is a pretty decent shooter; his biggest strengths are shot blocking and upper body strength, thanks to the Power Forward playing days. He can dribble the ball pretty well too. Aside from his strength, he doesn’t have any other physical gifts, as he is pretty slow and his vertical leap is bad too. And he is a surprisingly bad free throw shooter, but aside of that, you can be sure of his abilities late in the game, as he has saved some games for his old club with clutch shots and blocks.

Projected: 3rd Overall


Terry Keane
6’10’’ 215lbs

Position: PF
School: SE Illinois College
Many says, that he is the best prospect of this draft. Yes, he has some great abilities, like rebounding, inside scoring and he is pretty quick for a big man too. Plus, he will not loose his head late in the game and you can count on his free throw shooting too. But he is not a number one pick material – he has low basketball IQ and his passing is pretty bad too. When he gets the ball, it looks like he will live or die with it, but not throw it to others. It maybe worked in the NCAA, but it will never work in the big League. If he works on this, he would be a good second unit player for a play off team.

Projected: 1st Overall


Oscar Boyd
6’7’’ 227lbs

Position: SF
School: LSU
Boyd is probably the most basketball skilled player in this Draft, but he has some other issues, that could frighten teams to take him. Let’s talk about positives first – he has a good stroke from behind the arc and he is a pretty athletic player too. You will see lots of him in the daily top 10’s. He is fast and he can rebound the ball pretty well. Unfortunately, he is best known for his laziness and bad attitude to training and other team mates. But if can change his attitude, he could be a second or third option on a championship contender team.

Projected: Mid 1st Round


Lorenzo Gray
6’9’’265lbs

Position: PF
School: Iona
Lorenzo Gray is a power forward from Iona College in New York. His biggest strength is his outside shooting and athleticism. But he is often criticized for taking too many jump shots besides for going in the paint. He is a pretty bad rebounder for his position too. However it is believed, that he is the most NBA ready prospect in this year’s draft. He could help a play-off team from the bench already.

Projected: Top 10


Gabriel Kaminski
6’6’’ 261lbs

Position: SF
School: Poland
Gabriel Kaminski is another skilful player in this year’s draft, although there is some doubt that the 22 year old Polish won’t fit the playing style in the NBA. Last year Kaminski was one of the Assecco Prokom leaders last season in Euroleague and Polish league, averaging 15,8 points per game and 2,5 steals per game. He is not the best overall defender, but he has a great stealing ability and he can shoot behind the arc well. He is pretty fast too and, untypical for European players, a good dunker. However, he doesn’t like to pass a lot and sometimes he just quits playing, when things aren’t going the way he would like to.

Projected: Late 1st Round


Pete Cunningham
6’8’’ 227lbs

Position: C
School: Syracuse
An undersize center from the Syracuse University, who is a pretty good rebounder and defender, but that’s it. He is a terrible shooter, he can’t score anything, that’s farther than 2 feet from the rim. To think of it he isn’t such a great scorer in the paint either. The fuss, that is around him these days is only because of his size, which is extremely short for a center position player. If he doesn’t start to progress a lot, he will only be bench player tops.

Projected: Top 10


Luis Lorenzo
6’7’’ 241lbs

Position: PF
School: Syracuse
Another undersized player from Syracuse – power forward Luis Lorenzo. He is often called the Charles Barkley of South America, because of his length and his position. The Puerto Rican is a pretty decent shooter, who can make a basket from behind the arc. Lorenzo is a great dunker and a great offensive threat overall, but he should work on his defense a lot, if he wants to be something in the NBA. However, you can count on him in the last seconds of the game, because he is really clutch and he never gives up.

Projected: Top 10


Tristan Cochrane
6’1’’ 203lbs

Position: PG
School: Arizona State
Tristan Cochrane, born in London, Great Britain, is a score first pass second point guard. He is very athletic and he can finish it at the rim easily. He lacks a consistent outside shot and his playmaking abilities are really questionable. Although, he got his Arizona State University to the Semi Finals of March Madness this year. He has great on and off court leadership skills. But he couldn’t be a starter on a play-off team.

Projected: 2nd Overall

Which one of these future rookies do you plan on drafting?

lol Kaminski's a fatty for a SF his height.

I think Boyd is probably the best guy in this draft.

Lol yeah, as z02 said, 261 is a bit heavy for a small forward! Can't wait for the draft recap.

6'8" center ??? wtf ??
Chuck Hayes No.2

Which one of these future rookies do you plan on drafting?

Well we'll see... I only have the 13th pick so I have to wait and see what other teams pick and hope, that something good will still be there to draft

lol Kaminski's a fatty for a SF his height.

I think Boyd is probably the best guy in this draft.

Yeah, he is kinda fat. As for Boyd, he really looks good, too bad I have no chance to get him

Lol yeah, as z02 said, 261 is a bit heavy for a small forward! Can't wait for the draft recap.

Good food in Poland, I guess There will be some other updates between now and draft recap, so you'll have to wait a bit

6'8" center ??? wtf ??
Chuck Hayes No.2

I don't know, I kinda like it. It will be interesting to see, how he will be doing in the NBA.

Chapter 3

It was the day after the loss against the Knicks, where Wizards lost their chances at playing in the play-offs. Flip Saunders gathered the team for their last meeting before the summer vacation, everybody was here to hear, what their coach had to say. He thanked the players for the good effort this season and
congratulated John Wall on his Rookie of the year award. At the end he said:

“Guys, we had a good run this year, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough for us to end our season in the summer. I hope to see all of you next year more ready and hungrier for success.”

After the coach’s speech players one by one went to the General Manager’s Janis Kalnins’ office. The first one to meet the GM was Yi Jianlian.

“Hello sir,” Yi said entering the room.

“Hi, Yi, sit down, please.” Kalnins said to his power forward, who sat down in the chair on the other side of Kalnins’ desk.

“You’ve had a good year coming off the bench, we really liked your performance,” Kalnins said, “And we would like to offer you a contract renewal, what do you think about that?”

“I appreciate this, but I want to be on a team, where I can start” Yi answered

“Well, you know that we have Andray at the power forward spot too, but if you show the coach, that you are better than him, you will have a good chance to start.”

“It’s not good enough for me, sorry”

***

Next one to come in was John Wall.

“Hello John, sit down please.” Kalnins welcomed his star point guard in his office “Congrats on the Rookie of the Year award”

“Thanks” Wall replied

“This was a good season from you, and I hope you will show even better performance next season”

“I hope too, I’m gonna work hard this summer, to come back even better. I want to help this team to succeed as much as I can”

“It is great to hear that kind of dedication for our organization from you”

“I’m just happy to play here”

Crawford, Blatche, Seraphin and McGee were next ones, who one by one came into Janis Kalnin’s office. All of them claimed that they are happy with the team and ready to play here next year on even better level.

Everything was fine, except Yi’s desire to test the free agency, well, at least it looked fine. The first one to ring the caution bell was Josh Howard, who said he is not going to play in Washington next year.

“I’m sorry to say this, but I won’t play here next season,” he said.

“Why?” Kalnins wanted to know.

“I’m over 30 years know and I want to play for a contender. And as I see it Wizards isn’t one of them.”

Of course Kalnins wasn’t happy about this decision from Josh Howard, but he still had Al Thornton at the small forward, at least he thought he had.

“I want to test free agency,” Thornton said right after he sat down in front of Kalnins, “I want to be a starter, which I wasn’t here, so I’m going to look for a place where I can be that starter.”

“Josh is leaving, so I think there is no problem for you to start here.”

“Did coach said that?”

“Well, he still doesn’t know, that he is leaving.”

“Then I have no guarantees to start here, I will test the free agency. Sorry, there is nothing you can do.”

***

After the meetings with the players, Kalnins called head coach Flips Saunders to his office.

“Hello Flip. Please sit down.”

“Hello, so how did it go? Everyone’s staying?”

“No, Howard is going away and looks like Yi and Thornton too.”

“Well, that’s ok, I actually didn’t see a starters potential in any of them.”

“So you’re ok with this?”

“Well no, we don’t have any small forwards, so I’ll be happy only when you find a couple of those for me.”

“Don’t worry, I have an idea,” after these words Kalnins grabbed his cell phone and dialed.

“Hello, is this Tayshaun Prince’s agent?”

Prince is a nice addition man, go for it

2011 NBA Draft Recap

#1 Houston

PG Tristan Cochrane

This is a reasonable choice for Houston Rockets to take Tristan Cochrane from Arizona State University. With this pick they get insurance on the point guard position, if Aaron Brooks decides to leave Texas via Free Agency. Cochrane may not be as skilled as Terry Keane, who was expected to be taken first, but he is a pretty good fit for the Rockets.

#2 Toronto

C Lateef Dingane

Many Raptors fans around the world sighed, when Toronto picked 7-footer from India Lateef Dingane over Terry Keane with their second pick. Keane would be a good fit for the Raptors, and many people in Canada believed, that he could be their next Bosh. Dingane, on the other hand, could be the biggest disappointment of this draft.

#3 Sacramento

SF Nenad Marulic

No surprises here, the Kings were expected to take the Serbian small forward with the third pick, and they did. Marulic will fit nicely in Sacramento’s system as their back up small forward. And he has a good chance at getting that starting spot from Donte Greene.

#4 Minnesota

PF Terry Keane

Finally, Minnesota picked Terry Keane with the number 4 pick, although he was expected to go first. This is a good pick up for Minnesota, which strengthens their already strong frontcourt of Koufos, Love and Beasley with another potential all-star big man.

#5 New Jersey

PF Lorenzo Gray

New Jersey decided to take another power forward to their roster. The 6’9’’ forward Lorenzo Gray isn’t expected to play much in his first season, because he will have to fight with Favors and Humphries for the minutes at the PF spot.

#6 Memphis

PG Eddie Vinny

Memphis wanted some insurance for their point guard spot, if Mike Conley decides to leave this summer. Unfortunately for them, this draft didn’t have much talent in the point guard position, so Memphis had to take Eddie Vinny from Sweden, who is expected to be a bench player for a play-off team at best.

#7 Golden State

SF Oscar Boyd

Boyd is maybe the most talented player of this draft, but there are doubts about his attitude for work and training. And he has got into some legal troubles during college years. Frightened by these facts, most of the teams wouldn’t take him, but Golden State didn’t get scared, mostly because of their lack of a starting small forward, which they probably have now.

#8 Cleveland

PF Hugo Serrano

This guy isn’t the next LeBron James for Cleveland Cavaliers, heck, he is not even a J.J. Hickson. The 6’9’’ Haitian most probably will play in D-League most of his first season. Cavaliers hope he will progress there, but it is highly unlikely.

#9 Portland

PG Fritz Vega

Portland adds another point guard to their point guard army (they have 5 pg’s now). Fritz Vega isn’t anything special, so he will most probably see only garbage time in his first year at Portland.

#10 Charlotte

SG Angel Pastor

The Brazilian shooting guard Angel Pastor dropped to only 10th spot in this years draft, although he was expected to be taken 5th. Charlotte take him as their second shooting guard and hope, that he can develop and take the starting spot from Stephen Jackson some day.

#11 Atlanta

C Pete Cunningham

Atlanta Hawks takes on the experiment called Pete Cunningham, who is 6’8’’, which is exceptionally small for a center position. But Atlanta needed to take a center, because Al Horford is rumored to try out the free agency this summer.

#12 Philadelphia

SF Gabriel Kaminski

Philly took Polish small forward Gabriel Kaminski, who has already heard criticism for his big weight, with their 12th pick. They clearly went for the best talent here, because they already have Iguodala and Thaddeus Young at the SF spot.

#13 Washington

C Emmanuel Montero

The Wizards went for height with this pick, as Emmanuel Montero is 7’4’’ tall. He is big and strong, but many experts question his basketball abilities both on offense and defense.

#14 Denver

PF Luis Lorenzo

It is surprisingly to see, that Lorenzo is taken only at this stage of the draft, especially because some teams, who drafted higher were looking for a good power forward, which clearly Lorenzo is. He will fit well into Denver’s team and possibly be one of their top young pieces, when and if Anthony is traded.

Good job getting a big man, hope you can make him a decent player !

Good job getting a big man, hope you can make him a decent player !

thanks, I hope too

Prince is a nice addition man, go for it

Which is better: Prince, Battier, Thornton or Howard?

Chapter 4

Janis Kalnins had a meeting scheduled with the board of directors in the next day after the draft ceremony in which the Wizards took Emmanuel Montero and Oskar Cano. So at the next morning Kalnins went to Wizard’s club centre, where the board was already waiting for him.

“Good to meet you Mr. Kalnins, take a seat.” After Kalnins sat down, one of the board members started to ask questions: ”So what are the news from the team, regarding the players we are willing to resign?”

“Well, first of all, Josh Howard announced to me, that he is not interested into playing for us anymore. He wants to be on a championship contender team.”

The board didn’t look much interested into this. “Move on,” said another member of the board.

“Al Thornton won’t resign right away too, he said, he will look for other options and then decide, what to do.”

“Pity, but what about Yi Jianlian?” after this question all board members moved a bit closer to Kalnins to hear what he will say, this was the thing, why they wanted to hear from their General Manager.

“Unfortunately, Yi isn’t going to play for us either.”

“Why? Is it because of money?”

“No, he wants a starting spot, but we have Andray there and…” Kalnins started, but was interrupted by board members: “Screw Blatche, we need Yi on our team. He gives us big time money from the Asian market.”

“But I can’t guarantee Yi a starting spot if coach Saunders won’t give it to him.”

“We will talk with Saunders, you, in the meantime, contact Yi and offer him a starting spot and a good contract, OK?”

Kalnins didn’t look so happy, because he had to take orders about basketball from bunch of old not-knowing-anything-about-basketball crabs, who had dollar bills instead of their eyes.

“Alright, so this would be all?” he said after a moment of silence.

“Yes, thank you for coming Mr. Kalnins, we hope you will get this done.”

***

Although he didn’t like to take basketball related orders from the board, Kalnins called Yi and offered him a contract and a starting spot on the team. He thought, that Yi was a really good player and could be a great starter for the Wiz and Jianlian didn’t have high requirements for his contract so they managed to agree on one pretty quickly.

But know Kalnins had another problem to deal with – what to do with Andray Blatche, who, Kalnins was sure, won’t accept the bench player role. Some teams had already offered a trade for him, the best one thus far was the Oklahoma City offer. They offered James Harden and a first round pick in next years draft for Blatche, but Kalnins was a bit pessimistic of this, because he already had Arenas on SG spot and he wanted to get a starter for Blatche, preferably a small forward. Washington’s only small forward at this time was rookie Oscar Cano, who clearly wasn’t good enough to even come from the bench for a NBA team.

Things in the free agency weren’t looking good either for Janis and the Wizards team. Tayshaun Prince tended to take some other teams offer if Washington wouldn’t offer him more money, so Kalnins started to look for a “plan B” at the starting Small Forward position. Josh Howard was still certain, that he wanted to play for a contender and said, that he had some good offers, although it was rumored, that he is asking an unreasonably high salary. Al Thornton said, that he will take a look at Wizards offer and make a call if he decides to stay.

Kalnins had another player he was negotiating at the moment, a great defensive specialist - Shane Battier. Coach Saunders had high expectations on this player because of his defense: “Janis, guys like these make the team to play on the court, guys like these does the little things, that do not appear on statistics, but which are extremely important for every team,” he said the other day. So Kalnins decided to invite Battier to Washington to show him the training centre and maybe pursue him to sign the contract.

So a couple of days after Battier came to Washington to see Kalnins in person. The start of this meeting went pretty good, Battier liked the training centre, then he had a talk with Saunders and they had a similar opinion about how the game should be played, which was really good. But at the end, when Kalnins tried to convince Battier to sign a contract, he said: “Everything here looks good, the money on contract is good too, but I don’t think this is the right place for me, sorry, but I just don’t feel it.”

After that Kalnins walked Battier to a car, which drove him to the airport. Although, Battier didn’t take his offer, Kalnins didn’t look sad at all. He took his cell phone and dialed: “Hey, what’s up!” he said to the person on the other side of the phone, “he didn’t accept,” other person asked something and he answered, “Yes.” After this Kalnins hang up and went back to his office.

After just couple of days Wizards GM got a phone call: “Hello, Janis, let’s make a deal.”

Yi signs a 5-year deal with Wizards

Washington Wizards announced today, that they have re-signed their 7-footer from China Yi Jianlian for five more years. The deal is worth approximately 37,5 millions, so Yi will earn an average of 7,5 million each of these five years.

“We are happy to reach an agreement on contract with him,” said Wizards GM Janis Kalnins, “Yi gave us a spark from bench last season and we don’t want to loose it.” When asked, whether Yi will get a starting spot this year, Kalnins just answered:”No comments.”

It was rumored, that Yi will sign a deal with Wizards only if they promise him the starting power forward spot. Now, when they have agreed on contract, we can assume that Yi got what he wanted and could this mean the end of Andray Blatche’s time in Washington? “Andray is a great player and a good teammate, we are not looking to deal him,” said Janis Kalnins, when asked about this.

Thornton, Wizards agreed on a sign and trade?

Al Thornton, a 5 year pro, decided to test the free agency market this summer and not re-sign with the Washington Wizards. There are rumors swirling around the league, that Thornton has found a new team to play for – San Antonio Spurs. However, Spurs don’t have any cap space to sign Thornton so they’ll have to work out a sign and trade with the Wizards.

San Antonio are believed to offer Thiago Splitter as the centre piece to trade for Al Thornton, who could replace Richard Jefferson, who was traded away last season, on the Spurs starting line up. This sounds realistic, because aside from small forward position, the next position Wizards are looking to improve is the center position.

However, Janis Kalnins, the GM of Wizards, says he isn’t in any talks of signing and trading Al Thornton: “Sign and trade? We aren’t looking at it right now, we still hope Al joins our team for the next season.” We should see how this works out in the next few weeks.

Do it man! Splitter would be a great addition. He rocks in 2k11

Do it man! Splitter would be a great addition. He rocks in 2k11

He is good, but I will most probably go with another offer

Free Agency 2011: What to expect?

This year’s free agency doesn’t include such a big names as LeBron James, Chris Bosh or Dwyane Wade, but it has some interesting players on it like Steve Nash, Al Horford, Tayshaun Prince and many players that maybe aren’t big time stars, but certainly good starters for any team.

The main question of this summer is: where will Steve Nash’s next and probably last stop be? Memphis, Denver and Oklahoma City are the top 3 candidates to get Nash. Toronto could be in this race too, because Canadian Steve Nash would like to end his career in Canada, but it is doubtful, that he would go to such a bad team as Toronto is now.

Denver is the most desperate, out of these three, to sign Nash, because they failed to re-sign Kenyon Martin, J.R. Smith and Ty Lawson and probably will loose all of them on free agency. With Lawson gone and Billups traded away last season, Denver has a big gap on the point guard position, and they could use the future hall of famer there. Denver has a lot of talent for Nash to play with, starting with Carmelo Anthony and Danny Granger and ending with Nene Hilario, Chris Andersen and even rookie Luis Lorenzo. If they add Nash, they would be a contender to go all the way this year, despite of missing the play-offs last season.

Another great destination for Nash would be Oklahoma City Thunder, who are looking to strengthen up after a disappointing first round exit from the play-offs last season. Nash, with no doubt, would make an exciting core with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook. Only thing that could take back the Thunder to sign Nash is that Westbrook most probably would need to slide to the shooting guard position. Another plus for Oklahoma is that they have a cap space to sign another star player besides Nash, although there isn’t much of a talent to choose from. Prince, Horford and Kenyon Martin tops the list of other free agents available. The Thunder most probably would go for Horford or Martin to strengthen their front court, because their outside would be more than solid with Durant, Westbrook and Nash starting.

The third contender for Nash are the Memphis Grizzlies, who failed to re-sign Michael Conley and are now looking for another point guard. They have an interesting young core including Gay, Mayo and Marc Gasol, but they aren’t ready to win now, and Nash most probably would want to go to a team, which can be a championship contender right now. However Memphis have the cap space to get another top player from free agency so that Nash would be more interested to go there.

Let’s move to other big names in this summer’s free agent pool, like Tayshaun Prince, Al Horford, Kenyon Martin and Josh Howard.

Tayshaun Prince’s most probable destinations are Washington and Oklahoma City. The Wizards are in a serious need for a starting small forward and Prince is the best option available on the market. He would fit Flip Saunders systems very well, especially because he has already played for him during the days in Detroit Pistons. Oklahoma City on the other hand are looking for another star player to include into their line up to convince Nash to join the Thunder.

Al Horford most probably will sign with the Sacramento Kings, because they are willing to give him the most money and have promised him to play him as a power forward, which, as many think, is Horford’s natural position in the NBA. Sacramento gets another young star to add to their roster besides Evans and Cousins in this deal. And the Horfod-Cousins frontcourt should be a threat it he League couple of years from now.

Kenyon Martin, Josh Howard thus both being high caliber veteran players are looking to different directions. Howard seeks a team, which could be a contender this and upcoming years, but Martin, on the other hand, is willing to get the best contract available and isn’t afraid of going to Europe, if he doesn’t get one in the NBA.


Free Agent Class of 2011 (mention worthy members):

R. Alston
K. Azubuike
R. Beaubois
M. Belinelli
A. Brooks
O. Casspi
T. Chandler
M. Conley
J. Crawford
S. Dalembert
T. Ford
J. Green
S. Hawes
J. Hill
J. Holiday
J. Howard
A. Horford
T. Lawson
K. Martin
E. Maynor
S. Nash
J. Noah
M. Okur
L. Powe
T. Prince
J. R. Smith
R. Stuckey
S. Telfair
A. Thornton
V. Wafer
C. Wilcox