The NBA’s trade deadline is just a week away, and practically every team will be looking to improve its roster or its payroll over the All-Star break. Many of the media reports will come from the perspective of the teams and the executives in charge of making the trades, and few will detail how the players manage, cope and deal with being the subjects of these rumors and reports. Over the last few weeks, SheridanHoops spoke with nine NBA players on six different teams,
After the Washington Wizards ended a season-high five-game losing streak Saturday with a 37-point victory over the Brooklyn Nets, Marcin Gortat wasn’t quite ready to declare that their earth was back on its axis. “At the end of the day, it was Brooklyn, so we can’t get really excited,” he said. There’s nothing like perspective. And Gortat is right: One win against a plodding, tired team is nothing to get excited about. What the Wizards should be is concerned. Prior to the win
When Paul Pierce signed with the Washington Wizards on July 11, it seemed like Washington downgraded from Trevor Ariza, who departed to Houston. Two months into the season, it’s time for a fresh look. In our own free agency tracker, there were not kind words for the aging Pierce. “And while this may seem like a fine consolation prize for Ernie Grunfeld and Randy Wittman, anybody in Boston or Brooklyn who has been watching Pierce closely for the past two years
A year can make an enormous difference in the perception of an NBA team. Last summer, the Washington Wizards had the same backcourt of John Wall and Bradley Beal but they were faced with immense pressure of having to make the playoffs to save the jobs of head coach Randy Wittman and general manager Ernie Grunfeld. Before the season began, Grunfeld made what many perceived as a panicky move and sent its first round pick to Phoenix for Marcin Gortat, who was
Nothing in the NBA playoffs is going like it’s supposed to. The Pacers look like they’re all done, the Spurs struggled to get past the Mavs, the Warriors-Clippers game was a mess of missed free throws and turnovers, the Wizards are winning games… yeah, it’s a little weird. Of course, we’re only one game in. There’s going to be lots more. But right now, if I were a Pacers fan, I’d be worried. Losing to a Hawks team without Al Horford,
I had boatloads of schoolwork to finish (one more week!), so I didn’t get to watch any of the NCAA tournament games before the last one of the night, which hasn’t been a great contest. [Read more…]
A look at the overall NBA standings shows four teams at the top – Indiana, Oklahoma City, San Antonio and Miami – separated by one game in the loss column. In fact, they were dead even until three of them lost Sunday. Just a notch below them are three more teams – Houston, the Los Angeles Clippers and Portland – separated by two games in the loss column. They also would have been dead even had the Blazers held
If you were hoping for a blockbuster, “Woj Bomb” type of trade on Thursday, you were out of luck. The trade deadline came and went on Thursday without any real stars packing their bags, but plenty of teams made relevant moves throughout the day to bolster their franchises in some way. Our Chris Sheridan has the trade analysis of all the deals, but you can find more on everything that went down and everything else that fell through below. [Read more…]