Washington Wizards: The Magic Is Gone for Awful Wizards

Washington D.C. fancies itself as a basketball town, and in a way it is.

Thanks to perennial powers Georgetown and Maryland, the nation’s capital is only a college basketball town, because no professional basketball has been played within the district for a long time.

The Washington Wizards may be part of the NBA, but are not a pro basketball franchise. They’re a joke. Andray Blatche is their captain, and who among us wouldn’t be inspired by the tireless professionalism of 7-Day Dray,  a man who recently was called for goaltending a free throw.

And that’s just the start of things.

Entering Friday’s game against the New York Knicks, the Wizards are the league’s lone winless outfit. Washington’s impotent offense manages a dismal 85.2 points per game, the second worst total in the league. Five college basketball teams (North Carolina, Missouri, Virginia Military Institute, Iona and Florida) average more in a 40-minute game.

On the flip side, John Wall, Blatche and company allow 98.3 points a night, good for 25th. The Wizards' 13.1 point deficiency only betters that of the train wreck New Jersey Nets, who defeated Washington for their lone win.

As for Wall, he’s regressing. The former No. 1 overall pick is shooting a putrid 32.9 percent from the floor, a full 8.0 points below his rookie tally. His free-throw percentage is also down from 76.6 to 70.5. Needless to say, the franchise’s cornerstone's production has dropped from 16.4 to 13. 8 points a game. Assists have also slipped from 8.3 to 6.5.

Wall’s age (21) is no excuse. Fellow John Calipari one-and-down protégé Derek Rose led his team to the playoffs (in case you didn’t know, Wizards, the playoffs occur after the regular season and determine the NBA champion—they’re something you may want to look into) as a 21-year-old and was named M.V.P. last season while guiding Chicago to the best record in the league and the Eastern Conference Finals.

To be fair Wall’s supporting cast doesn’t compare to Rose’s, which, before last season, wasn’t particularly impressive. Longtime general manager Ernie Grunfeld, who signed an injured Gilbert Arenas to a contract equal to the gross domestic product of a small country, and head coach Flip Saunders, who must think the conference finals are the end of the postseason, have done a horrific job piecing together their team. When Javale McGee, who got totally punked by Dwight Howard the other night, is your best asset, you’ve failed.

The Wizards' new throwback-inspired treads may seem appealing, but they’re not. On a recent episode of The Tony Kornheiser Show, contributor Torie Clarke suggested that the team begin staging games by premier local high school outfits as an appetizer to that night’s NBA entrée.  

The problem is that the high school teams are probably better than their hosts.