Can the Wizards fix this new level of dysfunction?
The Washington Wizards recovered Sunday against a very bad New York Knicks team -- a home game they had to have, and one that had the organization on edge -- behind better effort, welcome rebounding from Dwight Howard and a nearly peak John Wall performance. Good thing, because the Wizards have almost no method beyond those of extricating themselves from whatever self-imposed morass they have plunged into. They must continue digging; their next six games all come against sub.-500 teams before the schedule turns hellacious again.cheap nfl nike jerseys from china
It's hard to remember now, amid the melodrama and backbiting, but the past half-decade has been a boom time for one of the league's saddest franchises.
Between 1982 and 2014, the Bullets/Wizards won one playoff series. In 2014, they bullied the Tom Thibodeau Chicago Bulls in the first round before falling to the Indiana Pacers in a spirited six games.
That playoff run served as a coming-out party for Bradley Beal. He looked comfortable running the pick-and-roll and siphoned much of the crunch-time offense from Wall. The young guards seemed to welcome postseason pressure -- to thrive under it. It was exciting.nike nfl jerseys cheap china
Trevor Ariza smothered Chicago in that first-round series. Seven weeks later, the Wizards signed-and-traded Ariza to the Houston Rockets on a four-year, $32 million deal. Washington could have outbid Houston; Ariza had emerged as an indispensable 3-and-D player. But it had Otto Porter Jr. waiting as a cheaper replacement. It was hoarding cap space for a run at Kevin Durant. #KDtoDC was a thing, and it didn't seem that ridiculous.
Washington signed Paul Pierce as a stopgap. After a desultory 2014-15 regular season, everything came together in the playoffs. The Eastern Conference has a way of facilitating well-timed cohesion.
Washington swept the dinged-up Toronto Raptors, nearly costing Dwane Casey his job and kicking off four years of debate within the team about busting up its core.
Washington split the first two games against the 60-win Atlanta Hawks in the second round, even though Wall broke five bones in his left wrist at the end of Game 1. Pierce later "called game," and the Wizards led Atlanta 2-1 before sputtering without a healthy Wall.
They might have advanced to the conference finals if not for Wall's injury. The Hawks absolutely feared, or at least respected, the Beal-Wall duo. Those playoffs served as Porter's coming-out party. He enveloped DeMar DeRozan and scavenged open 3-pointers and baseline garbage buckets -- the perfect third banana.
