No Leadership in Washington

In the city where our leaders congregate to handle matters of national importance, it’s funny to note the lack of leadership coming from the team that calls Washington, DC its home. From the starters to the last man off the bench to the Washington Wizards’ coaching staff, no one on this team seems to know which direction this team is headed or needs to go for that matter.

There is definitely no leadership on the floor. The Wizards drafted John Wall with the first overall pick last year expecting him to provide the type of floor leadership they didn’t get from former starter Gilbert Arenas.

Now Wall did play well as a rookie. He averaged 16.4 points, 8.3 assists and 1.8 steals. This season though, Wall has taken a major step backwards.

So far this year Wall’s scoring has dropped to 13.4 points-per-game, his assists are down to 7.1 per game and his steals are down also. What’s most telling about his declining play this season though is his poor shooting.

Wall wasn’t a very good shooter last season shooting only 40.9% but this year his percentage has dropped to 33.8%. On top of that he hasn’t hit a single three-pointer this season.

But Wall isn’t the only culprit who is playing badly this year. Only one of Washington’s top six scorers is shooting above 40% this season and that is center JaVale McGee.

The regression of Washington’s young stars should come as no surprise though when you look at coach Flip Saunders’s coaching career. In previous coaching gigs with both the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Detroit Pistons, Saunders had his best seasons with veteran rosters.

Kevin Garnett is the only young player to successfully develop under Saunders in the 15 years he has coached in the league and to be honest, most of Garnett’s development can be traced to his playing with veteran Sam Mitchell during the first seven seasons of his career.

Mitchell took Garnett under his wing when a young Garnett arrived in Minnesota straight out of high school and mentored him on the finer points of the game. He also showed Garnett how to conduct himself off the court and was a good influence on him offsetting the destructive presence of Isaiah Rider who was also with the Timberwolves when Garnett arrived.

Saunders would see a lot of talented young players come through Minnesota and led the Timberwolves to the playoffs eight straight years while coaching there. He would be unable to get them past the first round though until veterans Latrell Spreewell and Sam Cassell came to the team in 2003. Things would fall apart the next season and he would be fired by general manager Kevin McHale.

He then got to take over the Pistons the year after Larry Brown left having taken Detroit to two straight appearances in the NBA Finals. Saunders took that veteran Pistons squad to three straight Eastern Conference Finals appearances but they would lose all three.

Too bad the Wizards don’t have the kind of veteran leadership Saunders has had with those previous teams. Sure they have a few guys on the roster like Roger Mason, Rashard Lewis and Ronny Turiaf that have been with championship caliber teams but neither one of these guys can provide the type of mentoring needed to help this team develop.

Which means the Wizards young core of Wall, McGee, Nick Young, Jordan Crawford and Andre Blatche will just have to figure things out on their own. With a 1-9 record so far this season, someone definitely needs to step up and fill the leadership void this Wizards team is so sorely lacking because if the Wizards don’t start to show some improvement soon then Saunders won’t be finishing the season in Washington. 

Roosevelt Hall is an NBA Blogger for The Sport Mentalist 2 and also writes for Shatter The Backboard. He can be contacted at RHall@shatterthebackboard.com. Follow him on Twitter @sportmentalist.