Screw Defense

22Nov07

Here is Micheal Wilbon discussing what the Wizards will do now that Gilbert Arenas is out for 3 months.

Wizards fans weren’t nearly as giddy as they should have been when Ernie Grunfeld drafted Nick Young in the first round in June, perhaps because they never saw him play at Southern Cal. I thought it was a fabulous selection because Young, at least in college, showed he could do one thing great: score. The kid can flat-out fill it up. And with Arenas deciding he wanted to test the free agent waters, why not take a kid you could groom to take up some of the scoring load if Arenas left? Suppose you wanted to consider a trade?

Coaches and former coaches will look at Young right now and tell you everything he can’t do, like defend or handle the ball efficiently or make good decisions on the fly. All that’s true. He’s a rookie, not a franchise player.

I just want to say that I seriously think according to your average NBA analyst 90% of NBA players are below average defensively. In fact other then the Spurs you never hear anything positive about any team’s ability to play defense. When Larry Brown was in the league the fact his team’s could (sometimes) play really good defense seemed to make everyone forgot how badly he failed other basic coaching responsibilities, like completing his contract or not planning his departure from his team while they were trying to win a championship.

Defense will sometimes when you championships, but it will always win you the theoretical praise of basketball pundits.

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Tags: Larry Brown, Nick Young, Wizards