Blatche continues to embarrass himself, Wizards

I'll admit it: I'm not Andray Blatche's biggest fan -- far from it. And I'm certainly not alone. Blatche, now in his sixth NBA season, has shown flashes of improved play at times in his career, but he hasn't progressed to the point where most Wizards fans hoped he would be. At 24, he's still a young guy. But he hasn't been able to stop creating controversy off the court. If he was making tremendous strides on the court, his whole act may be worth overlooking at times. Unfortunately, that's not the case. (More on that below.)

The latest distraction involves Blatche's misadventures on Twitter. Blatche apparently got into several recent arguments with fans on Twitter, including an offer to let his fists do the talking instead.

Here's the latest, according to Michael Lee of The Washington Post (first link above):

After making comments about being able to "buy and sell" someone and calling people who make threats on the Internet "punks," Blatche allegedly tweeted: "ok let's do this so everyone can see wat u bout let's meet n dc saturday after my game." Another tweet on his account read, "like I said I'm done with this fake internet thing if you wanna see meet me saturday after game I can throw these things homie"

Those tweets no longer appear on Blatche's Verified Account, but he wrote this morning that his account was hacked, "If anyone really thinks that was me responding yesterday is crazy I just heard of this this morning."

He later added, "i would like for everyone to use there brain for a moment im hardly on here why would i wanna be on twitter in miami i tweeted 33 things"

That's right, the old "someone hacked my account" excuse. It's not the first time someone's used that explanation, and it won't be the last. Lee also noted that the Wizards are siding with Blatche on the matter and won't take any disciplinary action. That's not shocking either.

What is shocking, though, is that Blatche keeps finding himself in the middle of foolish stories like these. Really, this is one of the more harmless things Blatche has done (and there have been plenty), but he never seems to be able to avoid getting involved in the first place. Blatche says that it wasn't him arguing with fans and challenging them to fight, but this is also the same guy who listens to sports talk radio and will actually call in when fans are criticizing his play. If Blatche is going to be passionate about his play off the court, then he should be the same guy on the court too. It would be nice if he worried more about defending the paint than defending his subpar play. I'm not suggesting that he doesn't give maximum effort during games, but it would be nice to see a steady progression in his game. And that hasn't occurred.

Right now, Blatche is averaging a career best 15.9 points and 7.9 rebounds per game. He's also doing that while playing the most minutes of his career, over 34 minutes per game (nearly seven more per game than last season). Unfortunately, Blatche is doing so while also taking more shots per game (14.7) and shooting a lower percentage from the field (43.1 percent). For a guy who's not a very good defender, that's just not going to get the job done.

For comparison's sake, Blatche is currently 14th among power forwards in terms of scoring. There are plenty of talented players above Blatche, obviously, such as Amare Stoudemire, Blake Griffin, Dirk Nowitzki, LaMarcus Aldridge, Kevin Love, etc.; you get the idea. As you'd expect, those guys are much more efficient than Blatche and make more of their shots. In fact, the only power forward above Blatche who shoots a lower percentage is, fittingly, Antawn Jamison (17.9 points, 42.7 percent shooting). That's not to say that Blatche doesn't have talent -- he does, but just not as much as most fans thought. (For what it's worth, Love takes nearly the same amount of shots per game (14.6) and averages 20.9 points. Just saying.)

It's one thing for a bad team to just be bad. And yes, the Wizards have that part covered. But it's a whole different level of embarrassment when players are mentioned in the news for off-the-court nonsense that is entirely avoidable. The disappointing aspect to all this, which I mentioned a few times, is that Blatche has the talent to be a solid player. He's not a total stiff. But he hasn't always seemed completely dedicated to his craft. It's sad that a guy with great physical gifts would be more worried about fans' criticisms and smack talk rather than putting in extra work and proving them wrong.

And it's not that this story makes me think any different of Blatche or paints him in a different light. I think most people who heard about what Blatche did (or may have done) didn't find it surprising at all and probably just nodded their collective heads. But incidents like these are just more of the same for Blatche, who keeps demonstrating that he is not a player who will be on this team when it starts winning again -- let alone be a guy who, along with John Wall, the Wizards can build the team around.

Considering that Blatche signed a five-year, $35 million extension before the season, that's a bit disconcerting. Scratch that, it's very disconcerting.

Randy Winn is not an 'intriguing option' for O's

I'm sure Randy Winn is a nice guy. But on what planet does he present an "intriguing option" for the Orioles?

Winn is 36 and is coming off arguably his worst season, one in which he started with the Yankees and finished with the Cardinals. He hit a combined .239/.307/.356, and according to FanGraphs, had a -0.4 WAR. Normally a solid outfielder, Winn also finished with a -6.6 UZR while splitting time between all three outfield positions.

Clearly, the linked piece above is supposed to be a nice write-up of a veteran trying to make the O's roster. And that's fine. But the O's already have Felix Pie and Nolan Reimold as potential fourth outfielder/bench options, and one of them is already facing the likelihood of not being on the team on opening day. Both players are younger and better than Winn, and there's no question that one of them (or both) should make the roster over him.

Winn may still have the ability to end up on an MLB roster. Players get injured all the time, and Winn wouldn't be the worst fill-in outfielder that's out there. But for now, there's no place on the O's roster for Winn, and it's really not that intriguing.

Balanced effort leads Maryland over Florida St.

It wasn't the prettiest performance -- especially with the way Maryland ended the first half -- but the Terps got a much-needed, 78-62 win over Florida St. With the win, the Terps improve to 7-6 in the ACC and 18-10 overall.

Five Terps -- Terrell Stoglin (17), Dino Gregory (14), Adrian Bowie (12), Jordan Williams (11), and Sean Mosley (10) -- scored in double figures, and Maryland shot over 52 percent from the field while holding the Seminoles to 43.4 percent shooting. Both teams turned the ball over a bunch (17 for Florida St., 16 for Maryland), but Maryland won the rebounding battle by a 29-26 margin, made 10 more free throws, and made two more three-pointers. Williams had another double-double, adding 11 rebounds to his 11 points. Gregory collected eight rebounds as well, but no other Terp grabbed more than three. Stoglin also dished out four assists, extending his streak of games with at least 14 points and four assists to five.

For Maryland, though, the story of the second half was defense. After getting complacent in its 1-2-2 (or 3-2) zone in the first half and letting Florida St. back in the game -- the Terps led 38-37 at halftime -- Maryland played hard-nosed, man-to-man defense in the second half and completely shut down Florida St.'s attack. The Seminoles aren't a great offensive team and obviously miss Chris Singleton, their best player, so the Terps tightened the screws in the second half and only allowed 25 points.

The Terps have three ACC games remaining, and they could really use wins in all three. Their next two games are on the road -- at North Carolina and Miami -- before coming home and ending the season against Virginia. Getting to 10 wins in the conference would be huge -- definitely difficult, but huge -- and it's probably something the Terps would need anyway as a starting point to build an NCAA Tournament resume. Anything less than that will likely mean an NIT Tournament invitation (barring an unforeseen run in the ACC Tournament).

(Quick note: Where were all the fans last night? I can't remember seeing a Maryland home ACC game with so many empty seats, and it looked like most of the empty seats were in the students' section (not completely sure though). I know this isn't the best Maryland team of all time, but they're still a pretty exciting team and deserve an amped-up crowd cheering them on.)

McGee finishes second in dunk contest, still wows fans

JaVale McGee may or may not be a player on the rise. He may never learn to play better defense or harness his freakish athleticism. And no, he didn't finish first in tonight's dunk contest because he didn't dunk over a Kia.

But for one night, McGee put on an impressive performance on a national stage, and even though he didn't win, he certainly did not fail to entertain. Just check out these two amazing dunks by McGee, the first of which (the two-basket dunk) may have been the best dunk of the entire competition.

Another close loss may signal youth movement for Terps

Watching the Terps this season has been difficult. They always play hard and rarely get blown out, but it's obvious that they're missing something -- maybe a scorer or a glue guy, but probably a dead-eye shooter or two.

After their most recent game, a 91-83 loss to Virginia Tech, the Terps dropped to 16-10 and 5-6 in the ACC. Tech's Erick Green hit a couple of key threes down the stretch to pull away, and Maryland struggled to answer back. Overall, the Terps shot over 49 percent from the field and made 21 of 24 free throws (a significant achievement for this group), but Virginia Tech hit more timely threes, grabbed 11 offensive rebounds (including several down the stretch), and forced 15 Maryland turnovers. Their zone also made Jordan Williams have to work extra hard to get the ball, and only a few of his points came easily. He didn't have one of his more efficient games, but he did still have 16 points and nine rebounds.

One odd thing about yesterday's game was how much Virginia Tech's starters played. Each was on the floor for more than 31 minutes, and their starters scored 88 of their 91 total points. Only three bench guys got on the floor, and none of them had a field goal.

Most of Maryland's losses this season mirror this one -- enough skills and heart to hang with a talented team, but just not enough to finish the job. Remember these?

L vs. Pittsburgh, 79-70
L vs. Illinois, 80-76
L vs. Temple, 64-61
L vs. Boston College, 79-75
L vs. Duke, 71-64
L vs. Villanova, 74-66
L vs. Virginia Tech, 74-57
L vs. Duke, 80-62
L vs. Boston College, 76-72

Only the two games in bold could be described as blowouts, and Maryland still had a chance at some point (small or not) in each of those games.

With Maryland's NCAA Tournament hopes fading with each loss, it's time to start Pe'Shon Howard and Terrell Stoglin. The most disappointing Terps this season have probably been Adrian Bowie and Cliff Tucker, so it's time for the freshmen to show what they can do in the last few games of the season (though they still play a lot of minutes regardless). Bowie and Tucker have been too inconsistent; maybe they're just not that good and never really should have been expected to provide much. Stoglin just had his best game of the season, scoring 25 points and dishing out six assists. He plays a little quicker -- and more out of control -- than Howard, but as he showed yesterday, when he pushes the ball he can make some things happen (both good and bad). Howard has also had a few solid games in a row and even hit four threes against Boston College.

More minutes for Howard and Stoglin (and probably Haukur Palsson and James Padgett) seems like a good idea to start laying the groundwork for next season's team. Not only that, though, but they (particularly Stoglin and Howard) may present the best chance for Maryland to win regardless. Gary Williams has likely recognized that already, though, and that's why the two have been getting more crunch-time minutes. Too bad neither guy is a sharpshooter -- at least not at the moment.

Wall not doing enough, according to LZ Granderson

In a recent ESPN article titled "NBA rookie class: Worst in a decade?" LZ Granderson praises Blake Griffin while criticizing many highly drafted rookies from the 2010 NBA Draft. Granderson even took a shot at John Wall:

Top pick Wall has all the talent to develop into the next great point guard and is in the top 10 in assists. But as of now he's a player averaging 14.8 ppg on 40 percent shooting on a sub-.300 team, and the Washington Wizards pretty much have the same record they had a year ago.

All of those things are true, and yet it just doesn't seem fair. First of all, Wall isn't just top 10 in assists -- he's sixth, with 8.9 assists per game. The next closest rookie is Eric Bledsoe, who's averaging 3.9 assists per game.

Granderson's point about shooting better is valid; everyone, including Wall himself, knows that he needs to be more efficient and make more of his shots. That was one of the main concerns about Wall when he left Kentucky -- he would need to improve his jumper. However, Granderson fails to mention that NBA rookies (primarily point guards) don't generally put up the kind of numbers that Wall is. In fact, only two other rookies have ever put up seasons with at least 14 points and 8.9 assists per game: Oscar Robertson and Damon Stoudamire. Wall still has part of the season to go, but I'd still say that that's rather impressive.

Is it a shame that the Wizards (14-38) aren't winning more games? Yes, definitely. But Wall doesn't exactly have a ton of talent around him, and it's hard to place a large share of the blame on the rookie's shoulders. He's still having a pretty excellent season, though apparently that's not good enough for Granderson.

O's, MacPhail have busy week

If you've been seeking out Orioles-related content the past week or so, you've had a lot to choose from. There's been a lot of discussion about how effective the O's efforts this offseason have been -- some good, some bad. But the O's were mentioned a lot this week, and not all of it had to do with the team.

O's receive criticism for offseason moves

The Vladimir Guerrero signing was the last major move by Andy MacPhail and the O's front office. It was also the most widely panned. Two of the most vocal critics of the O's moves are two highly regarded baseball analysts: Keith Law and Rob Neyer.

On Thursday, MASN's Steve Melewski posted much of an interview he had with Law, who didn't hold back when it came to his opinion of what the O's were/are doing. Here are a few of his comments from the piece:

"The Orioles are not a club right now that is adding young talent, they have added veteran players to the roster. I don't get it, they are not winning 85 games this year and even if they did, what is that going to buy them? A couple extra fans in the seats? It won't put them in the playoffs," Law said.

"Vlad Guerrero, if he's not toast, he's in the toaster. It doesn't make sense to acquire players like that. I understand (Nolan) Reimold had a bad year last year and Felix Pie is a flawed player. But, they cost you nothing and they have some talent. It's possible that one of those guys will actually develop into a solid big leaguer. You will never find that out if you send them back to Triple-A."

There's much more in the entire interview, including more criticism of the Guerrero and Mark Reynolds moves, his opinion that the O's should invest more money in player development, and Law's belief that the O's should fully commit to a youth movement instead of this season's approach.

As expected, many MASN commenters weren't happy with Law's comments, and some figured that he must have some kind of anti-Orioles bias for not drinking the MacPhail Kool-Aid. Much of that uproar caused Melewski to write another post on the topic, in which he noted that he didn't include every single comment from his interview with Law. Melewski also made a few points of his own at the end of the post about the team's general direction.

Law's comments were harsh, but Neyer has been critical too -- mostly of the Guerrero signing:

And finally, let me address my all-time least favorite argument in favor of moves like this: "Hey, they have to spend the money somewhere, don't they?"

Yes, they do. Or rather, they should. But they don't have to spend it here. Every year, teams don't sign draft picks because they don't want to spend the money. Or don't even draft someone because the asking price will be too high. But that's just the stuff we know about. Do you have any idea how many teen-aged Dominicans and Venezuelans you can sign for $8 million?

I don't know, either. A lot.

If you were making a list of the things that a team like the Orioles should not do, spending $8 million on a player like Vladimir Guerrero is really close to the top.

Hey, I might be wrong. Probably not, though.

Again, Neyer, like Law, brings up many fair points. Neyer also answered a few questions from Camden Chat, which included his take that "reaching .500 is a lot less important than assembling the pieces that might eventually lead to 90 wins (rather than 81)" -- I believe most O's fans would agree with that.

Many fans are upset with the criticism because they believe the team is headed in the right direction for once. It's tough to stomach that two of the most respected baseball writers in the business aren't completely on board with what the O's have have been doing.

Still, they are just two opinions -- well respected or not -- but they're not the only ones who have opinions on the team's moves. Here's what Craig Calcaterra of Hardball Talk (also a respected name) thinks of what the O's have done:

I would agree with Keith that the incremental improvements the O’s made this winter aren’t the things long-term plans are made of. But that’s only bad if the moves foreclose the possibility of making the sorts of changes that do fit in a sound long term plan. In the meantime, there is some value to making the team into one that fans who watch 100 games a year can better stomach than the version they’ve watched the past few years. Derrek Lee, Vlad Guerrero and Mark Reynolds aren’t going to be a part of the next contending Orioles team, but they are far more easy to stomach than the guys they’ve trotted out recently.

And more importantly, they aren’t preventing that next contending Orioles team from coming together.

I'm not really a big fan of the Guerrero signing, but I still tend to look at the overall picture much like Calcaterra. But everyone is entitled to their opinion; the only thing that matters is what happens on the field.

Guthrie and Scott sign one-year deals

The O's avoided arbitration with their last two arbitration-eligible players, agreeing to deals with Luke Scott and Jeremy Guthrie. Scott signed a one-year, $6.4 million deal, and Guthrie agreed to a one-year, $5.75 million deal. Unlike the Guerrero deal, there's no controversy surrounding these agreements.

MacPhail's take on the A-Rod contract

Speaking to law students at the Baltimore School of Law on Thursday, MacPhail, answering a question, offered his opinion on what he thought was the worst free agent signing in baseball history:

"Alex Rodriguez to Texas was the worst signing in the history of baseball in my view," MacPhail said, according to The Baltimore Sun. "Why? Because he played as well as you can possibly ask the kid to play. He had great years. And the needle didn't move at all. ... The team didn't improve. Attendance didn't go up. But hey, they got the lead story on ESPN. Well, if that's what motivates you, you're going down the wrong path. You want to put 35,000 people in the ballpark, win the games. That's what (fans) are there to see. That's what the Orioles need—to win some games."

MacPhail's comments made the rounds, and most people vehemently disagreed. FanGraphs' Dave Cameron probably wrote the most thorough refutation, in which he argued that Rodriguez's contract was a pretty good deal for the Rangers. Here is his conclusion:

Alex Rodriguez’s first contract was far from the worst deal in baseball history. In fact, given his performance in the years after he signed the deal, Rodriguez was actually worth the money he was paid. Unfortunately, the narrative of the deal lives on, despite all the illogical hula hoops you have to jump through in order to reach the conclusion that MacPhail suggested yesterday. Don’t believe the hype; A-Rod was not the cause of the Rangers failures, and the contract they signed him to was actually a wise investment. The problem is that was the only good investment that franchise made in those three years.

Neyer and Calcaterra also offered their takes, along with plenty of others. Is MacPhail wrong? Probably. But is he entitled to his opinion? Of course. It's pretty funny, though, that his comments about the A-Rod contract are being talked about right now considering that he just signed Guerrero to an $8 million deal.

Ernie Tyler passes away

Ernie Tyler, the Orioles' umpires' assistant for many, many years, passed away on Thursday night. He was 86. I could post a ton of glowing quotes and anecdotes about Tyler, but I'll just go with this awesome feat:

A local legend, Tyler once worked 3,819 consecutive home games at Memorial Stadium and Camden Yards, from Opening Day 1960 to July 27, 2007. His streak, which included 3,769 consecutive regular-season games, 40 post-season games and nine exhibitions, ended when he accepted an invitation from Cal Ripken Jr. to attend Ripken’s Hall of Fame induction in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Simply amazing. For more on Tyler, check out these articles. Rest in peace, Ernie.

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Didn't mean to end on a sad note, but that's how it goes sometimes. So yeah, I'd say that's a rather hectic week.

Video: John Wall is an exciting player

After Wednesday's highlight-filled win over the Bucks, I figured that there's nothing wrong with staying positive about the Wizards for a couple days (not that I try to do the opposite) -- at least until tomorrow's game against the Spurs. So considering the team's entertaining performance, I went to YouTube in search of a recent, post-worthy clip. Thanks to tonytugathekiller (who's already made lots of other NBA player mixes), I came across, just as the title suggets, a "John Wall Mix."

Check out the video, and keep enjoying the continued development of John Wall.