Ballou HS Rocks the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade
Morning Roundup: Black Friday Edition
Photo of the Day: November 27, 2009
Caps Thankful for Varly in 2-0 Win
Thanks to This Week's Advertisers
Looks like that loss to a seven-man New York Knicks squad over the weekend was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back, as news is breaking that the Washington Wizards fired head coach Eddie Jordan this morning. Jordan, one of the longest tenured coaches in the league, had been in charge of the team since 2003 and enjoyed four straight playoff appearances, but got off to a very rough 1-10 start this year.
Jordan seemed almost resigned to his fate after a loss to the Miami Heat last week. "This team is built for Gilbert Arenas to lead us. This team is built for our All-Star forwards to carry the wings for us, and for Brendan Haywood to have a career year manning the middle for us. We don't have those things." Injured star Gilbert Arenas all but acknowledged the season was over last week when he suggested the team might be better off by having a down year and getting a high lottery pick for their troubles.
Director of Player Development Ed Tapscott will take over as interim coach, beginning with today's practice. But will he be able to turn this ship around? Probably not. Truth be told, the Wizards don't have a lot of bona fide NBA talent on their roster. Yes, injuries have decimated the roster, but players like Andray Blacthe, Juan Dixon and Darius Songaila have not stepped up to take their place. You have to wonder which players will be following Jordan out the door. There's not much sense in keeping a 1-10 team together if moves can be made to improve the team's future.
AP Photo/Morry Gash
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
The Wizards performed better than they should have the last couple of seasons given their players and injuries, and much of the credit for that should go to Jordan. Ironically, it was because of injuries — cough, Gilbert Arenas, cough — that allowed the Wizards to actually play as a team. The combination of Gilbert's contract, injury (again) and the team's poor play early this season doomed Jordan, but I don't think we've seen the last of him as an NBA head coach.
What a bunch of losers. You write off the season 10 games into it?
And Jordan was one of the longest tenured coaches after 5 years? I must be spoiled on Greg Popovitch.
the wizards don't have a lot of bona fide NBA talent on their roster? really? Two returning all stars isn't talent? i wouldn't be so sure that a new coach couldn't turn things around either. granted it's a different sport, but the capitals were in last place this time last year and a new coach got them to the playoffs.
Sure Eddie bares some responsibility, but how are you going to hold this guy accountable when his roster has been in shambles? Maybe ownership had been planning for a change of scenery and this was an open opportunity to make a move? For God's sake it's only 11 games in.
This doesn't make sense. I'm not privvy to what goes on behind the scenes, but it doesn't seem like the team had quit on Jordan, which would be the one good reason to dump him. Given the same roster, whoever gets the job next will almost certainly do a worse job than Eddie did.
So, who's going to get the gig (Tapscott is a stopgap)? Will they make a play for Pat Riley? Jim What's-is-name at George Mason? Any other guesses?
Wow! I really thought Grunfeld was smarter than this, I am totally and completely floored by this move.
They are 1 and 10 and very quickly being passed by a much improving Eastern Conference (Atlanta, Philly.) I think Eddie's a terrific coach and it's a shame he's the one that takes the hit for this but really at 1-10 a move had to be made. The team clearly wasn't responding.
I mean 1/8th of the season is already gone and this team should really be no worse than 6-5 and we all know they're better than that. 1-10 is inexcusable so...something had to be done. It's pretty simple.
Notorious is exactly right. Plus, EJ is a werewolf and that's not good for anyone.
Grunfeld is a goober.