Are the Wizards all talked out?
Tuesday before they boarded a flight for tonight’s game at Cleveland, down 3-1 in their best-of-seven series, prime agitators DeShawn Stevenson and Brendan Haywood were not available to the media.
Finally some vanilla from the bulletin board darlings of the NBA.
Poking the bear — LeBron James — has been a strategic and public relations disaster. With the Wizards on the verge of elimination, their veteran voices of reason, Antawn Jamison and Caron Butler, took over Tuesday.
“Let’s just go out there and play,” said Jamison. “Talking about this and that through the media, I’m kind of disappointed that my team has bought into that. It’s all about going out there and playing the game.”
The Wizards will do that tonight in front of a crowd they helped incite with their braggadocio and rough treatment of James, who has responded by averaging 29.5 points, 8.5 rebounds, and 6.5 assists per game in the series.
Does Wizards coach Eddie Jordan regret some of the comments made by his players?
“Things were said. I can’t take it back,” said Jordan. “It doesn’t matter what I think, I want to support my players. We approached it as, ‘This is what you said, these are things we have to do to be successful in this series. You want to talk the talk, now these are the thing you need to walk the walk.’ We’ve come up short so far, but we’re still talking, still walking.”
To be walking Friday for Game 6 in Washington, the Wizards will have to rebound tonight. The Cavaliers have out-boarded the Wizards in each of their last seven meetings. The edge overall is a revealing 331-239.
Desire is a component. Rebounding out of the help (zone) defense that the Wizards use against James further complicates the problem.
“We’re in rotations, so that hurts us sometimes,” said Jordan. “We’re double-teaming and the ball is shot and we’re scrambling to find a guy to get matched up and they’ve already got a lane to the basket.”
