A Love Story: Ernie Grunfeld, the Second Round of the NBA Draft, and Washington Wizards Fans
By Ward Watkins
2012:
The Pick: With the 32nd pick of the 2012 NBA Draft, the Washington Wizards select…Tomas Satoransky.
The Outcome: “Oh, just what we needed, another draft-and-stash Euro…freaking fire Grunfeld!” was no doubt heard a million times after this selection. Satoransky is another tantalizing prospect, an athletic 6’7 Euro combo guard that many felt we would never see here (and we still haven’t, for what it’s worth). It was thought that he would eventually come over to play with his buddy Jan Vesely, and serve as a backup point guard, especially after Shelvin Mack wasn’t retained. That hasn’t happened yet, and Jan is long gone, but there is the expectation that he plays with the Summer League team this offseason in July. Hopefully he pans out as the fourth or fifth guard next season, and potentially more in the future.
Woulda Coulda Shoulda: Given that the roster was full, maybe we should have seen this coming. That doesn’t make it any harder to swallow when there were plenty of players on the board at the top of the second round that many thought could have helped immediately at the time. As it turns out, Jae Crowder, Draymond Green, Quincy Acy, and Mike Scott were among players still on the board.
2013:
The Pick: With the 35th pick of the 2013 NBA Draft, the Washington Wizards select…Glen Rice, Jr.
The Outcome: OK, this pick came as the result of a trade. The Wizards traded the 38th and 54th picks on draft night to the Philadelphia 76ers to acquire GRJR. Many Wizards fans had tepid optimism about this selection. He has the pedigree and, despite some issues at Georgia Tech, had a tremendous playoff run in leading the Rio Grande Valley Vipers to the 2013 NBA D-League championship, where he averaged 25/10/5/2/2. After showing a few encouraging moments in his rookie season (even starting a game while Bradley Beal was injured), his season was spent basically shuttling back and forth from the D-League to the inactive roster with the team. Still, he showed some signs, and while his contract next season isn’t fully guaranteed, it would be nice to have him back next season. A good recap of Rice’s season was done recently on the site.
Woulda Coulda Shoulda: It’s so early in the process, we don’t know how these picks are going to turn out. The 38th and 54th picks turned out to be Nate Wolters and Arsalan Kazemi, respectively. Wolters proved to be a promising backup for the Bucks. Pierre Jackson wowed the D-League, but never made it into the big leagues, and I think is headed overseas. I’m having blind homer faith that Rice ends up as one of the better picks of the second round of this draft.
So there you have it, folks. Most of the second round of the draft for the Wizards under Ernie Grunfeld’s watch has been pretty bad, to say the least. He’ll always have finding Michael Redd (43) late in 2000, but that wasn’t here. Here’s to hoping that Ernie Grunfeld and the Wizards can conjure up the eye that he had in 2000 and find another gem at the 46th pick in a few weeks. Or sell it for cash considerations.