Washington Wizards 2015-2016 End of Season Awards
By Ben Mehic
Most Disappointing Player
David Statman (@DJStatman77):
After another brilliant playoff performance, Bradley Beal was supposed to stay healthy and take the next step towards stardom. Instead, his career completely flatlined.
His on-court performance plateaued and he played a career-low 55 games due to various injuries – despite this, he thought it would be a good idea to call out other guys on the team who had been missing games or not playing up to their best. Look in the mirror, Brad. The worst part? They’re going to give him a max deal anyway.
Winner: Bradley Beal
Nithin Kuchibhotla (@NKuchibhhotla):
In what was supposed to become Bradley Beal’s coming out party after another successful playoff campaign, the season turned into a disaster that left the team still in the dark about what he will become long-term.
He started off playing at an All-star pace, but yet another stress reaction along with the usual list of maladies caused him to miss 27 games and be in the unique position of expecting a max contract this summer without the associated production.
The main hope is that a new coach who is aware of the term player development helps him reach his potential (a la Klay Thompson) and he can stay on the court long enough to justify the big money. His numbers and advanced metrics improved across the board but health is really the only key at this point.
Winner: Bradley Beal
Osman Baig (@Obtoojiveforyou):
Strange that a player who is about to get a max contract in free agency is the most disappointing player, but this is a no-brainer. He started the season strong, scoring no fewer than 24 points in the first five games of the season. From there it was all downhill. Anything that could go wrong with Brad did.
His three-point shooting numbers were down, as were his rebounding numbers, and free throw percentage. By the way, how can “the next” Ray Allen, a career 39.7% shooter from three-point territory only shoot a pedestrian 76.7% from the free throw line?
More concerning to me is the spike in his defensive rating to 108 (point allowed per 100 possessions), and how his offensive rating has generally plateaued since entering the league at 102, 103, 102, and 103 this past season.
The Washington Wizards will pay him this summer and we still know very little about what type of player Bradley Beal could be.
Winner: Bradley Beal
John Cannady (@John_Cannady):
So I’m pretty sure that most of the crew will pick Bradley Beal here, and while that’s probably the correct answer, I’m going to go in another direction and pick the big Brazilian, Nene.
During the 2015 NBA playoffs, the Washington Wizards had the top seed in the East, the Atlanta Hawks, on the ropes.
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Even with star point guard John Wall being less than 100%, the Wizards still had a legit shot to go up 3-2 in the series with a chance to clinch the series at home.
Being up by one point, all the Wizards had to do was to have one stop and the game would have been over.
Of course on that last Hawk possession, a shot went up, missed and Al Horford somehow got the rebound away from Nene and the Hawks took the game on a putback.
Nene seemed like he never recovered after that series of events.
Nene had all the motivation he needed from that game and the summer to come back and show everyone that he was still a force to reckoned with and that he could be an anchor on a team that many were picking to make the Eastern Conference Finals before the season.
Well, it didn’t turn out that way for Nene.
He was regularly injured and missing games. When he did play, he seemed like an always upset, shell of his former self. We all expected to see Angry Nene on a redemption tour this past season for all of the chatter of Nene being washed up and how Coach Wittman always stayed with him too long in games. It didn’t come to pass.
Nene’s massive contract now comes off of the books for the Wizards, and Nene will have to weigh his options (including outright retirement) for his career.
Winner: Nene
Next: Most Forgettable Player