Tommy Can You Hear Me?

Tonight the Washington Wizards did a good thing. Maybe for the second time inside of a week.

Tonight the Wizards hosted a panel discussion for season ticket holders to break down their new basketball operations hierarchy. It was the first time in a long time the franchise has shown any sort of transparency about anything for season ticket holders. And I think that's a positive thing. No, it doesn't get us more wins or a division championship or an NBA title. It actually doesn't really get us anything. Except some communication. But that can be powerful.

So briefly...Tommy Sheppard's the guy basketball-wise for the Wizards, Mystics and Go-Go and even the NBA 2K Esports franchise (I mean...really? I'm trying to maintain an open mind here). Assisting him is Shashi Brown who's running the operational side of the things and who formerly got the Cleveland Browns all the hope that they have entering the 2019 NFL season (there's more to it than that but I'm trying to be succinct). Player development? John Thompson III (or JT3 if you prefer) formerly head coach at Princeton and Georgetown. Let's be real here: sometimes these young men entering the league acquiring vast wealth need some development physically but also straight up some advice. Finally, Dr. Daniel Medina is in charge of wellness, for lack of a better term. The difference between a talented basketball player and a dominant basketball player is sometimes health and conditioning. This is important stuff.

The panel discussion tonight was quick and mostly offered sound bites that could be taken cynically to mean absolutely nothing. Like I said earlier in this post, the Wizards didn't do anything tonight. They didn't sign any marquee free agents (or any free agents at all actually) or fire the head coach or do anything basketball-wise.

Free beer! Are there any two words in the English language more powerful?

But it is something different. 

It is different than no communication really for the past I don't know seven or eight years. When Ted Leonsis first got involved with the team there was a palpable sense of hope and connection. There was a dedicated email address where you could send your comments or questions and the owner of the team would actually respond personally. How cool was that? Ted also showed up for season ticket holder chalk talks and engaged in dialog with fans in a real meaningful way. Like one on one.

The last five or six years? All that's gone. Not much really. Silence about strategy except maybe some hopeful words before things failed and then cover ups around the resultant reaction (I see you summer of 2016 and also Otto Porter). I can't tell you how many season ticket holders I've talked to that have been blocked on Twitter by our team's owner (yes, that's you Ted) for posting a benign comment about firing Ernie Grunfeld (#FireErnie) before he actually did just that. Is this the way you want to conduct fan relations? I can't imagine.

Tommy Sheppard and tonight's event were a breath of fresh air. Tommy is not Ernie Grunfeld. I can't tell you the last time I was at an event (or even for that matter bumping into him in an airport which I have done) where what I got out of Ernie felt genuine or heartfelt. Tommy's not like that. He's in front of us talking into a microphone about hope or change or what needs to be done to succeed. Is he right? I have no idea. Will it work? Also no idea. But it's different. And that's worth something.

The rest of the organization is also different. It's pulling guys from the NFL and European football and college basketball and introducing a whole new setup. Will it work? Again...I have no idea. I often coach the people who work for me that if something's not working change it. Not in a random way but in a way that corrects the deficiencies that exist in their work process. The Wizards are at least intentionally changing things up. Too slow? For sure. Too late? It's probably never too late. 

I have to tell you that the Wizards have almost lost me. Or more accurately cast me aside in favor of people who will pay more for VIP experiences or one game party experiences who will leave when the going gets bad. Or gambling prospects. Or just ditching any hope of success to get under the salary cap. Or whatever. The vision coming out of this franchise has varied between confused to inconsistent to just plain puzzling. 

Tonight's event was hopeful. I'm willing to give it a try. Easy for me to say when I already bought in I guess. I expect that this season will be a disaster. But I'm willing to accept that in the context that it's no longer business as usual. It better not be. 

I've attended a lot of Wizards season ticket holder events in the last 19 years. I attended this one because it represented something different to me and I wanted to see if it was true. Turned out it was. The tone was different. I'll also say that the free beer and wine was different and welcome. Maybe it makes me seem like a lush but honestly the amount of season ticket holder events I've attended in Capital One Arena recently where I've had to pay for draft beer have been ridiculous. I mean, it's draft beer right? How expensive is that? You don't need to charge me for that. 

I'm encouraged. I don't think this team is going to be successful next year and I don't expect that I will renew for the 2020-2021 season. But tonight was the start of a conversation. I appreciate it. 

Trevor Ariza artwork? Really? Probably need to take this down.

Whose Signature Is That?

Last week I wrote my second to last Wizards blog post of the 2018-2019 season. Just like last year, I'm taking the summer off, although I will likely blog about the schedule when it's released rather that in September like I did last year. For now, I'm bullish on this coming season after what I see as a positive draft. Since my draft optimism stems mostly from the fact that the Wizards actually acknowledged that drafting in the second round is a good thing, there's tons of room for my euphoria to fully deflate before opening night. And it will. Pretty much can guarantee that free agency will do that.

Last week's blog post concerned the Sixth Man Referral program offered by the Wizards, a rewards benefit for current season ticket holders to refer new season ticket holders to the team. One of the gifts I received for my referral was a Wizards team autographed basketball, which now sits in the back of my closet on display surrounded by pictures of family, various power cords for phones and things and my bottles of prescription drugs (hey, I'm old and my diet hasn't been that healthy earlier in life!). I graded this reward as a C- for a couple of reasons. First, there are only 11 signatures on the thing. I know the Wizards tried to keep as few people on the team to avoid sniffing any sort of luxury tax but I don't believe you can carry fewer than 13 on a team so where are the other three? Second, some of these signatures are completely unintelligible. 

I'm hoping one of the half dozen or so people who occasionally read this blog can help me identify some of these. Here goes...let's start with the ones I can figure out before we move to those I need help with.

So this one is clearly Dwight Howard. It's a little lazy; just a large D with a 21. I guess these guys do have a lot of stuff to sign. Economizing is good.

Next up: Thomas Bryant. Very obvious T Bryant going on here with his #13 after it. Well done!

Then the rookie Troy Brown. Less legible than Thomas Bryant (the other TB) but there's clearly a T and B and his number 6 is fully understood.

Working our way down the ball...Kelly Oubre is the next one I find. I love Kelly's signature. Very well thought out and ready for use as a branding label (I would expect nothing else from this guy): a KO with the 12 inside the O. Good stuff!

On the same panel of the ball is Bradley Beal. Brad's signature has been the same since he got drafted. It's a little messy here so maybe I got the end of Brad's signing session but it's clearly "B Beal 3".

Now I need some help.

On the bottom of the ball, I have a clear Jason Smith autograph. Jason's helping me out immensely with a clear 14 next to his signature. I'm stumped on the other one. Assuming I'm looking at the beginning of last season (Jason Smith was traded mid-season so I think that's a good assumption) and I'm throwing away guys in training camp who didn't make the squad (not necessarily a good assumption), then I'm looking at John Wall, Otto Porter, Jeff Green, Tomas Satoransky, Markieff Morris, Austin Rivers,  Ian Mahinmi, Chasson Randle, Devin Robinson and Jordan McRae as possibilities. I cannot make the squiggle next to Jason Smith's name into any of these.

Next three...I got nothing here either. Maybe the one in the middle of these three is Tomas Satoransky? I can't begin to even explain which way up the other two signatures go.

Last one. I have no freaking clue. I looks like it's partially cut off, like whoever was signing was holding a piece of paper over the panel when they were writing and some of the signature ended up on the paper.

I'd appreciate any help. Also, if anyone out there wants this thing let me know. I own about 10 or 12 basketballs signed by various current and former Wizards. This one's not likely to make it to next season. Hopefully I will. Have a good summer everyone. Let's hope somehow Tommy Sheppard can make gold out of lead this free agency period.

Sixth Man Referral

The 2019 NBA Draft is in two days and the Washington Wizards do not have a general manager. Free agency starts shortly thereafter and I'm thinking they won't have anyone in place when that process starts either. This after firing Ernie Grunfeld so they could get a jump on the replacement GM process and later telling everyone they decided they are "playing the long game" on the search after being unable to convince Tim Connelly to leave the Denver Nuggets. What a mess.

On top of all that, they have worked out just one top ten draft prospect despite holding the nine pick, have used most of the salary cap on just five players and still think that Washington is a desirable destination for free agents and potential general managers. What a delusional bunch. Now the rumor is that the team intends to lure Masai Ujiri from Toronto with a boatload of cash and the prospect of ownership. Yes the same Toronto team that just won an NBA championship. It's the latest chapter in the "put all your eggs in one basket" strategy this team seems to employ time after time (see: Kevin Durant, Al Horford and Tim Connelly) before failing time after time. How did this franchise become the most dysfunctional team in the entire NBA?

Ted Leonsis gave Washington's front office an A for last year's offseason. You know who got an A? Toronto! You know who didn't? Washington. And this year's even worse so far. It's no wonder I haven't posted anything on this blog in a month. I'm sick just thinking about this team. Yes, I'll be back as a season ticket holder next year. But that's not what I'm here to write about today.

What I got in the fridge during my suite game last year. Also the current state of the Wizards' franchise.

Next season will be my 20th as a season ticket holder. Over all those years I've taken advantage of pretty much every current or now extinct benefit the team has offered from autograph sessions to chalk talks to VIP experiences to the Monumental Rewards programs to season ticket holder gifts to free seats to everything else that the team has concocted in an attempt to add value to the season ticket package that's not winning.

Buried somewhere on the Washington Wizards website, there is a page called the 6th Man Referral Program, which details the rewards available for current season ticket holders for referring new accounts to the team. I know, I know, what are the odds of someone actually wanting to buy Wizards season tickets? But hey, I found one last year and made a referral. So I thought I'd spread the news in case you find that one person out there in the metropolitan Washington area looking to be a first time Washington Wizards season ticket holder.

Despite the odds being against me in my 19 years as a season ticket holder taking advantage of this benefit, once you get it, it's pretty advantageous, especially if you manage to refer more than $10,000 of sales like I did. Let's take a look at the benefits of this program and how much value each one meant to me this past year. We'll grade them on an A through F scale, just like you used to get graded at school and just like Ted Leonsis handed out last summer. Spoiler alert: my grades are more accurate than Ted's!!

Complimentary All-Inclusive Food and Beverage Tickets to a Game

Grade: B+

My hope here was that the Wizards would see fit to set me up with four wristbands to the Etihad Lounge and I could feel like a king for a day. Or at least a few hours. Free food and beer always makes me feel like I'm on top of the world.

Alas, the four passes turned out to be in the (completely dead) Budweiser Brewhouse on the 200 level. Complaining? Not me. Free food and beer is free food and beer. Unexpected in this reward was a set of four seats in the lower level at about center court. It's the first time I've sat in that section in quite a while and I have to admit the view is better than it is from Section 109 two sections over.

So why a B+ on this one and not an A? Well an A would be the Etihad Lounge I think and the seats were about as far from the Budweiser Brewhouse as I could have gotten. Would have been much better sitting on the south side of the 200 level.

Refer less than $5,000 of sales and you get two seats, not four.

Wizards Team-Signed Basketball

Grade: C-
I love autographed stuff. I have I don't know how many signed pictures and basketballs and basketball cards and jerseys and other things I have squirreled away around my house. I should have loved this. A Wizards logo-ed basketball signed by the entire squad. How cool is that? Actually not really. I didn't love it and I don't love it.

I get that basketball players in the NBA are probably made to sign thousands of autographs per year and I'm sure that these types of team autographed collectibles are signed assembly line fashion one after the other. I think some of the guys who signed my ball were on their last legs. Some of the signatures are completely unrecognizable. So much so that I'm going to devote my last (probably) pre-summer break blog post to that object just to see if my eight or so readers can help me figure it all out.

It should be noted that this gift is only available for referrals of $10,000 or more of sales. 

Pair of Suite Tickets for a Game

Grade: D

I've sat in suites set up by the Wizards for games before. Usually these are communal affairs in the 200 or Lexus Suite levels where I'm sharing the space with 16 or so other fans who are on the same sort of junket as me: there for a game as a little bit of an upgrade perk. Sometimes there is a little free food; sometimes there's more than a little free food and you can actually make a meal out of the whole experience; and there's always been some sort of liquid refreshment.

This reward was a pair of tickets to sit in what would become the renewal suite. Nobody checking tickets, nobody there, empty refrigerator. No food. No drink. I actually skipped dinner thinking I could score some free food on this one. Denied! I ended up buying beer and a meal at the game and since we didn't sell our regular seats, I didn't even sit in the suite much longer than it took to take these two pics of the overpriced menu.

Trio of dips for $138 and a $6 bottle of Tabasco? Count me in! When I own the team.

$200 in Concession Credit

Grade: Incomplete

So honestly, I haven't gotten this one yet. After being promised several times by my account representative that the credit had been added and trying out my season ticket holder card to buy food or beverage only to be denied each time, I was told by someone else that the credit is applied during the season after the referral. 

Still not convinced I'm ever getting this one, which I would actually use.

You only get $200 for referrals of over $10,000. Less than that but more than $5K = $100. Less than that, just $50. Free money is free money. Unless you never get it. lower for less than $10K and less than $5K - $100 / $50

Credit for 2019-2020 Season

Grade: A+

So here, free money really IS free money. Anytime I can get anything off the price of my season tickets I'm on board. In this case, the discount is 5% of the referred sale off the price of your tickets, which saved me about $800 off the price of next year's tickets. Any way you slice it, this is an awesome benefit. The only way it could be better is if the discount was on something that would add a ton of value to my life. The 2019-2020 Wizards season is unlikely to do that.

The 5% discount isn't applicable at all referral levels. Less than $5K of referral gets you 1% off; between $5,000 and $10,000 gets you 3%.

The view from my completely empty suite.

So is the Sixth Man Referral benefit as good as it's advertised. I think the answer there is maybe. I definitely see easy, low cost ways for the team to increase the benefit to the referrer and really make this something special. But then again, this team isn't known for making small tweaks to season ticket holder benefits to add lots of value. On the flip side, they don't have to offer anything at all here and the $800 of next year's tickets is much appreciated. I'll be even happier if they come through on the $200 concession credit next year.

If you actually find someone who's looking to buy, you may as well make a referral. It's not like it's going to hurt you. In fact if anyone out there wants to buy, let me know and I'll refer you. But I do have some words of wisdom for potential referrers. My path to referral riches was not exactly easy.

First, if you are planning on making a referral, I'd call your account representative and let him or her know that you are planning on doing so. Don't just fill out the online form. I'd also screenshot the entry that you are making and the confirmation screen. I didn't do either and when I asked about the referral I had made, I was told the referral system didn't talk to the system the account reps use and that there was no way to verify the referral.

After that I spent maybe two or three months gently prodding my account representative with no results. I got the account number and name of the person I referred so they could check it out for me but got crickets. I'd recommend you document everything about this process.

Finally, I sent an email to my rep asking about if I was getting any discount on next year's tickets because if I wasn't it would really affect my decision to renew. Things moved pretty smoothly from there. Other than the oft-promised concession credit.

It shouldn't have had to come to that but eventually I got what was coming to me. Mostly.

John Wall Bobblehead No. 5

For the past couple of years, I've been somewhat less than kind to the Washington Wizards when reviewing their giveaway offerings each fall. It's an exercise that's turned into a strategy (if you can call it that) of handing out a schedule magnet, a bobblehead and a team poster and calling it a year. No imagination, no outside the box thinking, no multiple bobbleheads. It's like they think that fans don't care about useless things being handed out at the doors of Capital One Arena on game night. News flash: we do care!

Most of my ire in the last several years about the freebie schedule has revolved around the Wizards' tired and true (not a typo) approach to bobbleheads, meaning they only give away one each year. Yes, that's right...while the Golden State Warriors, Dallas Mavericks, Milwaukee Bucks or some other franchise is handing out multiple bobbles in any given season, the Wiz are determined to stick with one. Sure, sure, there have been years where there's an extra bobblehead available through the Kids' Club for a fee or through Monumental Rewards (R.I.P.) but there's a cost associated with those above and beyond a game ticket and they appear to have stopped all that anyway. I have no idea why this team doesn't set its sights higher with the promotional schedule.

So given all that, April 5 was likely the most bittersweet Wizards game of the season. First, it was the last game I attended his year which brought the frustration which was this season to an end. I should never be welcoming the end of basketball season, not with a team allegedly this talented. Second, it was bobblehead night which simultaneously made me happy and also pointed out that the Wizards had pretty much only made me this happy on this one night this season, either with their play or due to the fact that no other games had bobblehead giveaways.

Now, one of the perils of just having one bobblehead handed out per year is that the team pretty much creates a no win choice for themselves: make a bobblehead of a popular player or go unconventional and give a role player a shot. The former choice risks the ardent fan having multiple bobbleheads of the same player over and over again; the latter risks nobody bothering to show up explicitly for the bobblehead because nobody knows who the heck the player even is. Of course, this year by the second to last home game of the season, there weren't many Wizards fans there; the San Antonio Spurs fans were way more vocal.

The Wizards, to nobody's surprise, over the years have opted for the first tact, whereby they give away the same players in bobblehead form over and over again. At the beginning of this season, I had on my bobblehead shelves (yes, shelves) four John Wall bobbles, three of Bradley Beal, two Ottos and a Kelly Oubre bobblehead and no other active players on the roster. When the Wizards announced the promotional schedule this year, they didn't name who was on the schedule for April 5, preferring to go with the enigmatic "bobblehead". In all my stupidity I first assumed it would be Dwight Howard but then got my hopes up for Tomas Satoransky or Thomas Bryant.

Of course, it ended up being John Wall. I now have five Wizards-issued John Wall bobbleheads.

So the first and obvious question here is: WHY? Why give us another John Wall bobblehead? If the decision was made at the beginning of the season, why schedule an end-of-season bobblehead for a dude that missed half of last season? If the decision was made during the season, it's even more puzzling with Wall missing more of this season than last season. I know I've already answered these questions earlier in this post (he's the most popular player) but I still don't get it.

Complaining won't do me any good. Let's talk about how I feel about my new bobblehead shall we?

First off, let's deal with the scale of this bobblehead because it's unique in my collection. While it's as tall as a standard sized bobblehead, it's standing on a plinth, which has forced the artist to scale the bobblehead itself down to sort of a three quarters scale model. I don't know that this is necessarily good or bad, it just it what it is.

The plinth has been painted in an attempt to make it resemble marble to match the spirit of Nike's City Edition uniforms which feature a stylized Washington Monument along the side of the uniform to right below the armhole. The plinth also has a Capital One sign (because Capital One sponsored every one of the three giveaways this year), some holes and a button for pressing. We'll come back to that.

Of course, John Wall is sporting the 2018-2019 Wizards City Edition in black with the aforementioned Washington Monument below the armpit and the District of Columbia logo across the chest.  As they have with other recent bobbleheads, the Wiz have opted to do with decals for the detailed wordmark, numbers and nameplate on the uniform in lieu of casting these details into the model and relying on the Chinese workers to skillfully execute the paint job. This strategy generally yields a better product, although it loses some of that unskilled paint application free bobblehead appeal.

If you are worried about the last sentence of the previous paragraph, don't be. There's still plenty of spots on this bobblehead for a sloppy paint job, namely the Washington Monument / stripe down the side of the uniform which looks like someone painted the red and white and then aggressively colored with a grey or silver marker which I assume is supposed to simulate the marble veining on the white part of the stripe. They definitely didn't stay within the lines; the red is covered with grey/silver color.

One of the big tests of the value of a bobblehead is whether the head of the thing actually looks like the player. Sometimes I feel that teams just select any old representative black man's head and hope that works. The 2011-2012 season John Wall bobblehead looks like some kind of crazed elf (second from left in the 5 John Walls pic above).

In this case, I'm going with the likeness being pretty good. The smile is a little off and the chin seems oversized, particularly on the left side of John's face. I guess it becomes inherently a little easier with a beard but John's is rendered so minimally here that it doesn't really contribute to making the head look more or less like John's actual face. But the overall effect is one of John Wall. I can buy it. There are definitely bobbleheads out there that are better but its not the worst of the bunch.

So about that plinth...as you may have guessed, the height, holes and button mean one thing: talking bobblehead. This is not the first time the Wizards have issued a bobblehead with a sound system. The one and only team-issued Gilbert Arenas has a custom recorded message from Agent Zero himself. A couple of years later the team gave away a Phil Chenier / Steve Buckhantz featuring a "Dagger!" call from Steve.

So what's this one? Some words of wisdom from John Wall? Nope. Some kind of confidence-laden statement about D.C. being his city? Not that either, although that would be awesome. In fact, there are no words from John at all on the recording. Instead it's the "Welcome to D.C." song that they play at the games. Kind of lame? Sort of but for me, it's not what bobbleheads are about. I don't press the play button on my Arenas or Phil/Buck bobbleheads too often so it doesn't matter to me. 

Of course, as all Wiz bobbleheads do these days, this one comes in a box covered with stats. OK, so one half of one side has a few stats. Important to me: franchise leader in assists and steals, 2014 Slam Dunk Contest champion and one each All-NBA and All-Defensive team nods. Interesting to me: All-Star point guard. No number of times. Makes me guess this was decided at the beginning of the year.

Also interesting to me: the accurate representation of the Nike jersey template reflected in the seams on the back of the bobblehead. That shows me how far bobbleheads of come. It used to be that you would struggle to recognize the player. Now the jersey seams are accurate. This is also the first bobblehead with the Geico advertising patch on it which I obviously hate. I find it curious the team had to (I'm assuming they did "have to") put that on the bobblehead but didn't have to (or were forbidden from?) putting the Nike swoosh on it. 

Overall, I'm giving this bobblehead a B. This one looks pretty good. It's clearly John Wall and I'm OK having this on my shelf. I just wish it was someone else. And not Bradley Beal either. If there was a reason to mark this down (and I did) it was because the choice of player shows absolutely no imagination whatsoever. Here's hoping next year the Wizards will get things right in the bobblehead department and hand out more than one next year. 

Spoiler alert: they won't. Just a hunch.

Season Tickets vs. StubHub? 2019 Report

It's been over a month since I've posted anything on this blog. And while I'm still trying to recover from what has to be one of the most disappointing seasons of my 19 year run as a season ticket holder, I have some things to say to wrap up this season and move on to the next, which hopefully starts with a lucky result in next Tuesday's draft lottery. We can always hope, right?

For the past five years on this blog, I've written an end of season post comparing the cost of Wizards season tickets to the cost of tickets on the secondary market based on my weekly tracking of season ticket prices on StubHub. This year I'm not doing that. Instead I'm just going to write about my own personal experience owning and selling Wizards season tickets in two locations in the building (Sections 109 and 415). And yes, I know the title of this post is now wrong.

I'm changing my reporting here for two reasons. First, I just couldn't be bothered to track this data every month or every week. It's just too much effort for a team that didn't exhibit much effort out on the court. Or in other words, I just don't have the data. Second, this is the first season since I've been tracking the value of my tickets that I've been underwater, where what I paid yielded less than the value of the dollars shelled out.

How do I measure that, you might ask? Here's how:

Let's say I have two pairs of tickets to a Wizards game: one in Section 109 which cost me $192 (2 tickets at $96 each) and one in Section 415 which cost me $80 (2 tickets at $40 each). Let's say I manage to sell my upper deck tickets for $28 and use the other two to go to the game. The value of that game for me is $192 because that's the cost of the seats that I am actually sitting in. I only recovered $56 on the two tickets I sold so therefore my cost for $192 of value is $216, meaning I took a $24 loss. 

I track every game like that for the entire year and then measure whether I won or lost money on the season. Every season I have tracked this, my value has been equal to or slightly greater than my cost, except this year when I took a loss of $307.

The month of March 2019. Possibly the most disastrous month ever from a Wizards value standpoint.

How did this happen, you might ask? Well broadly speaking and without citing any specific facts for now, the bottom fell out of the Wizards ticket market this year when the bottom fell out of the season, which happened in like November. Honestly, unless you wanted to go see the Warriors or Lakers games, this season's tickets were available for cheap (and certainly less than season ticket holders paid for them) on the secondary market. Too much supply and little demand. Folks lost interest in this season pretty quickly when the team started underperforming worse than they usually do to start a season. No winning, no attendance. Not this year.

Now for some specifics:

• This year I sat in my Section 415 seats just four times, meaning I sold or tried to sell 36 regular season games (the Wiz only had 40 home games this year due to the Londan game being a home game) and three preseason games. My total cost for those 39 games was $3,320. My return on trying to sell those tickets got me $1,492. These things have no value most games. The team selling them at $40 per regular season seat is far, far above market value. 


• There were just eight games this year where I sold tickets for more than I paid in Section 109 (Houston, Boston, the Lakers, Philadelphia, Golden State, Milwaukee, Miami and San Antonio). In the upper deck, that number dropped to five (the Lakers, Toronto, Golden State, Miami and Boston).  


• There were six games in the upper deck that I couldn't sell at all, not even for $5 to me and a cost of $7 to the buyer. That means that there was nobody willing to buy my seats for a lousy $7. $7!!!! The six games by the way were Orlando, the Clippers, Charlotte, Sacramento, Orlando again and Utah.


• I took a trip out of the country in March and had to miss the first six games of that month which unfortunately for me were not very sell-able. My cost for these six games? $1,632. My return via selling on the secondary market? $594.50. That's a loss of $1,037.50 over a two week period.


• I sold my lower level seats to the Orlando game on March 13 (which was one of the six games in the bullet above) for $25 each, a loss of $71 per seat.


• The overall numbers would have been way worse if it wasn't for the Miami game on March 23 and the Boston game on April 9. I actually made money on the Miami game just because (in all likelihood) it was Dwyane Wade's last game in D.C. In all likelihood refers to the reason I likely sold at a profit, not the likelihood it was Wade's last game in Washington. And the Boston game? Some fool paid me $60 per ticket for my upper deck seats only to be at a game where the entire roster of the Celtics sat out to rest for the postseason.

This is not a good set of stats for the Wizards season ticket holder.

To the Wizards' credit, I guess, they elected not to raise season ticket prices this year. I am sure the team has a lot of data similar to what I've presented above and I'm pretty positive they had lots of anecdotal information about how angry a good portion of the season ticket holder base was and is about the state of the franchise. Raising ticket prices would have been suicide, even with the firing of Ernie Grunfeld out there.

I also appreciate the fact that the team allowed me to renew my lower level tickets, which all things considered could sell pretty well (except in March of 2019) most nights, and not renew my seats in Section 415 which are nothing short of extortion on the part of the team. Unless the team goes deep into the playoffs for the next few seasons (which is unlikely) I see no way those seats returning the value to the people who buy them. They should drop the prices on those things. And fast.

I've had some pretty good years getting value out of my season tickets. The discount provided to season tickets have helped some years tremendously but the real value has come through season ticket holder benefits like the Monumental Rewards Program (now gone) and the Fluid Tickets Program (not gone but completely useless). I renewed my season tickets for three reasons this year: (1) next year is my 20th season and it's a nice round number, (2) some seasons I've attended a lot of games pretty cheaply so I'm OK overpaying for a couple of years at the end (that's such a terrible attitude by the way) and (3) maybe the team will win the draft lottery and tickets will become valuable again. I'll be watching next week for sure.

400 Level Farewell

This post is short and stupidly (and I really mean STUPIDLY!) sentimental.

In the fall of 2000 I decided (along with a coworker) to buy Washington Wizards season tickets. The tickets cost $10 per game or $410 for the whole season (I can't remember if our package included preseason games or if we just bought right before the season but the $410 number sticks in my head). We got some tickets in Section 402, Row G near the end of the row away from center court. One year later, Michael Jordan returned to the court to play for the Wizards. Cool.

A few years after the Jordan era (and with per game prices now boosted to a whole $15), I moved my season ticket seats in 402 right to the other end of the same row, closer to center court. I had also by this time switched (or upgraded if you prefer) the co-worker I was sharing games with. I used to love mid-week games against non-popular opponents up in Section 402. There were some games where there was literally nobody higher up in the section that us so we could stand if we wanted or walk around during a tense part of a game during timeout. We also had some great memories taunting opposing fans when they came in to the building to see their team beat the Wiz only to be disappointed. It was most fun against Celtics fans and our seats were perfectly positioned to wave and say goodbye to the other team's "faithful" on their way out of the building before the end of the game.

Then one year I bought a 10 game package down in Section 103 right near the tunnel where the Wizards enter and exit the court. That 10 game package grew to a 21 game package then to a full season along with a move across the arena to Section 109 where I have seats today. While I was doing that, I kept my upper deck seats, although we moved across the building upstairs too to Section 415 right on the end in Row C. I think I can get to the bathroom at Capital One Arena faster than anyone else from those seats. It's the secret charm of those seats.

Over time, the $10 per game seats in the 400 level have increased up to $40 per game, which is a complete swindle. No way should those seats cost that much. So next season for the first time since the 1999-2000 season, I will not hold Wizards season tickets in the 400 level at 601 F Street NW. And I likely never will ever again. I'm not going backwards from my lower level seats.

Last night I sat in Seat 13 in Row C of Section 415 for the last time as a season ticket holder. It's been a good ride upstairs, although let's face it the team accomplished pretty much nothing. Somehow it's just not as fun when the cost is 3-4 times as much as it should be. I'm not saying I'll never sit in the upper deck at Capital One Arena ever again for a Wizards game, but I won't do it as a season ticket holder. It's time for someone else to take over that real estate.

In Memorium: Ernie Grunfeld

So I'm halfway through a pair of posts about Ernie Grunfeld and the Wizards up and let him go this week. My timing sucks sometimes. I figured they would wait until the end of the season. I was wrong. So I've abandoned those two posts that were under construction in favor of this one.

Like most Wizards fans out there, I was convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was time for President of Basketball Operations Ernie Grunfeld to leave the team. No other team executive had stayed in place as long as Ernie had with so few good results. It was time to move on and give someone else a shot. I only hoped Ted would do it in plenty of time to get someone else in place before the NBA Draft in late June. It appears he's done that.

The Ernie Grunfeld era in Washington wasn't all bad although as I hope I'll demonstrate below, most all of his successful moves came in his early years on the job. Measure Ernie against his immediate predecessors in Wes Unseld and Michael Jordan and he looks quite successful: one division title and eight playoff appearances, including four trips to the second round of the playoffs. But in a league where there are just five teams in a division and more than half of the teams in the league make the postseason each year, achieving those results in 16 seasons on the job is not good enough. Not by far. Just being better than the people before you who were lousy at their jobs don't cut it.

The posts I was working on were Ernie's greatest triumphs and his greatest failures (one post for each) as the Wizards' head basketball decision maker. I made a top 10 list for each category and I'm posting the lists I assembled for this exercise anyway, although I'm just going to provide a little less explanation than I planned.

Let's start with the top 10 successes. I'm placing the date of each in parentheses because I think that's important.

Ernie's Top 10 Hits 

10. Signing Shaun Livingston to a 10 Day Contract (2010)

9. Drafting John Wall (2010) and Bradley Beal (2012) 

8. Signing Paul Pierce to a Free Agent Contract (2014)

7. Trading for Marcin Gortat (2013)

6. Swapping Kwame Brown for Caron Butler (2005)

5. Trading Rashard Lewis for Emeka Okafor and Trevor Ariza (2012)

4. Signing Gilbert Arenas to a Free Agent Contract (2003)

3. Trading for Nenê (2012)

2. Trading for Antawn Jamison (2004)

1. Bringing Credibility to the Position (2003)

A few notes on the above list before we get to the misses / disasters list. 

There are three awesome deals in the top six used to assemble the Arenas / Butler / Jamison team that could have been something; each of those deals were masterful. The Butler deal with the Lakers was outright robbery. All three of these transactions occurred in his first two years on the job which is why my number 1 is number 1. He transformed that team into a contender instantly as soon as he started. MJ and Wes couldn't compare.

Drafting Wall and Beal is so low on the list because he had to get these right; these were no excuses type decisions. Bringing Nenê, Okafor and Ariza into the locker room (the first time for Ariza, not the second time) are so high because what the team needed more than anything else was adult supervision. Nenê is in the three spot because a lot of people saw that deal as good for everyone except the Wizards when the opposite turned out to be true. The Okafor / Ariza trade is ahead of the Butler deal because he gave up a second round pick to get them. Can you imagine 2018 Ernie using second round picks to acquire talent rather than erase mistakes? 

You can argue with any of the above items if you want. I'm up for it, especially the Livingston one, which is admittedly a completely emotional decision for me. I'm happy Shaun made it the way he did after that knee injury.

So now that I've made everyone angry by actually maintaining Ernie did as many as 10 good things in his time in Washington, let's take a look at my top 10 non-successes.

Ernie's Top 10 Misses

10. Drafting Oleksiy Pecherov (2006)

9. Extending Andray Blatche's Contract (2010)

8. Not Re-Signing Garrett Temple (2016)

7. Player Options (2014, 2016, 2017 and 2018)

6. Trading Tons of Second Round Picks (2015, 2016, 2018 and 2019)

5. Coaching Hires (2009 and 2016)

4. Trading the 5 Pick for Mike Miller and Randy Foye (2009)

3. Trading Tons of First Round Picks (2013, 2016 and 2017)

2. Failing to Anticipate the Reality of 2016 (2016)

1. The Record (2003-2019)

A few notes on this list. I'll try to be brief. I may not succeed. 

Some of these decisions defy explanation. Extending Andray Blatche three years when already had two years remaining on his deal (the Wiz amnesty-ed Blatche before the extension kicked in but still paid out $35M); choosing Andrew Nicholson, Jason Smith or Ian Mahinmi (let alone all three) over a high character role player and locker room leader like Garrett Temple in 2016; and envisioning Mike Miller and Randy Foye as the guys who were going to put the team over the top and get us a championship instead of drafting Steph Curry or DeMar DeRozan. 

There's clearly a lack of respect for the Draft. Do you realize that from 2014 to 2017 the Wizards held only one first round pick? Ernie even managed to circumvent the rule that a franchise can't trade it's first round draft pick two years in a row by trading the first rounder at the trading deadline in two consecutive years. That rule was designed to save franchises from their own stupidity and Ernie found a way around it. And don't get me started on second round picks which the Wiz don't have for sure until 2024. 2024!!! 

In case you are wondering...2019 pick traded to sweeten the Kelly Oubre deal in 2015; 2020 pick traded to conditionally to acquire Jared Dudley in 2015 and made unconditional to make Jodie Meeks go away in 2018; 2021 pick traded for Trey Burke in 2016; 2022 pick traded to make Jodie Meeks go away (not a typo; it took two second rounders to get rid of Meeks); and 2023 traded to make Markieff Morris go away.

What's the story with player options? How about Paul Pierce (who declined his to leave when we needed him to stay), Jason Smith, Jodie Meeks and Dwight Howard (all of who have or will accept all theirs to stay when they needed or need to leave). And the coaches? How about hiring Flip Saunders and Scott Brooks without talking to any other candidates.

But the biggest thing for me (other than the losing record and no 50 win seasons) was the 2016 offseason. Not because he signed Ian Mahimni, Andrew Nicholson and Jason Smith to multi-year deals but because he failed to realize what was happening in the NBA with the salary cap. By that I mean the Wizards' strategy for that summer was to clear enough space to sign a max free agent (hopefully Kevin Durant) and that realistically they would be one of maybe four or five teams that would have that much cap room. But he failed to see the impact of the new TV deal, which turned almost every team into a max free agent destination. Instead of competing with two or three other teams for the best free agents, they were competing with like 25. And he failed to realize this and failed to adjust. Cap management and long term vision has to be part of the job description, right??

Sorry for being so long winded on that.

Ask 10 Wizards fans for these lists and I'm sure you would get 10 different answers, although some might not get to 10 items on the hits list. 

When I look back at these lists, I see a few things. First, Ernie used to be a good deal maker. Some of those deals he made were just awesome. But there's nothing that I can point to trade-wise in the last five years that's been any good. Second, he has not attracted quality free agents to Washington and he's run screaming from the Draft any time he can. Drafting, trading and signing free agents are three core parts of the job and he's only ever really been good at one of those. And he's not even any good at the one he used to be good at.

Third, and most important, there's an astonishing lack of medium or long term planning with a lot of these moves. 2016 was a complete disaster. I mean one of the total and unmitigated variety. How someone is allowed to dole out that kind of money after whiffing on his top three targets and then use that many future assets (draft picks) to erase his mistakes and then keep his job so long is incredible. And 2016 is not the only one. Sometimes, even when Ernie made a good decision there's a but associated with it. 

What do I mean by that? He made the right move by signing Gilbert Arenas after he won the Most Improved Player Award but give him an albatross of a contract later on. He plucked Shaun Livingston off the NBA scrap heap but then failed to develop him and lock him up long term. He signed Paul Pierce when Trevor Ariza walked (or the team let him walk) but gave him a player option which let him leave the next year. He drafted John Wall over Evan Turner but gave Wall a supermax contract as soon as he humanly could.

Where does that leave the Wizards? Honestly with a lot of messes to sort out. As I detailed a couple of months ago, the cap situation for this team going forward is going to take some real creativity to get a competitive team on the floor. Throw in an injured John Wall making north of $40 million, Dwight Howard with a $5 million plus player option and no second round picks for the next half decade and things look even worse. Despite all that, this team does have some talent and with the right free agent signings, a smart draft and a creative coach who can develop players...who knows.

For now, Ernie's gone. And it's about time.

I know Randy's thinking how long does it take to get this guy out of here.