Washington Wizards fire coach Eddie Jordan

Eddie Jordan likely had some margin of error entering his sixth season at the helm of the Washington Wizards.  Injuries to superstar pointguard Gilbert Arenas and starting center Brendan Heywood had tempered expectations from the outset.  Despite having a decent alibi, however, there’s nothing acceptable about opening the NBA season 1-10 and on Monday Jordan paid the price as the Wizards fired him.  The only other time in franchise history the team had been 1-10 was 1966 when they were known as the Baltimore Bullets.

The Wizards opened the season by losing their first five games, then upset the Utah Jazz to avoid their first 0-6 start in franchise history.  That success was short lived, however, as they immediately went back in the tank losing their next four games.  The last straw was likely a sloppy 122-117 loss to the NY Knicks at Madison Square Garden on Saturday night—after a couple of trades the Knicks dressed the NBA minimum eight players and only had seven players available as petulant guard Stephon Marbury refused to play. 

Director of Player Development Ed Tapscott was given the head coaching reins for the rest of the year.  This is his first experience as an NBA head coach and he described the sudden turn of events as “surreal”.  Team President Ernie Grunfeld offered this explanation for the move, citing the team’s woeful W/L record:

"That's an unacceptable record, obviously. We thought the change needed to be made. We needed to do things a little bit different."

Grunfeld wouldn’t accept the team’s injuries as an excuse for the substandard performance:

"Other teams in the league also have injuries. It just felt like we were going in the wrong direction. It felt a little bit stale and we needed to freshen it up."

Despite the Wizards’ 1-10 record, the players seemed somewhat surprised that Jordan had been sent packing.  Asked if he was shocked by the firing, team captain Antawan Jamison tersely replied:

"Why wouldn't I be shocked? The team is 1-10, not the coach. Next question."

Despite Jamison’s obvious displeasure at Jordan’s dismissal, he insisted that the team wouldn’t treat new coach Tapscott as a scapegoat:

"We all respect him. We know he has a great basketball IQ."

Tapscott’s prescription for the team’s short term improvement--better defense and more physical play:

"We need to guard the rim, guard the lane, be a more physical team. It doesn't mean I think were going to try to turn greyhounds into Clydesdales. But we have not been a very physical team, and so we're going to try to play more physically on defense. We've been a little sieve-like."

Tapscott’s promotion paid immediate dividends, as the Wizards routed Golden State124-100 in his first game at the helm on Tuesday night.