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On Thursday, Wizards GM Tommy Sheppard took part in a live Twitter Q&A, hosted by Dave Johnson, answering questions submitted by Wizards fans. Before he got to questions, though, Sheppard opened with a message for the Wizards’ fanbase.
“From the Wizards family, to all our fans: we miss you,” Sheppard said. “We can’t wait to get back out there and perform and have a team that you can be proud of and support. In this time that we’re not able to do that, we’re trying to use it as wisely as possible. Stay safe, wash your hands, social distancing, all the obvious things that we can’t say enough.”
Sheppard, who earlier this year conducted an “Ask Me Anything” session on Reddit and will appear next week on the Wizards Podcast Network’s Full Court Press podcast, took questions Thursday from his home. Sheppard touched on staying connected, keeping players in shape, prioritizing the fan experience, John Wall, Rui Hachimura, Bradley Beal, the scouting process and more. Below are five key takeaways from Sheppard’s Q&A session.
The Wizards’ efforts to stay connected as a team
As the Wizards and all the other teams around the league look for ways to maintain a season’s worth of built up camaraderie, the organization has gotten creative in its efforts to keep the team connected and engaged with one another.
“In terms of the players and our staff, we are staying connected,” Sheppard said. “We stay connected every day in some way, shape or fashion. We found a lot of great activities that we can do that have become team building. The ability to get several people on the phone or on the computer and see each other’s faces has been invaluable. We have group workouts, team ball-handling and group yoga. We’ve included the Mystics in a lot of the things that we do. We’re keeping contact with the Go-Go. Our basketball community is fine. We’re healthy and we’re safe, we just miss our fans and we hope our fans are certainly healthy.”
While Sheppard is proud of the organization’s ability to maintain a feeling of togetherness, he knows nothing will compare to the moment everyone walks back through the doors of the practice facility for the first time.
“The thing I’m looking forward to (the most) is that first day,” Sheppard said. “That first time we’re back together in the facility and the celebration of getting back to what we’re great at doing, what we’re blessed to do in the NBA.”
The importance of players staying in shape on hiatus
With no access to team facilities and stay-at-home mandates across the country, players face a unique challenge when it comes to keeping fit for the eventual return to play. While Sheppard recognizes the challenges they face, he knows and emphasizes to the players the importance of prioritizing their physical conditioning.
“It’s so much easier to stay ready than to get ready. This is a little bit unusual for basketball players to go more than a day without touching a basketball. It’s unusual to go more than a week – they’re normally injured or sick. To go more than two weeks, it’s almost an impossible situation to ask them, ‘When’s the last time you’ve been away from a court this long?’ It’s never happened.”
The team has taken a number of measures to make staying fit more convenient for the players. Dr. Daniel Medina, the team’s Chief of Athlete Care and Performance, said earlier this week on the Off The Bench podcast that his staff has provided players with workout equipment kits, including resistance bands and weights, to help them stay fit at home. The group convenes through Zoom for workouts, yoga and meditation. The nutrition staff has provided players with tips an on-call guidance to help them responsibly navigate the kitchen.
Sheppard wants to take the challenges that players are facing and “the misery of missing the game” and channel that as a group. “It’s like group therapy the way we’re getting guys together,” he said. “They’re working hard, but they’re having fun at the same time.”
An update on John Wall
Sheppard addressed one of the biggest questions on Wizards fans’ minds these days – would the league’s hiatus have any impact on John Wall’s ability to return to the court this season? Sheppard said that while he would have loved to see it as much as anyone, “it’s just not feasible.”
Sheppard then provided an update on some of the work Wall has been doing behind the scenes to prepare for his eventual return to action, the progress he’s made and how the league’s hiatus impacts his timeline.
“We were scrimmaging [with Wall] before,” Sheppard said. “On March 12, John scrimmaged for the sixth time with the Go-Go. He had gone through a lot of practices with the Wizards, shaking the rust off and trying to get his legs back to get into shape. To the untrained eye, you’d walk in and say ‘Wow, he looks fantastic.’ And he does. But in the NBA, the elite player that John is, to be in NBA top shape, he was definitely not that…He’ll be in great shape coming out of this because he’s working hard every day, but from a basketball training perspective, he’s just not able to get out on the floor and do those things.”
“But I’ll tell you what, we saw enough with John through this path in all the practices, all the scrimmages that he’s been through that next season, I can’t wait for it to get here for him,” Sheppard said. “We certainly are looking forward of the rest of this season. That’s where our focus is, but in the back of my mind, I feel pretty good that we're going to get a five-time All-Star back [next season] at a really, really high level. John is so excited to get back in front of our Wizards fans.”
Rui’s rookie season
One of the highlights of the Wizards’ season so far has been the immediate impact made by rookie Rui Hachimura. Drafted ninth overall in last year’s draft, Hachimura has averaged 13.4 points and 6.0 rebounds per game this season and started all 41 of the games he has appeared in. Sheppard was thrilled to see Hachimura succeed so early, but was by no means surprised.
“I had very high expectations of Rui because I was very familiar with the player and the character of the kid and the competitiveness of the kid,” Sheppard said. “He exceeded (those expectations) as a rookie. To come in and get the starting job from day one and to produce the way he was producing. He was a great fit, seamless fit, our players love playing with him.”
“One thing about Rui and all of our bigs, we want them to be versatile. To be able to guard multiple positions and to be able to be sufficient on the floor at different positions at different times during the game. I think that’s what we’re really hopefully with Rui to increase his ball-handling and give him some opportunities to play the wing. The more versatile you are, the more tools you have in the toolbox to go out and match up with anybody out on the floor. We’re really trying to observe how the game is being played and certainly what the future of the game is.”
Sheppard said that Hachimura’s development is a key element of the Wizards’ plan for the future. Continuing to diversify his skillset and his ability play multiple positions could unlock a number of lineups and options for the Wizards’ roster in the future.
“We envision putting a team out on the floor that has shooters like Beal out there, Bertans out there, then you throw Rui who can hit the three and even Thomas Bryant can hit a three and roll to the rim. Think about John Wall distributing to those guys. Think about the other team trying to guard those guys. That puts a lot of pressure on the defense when you have shooters out on the floor.”
The challenges and advantages of the remote scouting process
While the league’s and teams’ focus remain on making the most of the current season, front offices must continue their usual work preparing for the 2020 NBA Draft. Sheppard said that while the current circumstances may prevent a number of the normal scouting procedures (individual workouts, the combine, in-person interviews, etc.), he said it may have less of an impact on the team’s process than it may seem.
“This is actually a normal time for us,” Sheppard said. “We're just taking more time on each player to find out who the best fits for the Wizards are. We’re digesting so much more video as a group collectively as a group, going over players in far more detail. This may end being the way we do the draft moving forward.”
“Workouts are important, but they’ve played all season…we’ve done our homework. We have a tremendous scouting staff that’s scoured the United States and the globe to find the very best talent. We have a database stuffed full of reports. We’ve done the preparation work. If we don’t have the opportunity to actually spend time physically with players, watch them work out and do interviews, we just pivot.”
Sheppard then provided an update on the team’s scouting timeline, saying that interviews with select prospects will begin Monday.
“We’re going to start next week doing video conference interviews with the top seniors that are in college now and some international players,” Sheppard said. “We are allowed to do that. We have to wait for the underclassmen list to come out. When that does come out, we’ll be able to do even more interviews. It’s been great. We look forward to that. It starts Monday for us with some seniors. It makes it feel very normal. That’s what we would be doing normally at this time of year.”