I missed the Wizards game last night, but it looks like Flip Saunders finally gave a D-Leaguer some playing time, and Alonzo Gee responded with 13 points and a team-high 10 rebounds. Five of those boards came in a five and a half minute stretch in the third quarter. He had the Wizards' Twitter universe going nuts. To wit:
BulletsForever: Alonzo Gee can shoot threes apparently. He can do everything. Shoot threes, slash, steal the ball, rebound Need to move a mountain? Call him
DCWIZ: Well, Washington is going to lose to Denver tonight, Blatche should be okay but we'll see. A positive continues to be Gee.
BulletsForever: Alonzo Gee continues his moving mountains routine with a ridiculous half-court buzzer-beating three. Gee for emm-vee-pee?
rashad20: Alonzo Gee reminds me a lot of Darvin Ham
(That last one is supposed to be good, right?)
Gee was awarded with a second 10-day contract today. Hit the jump to see how this development came about.
Two days ago, the Wizards played the Utah Jazz, and Alonzo Gee collected a career-high 10 points and three rebounds in 15 minutes. He played the entire fourth quarter of that game, but since it was a blowout he didn't have much of an impact on the outcome. (He also was a +7, but single-game non-adjusted plus/minus caveats, etc.)
Yesterday, Washington Post beat reporter Michael Lee wrote about Gee for his Wizards Insider blog/column. The focus of it was, "who exactly is this guy?" Before going into his playing background in college and the D-League, Lee starts off with this (apologies for the long quote)
Alonzo Gee signed a 10-day contract with the Wizards on March 7, but was so quiet and unassuming that two days later, James Singleton still had no idea Gee was his teammate. Singleton looked across the locker room stunned and confused as he saw a nameplate that read, "Gee 24."
Singleton knew of JaVale McGee, who sat in the locker room stall next to him.
"I'm looking like who's Gee?" Singleton said. "I didn't know who Gee was."
That changed last night, as Gee got more significant playing time spelling Al Thornton in the first quarter and playing the entirety of the second., and playing 26 minutes overall. He hit a pair of threes and was a solid 5-9 from the field overall. Saunders, for one, was impressed, as quoted in today's Wizards Insider:
"He's playing well," Saunders said. "There is no question, he's a guy that can play in this league. I like the things he does. We're going to keep on playing him, because he's athletic, he defends and he hasn't had a practice yet. We brought him in and he hasn't had a practice."
Gee was awarded with a second 10-day contract pretty much immediately after the game. The Wizards are strugg-a-ling right now, and Saunders is trying to find some combination of players that works on the court, so the opportunity is definitely there for Gee to show them why he should be signed for the season, and maybe even retained for the future. He missed three out of four free-throws last night and still could use some work on his defense, but RU's own Scott Schroeder put it best in this Toros recap: "Gee has upside and it is ridiculous - as an energy guy that can score off the bench with the tools to improve on defense, I like him. I like him a lot."