Washington, D.C. -- Prior to Sunday's matinee game between the Boston Celtics and the Washington Wizards, head coach Flip Saunders responded to a few questions from the media regarding Andray Blatche. Blatch has struggled mightily on the court recently, and the negative fan reaction he has been receiving from the home crowd at the Verizon Center has been noticed by opposing players and national media alike.
"As I said to Dray, you're in a situation where you lost some trust from the fans. How you get that trust back is by just doing little things," Saunders said.
"Sometimes you get in quicksand and the harder you try, the more you fall. Sometimes it's better to just settle down and do the little things - play hard, rebound, and as a team we can help. You know, winning cures a lot of those things. Hopefully we can help him get through that."
When asked about if Blatche might respond better to coming off the bench, Saunders noted that "he's a big boy. He can deal with it - it's all part of it; we'll get him through it. We're not going to make a decision where he starts or not based on what the fan reaction is."
How Blatche performs on Sunday against the Celtics could go a long way in either repairing or further damaging his tenuous relationship with Wizards season ticket holders. Saunders continues to believe that things will get better if the team starts to win, and that important journey starts today.
For more on this game and all things related to Wizards basketball, as always, check out Bullets Forever. For more on the Celtics you can check out CelticsBlog. And for more on this and every NBA game please head over to the SB Nation basketball hub page.