First some good news: ESPN’s Ric Bucher tweets that we should expect both Antawn Jamison and Mike Miller to be on the floor and ready to play this Saturday in Washington’s game against the Detroit Pistons. Okay, not good news, great news.

The Wizards have lost 4 straight heading into tonight’s game against the Miami Heat, who have already pummeled the Wiz this season. The problem has not been the usual suspect, defense. The Wizards have one of the better defenses in the league, statistically. The problem is the awful offense that hasn’t produced more than 90 points in any of the 4 straight losses. The team is frequently shooting below 40% in games and committing more turnovers than assists.

“Right now we got no mojo,” Coach Flip Saunders said. “So, we need to find some mojo, bottle it up, and bring it with us.”

The Wizards had seven losing streaks of five or more games last season, when they won just 19. But this is unfamiliar territory for Saunders, who never lost more than three consecutive regular season games in Detroit and hasn’t lost four straight regular season games since his final season in Minnesota. The Timberwolves had a six-game skid from late January to early February 2005, and a week later, Saunders was fired.

More good news for local sports fans: the Wizards and the Capitals are a bargain!

The Washington Capitals and Washington Wizards are among the least-expensive teams for fans of the NHL and NBA with ticket prices well below the league average even as the popularity of both teams has increased in recent years, according to Chicago-based Team Marketing Report.

TMR, which collected pricing data for its annual “Fan Cost Index” surveys, said last week the average ticket price for a Wizards game is $27.21, the third lowest in the NBA and more than $21 below the league average.

The Caps, meanwhile, ranked 21st in the NHL in ticket prices, with an average ticket costing $44.75, more than 12 percent less than the league average of $51.27.

The Caps showed to be inexpensive compared with their NHL brethren even after raising tickets by more than 7 percent this season, an indication of team owner Ted Leonsis‘ effort to keep prices down during periods when the team struggled to win.
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The Wizards, meanwhile, were among 14 teams that lowered ticket prices entering the 2009-10 season, and only the Memphis Grizzlies and New Orleans Hornets have lower prices on average. The Wizards, who offered rebates to some season-ticket holders, are less expensive on average than the Washington Nationals, making them the only NBA team with an average ticket price less than the major league baseball team in their city.

Speaking as a former Redskins season ticket holder, it sort of makes you wonder why ANYONE pays Dan Snyder’s high ticket prices for his awful product. Oh, and let’s not forget the $9 beers and $30 parking spaces.

As we wrote yesterday, Gilbert Arenas missed practice with calf soreness and Mike James is out 4-5 weeks with a broken bone in his hand. So much for that “backlog in the backcourt.”

Over at HoopsHype, former Wizards Etan Thomas writes about political activism in the NBA [he's a part of that] and denounces the NBA age limit. Etan goes on to correctly condemn LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling for paying $2.73 million to settle a federal discrimination lawsuit against him involving his properties and ethnic minorities. Thomas asks, quite reasonably, why NBA owners and David Stern are silent about Sterling’s sins. Finally, there is this gem:

While on the subject of team trainers and doctors, is it possible to impose a fine or forced firing when a team trainer or doctor consistently misdiagnoses numerous players? Not to call out any names but certain teams (not here with the Oklahoma City Thunder) employ trainers and doctors who regularly make medical mishaps (if that’s a politically correct way of saying it).

Hmmm. Think that might be aimed at the much-maligned Wizards medical staff?

Nick Young talks exclusively to DC Landing Strip. Seems like Nick has done more talking than playing this season. Read it.