“Right now we should really be 3-0,” Jennings said. “We were up at halftime against Charlotte, and we lost a lead. And tonight we were up (24) at half and let a team come back. That is something we really need to focus on, especially going on a West Coast road trip. On the road in hostile environments you have got to be able to contain the lead and take over.”

Jordan Crawford, benched in favor of Nick Young after scoring one point in a loss at Atlanta on Wednesday, led Washington (0-3) with 24 points. John Wall had six points on 1-of-9 shooting and four turnovers.

Ersan Ilyasova had 16 points, and Carlos Delfino, who missed the first two games of the season with a sprained right wrist, added 15 off the bench for Milwaukee (2-1). Andrew Bogut had 13 points, 15 rebounds and three blocks.

Jennings has scored 22, 24 and 22 points in three games this season.

“He has been very efficient,” Bucks coach Scott Skiles said. “He is doing a good job in the first half of the games of moving the ball around and seeing people and kind of taking his scoring opportunities as they come. And then as the game has gone on he’s gotten a little more aggressive, especially when we’ve struggled a little bit in those stretches.

“That’s what the good players do.”

The first half went about as badly as it could go for the Wizards – starting with a technical foul called when Roger Mason Jr., who was not on the active list, checked into the game.

Mason had come in for Crawford with 3:27 left in the first quarter and scored on a baseline jumper seven seconds later. However, during a timeout at the 2:53 mark, the Wizards were whistled for the technical. The basket was later taken away from Mason and credited to Rashard Lewis. Jennings made the technical free throw to make it 25-18 Milwaukee, and Ronny Turiaf’s dunk made it 25-20 before the Bucks poured it on.

Wizards coach Flip Saunders took responsibility for Mason being disqualified from the game. The Wizards public relations staff also took the blame.

The NBA provides a roster to teams to circle who will be inactive for each game. The list excluded Mason’s name, and neither Saunders nor the PR staff caught the mistake before sending the final active roster to the league office.

The Bucks statistical staff noticed the mistake when they tried to enter Mason’s basket.

“It’s my fault,” Saunders said. “I didn’t notice it. I take responsibility for that. I thought he would have given us some help.”

Said Mason: “It was just human error. Just a mistake. It happens.”

Milwaukee outscored the Wizards 40-21 the rest of the half to take a 65-41 lead. The Bucks, 22nd in the league in field goal percentage coming in, shot 61.5 percent in the half to Washington’s 34 percent. Young and Wall combined to go 1 for 11 in the first half.

“A little bit, I think,” Vesely said when asked if the adjustment has been tough. “I think I’m getting every day into better shape so I think can get into this rhythm.”

The unusual circumstances of the past month have also contributed to the whirlwind of preparing for his rookie season. He trained in Los Angeles, then left last month to return home to the Czech Republic, believing that there would be no swift resolution to the lockout. He contemplated returning to his former team in Serbia, Partizan Belgrade.

But NBA owners and players found a compromise to end the lockout. Then, Vesely wondered if he would be allowed to enter the United States in time for training camp to begin.

“It was difficult,” Vesely said.

Vesely, 21, said he feels comfortable in his new surroundings, but his performance in scrimmages during the first few days of training camp often shows otherwise. He runs the floor well, makes sharp cuts toward the basket, sets screens and is a capable passer. But the high-flying, 6-foot-11 forward appears more willing to blend in than steal the spotlight (as he did with the infamous smooch with his girlfriend on draft night).

For example, Wall tried to set him up for a potential fast-break dunk this week, throwing a beautiful outlet pass ahead of every defender, but Vesely never lifted his head and the ball drifted out of bounds. A day later, Vesely found himself a few feet from the basket with Wall defending him. Despite having a decided height advantage, Vesely refused to back him down or simply shoot over Wall. Instead he turned and attempted a fadeaway, and Wall forced him into shooting an air ball. Afterward, veteran Roger Mason Jr. pulled Vesely aside to urge him to be more assertive in that situation.

“With him, he’s so talented, he can take his time a little bit,” Mason said. “I was just letting him know, giving him support, that in this league, you don’t have to rush. A young guy, the tendency in this league is to rush.”

With plenty of depth at his position, the Wizards are in no such hurry to bring along Vesely. Andray Blatche is the starter at power forward, Rashard Lewis can slide over when the team goes to smaller lineups and Trevor Booker, new acquisition Ronny Turiaf and rookie Chris Singleton will also get minutes at the position.

Coach Flip Saunders certainly isn’t concerned, as Vesely regains his legs and attempts to process all that is going on around him.

“Of all of our players, he has a great feel for the game. He really understands, passes the ball extremely well, makes the extra pass, knows when to hold it, when to get rid of it. The speed of the game, that’s not his problem because that’s his forte, getting up and down,” Saunders said. “For him, it’s just constantly working on his fundamentals, working on his shooting, working on all those things. But as far as the feel and how to play, he’s got that.”

Wall has also been encouraged by what he’s seen from Vesely.

“I think he’s still just learning how the NBA game is, how physical it is, how quick it is. But I think he’ll be good down the road,” Wall said. “He’s athletic, can play defense, can jump. He does those things, and he just wants to work. He’s not frustrated or anything. He’s just playing hard.”

After each practice, Vesely spends extra time working on his shooting form near the basket and at the foul line. As Vesely goes through his shooting motion, assistant coach Ryan Saunders will often stand nearby, placing his hand against Vesely’s back to ensure that he maintains his balance and avoids the temptation to lean.

“He’s got really good form,” Flip Saunders said. “He just has a tendency, he fades a little bit and loses his concentration, so I think it’s more to just tighten up his shot a little bit.”

During Vesely’s professional stops in Serbia and Slovenia, the teams didn’t emphasize individual attention and player development. The Wizards have made that a priority as they attempt to rebuild with one of the league’s youngest teams.

“Not a lot of shooting drills, not a lot of one-on-one drills,” Vesely said of his previous teams. “This NBA is different than European basketball.”

Vesely visited Washington for the first time when he came for his introductory news conference. He is still looking for a new apartment but doesn’t expect to have any trouble making the transition to living in a new country.

“The weather is fine, it’s close to Czech so I didn’t have a problem for getting used to D.C.,” Vesely said. “It’s good to be back and to work out.”

John Wall may have been “happy” to hear that representatives for NBA owners and players reached a tentative settlement that could mean the end of a nearly five-month long lockout. But if the Washington Wizards guard has had time to review the details of the agreement — which still needs approval from the majority of the players and owners before being ratified — he should truly be elated about at least one of the negotiated provisions.

Since they were established in 1995, rookie scale contracts have been some of the NBA’s best bargains, with superstar talents often exceeding their value in the first four years of their career. But players who prove to be elite talents before signing their first contract extensions now have the opportunity to reap financial rewards earlier.

If Wall is able to make the all-NBA team twice, get voted as an all-star starter twice, or win an MVP award over the next three seasons, he could receive the same maximum-salary extension as players with at least six years of service in the league — worth 30 percent of the salary cap instead of 25 percent.

Derrick Rose, who won the league’s MVP award in his third season with Chicago, will be among the first to take advantage of the provision and Kevin Durant may also be eligible to receive the extra five percent bump because the extension he signed in 2010 does not take effect until this season. Wall, the 2010 No. 1 overall pick and runner-up to Los Angeles Clippers all-star forward Blake Griffin for rookie of the year last season, faces a steep climb to reach elite status but certainly has considerably more incentive to get there.

Players benefitted from several compromises from the league over the weekend and several of the rules, according to a memo Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver distributed to team executives, will have an immediate effect on the Wizards.

The split of the revenues was an important part of the negotiations, and players will receive 51.2 percent of the basketball-related income in the first year of the 10-year deal (players and owners can each opt out of the deal after six years). But they will also have to absorb huge financial losses with a 66-game season beginning on Dec. 25.

Contracts will also be prorated, so players will receive about 80.5 percent of their salaries from an 82-game season. Based on an estimated $2 billion in player income, players have lost about $390 million because of the delayed start. While Wizards forward Rashard Lewis is slated to earn nearly $22 million in the upcoming season, he will now receive about $17.7 million.

The salary cap for next season isn’t expected to go below $58 million and the Wizards have about $52 million committed to salaries for next season. In the past, the teams with cap room, such as the Wizards, were limited to using only their available cap space, then signing minimum salary players to fill out their rosters. But they have now been granted a new exception allows them to sign one or more free agents to a salary up to $2.5 million and two years in length.

On May 4, the Washington Post reported on Page A1 that Washington Wizards Coach Eddie Jordan and President of Basketball Operations Ernie Grunfeld met with forward Kwame Brown. Grunfeld said afterward that “philosophical differences” forced the two sides to mutually agree that they were better off without each other.

Coach Jordan was asked to elaborate.

“Brown was using too much metaphysics under the boards. We’ve practiced logical positivism all year. Metaphysics just doesn’t work with the Bulls — they’re some of the best rationalists in the league.”

Brown’s teammate, center Aristotle Jones, said that during the regular season Brown was “hot-dogging it with his existential ball-handling.

“But that’s simply not in our dialectic. Coach Jordan wanted us to keep it conservative with a utilitarian defense.”

Brown has gotten into trouble before when he publicly claimed before the playoffs that his Cartesian dualism is a double threat against any team in the league. He failed a mandatory logic test last year when high doses of deconstructionism were detected in his thinking.

Coach Jordan did his post-doctoral work critiquing Descartes.

“Brown may be the finest metaphysician in the league but he’s got to be a team player in our epistemology,” Jones said.

“His sophistry was just getting too sloppy,” said Ludwig Wittgenstein, a disappointed Wizards fan. “You could see it in his rebounding.”

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – JaVale McGee only acknowledged the inevitable Friday when the Washington Wizards center said a few NBA players are “ready to fold” in their contentious labor negotiations with the league.

McGee and union president Derek Fisher both believe far more players are sticking together and staying strong as they head into a crucial week for the league’s future.

And whatever commissioner David Stern’s gut is telling him about next week’s meeting with a federal mediator, Fisher remains confident they can make a deal to save the season.

“My gut tells me that there’s no way Commissioner Stern and the NBA would damage their business by making us miss a whole season,” Fisher said Friday after a union meeting at the Beverly Hilton.

While Stern made another round of radio interviews postulating doom if a deal isn’t reached quickly, Fisher and union executive director Billy Hunter briefed a group of roughly 30 players in Beverly Hills on the state of negotiations.

McGee left the meeting early, but made the biggest headlines at the valet stand when he described frank conversations among the players.

“There’s definitely some guys in there saying that they’re ready to fold, but … the majority of guys are willing to stand strong,” McGee said.

But later, in a tweet, McGee denied he said the words recorded by more than a dozen reporters.

Fisher and the players who didn’t leave early laughed off the brouhaha. “The person that spent the least amount of time in the room has no ability to make that statement,” Fisher said.

Still, the union’s collective will is about to be tested by Stern and his owners, who already canceled the first two weeks of the regular season. Stern also said he believes there won’t be basketball on Christmas, traditionally the league’s biggest regular-season day, if a deal isn’t reached next week.

“That’s an arbitrary deadline just to throw out on Commissioner Stern’s part,” Fisher said. “We don’t see it that way.”