Cross your fingers
The Wizards are counting on lottery luck to help end decades of dynsfunction
Associated Press photo
Hope, we’re often told, is not a strategy. And playing the lottery isn’t a valid get-rich-quick scheme.
That may help explain why the Washington Wizards have been so bad for so long, since hope seems to be all they have.
You’d think a team called the Wizards could simply conjure up success. But it’s been 48 years since the franchise (then known as the Bullets) won its one and only NBA title and 47 since it even reached the Eastern Conference finals. The Wizards have made the playoffs just once in the past eight seasons and last won a postseason series in 2017. They’re a combined 50-196 over the past three dreadful seasons.
All that losing should have netted them some spectacular young talent, but their drafting and talent retention have been as spotty as their on-court play.
Yes, they have added Alex Sarr and Tre Johnson with top-10 picks in the past two drafts, but they also struck out with Troy Brown Jr. in 2018 (10 picks before Orlando selected Moritz Wagner); Corey Kispert in 2019 (one pick before Houston ended up with Alperin Sengun); and Johnny Davis in 2022 (two picks before Jalen Duren landed in Detroit).
Yes, hindsight is 20/20, but arguably Washington’s two best selections in that span (Rui Hachimura in 2019 and Deni Avdija in 2020) are now excelling elsewhere.
Die-hard Wizards fans (if there are any remaining) will insist that the team narrowly missed out on the No. 1 pick and the opportunity to draft Victor Wembanyana in 2023 and Cooper Flagg last summer because the NBA lottery’s ping-pong balls didn’t quite fall their way.
Which brings us to this year’s lottery, which will be held Sunday afternoon and might be their last chance for a franchise-altering break (other than assembling and coaching up a talented roster). It’s not great when you’re counting on luck to overcome your shortcomings.
Because they had the NBA’s worst record (17-65), the Wizards have as good a shot at anyone at the No. 1 pick in a draft that most analysts consider as deep and talented as any in recent years. They, Indiana and Brooklyn all have a 14 percent chance of choosing first and a 52 percent shot at landing in the top four.
That’s important, because experts point to at least four candidates whose immediate impact should be greater than anyone currently on Washington’s roster: forwards AJ Dybantsa (BYU), Cameron Boozer (Duke) and Caleb Wilson (North Carolina), along with Kansas guard Darryn Peterson.
At 6-foot-9, Dybantsa seems to have the highest ceiling, and he’d be my choice if I had the No. 1 pick. He’s not as tall as Kevin Durant, but he plays with a similarly smooth style and the ability to shoot (and make) from almost anywhere.
ACC fans got to see a lot of Duke’s Boozer and UNC’s Wilson and had to like what they saw. Boozer is polished and versatile, if not quite as athletic as the other three, and could be even better than his father Carlos, who played in the NBA for a decade. Wilson, whose season ended prematurely due to a broken thumb, is 6-10 with long arms and could be another Bam Adebajo (who dropped 83 on the Wizards this season).
Peterson is the trickiest of the four. He arrived at Kansas as the presumptive No. 1 pick, but missed nine games and left several others early due to cramping that he now attributes to high doses of creatine. He may be the most talented candidate, but if you can’t stay healthy for one 35-game college season, what will you do over 82 annual games in the pros? Zion Williamson has proven that you’re not much good to your team on the bench in street clothes.
On paper, at least, any of those four would represent a significant upgrade for a team that’s not even on any top-tier free agent’s radar right now and that allowed an atrocious 125 points per game this season. (In a recent anonymous player survey, The Athletic asked which NBA head coach impressed them the least. “I don’t even know who’s coaching the Wizards, but whoever coaches the Wizards,” one player said. If you don’t know, either, don’t kick yourself. It’s Brian Keefe.)
It’s even more important than ever for Washington to upgrade its roster in this draft, because the NBA finally claims to be getting serious about combatting tanking. And the Wizards have prioritized losing every bit as much as the Washington Generals, the Harlem Globetrotters’ longtime foils. (Fat lot of good it’s done them.)
Even if they don’t get a top-four pick, there are other promising players available: guards Kingston Flemings (Houston), Darius Acuff Jr. (Arkansas) and Keaton Wagler (Illinois). But would the Wizards’ decades of dysfunction rub off on one of them as well?
Perhaps adding Dybantsa or Williams would enhance the development of Sarr and Johnson. It might excite Trae Young into playing hard for his new team and convince Anthony Davis to stay in D.C. rather than demanding a trade. (If you’re counting on the mercurial, defense-averse Young or the aging, injury-prone, disinterested Davis to put you over the top, that’s another big leap of faith. They were both available for a reason.)
First, though, the Wizards have to luck into a high pick, then use it wisely, then develop that player into a productive professional. That’s a pretty long to-do list for a team that’s failed spectacularly at each of those tasks for going on half a century.
But hope springs eternal. In an effort to boost their odds, the Wizards are sending John Wall (their last No. 1 overall pick, in 2010) to Chicago to represent them. He never got them past the conference semifinals as a player, but he’s hoping to bring them luck.
That’s about all they have right now. Keep your fingers crossed.