Story By: Sol Tucker
Photos By: Sol Tucker
Just a few weeks ago Wizards President Michael Winger said that the rebuild process was over. Was the trade today with the Dallas Mavericks what he was referring to and was this one the biggest moment in the last 20 years of Wizards front office history? Only time will tell, but Anthony Davis to D.C sounds kind of nice.
Dallas shipped star forward Anthony Davis, along with Jaden Hardy, D’Angelo Russell and Dante Exum to the Wizards for Khris Middleton, AJ Johnson, Malaki Branham, Marvin Bagley III and five draft picks to the Mavs. The best thing about the draft picks, is that none of those actually belonged to the Wizards and they were acquired as part of the trades of Kyle Kuzma and Bradley Beal.
Personally, I don’t remember the front office doing anything this bold since they announced John Wall as the top pick in the 2010 Draft or perhaps even bringing Gilbert Arenas to D.C. Unfortunately, all of those pieces just barely got them where they needed to be, and all of those components never led them any closer to a championship. Maybe this what a good front office team does. This just seems different. These guys have put some solid young guys with a bright future with the chance to get maybe one more key piece in the off-season or even make one more move before the trade deadline.
The news today certainly is a bright light at the end of the tunnel, which after the embarrassing loss to the Knicks last night, seemed like it might be getting longer and longer, and they would never get out of it.
One big thing that needs to happen as part of this entire last month is that they will need to work out a contract extension with Young in the offseason. Young, 27, also has the option of playing out the 2026-27 season on a player option valued at near $50 million.”
Washington will have officially run out of cap space after this trade, when they were projected to have around $86 million going into the off-season. Either way, these are the two best players on the roster in a long time. The other big question is can they keep both of these players healthy. Many fans have questioned that, since both players have had their fair share off the court this season.
Their financials look a bit like this if all of the players are kept in D.C. One more move could be sending Cam Whitmore somewhere for another valuable piece to this growing puzzle.
