NBA Draft: 4 Centers the Washington Wizards Could Draft at #9

It’s unclear what exactly the Washington Wizards strategy will be next week on draft night, but they’ll need to take somebody with the ninth pick overall. If they want to choose a big man, there will be some good ones available.

The Washington Wizards currently have five players under contract for next season and two of them, Ian Mahinmi and Dwight Howard, are centers. Whether they will be serviceable centers next season is still yet to be determined, though. Mahinmi has spent the last couple seasons watching his minutes shrink and Howard spent nearly all of last season on the sideline with an injury.

Plus, with the emergence of Thomas Bryant, it’s very likely the Wizards make him a priority this offseason. If they add him to the mix, too, things could quickly get crowded in the frontcourt. However, both Mahinmi and Howard will be out of Washington (presumably) at the end of next season. In that case, the future for Washington’s center position could be bleak. At the very least, they’d be thin at that position. The Wizards could find themselves entering free agency next summer without a single center under contract. Not an ideal situation.

However, that could all be avoided if they spend their ninth overall pick in the NBA Draft on one of the NBA’s next top tier centers. There should be more than a few good prospects still available towards the tail end of the top ten.

Here are four center prospects that the Washington Wizards should consider adding to the team.