Fans are endlessly roasting Wizards over latest rumored trade target

The NBA Trade Deadline is a wild time. Normally measured, logical teams are suddenly rumored to be considering crazy ideas. Some of it is wild speculation, but teams do enough insane things when pressed against a deadline that the rumors can’t be dismissed out of hand.

Now enter a franchise like the Washington Wizards, which can be relied upon to wildly overpay their own players but otherwise are unreliable, quick-twitch and generally a great bet to prioritize the present over the future.

That’s why fans of the Wizards have no choice but to accept the most recent rumors about the team as true. On Wednesday, just over 24 hours away from the Feb 9th trade deadline, NBA Insider Marc Stein reported that the Wizards “have emerged as a team with interest in Jakob Poeltl.”

Poeltl, a 7’1″ center with the San Antonio Spurs, is going to be an unrestricted free agent this summer. As the Spurs are rebuilding, he is seen as a player who could be gettable on the trade market, and teams who don’t expect to have enough cap space to sign him this summer are asking about the price to trade for him now.

The previous teams linked to Poeltl have made sense. The Boston Celtics are all-in for a title and could use center depth. The Toronto Raptors don’t have a reliable starting center. The LA Clippers have just one center in their rotation. The Wizards, though? They don’t make as much sense.

To help me explain why, I’ll enlist the help of the Wizards fan base:

https://twitter.com/JohnnyObeid/status/1623367401982009345

In case you don’t speak “aggrieved fanbase on Twitter”, the Washington Wizards are currently 24-29, in 12th place in the Eastern Conference. That’s the kind of team that sells off veterans, rather than making a run at adding another.

In addition, the Wizards already have Daniel Gafford and Kristaps Porzingis at center. Adding Poeltl to the mix crowds an already expensive room at the league’s most replaceable position. Could Porzingis move to power forward? Perhaps, except they are planning to re-sign Kyle Kuzma to a substantial contract this summer to play the 4, and have Deni Avdija behind him.

Alright, so perhaps the Wizards will need to move on from one or more players in their frontcourt, but the chance to add a player like Poeltl could make it worth it. Stein describes Poeltl as a “needle-mover” so….wait, the Wizards fans have more to say.

Jakob Poeltl is a really gifted rim protector, but he isn’t a game-changer in other areas of basketball. He has never averaged more than 13.5 points, 9.3 rebounds or 29 minutes per game. This season his rim protection hasn’t been enough to stop the San Antonio Spurs from having a historically bad defense, last in the league by a Texas mile. He hardly seems like a must-have player.

At least the Wizards’ fan base can have confidence their team will make the right decision, yeah?

https://twitter.com/WonzoTV/status/1623376755997216774

Well, that was fun.

Whatever the Washington Wizards do at the Trade Deadline, it will absolutely be the wrong thing. Until they do something worse in the offseason. The joy of being a Washington sports fan.