The Washington Wizards was one of the most active teams in the NBA during the offseason. Even though they weren’t heavily engaged in the free agency market, they were involved in a number of trades including Kristaps Porzingis, Bradley Beal, Chris Paul, and Monte Morris. They drafted two young, talented prospects Bilal Coulibaly and Tristan Vukcevic, while re-signing Kyle Kuzma.
The Wizards completely reshaped their roster and brought in plenty of young talent including Jordan Poole, Patrick Baldwin Jr, and Ryan Rollins in the trades. It’s a much younger, more dynamic, and more exciting roster than the last few seasons.
This was also the Washington Wizards’ new front office‘s first offseason. Immediately after their hire, they had a lot of decisions to make. The biggest one was choosing a direction for the franchise.
And they made the right choice by going the rebuilding route. The team wasn’t going anywhere after missing the playoffs four times out of the past five seasons.
So, when judging the offseason moves, we have to look at them from the rebuilding perspective. For a move to be a good one, it needs to make it more likely for the Wizards to be competitive in a few years.
It’s also important to consider the circumstances and resources available when giving out off-season grades. What was the alternative route? What were other realistic packages in potential deals, or picks in the draft?
The Wizards were unfortunately in a tough position to start the summer due to the past mistakes of previous regimes. They didn’t have high-end young talent, weren’t picking in the top five of the draft, owed their 2024 first-round pick, their star player had a no-trade clause in their contract, two of their best three players’ contracts were expiring, and they had no cap space or financial flexibility.
Fixing all of this in one offseason was going to be challenging, but team president Michael Winger and GM Will Dawkins had a good start taking on these challenges. Let’s take a look at how they did with each move.