2025 Draft Thread

[The Consiglieri]

We're tied for first. Actual first will be determined by
random drawing, assuming we finish with identical records.

Pretty annoying method. I don't know why they don't just split the risk. Give us both a 10% chance of landing the 1.06, instead of 20. Why draw straws? Its just stupid, considering the scale of importance.

[The Consiglieri]

My take on if we get #1, we take Flagg - I don't believe he would opt out.

Then we shamelessly tank again and get a bottom four (guaranteeing us a bottom 8). All of our youngster contracts don't start coming due until '27-'28 sans Champagnie. We then off-load a few to get additional picks moving forward.

Goal is to start to be competitive in '27-'28. Flagg, '25 FRP, '26 FRP, and whomever works out among Sarr, Bub, George, Champagnie, AJ and Bilal. That is 9 youngsters. We need a #1 & #2 and the others that can develop to become serviceable starters.

No?

If we get first, there should be no more tanking.

Sarr was #2 overall
Flagg will be #1 overall

That's enough!

The league should put a stop to anything that looks like tanking from the Wizards after this if it comes to fruition.

Losing on purpose is throwing games.

Losing on purpose is shaving points.

Instead of randomly developing a farm system of players from without and banking on drafting a lottery superstar; win as many games as you can.

Atlanta drafted Trae Young after winning 36 games.

The idea of being non-competitive AGAIN is sickening to me. The Wizards were stuck at 40-wins in a different era. This team needs to stop being a 20-win team ASAP.

Young players need to learn how to win. With Flagg or Harper, the Wizards should look at being playoff contenders

.

Nope, disagree 1000%. This is a league where you either have the elite franchise mega players, or you do not matter a good 95% of the time (periodically a Detroit '04 swims to the top, then immediately sinks back down to the abyss). Now add in that franchise players, especially domestic ones, have zero interest in moving anywhere beyond nice cities in non-state income tax states (Arizona, Texas, Florida etc), or big city lights and or sun (NY and the Northeast, LA, etc), and you realize the only way to compete is by tanking, if you are a team stuck in an unattractive city/state (Indiana, Milwaukee, Orlando, Charlotte to some degree Portland etc).

This is how you build, IN ANY SPORT, when your team either can't build another way (those cities above like in the NBA) or you have flat lined. It's so bizarre to me that in a city that simply saw its team properly accidently tank once, in the perfect year for it (the '24 QB Class) and then turn around a franchise that had been in the sewer for 30+ years, fans don't get this, is utterly beyond me. No tanking in '23, no Jayden Daniels. No tanking in '03-'04, no Ovy, no tanking in '97 for the colts, no Peyton Manning.

This isn't hard. Tanking is a perfectly acceptable way for a team in any league to try and turn around its luck. In the NBA, where the league is fundamentally designed to ---- over permanently more than half of the franchises, tanking should be automatic, and the anti-tanking rules are and have always been absolute 1000% bull----, a way to stick it to the hopeless and further enrich the flagship teams and cities (Boston, NY, LA, Miami etc), I think its done by accident, but make no mistake the end result is the same, the talent once it hits FA, freely flows to the same cities every single freaking time, beyond some Euro's, and without tanking, or blind luck (see Giannis, Jokic), it's completely impossible to compete.

As for DC, that you're over tanking after two years is hysterical. Did you enjoy 1980-2023? 45 years (or nearly so) of total irrelevance. I don't know how on earth you'd think the tanking is done at this point. We have if we're lucky, a complimentary player or two (Bub, maybe Sarr), and a good bench guy (George), and an open question (AJ), plus a guy who isn't reaching his ceiling despite tantalizing us a bit last fall (Bilal) and ZERO stars.Cooper Flagg will not suddenly make us a complete franchise. With Wemby, a superior talent to Flagg, San Antonio is a 33 game winner with a couple of days left in the season.

The tank will end summer '26 or '27 once we've accumulated the resources necessary to actually compete for a birth in the conference finals and beyond, w/o such resources it will continue to an unknown date in the future, the only way to contend is through that door, hasn't 45 years of sucking been enough to let us know what door, is the only door to potential success? Tanking, or blind luck in the lottery, and that is it. Period.

I find it inexplicable that people find this experience painful, this is losing with a purpose and a direction, it is the early seedlings of a long term plan for future potential glory, instead of just doing dumb--- donuts in the parking lot, driving to nowhere which was 1980-2023, now that, that was excruciating. This, this is actual purpose and direction. I cannot understand why people are so pained from it, especially after watching the redskins do the very same from 1993-2023. People should understand, this is how winning is birthed, and slowly grown to an actual fully grown reality. It hurts at the start, but nowhere near as much as not even trying, which was the past 45 years (with a 2 or 3 or 4 year moment here and there of attempted builds (mid nineties, 15 years ago, etc).

[dckingsfan]

My take on if we get #1, we take Flagg - I don't believe he would opt out.

Then we shamelessly tank again and get a bottom four (guaranteeing us a bottom 8). All of our youngster contracts don't start coming due until '27-'28 sans Champagnie. We then off-load a few to get additional picks moving forward.

Goal is to start to be competitive in '27-'28. Flagg, '25 FRP, '26 FRP, and whomever works out among Sarr, Bub, George, Champagnie, AJ and Bilal. That is 9 youngsters. We need a #1 & #2 and the others that can develop to become serviceable starters.

No?

If we get first, there should be no more tanking.

Sarr was #2 overall
Flagg will be #1 overall

That's enough!

The league should put a stop to anything that looks like tanking from the Wizards after this if it comes to fruition.

Losing on purpose is throwing games.

Losing on purpose is shaving points.

Instead of randomly developing a farm system of players from without and banking on drafting a lottery superstar; win as many games as you can.

Atlanta drafted Trae Young after winning 36 games.

The idea of being non-competitive AGAIN is sickening to me. The Wizards were stuck at 40-wins in a different era. This team needs to stop being a 20-win team ASAP.

Young players need to learn how to win. With Flagg or Harper, the Wizards should look at being playoff contenders.

Its not tanking, its about talent accumulation and internal development which does not happen overnight and usually takes years. Flagg also does not necessarily guarantee the opportunity to make a playoff run in year 1. Trade your best shooters in Poole & Middleton and they'll still struggle to score and win many games. Success needs to come on the backs of this young core, not the supplemental vets that we've added to hold the ship steady and provide mentorship.

The feeling of frustration and being sick of losing has been short circuiting rebuilds for years. I'm patient with this and in all honesty, I think the plan has always been about '25-26 as being the last year of the 'deconstruction phase'.

Agreed. Although I think it is '26-'27.

[The Consiglieri]

The loss to PHL kinda ruined my confidence about
being better next year. Then I realized the team
that lost that game was our 3rd string, not our
second string. It was important to lose given UTA
won a game, but not important in projecting how
we do next year.

Why would the result of any of these games ruin your confidence in the team lol. We are tanking.

Because our record is a result of winless NOV and
winless FEB this season. Our young players have gotten better. In order to have no chance of losing
the 2026 pick, we have to be bottom 4 in the league
next year. The pick is top 8 protected.

Above that, there is an increasing chance we could
lose the pick if our luck is poor depending on how
much better we are.

edit - thinking further about this, if we finished 5th, 4 teams below us (5-14) would have to pass us in the lottery,
6th, 3 teams and so on. Those are low odds so I'm probably over-worrying. But we are the Wizards.
So between 5-8, there is a smallish chance we could lose the pick. If we finish above 8th, the only way we keep it
is if we're selected in the top 4.

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.


The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?


Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

[dckingsfan]

Why would the result of any of these games ruin your confidence in the team lol. We are tanking.

Because our record is a result of winless NOV and
winless FEB this season. Our young players have gotten better. In order to have no chance of losing
the 2026 pick, we have to be bottom 4 in the league
next year. The pick is top 8 protected.

Above that, there is an increasing chance we could
lose the pick if our luck is poor depending on how
much better we are.

edit - thinking further about this, if we finished 5th, 4 teams below us (5-14) would have to pass us in the lottery,
6th, 3 teams and so on. Those are low odds so I'm probably over-worrying. But we are the Wizards.
So between 5-8, there is a smallish chance we could lose the pick. If we finish above 8th, the only way we keep it
is if we're selected in the top 4.

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.

The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?

Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

One thing you have to take into consideration. If you are say, the 8th worst team (not 5th) and one team below you jumps - you are now the 9th team in the lottery and lose your pick.

To be "completely" safe, you need to be one of the worst 4 teams. However, there is also a chance that at 8 you move up, 32.00% top 4.

So, when doing all this analysis you need to take those factors into account as well (not to mention #soWizards).

My list to challenge the Wiz are Utah, Phoenix, Charlotte, Philly, Brooklyn, Dallas + wildcard team that decides to also tank. But I trust that Keefe can discretely tank with the best of them.

[AFM]

Watch on YouTube

[dobrojim]

Why would the result of any of these games ruin your confidence in the team lol. We are tanking.

Because our record is a result of winless NOV and
winless FEB this season. Our young players have gotten better. In order to have no chance of losing
the 2026 pick, we have to be bottom 4 in the league
next year. The pick is top 8 protected.

Above that, there is an increasing chance we could
lose the pick if our luck is poor depending on how
much better we are.

edit - thinking further about this, if we finished 5th, 4 teams below us (5-14) would have to pass us in the lottery,
6th, 3 teams and so on. Those are low odds so I'm probably over-worrying. But we are the Wizards.
So between 5-8, there is a smallish chance we could lose the pick. If we finish above 8th, the only way we keep it
is if we're selected in the top 4.

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.


The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?


Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

Largely agree with all of this although I think we are essentially even (in suck) with UTA and CHA.
The difference isn't that meaningful.

Thanks for doing the quick calculation on the odds of losing the pick were we to finish 5-8.
I was definitely over-worrying.

I've yet to see a definitive/authoritative explanation for the various possibilities
that come into play with pick swaps relative to pick protection.

[doclinkin]

We're tied for first. Actual first will be determined by
random drawing, assuming we finish with identical records.

Pretty annoying method. I don't know why they don't just split the risk. Give us both a 10% chance of landing the 1.06, instead of 20. Why draw straws? Its just stupid, considering the scale of importance.

Ha. How? Given that the chance to fall out of 1-4 is solely a product of all the teams behind us who have a chance to jump up.

[The Consiglieri]

Because our record is a result of winless NOV and
winless FEB this season. Our young players have gotten better. In order to have no chance of losing
the 2026 pick, we have to be bottom 4 in the league
next year. The pick is top 8 protected.

Above that, there is an increasing chance we could
lose the pick if our luck is poor depending on how
much better we are.

edit - thinking further about this, if we finished 5th, 4 teams below us (5-14) would have to pass us in the lottery,
6th, 3 teams and so on. Those are low odds so I'm probably over-worrying. But we are the Wizards.
So between 5-8, there is a smallish chance we could lose the pick. If we finish above 8th, the only way we keep it
is if we're selected in the top 4.

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.

The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?

Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

One thing you have to take into consideration. If you are say, the 8th worst team (not 5th) and one team below you jumps - you are now the 9th team in the lottery and lose your pick.

To be "completely" safe, you need to be one of the worst 4 teams. However, there is also a chance that at 8 you move up, 32.00% top 4.

So, when doing all this analysis you need to take those factors into account as well (not to mention #soWizards).

My list to challenge the Wiz are Utah, Phoenix, Charlotte, Philly, Brooklyn, Dallas + wildcard team that decides to also tank. But I trust that Keefe can discretely tank with the best of them.

I know, but when you look at the odds: .6% if you're fifth, close to 4% if your 6th worst, you only start really entertaining serious odds at 7th worst (13% chance of 9 or below basically). Now add in the Suns pick swap, and how does that factor in. If the Suns blow it up this summer or next winter, they are definitely a lottery team, hell they already are this year, w/the guys reasonably healthy and present, so even in a worst case scenario, I imagine we could activate the pick swap, I'm just not sure how that will work, or if we can, if we end up outside the top 8. No idea.

[dckingsfan]

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.

The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?

Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

One thing you have to take into consideration. If you are say, the 8th worst team (not 5th) and one team below you jumps - you are now the 9th team in the lottery and lose your pick.

To be "completely" safe, you need to be one of the worst 4 teams. However, there is also a chance that at 8 you move up, 32.00% top 4.

So, when doing all this analysis you need to take those factors into account as well (not to mention #soWizards).

My list to challenge the Wiz are Utah, Phoenix, Charlotte, Philly, Brooklyn, Dallas + wildcard team that decides to also tank. But I trust that Keefe can discretely tank with the best of them.

I know, but when you look at the odds: .6% if you're fifth, close to 4% if your 6th worst, you only start really entertaining serious odds at 7th worst (13% chance of 9 or below basically). Now add in the Suns pick swap, and how does that factor in. If the Suns blow it up this summer or next winter, they are definitely a lottery team, hell they already are this year, w/the guys reasonably healthy and present, so even in a worst case scenario, I imagine we could activate the pick swap, I'm just not sure how that will work, or if we can, if we end up outside the top 8. No idea.

Yeah, if you don't have a pick, can you swap? I think the danger is if we rise to 7 or 8. Other than that, I feel we are safe. And even at you have 37.20% and 32.00% chance of getting a top 4.

Your overall point stands. Doubt we are going to be better than the 8th worst team and likely we get to keep our pick - especially because Keefe and the FO are on the same page and he has carte blanche to play the youngsters.

[doclinkin]

I'm patient with this and in all honesty, I think the plan has always been about '25-26 as being the last year of the 'deconstruction phase'.

Agreed. Although I think it is '26-'27.

The '26 draft is the last of the prior regime, with the pick in danger. At that point if your team has sufficient talent to start winning, it will be evident in the record and you won't need to artificially boost your chances of losing. If you are not good enough to win then you'll land the high picks anyway.

After the '26 draft I think you can start looking at roster balance questions though. To allow you young players the best chance to developing into a winning team. After that point you hope to have landed talent good enough to begin to build around. That doesn't mean selling off all your youth to draw veterans, but you can listen to trade offers if you are deep in a position, and begin to draft for fit instead of solely for best available. If there's a 50/50 choice between two guys you can weight the decision based on synergy instead of future upside. That sort of thing.

I'd agree that its imperative to tank next year, but after that the pressure changes to teaching your young players how to win.

[The Consiglieri]

Because our record is a result of winless NOV and
winless FEB this season. Our young players have gotten better. In order to have no chance of losing
the 2026 pick, we have to be bottom 4 in the league
next year. The pick is top 8 protected.

Above that, there is an increasing chance we could
lose the pick if our luck is poor depending on how
much better we are.

edit - thinking further about this, if we finished 5th, 4 teams below us (5-14) would have to pass us in the lottery,
6th, 3 teams and so on. Those are low odds so I'm probably over-worrying. But we are the Wizards.
So between 5-8, there is a smallish chance we could lose the pick. If we finish above 8th, the only way we keep it
is if we're selected in the top 4.

I would note that there are a handful of teams pre-lottery that are in close to our zone of suck, I think the reasonable way to look at it is:

Tier 1 of suck:
1. Washington.

Tier 2 of suck:
2. Charlotte
3. Utah
4. New Orleans

Tier 3 of suck:
Philly, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami and Milwaukee if they blow up their teams (any 1 of them), Portland, Brooklyn, and Toronto.


If Charlotte, utah or New Orleans win the lottery, I think they become almost no threat to finish worse than us.

So to me anyway, the teams we have to fear are Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans, and probably Toronto, plus any team that decides to blow up its former contender (there are probably four or five of them).

Is there a risk? I think there is, but I think the truth is that the only way likely for it to happen is for multiple contenders above to blow it up + for us to win the lottery or simply draft what happens to be a star from a lesser slot, and even then I think its unlikely.

That being said, it's definitely possible, but still unlikely:

If we go into the lottery fifth worst:

5. 1 in 150 chance of losing our pick
6. 1 in about 27 chance of losing our pick
7. 1 in about 11 chance of losing our pick.


The interesting piece is what about a pick swap? what happens if the Suns end up tanking, and there pick lands at say, 2, and ours lands at like 9. How do we do the pick swap? Do we get theirs and NY gets our lower pick? What's the contingency with that?


Anyway, regardless, I almost find it impossible to believe our odds of losing our pick will rise above somewhere between .6% to at worst, 3.7%. Its nearly impossible to believe there will be 7 or more teams that suck worse than us next year no matter who we draft. Strikes me as borderline crazy to imagine that, but yes, its technically possible, and not 1 in a million possible, I think the Vegas odds chance would probably be about 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000 going into the season.

Largely agree with all of this although I think we are essentially even (in suck) with UTA and CHA.
The difference isn't that meaningful.

Thanks for doing the quick calculation on the odds of losing the pick were we to finish 5-8.
I was definitely over-worrying.

I've yet to see a definitive/authoritative explanation for the various possibilities
that come into play with pick swaps relative to pick protection.

Tankathon has the odds for you of falling below 8

5th worst is 0.6%
6th worst is 3.7%
7th worst is where it becomes something anyone should fear (12.9%)

I don't really understand the pick swap thing either. If we can swap picks with the Suns, and they pick say, 3rd post lottery. Wouldn't we simply activate it, use the 3rd pick and hand over say, the 9th pick in such a scenario, to the Knicks? But I have no idea how it would work.

[doclinkin]

I know, but when you look at the odds: .6% if you're fifth, close to 4% if your 6th worst, you only start really entertaining serious odds at 7th worst (13% chance of 9 or below basically). Now add in the Suns pick swap, and how does that factor in. If the Suns blow it up this summer or next winter, they are definitely a lottery team, hell they already are this year, w/the guys reasonably healthy and present, so even in a worst case scenario, I imagine we could activate the pick swap, I'm just not sure how that will work, or if we can, if we end up outside the top 8. No idea.

To reiterate: If we don't have a pick (ie it goes to New York) then we don't have a pick to swap. PHX keeps their pick. That's it. Swaps happen after the lotto. Before the lotto they are just combinations. Not actual picks. We owed the pick to New York before we made a trade with PHX. New York has first dibs. If we lose it, we can't swap nothing for something.

However if we do have a pick, after the lotto, then we have the option of switching picks with PHX if theirs is better than ours. Which basically means so long as we don't lose our pick, we can basically add all of their lotto combos to ours when trying to guess if we get the top pick.

Which is why it is imperative that we keep our pick.

Imagine we are good/bad enough to land the 8th pick. And PHX is the worst team in the league. All of a sudden instead of a 26.2% chance at a top 4 pick, we add their 52.1% and now have a 78.3% chance of jumping to the top.

If PHX and us are both in the top 3 we pretty much have a 100% chance of a top 4 pick. Top 3: 80%. Top 2: 50+%, #1 overall: double the chances of anyone else, 28%.

It's a super smart way to game the odds in our favor. And we have a few more of them, so in future years even if we are winning and in the playoffs we can potentially add lotto pick talent to our squad.

[dckingsfan]

I'm patient with this and in all honesty, I think the plan has always been about '25-26 as being the last year of the 'deconstruction phase'.

Agreed. Although I think it is '26-'27.

The '26 draft is the last of the prior regime, with the pick in danger. At that point if your team has sufficient talent to start winning, it will be evident in the record and you won't need to artificially boost your chances of losing. If you are not good enough to win then you'll land the high picks anyway.

After the '26 draft I think you can start looking at roster balance questions though. To allow you young players the best chance to developing into a winning team. After that point you hope to have landed talent good enough to begin to build around. That doesn't mean selling off all your youth to draw veterans, but you can listen to trade offers if you are deep in a position, and begin to draft for fit instead of solely for best available. If there's a 50/50 choice between two guys you can weight the decision based on synergy instead of future upside. That sort of thing.

I'd agree that its imperative to tank next year, but after that the pressure changes to teaching your young players how to win.

Lots of caveats in there that I can't disagree with. First, who do you draft in '25, second, who do you draft in '26, which of your youngsters break out (or don't).

Going with one set of probabilities that we don't land a top 4 player in either draft, I could see this extending for quite time. I am with Dat about being patient. My initial thought was that this would easily extend to '28-29 and posted that previously.

[The Consiglieri]

I know, but when you look at the odds: .6% if you're fifth, close to 4% if your 6th worst, you only start really entertaining serious odds at 7th worst (13% chance of 9 or below basically). Now add in the Suns pick swap, and how does that factor in. If the Suns blow it up this summer or next winter, they are definitely a lottery team, hell they already are this year, w/the guys reasonably healthy and present, so even in a worst case scenario, I imagine we could activate the pick swap, I'm just not sure how that will work, or if we can, if we end up outside the top 8. No idea.

To reiterate: If we don't have a pick (ie it goes to New York) then we don't have a pick to swap. PHX keeps their pick. That's it. Swaps happen after the lotto. We owed the pick to New York before we made a trade with PHX. New York has first dibs.

However if we do have a pick, after the lotto, then we have the option of switching picks with PHX if theirs is better than ours. Which basically means so long as we don't lose our pick, we can basically add all of their lotto combos to ours when trying to guess if we get the top pick.

Which is why it is imperative that we keep our pick.

Imagine we are good/bad enough to land the 8th pick. And PHX is the worst team in the league. All of a sudden instead of a 26.2% chance at a top 4 pick, we add their 52.1% and now have a 78.3% chance of jumping to the top.

If PHX and us are both in the top 3 we pretty much have a 100% chance of a top 4 pick, 80% top 3, over 50% top 2, 28% at the #1 overall.

Alright, well that settles it, then we definitely need to fall in the top 4 crap teams to ensure we keep it, top 5 to logically almost certainly keep it (somewhere around 1 in 150 chance of losing it, technically possible but highly unlikely). I was wondering if we could basically say to the Knicks post lottery:

We fall to 1.09, we generate pick swap with the Suns who jumped to 3, that's the Suns pick, our pick, at 9, stays at 9, knicks use it. But it doesn't work that, way, I guess the protection runs to 8 and nothing can be done ex-post facto, like running the swap (would that mean the knicks could use the swap though? since its their pick?).

So bizarre, I hate how this league pretty much runs everything lol, apron this, apron that, mid level exception, yada yada, its just feels like the insane tax code we have, why not just set up a simple cap structure like the NFL? Maybe there's a good reason, but it just gives me a migraine.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

If we get first, there should be no more tanking.

Sarr was #2 overall
Flagg will be #1 overall

That's enough!

The league should put a stop to anything that looks like tanking from the Wizards after this if it comes to fruition.

Losing on purpose is throwing games.

Losing on purpose is shaving points.

Instead of randomly developing a farm system of players from without and banking on drafting a lottery superstar; win as many games as you can.

Atlanta drafted Trae Young after winning 36 games.

The idea of being non-competitive AGAIN is sickening to me. The Wizards were stuck at 40-wins in a different era. This team needs to stop being a 20-win team ASAP.

Young players need to learn how to win. With Flagg or Harper, the Wizards should look at being playoff contenders.

Its not tanking, its about talent accumulation and internal development which does not happen overnight and usually takes years. Flagg also does not necessarily guarantee the opportunity to make a playoff run in year 1. Trade your best shooters in Poole & Middleton and they'll still struggle to score and win many games. Success needs to come on the backs of this young core, not the supplemental vets that we've added to hold the ship steady and provide mentorship.

The feeling of frustration and being sick of losing has been short circuiting rebuilds for years. I'm patient with this and in all honesty, I think the plan has always been about '25-26 as being the last year of the 'deconstruction phase'.

Agreed. Although I think it is '26-'27.

My take on if we get #1, we take Flagg - I don't believe he would opt out.

Then we shamelessly tank again and get a bottom four (guaranteeing us a bottom 8). All of our youngster contracts don't start coming due until '27-'28 sans Champagnie. We then off-load a few to get additional picks moving forward.

Goal is to start to be competitive in '27-'28. Flagg, '25 FRP, '26 FRP, and whomever works out among Sarr, Bub, George, Champagnie, AJ and Bilal. That is 9 youngsters. We need a #1 & #2 and the others that can develop to become serviceable starters.

No?

If we get first, there should be no more tanking.

Sarr was #2 overall
Flagg will be #1 overall

That's enough!

The league should put a stop to anything that looks like tanking from the Wizards after this if it comes to fruition.

Losing on purpose is throwing games.

Losing on purpose is shaving points.

Instead of randomly developing a farm system of players from without and banking on drafting a lottery superstar; win as many games as you can.

Atlanta drafted Trae Young after winning 36 games.

The idea of being non-competitive AGAIN is sickening to me. The Wizards were stuck at 40-wins in a different era. This team needs to stop being a 20-win team ASAP.

Young players need to learn how to win. With Flagg or Harper, the Wizards should look at being playoff contenders

.

Nope, disagree 1000%. This is a league where you either have the elite franchise mega players, or you do not matter a good 95% of the time (periodically a Detroit '04 swims to the top, then immediately sinks back down to the abyss). Now add in that franchise players, especially domestic ones, have zero interest in moving anywhere beyond nice cities in non-state income tax states (Arizona, Texas, Florida etc), or big city lights and or sun (NY and the Northeast, LA, etc), and you realize the only way to compete is by tanking, if you are a team stuck in an unattractive city/state (Indiana, Milwaukee, Orlando, Charlotte to some degree Portland etc).

This is how you build, IN ANY SPORT, when your team either can't build another way (those cities above like in the NBA) or you have flat lined. It's so bizarre to me that in a city that simply saw its team properly accidently tank once, in the perfect year for it (the '24 QB Class) and then turn around a franchise that had been in the sewer for 30+ years, fans don't get this, is utterly beyond me. No tanking in '23, no Jayden Daniels. No tanking in '03-'04, no Ovy, no tanking in '97 for the colts, no Peyton Manning.

This isn't hard. Tanking is a perfectly acceptable way for a team in any league to try and turn around its luck. In the NBA, where the league is fundamentally designed to ---- over permanently more than half of the franchises, tanking should be automatic, and the anti-tanking rules are and have always been absolute 1000% bull----, a way to stick it to the hopeless and further enrich the flagship teams and cities (Boston, NY, LA, Miami etc), I think its done by accident, but make no mistake the end result is the same, the talent once it hits FA, freely flows to the same cities every single freaking time, beyond some Euro's, and without tanking, or blind luck (see Giannis, Jokic), it's completely impossible to compete.

As for DC, that you're over tanking after two years is hysterical. Did you enjoy 1980-2023? 45 years (or nearly so) of total irrelevance. I don't know how on earth you'd think the tanking is done at this point. We have if we're lucky, a complimentary player or two (Bub, maybe Sarr), and a good bench guy (George), and an open question (AJ), plus a guy who isn't reaching his ceiling despite tantalizing us a bit last fall (Bilal) and ZERO stars.Cooper Flagg will not suddenly make us a complete franchise. With Wemby, a superior talent to Flagg, San Antonio is a 33 game winner with a couple of days left in the season.

The tank will end summer '26 or '27 once we've accumulated the resources necessary to actually compete for a birth in the conference finals and beyond, w/o such resources it will continue to an unknown date in the future, the only way to contend is through that door, hasn't 45 years of sucking been enough to let us know what door, is the only door to potential success? Tanking, or blind luck in the lottery, and that is it. Period.

I find it inexplicable that people find this experience painful, this is losing with a purpose and a direction, it is the early seedlings of a long term plan for future potential glory, instead of just doing dumb--- donuts in the parking lot, driving to nowhere which was 1980-2023, now that, that was excruciating. This, this is actual purpose and direction. I cannot understand why people are so pained from it, especially after watching the redskins do the very same from 1993-2023. People should understand, this is how winning is birthed, and slowly grown to an actual fully grown reality. It hurts at the start, but nowhere near as much as not even trying, which was the past 45 years (with a 2 or 3 or 4 year moment here and there of attempted builds (mid nineties, 15 years ago, etc).

So, accumulate talent and several seasons from now (2028?) reach mediocrity (41-41).

Or, do we have another 17-win season and leapfrog all the way to a fourth seed and climbing?

[The Consiglieri]

Agreed. Although I think it is '26-'27.

The '26 draft is the last of the prior regime, with the pick in danger. At that point if your team has sufficient talent to start winning, it will be evident in the record and you won't need to artificially boost your chances of losing. If you are not good enough to win then you'll land the high picks anyway.

After the '26 draft I think you can start looking at roster balance questions though. To allow you young players the best chance to developing into a winning team. After that point you hope to have landed talent good enough to begin to build around. That doesn't mean selling off all your youth to draw veterans, but you can listen to trade offers if you are deep in a position, and begin to draft for fit instead of solely for best available. If there's a 50/50 choice between two guys you can weight the decision based on synergy instead of future upside. That sort of thing.

I'd agree that its imperative to tank next year, but after that the pressure changes to teaching your young players how to win.

Lots of caveats in there that I can't disagree with. First, who do you draft in '25, second, who do you draft in '26, which of your youngsters break out (or don't).

Going with one set of probabilities that we don't land a top 4 player in either draft, I could see this extending for quite time. I am with Dat about being patient. My initial thought was that this would easily extend to '28-29 and posted that previously.

I've certainly mentioned.

If they get a worst case, kind of Celtics in '97 scenario with the lottery in both '25 and '26, the rebuild will fail, at least in the '23-'25 iteration. The Pick swap possibilities will make a second tank possibly successful simply because we will both suck, and have options in the '27, '28 and '30 classes to rectify what went wrong in '25 and '26 in such a scenario.

So maybe in such a scenario we basically land the 5th pick both years and land solid players but not special ones, and we climb to a 25-35 win team. Well, Phoenix is already imploding, so in '27 we'll probably have a mid lottery pick like '19-'23, '28 we'll have multiple swaps in play plus our own pick, '29 our own pick.

I think it's reasonable to imagine that the structure they built with trades simply gives us to lay out a ton of metaphors: lots of outs, or pathways or doors to contention.

1. We could land a star in both of these next two drafts in which case the swaps become ammo to finish the last touches of the rebuild and we have a powerhouse.

2. We could land only 1 star, and need the pick swaps to help get the second.

3. We could land zero stars, become a team perpetually slotted between 6th and 14th (basically most of our history since the late eighties), and use the pick swaps to increase our chances of landing a star in '26, '28 and '30 and become at least competitive that way (more than likely turning either our own pick or a swap eventually into a pick good enough to land a star or more between '26-'30)


4. We could land zero stars, the pick swaps don't pan out and we just continue to be the hornets into the 2030's and these guys are fired.

To me, those are the 4 pathways.

I tend to think pathway 2 and 3 are the most likely, pathway 1 is probably the least likely and pathway 4 is probably a 15-25% possibility.

I think a lot of people are fixated on option 1, 2, and not considering the reality that 3 and 4 are about as likely as 1 and 2 are to happen, well, with the possible exception of '26, I think the Wizards+Suns lottery balls in '26 become a real interesting proposition if Durant, and Booker end up demanding a trade this summer or in the winter which I think is a distinct possibility. If the Suns are currently 9th level bad with Durant and Booker in house, how bad are they without them? And how do they structure the rebuild knowing they don't control their own picks for tanking purposes? Do they blow up the team for picks, or do they blow up the team for assets from a team rich in young players and picks like say OKC?

Not sure.

[The Consiglieri]

So, accumulate talent and several seasons from now (2028?) reach mediocrity (41-41).

Or, do we have another 17-win season and leapfrog all the way to a fourth seed and climbing?

I think the plan was:

Bottom out for the '25 and '26 classes, and hopefully try to get to the 39-43 win barrier in '26-'27. The pick swaps with the Suns and Milwaukee serve two purposes: #1 is to increase the odds that we can pull a superstar out of the top heavy '26 class, and #2 is to add a second avenue for acquiring star #2 if we only pull one out of the '25-'26 classes, and have in our pocket a pick swap of enormous value if the Suns and Milwaukee bottom out (which I think is a 90% chance for Phoenix by '26 or '27, and about a 80% chance for Milwaukee in time for '26-'27 or '27-'28 at the latest.

by structuring the build this way if we get lucky in May, and we are right in our eval, we climb to a 20-30 win team in '25-'26 (most likely, to my mind, '20-27 if we're healthy), add in Phoenix imploding, and we probably get the lottery balls of the 3rd or 4th worst team in us, and in the Suns a team that could be legit worst (if they trade away Durant and Booker for picks and swaps rather than young stars or in prime vets), or at best probably 4th-8th worst (if they try a middle road, which almost never works).


If I were to look at the odds in general I would guess this:

Spring '24: Bottom 5 team (we were)
Spring '25: easily the worst team (we are but the Jazz executed the late tank better than us
Spring '26: After landing a good or great player in '25, we become a 20-28 win side in '25-'26 which slots us between 3rd and 6th going into the '26 class.
Spring '27: At this point we are either building around a star or stars from '24-'26 aiming for 30-38 wins in '27, or we just have good young players in which case we are peaking as a 6th-12th slotted team, treading the '19-'23 era water.
Spring '28 In the former scenario we compete for a playoff spot either in '27 or '28, in the latter scenario, '28 becomes the last draft class that really gives us a really good shot at one more star ('30 might as well, but if we pull zilch of star quality from '24-'28, we're screwed anyway).

Your expectation based on their build strategy should be promising improving by spring '27, possibly in the play in game, by '28, we should either be a legit stud team, or praying that class gives us the piece to turn from a 25-30 win team, to a jump into the 40's and 50's if we get our 2nd star from that class.

Your wait for it to work is basically '28 at the latest, or four more classes including this one, and '27 at the earliest for a genuine playoff contender. We aren't contending for anything in '26 unless we screwed up the build quite badly and generated a 35-40 win team lacking in stars like the mid eighties, and mid nineties builds.

It's not long man. I've been watching since the mid eighties, and I knew back then with certainty, the only periods of hope whatsoever were '94-'97, and '10-'17, and to be fair, '10-'17 was something we all knew wasnt going to work by '14 or '15 at the latest, neither wall or beal were ever going to be top 5-10 players in the league, and as such the only way that iteration was making it was if we lucked into a Jokic or Giannis or SGA scenario, which being the wiz, there was no way whatsoever of that happening. I'm not gonna reference the Arenas years because it was clear with the Jamison trade, that that build was just aiming for 4-8 seed contention, they were never seriously trying to build a winner, period. So for me, '81-'91, was spinning the wheels, '98-'03 was deliberately blowing up a tank that actually kinda worked (Webber, Howard, Muresan/Strick/Cheaney was not a bad set up), '04-'08 was trying to become a mid level east conference side, and '10-'15 was the failed rebuild from scratch, primarily a failure due to bad luck in the '11, '12 lotteries, and luck in the wrong one ('13).

For me anyway, I don't want to keep spending time passively following a team that only seriously tried to build a winner for about 5 or 6 years of the past 40.

[popper]

I'm getting dizzy.

[AFM]

I'm getting dizzy.

Let me make it easy for you. Just remember 3 letters. D D Q.