Wizards Unload, Look to the Future

Fifty games into a hugely disappointing season, the Washington Wizards have begun unloading their big name players and rebuilding for the future. Washington first sent Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood, and DeShawn Stevenson to Dallas in exchange for Josh Howard, Drew Gooden, Quinton Ross, and James Singleton. They then traded Dominic McGuire to Sacramento for a 2010 second round draft pick. Finally, in a three team deal, the Wizards sent Antawn Jamison to Cleveland and newly acquired Drew Gooden to the LA Clippers. In return they got Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Al Thornton, a 2010 first round draft pick (from Cleveland), and the rights to Emir Preldzic, a second round pick from last year.

This is clearly a step in the right direction for a team that was going nowhere. It can be very hard for teams to recognize that they have no chance of going forward and that they need to get rid of the talent they have. Butler, Haywood, and Jameson are all very good players. The problem is, it wasn't working. You can load a team with talent, but if they don't win, it doesn't matter (are you listening Dan Snyder!?!?!). You have to start over. The Wizards' 2009-2010 season is over. Now it is time to save money and build a team that will be in a position to win two-three years from now.

That may seem steep, but that is how long it takes. The obvious example comes from the team that shares the Verizon Center, the Washington Capitals. Despite star players Jaromir Jagr, Peter Bondra, Sergei Gonchar, Robert Lang, and several others the team could not win. They then unloaded all their large contracts for draft picks and prospects. The team grew together and in three years won their division and now sit atop the NHL with the best record in the league. While the financial situation for the Capitals was more dire with an NHL lockout looming, it is still something the Wizards need to be aware of. There is no point in continuing to lose money when you've already thrown in the towel.

So let's look at how the Wizards have done so far. Step one is to get rid of the expensive talent. Trading Butler, Haywood, and Jameson had to happen. They all are on the older end of the spectrum; 29, 30, and 33 respectively; and have high contracts, the lowest of which being Haywood's $6 million this season. Step two is to acquire draft picks and younger players. First round picks are always great regardless of how low that pick will be. A second round pick from Sacramento is also good, as Sacramento is likely to have a very high pick. That's two good pickups, not including the very high picks the Wizards will get themselves. As for their player pickups, they got what they could, but not really what they needed. Ross and Singleton are both 28 and have contracts of $1.03 million. Older than the Wizards would have liked, but perhaps future leaders over the next few years. Thornton is a very nice pickup at 26 years old, a $1.9 million contract, and a lot of potential. Right now he averages 10.9 ppg, 3.8 rpg, and 1.2 apg and those numbers are likely to continue to go up.

The two guys that make you wonder are the big name pickups. Howard is 29, an inconsistent shooter, and expensive ($10.89 this season). While the Wizards may be thinking that Howard will be the team leader over the next few years, what is more likely is that Dallas wanted Howard included in the deal. To add around $19 million to the salary cap, someone has to go. Howard was the obvious choice. The same goes for Ilgauskas. The Cavaliers needed to add more support for LeBron James for a title run and picked up Jamison. To clear room for his $11.64 million they needed someone to take the $11.54 million Ilgauskus who is in the last season of his contract. Hopefully the Wizards have zero expectations for him. He has been a Wizard for less than a week and is already talking about buying out his contract. With his departure at the end of the season, the Wizards will have plenty of cap space to make some moves.

The biggest question for the Wizards, however, remains unresolved. Gilbert Arenas is still a Wizard. At the moment there is really nothing that can be done. No one will trade for a suspended player and as Arenas has already been punished by the league for his idiotic gun joke, the Wizards cannot release him without having to buy out his ridiculously huge contract. Yet, despite all the controversy surrounding Arenas, team president Ernie Grunfeld said that he would be back. "He's under contract and he's going to be with us. He's part of our organization. If he wants to play, he's going to play here." This statement is rather odd. If Grunfeld thinks he is going to build a team around Arenas, he's dreaming. He already tried and it didn't work. Arenas will be even less dependable when he returns as he continues to get older. Arenas has yet to show that he can continue to play at a superstar level and to assume he can lead the Wizards after failing to do so in the past is just plain stupid. I hope the motivation behind this comment was to encourage Arenas to come back. If Arenas were to buy out his contract, it would save the Wizards a lot of money, but the Wizards would still lose his trade value. Even so, Arenas buying out his own contract may still be the best option. The Wizards need young, cheap talent. Teams can't afford to trade draft picks for Arenas since his contract is so expensive (over $16 million per year). The Wizards might be able to get two or three prospects for him, but ultimately teams may not want to take the risk or pay him that much money. This would leave the Wizards with the choice of buying out his contract themselves or keeping him for another season which would honestly be the worst case scenerio.

Sit back Wizards' fans, the next few seasons are going to be pretty long. If they continue to do things right, they may be playoff bound in two or three years, but they cannot get impatient. Keeping Arenas are bringing in players that just don't fit the system will only set them back. If the Wizards want to rebuild, they need to commit and go all in.