The Washington Wizards are one quote away from having their team implode, and the Minnesota Timberwolves should be prepared to potentially find Washington’s All-Star Bradley Beal on the trade block.
Among several reports, it’s overwhelmingly obvious that the Washington Wizards are having very Minnesota Timberwolves/Jimmy Butler-like drama out in D.C.
Whether it’s the poor schemes from head coach Scott Brooks, the dramatic flair from point guard John Wall, or even the fly on the wall that likes to talk in Austin Rivers, it seems there are too many poisonous members within the current Wizards’ organization.
The obvious cure for any poison would be medicine, and Washington has quite literally been waiting in line at a full hospital with their current roster for the past few years without any treatment in sight.
The answer and medicine is clear: Blow It Up.
And while it may seem that I have bias to want the Wizards to sell low on their talent, this is a very different situation than what Minnesota was looking at over the past few months with Butler.
The Wolves have two young max contract players that are still trying to find their groove in the league before they hit their prime and ceiling. While the Wizards are currently going through a mid-life crisis with John Wall, Bradley Beal, and Otto Porter not quite finding their ceiling – or at least, not with the current roster.
And while general manager Ernie Grunfeld hasn’t made quite the impact in Washington that all of D.C. was hoping for, he has the potential to get some solid assets to rebuild the Wizards and tank for the remainder of the season in hope for Duke-star Zion Williamson.
To shed more light on the current debacle in Washington, the fly on the wall himself, Austin Rivers, sheds a unfiltered light on the current drama with Candace Buckner and Gene Wang of The Washington Post:
"Via, The Washington Post “Though Rivers has his own team to worry about, as a father he has somewhat of a rooting interest in the Wizards. Rivers has noticed the negative tendencies during Washington’s slow start to the season. However, when he accounts for the talent on the roster — and, yes, he’s including his son in this group — Rivers sees a team ready to blow up. He means in a good way. “They remind me of, like, dynamite that hasn’t gone off yet,” Rivers said. [Brewer: The Wizards are a leaderless crew playing lifeless basketball. Something must change.] Austin Rivers hopes that explosion has just happened. “If there’s any time to turn the corner, it’s now,” he said. “We were just down 24 points to one of the best teams in the West so far, with how they played, and we were able to come back at home. We had the crowd booing us. We had a lot to go against us [Tuesday], and we were able to band together and play hard and win that game. That’s the biggest win of the year, so I think if there’s any time for a ‘boom,’ I think that was it.”"
Austin Rivers’ analogy of comparing the Wizards and dynamite that hasn’t gone off yet, can be construed in a few ways.
We’re either looking at a Wizards’ team that takes these rumors of “blowing it up” and comes together to prove everyone wrong, blasting the dynamite in surprise to the NBA.
Or, we’re looking at dynamite within the locker room, quite literally imploding and leading to a fire sale of the current roster.
Most likely, we’re looking at the ladder of the two. Moreover, we’ve created a scenario where the Wizards do send their 1-time All-Star Bradley Beal to Minnesota, but get enough assets in return to quickly rebuild their organization.
2 trades that range from fairly simple, to pretty insane.