Wizards Starting Lineup Ranked Among League's Worst

No one is expecting the Washington Wizards to compete for anything outside of lottery odds entering the NBA's 2025-26 regular season.

The front office has all but broadcasted the message themselves, publicly emphasizing their prioritization of player development, draft capital accumulation and asset management. They're preparing to enter the regular season with a similar routine to the past pair of campaigns, full of prospects and veterans on expiring contracts, and their starting lineup will include the best of both worlds.

While no official statement will be made regarding the opening night lineup until October, most guesses as to who'll earn the starting nods are about the same. Bleacher Report's guess is as good as anyone else's, as they ranked the unit of Bub Carrington, CJ McCollum, Khris Middleton, Bilal Coulibaly and Alex Sarr 28th out of 30 teams.

There's more to the team besides that combination of recent lottery picks and grizzled veterans, with the Wizards having put together an intriguing bench unit that includes Tre Johnson, Kyshawn George, Corey Kispert, Justin Champagnie, AJ Johnson, Cam Whitmore, Will Riley and Marvin Bagley III, but they're viewed much more as an interesting case study into how a rebuilding team throws their prospects into the fire as opposed to other "win-now" situations around the NBA.

Greg Swartz touches on their "extremely limited" ceiling, with the Wizards playing some improved ball upon adding Middleton midway through last season.

"The Wizards had a net rating of minus-12.7 overall last year, yet they were a respectable minus-0.8 with Middleton, Carrington, Coulibaly and Sarr all on the floor," Swartz writes. "McCollum won't be enough to push this unit into positive territory, but we will see glimpses of actual basketball being played by this lineup to begin games."

Those starting prospects will make or break the team's fortunes, with Coulibaly and Sarr specifically expected to take steps forward after shaky starts to their NBA careers. Coulibaly is expected to out-rank George in the depth chart despite the rising sophomore's exciting potential as a supersized 3&D wing, while the more raw Coulibaly has to start showing some growth on offense with more shots to go around.

Sarr doesn't have much center depth behind him, with the Wizards putting together a big man room that's generally limited to Bagley, Anthony Gill and two-way prospect Tristan Vukcevic, none of which can hold up on defense. Last summer's No. 2 pick will have his work cut out for him in attempting to make the leap as a reliable shooter and rim finisher.

The Wizards, miraculously, outranked multiple teams on Bleacher Report's list. They just bested their fellow tankers in the Utah Jazz, while the Brooklyn Nets served as the league's caboose after an offseason for the ages.