Wizards keep accumulating assets but still lack direction

Since the Wizards hired Michael Winger to run the team after the 2022-23 season, the team has been focused on acquiring as many young players and as much draft capital as possible. The process has set them up with plenty of young talent and picks, plus salary cap space next summer, but it's still hard to see where the Wizards are heading in the long term.

With Smart, the Wizards acquired a pick from the Memphis Grizzlies that they turned into Canadian small forward Will Riley and two future second-round picks, in exchange for whatever they end up paying Smart in his buyout. They've now built a roster full of first-round picks from the last few drafts, mainly by trading veterans and taking on unwanted salaries into their salary cap space.

That's the model used by the Oklahoma City Thunder during their rebuild after the 2019-20 season. Five years later, their strategy of "renting" cap space and amassing draft picks led to an NBA title.

The difference between the Wizards and the Thunder is that OKC already had a future superstar in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who averaged 19 points per game as a 21-year-old on a playoff team. The Wizards still haven't found the player who will anchor their franchise going forward.

That might be this year's No. 6 pick, guard Tre Johnson. It could be All-Rookie guard Bub Carrington. Last year's No. 2 pick, Alex Sarr, is still a project at center. The Wizards have Johnson and Riley from this year's draft, five first-round picks from the 2024 draft and Bilal Coulibaly and Cam Whitmore from the 2023 draft. One of those former first-rounders is Dillon Jones, acquired in a salary dump from the Thunder.

But the problem is that the Wizards have only so much playing time to distribute to these young players and no one who's a clear star. They already had to release 2022 first-rounder Blake Wesley to clear roster space Saturday.

The Wizards have a lot of options and plenty of cap space next summer. But dumping veterans for picks and renting cap space is the easy part of a rebuild. The hard part is figuring out which players will be part of the next competitive Wizards team.