NBA Trade Deadline 2016: 10 players who are off limits
By John Buhler
142. . Point Guard. Washington Wizards. John Wall. 5. player
As difficult as it maybe for hoops fans in the DC area, their hometown Washington Wizards might need to rebuild as soon as this summer with the hopes of fielding a championship caliber team in the long run. At 23-28, the Wizards are in 10th place in the Eastern Conference and trail their division rival Charlotte Hornets by three games for the final playoff spot in the East.
The logical centerpiece for any massive rebuilding project would be to put a deeper team and a better corps around All-Star point guard John Wall. Wall is a franchise centerpiece and is arguably the best point guard in the Eastern Conference in his mid-20s.
Wall is the type of talent at the point that a lucrative power forward/center would love to pair up with for a dynamic pick-and-roll partnership in the nation’s capital. Washington will likely end up selling at the NBA trade deadline to hopefully acquire better assets to build their team around Wall next year, hopefully to rapidly accelerate an inevitable rebuild.
Losing Wall would ruin the Wizards for the next decade, as Washington would become one of the three worst teams in the Eastern Conference overnight without their star point guard. Very few can effortlessly or as coolly distribute the basketball as well as Wall can. He’s in Washington for a long, long time.
Next: 4. Anthony Davis