NBA Free Agency 2016: 5 destinations for Kevin Durant

5. Washington Wizards

The homecoming story. While they aren’t a contender, there is an attraction to the Wizards that at least makes this idea worth looking at. Imagining Kevin Durant going to Washington has been one of his rumored and speculated free agent destinations longer than any other. The draw of going home is always existent for NBA players or any athlete, and many have thought for some time that if the Thunder can’t win a title, Durant may team up with a new star point guard.

Of course, that man is John Wall. He’s one of the best playmakers in the game, a top defender, an improved three-point shooter, and an absolute terror in transition. While he uses sheer speed, acrobatics and 360 layups rather than attacking with anger like Russell Westbrook, his passing gives Durant a similar partner to his current point guard.

Besides Wall and another exiting young talent in Bradley Beal, the weakness of the Eastern Conference in comparison to the West (now plagued for all others with the Warriors’ emergence), Durant may want to test his improved chances of a NBA Finals run with a conference switch.

So much of the Wizards’ offense runs through Wall, and more than anyone he knows that his team needs Durant’s help. Even more than a year ago, their need to land KD in free agency is greater now as they sit just 10th in the East. As Wall said to The Vertical, he isn’t trying to waste the 2015-16 season no matter what struggles they endure. But their goal is still to land Durant:

"“I know what our goal is, to try to go after Kevin, which is not a bad situation. But my ultimate goal is this year. I ain’t trying to waste a season,” Wall recently told The Vertical."

The problem for the Wizards, though? Simply put, they really aren’t a good team right now. Even though Wall is incredibly talented, too much rides on him offensively and when shooters aren’t hot, they don’t have much to offer. Unlike the Thunder who also have a loaded frontcourt with Serge Ibaka, Steven Adams and Enes Kanter, the Wizards are hardly comparable in that regard.

It’s for this reason that, regardless of the sentimental value of returning home, it doesn’t make sense for Durant to join the Wizards based on purely basketball reasons. He’ll still have the Cleveland Cavaliers and up and coming Toronto Raptors in the East to deal with, and he’ll be taking a major downgrade in terms of his supporting cast with the Wizards.

Washington fans will just have to hope he suddenly gets a surge of sentimentality when free agency comes around.

Next: 4. Adding to a dynasty in the making