Did the young Wizards torpedo the "tanking" operation in Washington?

The Wizards We’re halfway through the NBA season and it seems some franchises are already thinking about the draft, while a trio of very talented players (Derrin Peterson, Cameron Boozer, AJ Dibanca…) is getting closer.

Sacramento (12-39), New Orleans (13-38), Indiana (13-36), Washington (13-35), Brooklyn (13-35) floor Utah (15-35) will “tank” in this second part of the season? For New Orleans, it’s useless since the Pelicans gave up their No. 1 draft pick to the Hawks in the trade about Derrick Quinn.

However, for other franchises, it could generate strange things, while Networks take huge spankingsand yes it is Wizards They finished the match against the Kings with a very surprising group…

Indeed, while they were in no rush to play Trae Young and Alex Sarr and Tre Johnson were on the injured list against the Kings, another struggling team they may have to contend with for the No. 1 pick in the draft, Brian Keefe finished the game with Will Riley, AJ Johnson, Anthony Gill, Skal Labissiere etc Sharif Coopera group far more used to G-League ballparks than NBA ones.

“It was an opportunity to give them time to play in decisive moments”

“I thought it was an opportunity to play with our guys and give them playing time in the decisive moments” Brian Keefe justifiedwho therefore released Bilal Coulibaly, Chris Middleton, Bub Carrington and even Marvin Bagley III from midway through the third quarter. No reboots in the last period.

To many Washington fans, this was clearly an attempt to “lose” a game against an equally low-ranked team, although the Washington coach won’t say so.

“Those guys played really well in the first half as well. They kind of built our lead and I wanted to see them under pressure. They need opportunities. We need to see them in these situations so they can improve and they really improved a lot tonight.” concludes Brian Keefe.

In particular, they resisted the holders (Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan…) of the Kings to finally win (116-112), while their draft pick is protected 1-8, which will otherwise join New York.

			Shots			Rebounds
Players	MJ	Min	Shots	3pts	LF	Off	Def	That	Pd	Bp	Int	Ct	Ft	Pts
Cj McCollum	35	30:55	45.4	39.3	80.4	0.7	2.9	3.5	3.6	1.7	0.7	0.3	2.1	18.8
Alec Sarr	38	28:38	49.9	33.3	71.3	2.4	5.3	7.7	2.8	1.7	0.8	2.1	2.0	17.6
Kishawn George	39	31:00	44.6	37.8	77.9	1.0	4.7	5.7	5.0	2.9	1.1	0.9	3.9	15.5
Tre Johnson	39	25:08	44.4	39.3	89.1	0.5	2.2	2.7	2.2	1.4	0.6	0.3	1.8	12.9
Chris Middleton	33	24:24	43.3	32.6	84.1	0.9	3.1	4.0	3.3	1.7	0.8	0.3	2.5	10.3
Marvin Bagley III	37	19:19	62.8	42.1	71.0	2.6	3.1	5.7	1.5	1.2	0.5	0.7	2.1	10.1
Bub Carrington	48	28:25	40.0	40.5	77.4	0.5	3.3	3.7	4.7	2.4	0.6	0.2	2.3	10.0
Bilal Coulibaly	29	26:23	39.7	26.0	78.1	1.0	3.7	4.7	2.6	1.4	1.4	0.9	2.7	9.9
Corey Kispert	19	19:28	49.6	39.5	76.5	0.3	2.0	2.3	1.7	0.7	0.4	0.2	1.1	9.2
Cam Whitmore	21	16:51	45.6	28.6	74.2	0.9	1.9	2.8	0.7	0.9	0.7	0.4	1.2	9.2
Justin Champagne	45	19:04	51.0	31.1	71.9	2.0	3.6	5.6	1.1	0.6	0.8	0.6	1.6	7.3
Tristan Vukcevic	30	11:24	45.5	20.0	76.4	0.6	1.8	2.4	1.0	1.0	0.3	0.7	1.2	6.9
Shall Labissiere	2	15:00	66.7	25.0	0	1.0	3.0	4.0	1.0	0.5	1.0	0.5	1.5	6.5
Will Riley	40	14:56	40.4	31.4	80.4	0.8	1.2	2.0	1.4	0.8	0.5	0.1	0.8	5.9
Big Branham	28	9:49	47.3	37.8	82.4	0.4	1.1	1.6	0.8	0.5	0.4	0.1	0.8	4.6
Jamir Watkins	23	15:37	39.0	23.3	77.3	0.9	2.7	3.6	0.7	0.6	0.8	0.4	2.4	3.8
Johnson too	24	7:55	30.7	25.0	66.7	0.3	0.8	1.1	0.8	0.8	0.3	0.0	0.5	2.3
Anthony Gill	24	5:53	58.6	42.9	100.0	0.5	0.9	1.5	0.1	0.4	0.2	0.2	0.6	1.8
Sharif Cooper	7	6:26	40.0	33.3	50.0	0.3	1.0	1.3	0.9	0.6	0.1	0.0	0.7	1.4