The rosters for the 2012 NBA Rising Stars Challenge (formerly the Rookie/Sophomore Game) are out, and as expected, John Wall was one of the nine sophomores selected to be in the first annual draft between Shaq and Charles Barkley. Here's the full list.
Rookies: Kyrie Irving, Ricky Rubio, Marshon Brooks, Brandon Knight, Kawhi Leonard, Markieff Morris, Tristan Thompson, Kemba Walker, Derrick Williams.
Sophomores: Blake Griffin, John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, Landry Fields, Paul George, Gordon Hayward, Greg Monroe, Tiago Splitter, Evan Turner.
Notice anything about those lists? Other than Wall, where are all the other Wizards? With the release of Hamady Ndiaye, exactly 50 percent of this roster (seven out of 14) are first- or second-year players. And yet, none of those six players were deemed good enough to be one of the top nine players in their class. It's not like these are spectacular classes either -- how good are Thompson, Morris and Splitter anyway?
That's not an especially good sign.