Top Stories of the Week: Wizards are out of the playoffs, could have Mike Zarren as a new General Manager

The Wizards finished another week in the 2018-19 NBA season. So let’s get to the two top storylines.

The Wizards are out of the 2018-19 NBA Playoff contention

It was inevitable for quite some time, but the Wizards were finally put out of their misery this week when the Miami Heat defeated the Dallas Mavericks last Thursday. It’s almost fitting that the final nail in the coffin wasn’t a Wizards loss, but rather another team winning.

If there’s something that more-or-less summarizes this season for the Wizards, this tweet has it all down by month:

I’m not happy that the Wizards didn’t win 50 games. But considering the fact that the Wizards are salary cap tied and have little hope for improving in the future unless they do a great job with the NBA Draft, this team won’t be very good until after the 2022-23 season when Wall’s supermax contract finally goes off the books.

Supermax contracts were originally intended to be a way to keep top players on their teams and prevent a situation like in 2016 when Kevin Durant left the Oklahoma City Thunder for the Golden State Warriors. Perhaps it worked with someone like Russell Westbrook who is a walking triple-double.

But for the Wizards, the supermax effectively keeps them in salary cap prison until 2023 because of Wall’s Achilles injury and their past systemic issues with salary cap management and the draft. An even if he wasn’t injured, the chances of him playing at an MVP level through 2023 wasn’t very high. Now, it will be hard to see him become an All-Star player ever again.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Washington lost seven of their last ten games. Considering that the Wizards won’t be in the playoffs next month, that’s a good thing. Washington’s next game is against the Nuggets on Sunday at 8 p.m. ET.

Could Mike Zarren be the Wizards’ next General Manager?

Wizards fans were certainly pleased to hear the news that someone not named Ernie Grunfeld could be the General Manager of President of Basketball Operations for the Wizards next season.

Mike Zarren, the uber-analytics-friendly Assistant General Manager of the Boston Celtics. He’s been rumored to be on the wish lists for many NBA teams in recent years including the Wizards now. But Zarren hasn’t been willing to just leave Boston for another team. The Wizards may be competing against the Pelicans and Suns if Zarren is truly willing or ready to leave. They already are looking for a GM. The Wizards on the other hand may or may not. We’ll see what happens to Ernie Grunfeld once this season is over.

Alright, enjoy the rest of your weekends everyone.