WASHINGTON — The Washington Wizards capped a busy trade deadline by adding a lottery-protected first-round pick in this year’s draft and former NBA Defensive Player of the Year Marcus Smart from the Memphis Grizzlies in a three-team deal that also included the Sacramento Kings on Thursday afternoon, league sources said.
In addition to Smart joining the Wizards from the Grizzlies, the Wizards will receive veteran center Alex Len and second-year wing Colby Jones from the Kings.
The Wizards parted with center Marvin Bagley III and former first-round pick Johnny Davis, one of the final players remaining from the previous era of former general manager Tommy Sheppard, and will send a 2025 second-round pick to the Kings as part of the deal.
Sheppard had been tasked by ownership to keep the Wizards competitive, and drafted and made trades accordingly. After Ted Leonsis fired Sheppard in 2023 and hired Michael Winger and Will Dawkins to oversee the franchise, Leonsis empowered them to begin a full rebuild, concentrating on building through the draft. The Wizards have taken their roster down to the studs, and are now building it back up.
Washington did, though, opt to hold onto veteran guard Malcolm Brogdon, who’s in the final year of his current contract. Brogdon came to the Wizards as part of the trade last year that sent Deni Avdija to the Trailblazers. The Wizards like having the 32-year-old Brogdon, as well as the newly acquired Smart and Khris Middleton, as veteran mentors for their young guards and wings the rest of this season.
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Moreover, with its moves the last few days, Washington is now further along in building a significant inventory of future draft picks, including multiple first-round picks that could help the Wizards move up or around in the 2025 and 2026 drafts, which will be crucial to the team’s hopes of adding impact players at the top of the next two drafts.
After their moves Wednesday and Thursday, the Wizards now have three more incoming future first-round picks. (The Wizards have depleted their second-round stash somewhat, but they still have multiple extra seconds between 2025 and 2031.)
Washington now has:
• All of its own first-round picks through 2031, with a caveat. Because of a trade several years ago, the Wizards have a prior obligation that is now owed to the New York Knicks. Washington’s first-round pick this year is protected 1-10 in the lottery, and so it’s highly, highly unlikely that that pick will convey this year.
If it doesn’t convey this year, the Wizards’ 2026 pick would be protected 1-8 in the lottery. If the Wizards finish the 2025-26 season in the bottom four of the NBA standings, they would have no chance of conveying the pick. Even if the Wizards finish the 2025-26 season with the league’s fifth- or sixth-worst record, the odds of having to convey their pick to New York would be miniscule.
If, as expected, Washington doesn’t convey a first to New York either this year or in 2026, Washington would have to send its 2026 second-round pick and its 2027 second-round pick to New York.
- A 2025 first-round pick from Memphis, from Thursday’s Smart trade Thursday, that is protected 1-14 — the entire lottery. Because the Grizzlies are currently second in the Western Conference with a 35-16 record, you can pencil that pick in to go to the Wizards.
- A 2026 first-round pick from Philadelphia, from the Reggie Jackson/Jared Butler trade Thursday, that will be the least-favorable first-rounder from among Houston, the Clippers and Thunder.
- A 2028 first-round pick swap with Milwaukee, from the Khris Middleton/Kyle Kuzma trade Wednesday;
- A 2029 first-round pick from Portland, from the Deni Avdija trade in 2024, that will be the second-most favorable first-rounder from among Boston, Milwaukee and Portland.
- A 2030 first-round pick (protected 1-20) from Golden State, from the Chris Paul trade in 2023, which is not likely to convey to Washington.
- First-round pick swaps with the Phoenix Suns in 2026, 2028 and 2030, stemming from the Bradley Beal trade in 2022. The ’26 and ’30 swaps are outright between Washington and Phoenix; the ’28 swap will be the second-best pick from among Washington, Phoenix and Brooklyn, and could also involve the 76ers’ first-round pick.
Smart, who will turn 31 in March, has been one of the NBA’s most physical perimeter defenders, though he’s dropped off somewhat from 2021, when he was named NBA Defensive Player of the Year while with the Celtics. In his two seasons with the Grizzlies, injuries limited him to a total of 39 regular-season games. On Wednesday, he played in his first game since mid-December, when he suffered a right index finger injury.
Prior to Thursday afternoon’s three-team deal with the Grizzlies and the Kings, Washington had already had a busy and productive trade deadline.
On Wednesday, they received Middleton, rookie guard AJ Johnson and the 2028 first-round pick swap from the Milwaukee Bucks in exchange for Kuzma and Patrick Baldwin Jr. and a 2025 second-round pick. Later on Wednesday, the Wizards received two second-round picks from the Sacramento Kings for center Jonas Valanciunas. (In that transaction, the Kings also sent swingman Sidy Cissoko to Washington, but the Wizards waived Cissoko on Thursday to open a roster spot).
On Thursday morning, the Wizards traded Butler, a guard who’d played quite well on a two-way contract the last year, and four second-round picks to the Philadelphia 76ers for a 2026 first-round pick and Jackson, who was promptly waived.
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The Wizards also have added more young players that they can evaluate over the next year or two, along with their existing core of rookies Alex Sarr, Bub Carrington and Kyshawn George, second-year forward Bilal Coulibaly and Corey Kispert, Washington’s 2021 first-rounder, who got a four-year, $54 million extension last fall.
Washington had good pre-draft grades on the 6-foot-5 Johnson, who played in Australia’s National Basketball League during the 2023-24 season before he was selected 23rd overall by the Bucks in last year’s draft. He played mostly for Milwaukee’s G League team this season.
Jones, a second-team All-Big East selection in 2023, was an early second-round pick (34th overall) in the ’23 draft by Charlotte. His draft rights were traded, through Boston, to Sacramento on draft night. He played spot minutes in 54 games over a season and a half for the Kings, spending most of his time with the team’s G League affiliate. But Jones had first-round grades from many NBA scouts and teams before the draft.
One college assistant coach said of him before the ’23 draft: “I just like the fact that he competes. He’s not cool. Some of these guys are cool and they play cool. He’s not like that. That’s why I fell in love with the kid. I just like his whole DNA. He’s one of the best defenders in the (Big East). He can guard one through four because he’s such a tough competitor. Physical, doesn’t back down. I might be overselling him, but I’ve watched him play for three years, and he’s my scout. I’ve watched him a ton, beyond watching him on TV.”
This will be Len’s second go-round with the Wizards. The former University of Maryland big man started 40 games for Washington in the 2020-21 season, playing almost 16 minutes a game. He’s spent the last three-plus seasons in spot duty for Sacramento.
The Wizards took Davis with the 10th pick in the 2022 draft, after his sophomore season at Wisconsin. But the 22-year-old never came close to living up to his lottery status. He struggled at both ends of the court and rarely displayed the form that made him the 2021-22 Big Ten Player of the Year. He started 11 games over two-plus seasons. His departure leaves Kispert and Anthony Gill as the only remaining players from the previous regime still on the team.
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