Thank you all for submitting your responses to this week’s SB Nation Reacts survey. Here are the results from our Wizards based one.
We asked you back on Tuesday whether the team’s recent winning ways (since Christmas 2025) could keep Washington out of the bottom five in the NBA standings for the 2025-26 season. Sixty percent of you believe that that will be the case.
As of games played through Thursday, Jan. 8, Washington had the fourth worst record in the NBA in the 2025-26 season, which gives them a 100 percent chance of keeping their 2026 first round pick because it is Top 8 protected. The worst that the fourth worst NBA team could pick is No. 8. If the Wizards were the fifth worst team, there is a 0.6 percent chance that they will finish with the No. 9 pick which would then go to the New York Knicks. And if they are sixth worst, the chances of Washington getting the No. 9 or No. 10 pick go up to 3.9 percent. If the Wizards are the seventh worst, they have about a 14.2 percent chance of getting the No. 9 pick or lower. And finally, if the Wizards are the eighth worst team in the NBA, they have a 39.3 percent chance of getting the No. 9 pick or lower.
This survey question came out at interesting time, when the Wizards were named as a potential suitor for then-Atlanta Hawks guard Trae Young, and then it quickly escalated to him getting traded to Washington just yesterday. But since Young is nursing minor injuries, there isn’t too much to worry about him leading the Wizards to a 2021 Russell Westbrook-like stretch where Washington makes a big run in the standings.
Let us know your thoughts below about where you think the Wizards will fall in the standings after this regular season.