In my humble opinion, one of the most interesting NBA matchups of the season – note that I didn’t say it was a “good” matchup – is Thursday night when Utah visits Washington with sadly no national television. This is not only one of the biggest tank games of the year, but also the Wizards debut of former All-Star guard Trae Young off a long injury absence and trade. So what might we expect? And, hey, the Wiz are favored for only the fifth time this campaign, and they went 2-2 straight-up and against the spread in the previous four.
In case you are wondering, no sportsbook I can find has a prop on whether Young will be ejected for a second game in a row. Indeed, he was kicked out of Monday’s game in a loss to visiting Houston. Young walked onto the court (in civvies) and complained to an official during an on-court confrontation between the the Rockets’ Tari Eason and Washington’s Jamir Watkins, and Young was shown the gate. But you can see what he was doing, acting like a leader of a young team and sticking up for a rookie teammate.
Just think how much the world has changed since Dec. 27, which was the last time Young suited up for his former Atlanta Hawks team. The four-time All-Star and 2024-25 NBA assists leader has been out because of MCL and quad injuries in his right leg. That obviously didn’t stop the Wizards from acquiring him from Atlanta in early January for the quite-low price of veterans CJ McCollum and Corey Kispert.
Not even a draft pick, but that’s how far Young’s stock had fallen. He was averaging 19.3 points and 8.9 assists in 10 games played this season. He can certainly score and is one of the league’s better ball-handlers and passers. But Young is so tiny that he’s a clear defensive liability, and that’s not even strong enough. Casper the Friendly Ghost would be a better on-ball defender.
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Why the rebuilding Wizards acquired him and fellow overpriced and injury-prone Anthony Davis ahead of the trade deadline is anyone’s guess, although the team is expected to extend Young, who has a $49 million player option this offseason. He is still only 27.
Washington coach Brian Keefe said Young is expected to play 17-20 minutes in his debut. He’s set at Over/Under 13.5 points and 5.5 assists. Young’s 40-minute averages this season were 27.6 points and 12.7 assists while with Atlanta if you want to guess-timate half of those in 20 minutes.
Purely my opinion, but Young’s career is at a crossroads, and I don’t think he’s going out there gunning from deep just to satisfy the fans. I think Young acts like a veteran leader like he did Monday and is very unselfish – Over the 5.5 helpers perhaps? Utah is the worst defensive team in the league in allowing 125.5 PPG (and will have tired legs), so there should be plenty of assist chances. Young holds a career average of 9.81 assists per game, the third-highest mark in NBA history among all qualified players. FanDuel projects Young with 11.3 points and 5.3 assists in about 16.5 minutes.
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Remember, neither the Wizards nor Jazz want to win, and in fact a victory tonight could be the difference between finishing with one of the three worst records in the league or not – Utah (18-44) currently has the fifth-worst and Washington (16-45) the fourth. The three worst have the equal-best 14.0% shot of winning the lottery, and those spots are held by the Kings (14-49), Pacers (15-47) and Nets (15-46). The fourth-worst club has a 12.5% shot at winning the lottery and the fifth 10.0%.
The 2026 NBA Draft class is considered to have three clear-cut top prospects in Duke’s Cameron Boozer, Kansas’ Darryn Peterson and BYU’s AJ Dybantsa and then there’s a drop-off. So tanking is frankly understandable right now. Peterson had been the favorite to be the top pick much of the season but just this week was passed at DraftKings by Dybantsa, who is -105 to Peterson’s +105.
Washington might not be too bad next season with a healthy Big 3 trio of Young, Davis and Alex Sarr — the former No. 1 overall pick hasn’t played in nearly a month due to a hamstring injury and won’t for a while — along with one of those three NCAA guys.
I like the Wizards tonight to win by accident — see my pick write-up and all expert picks by signing up for the SportsLine daily premium newsletter — because of the Young excitement and that Utah is in the second of a back-to-back after losing a seventh in a row Wednesday, 106-102 in Philadelphia.
That this is a second game in 24 hours gives the Jazz some “cover” in terms of resting any other key guys left such as Keyonte George, who had 30 vs. the Sixers, and not get fined again by the league for blatant tanking. Utah already has shut down top players such as Jaren Jackson Jr., Jusuf Nurkic and essentially Lauri Markkanen.
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