Wizards Fan Vote Reveals MVP, Future Stars and the Team's Most Chaotic Personalities
We asked, you answered, and now, we can officially reveal the results for the Washington Wizards' batch of year-end awards!
Shout-out to everyone who participated. You played a pivotal role in helping us dole out invaluable hardware. From the Wizards' MVP and most underrated player to their best trash-talker and zombie apocalypse savior, you covered all the most important bases.
So, who won each category? Let's get to the big reveals.
Stats accurate as of Sunday, April 12. Contract data via Spotrac.
Who Is the Most Valuable Player?
1 of 10
Winner: Alex Sarr
Numbers (almost) never lie: 70 percent of you agree that Alex Sarr is the obvious choice here.
Washington's sophomore big man stands out more than anyone from a jumbled Wizards field. The amount of ground he needs to cover on the defensive end—nobody contests more shots at the rim per game—coupled with the various layers of his offense makes him the closest Washington comes to a franchise centerpiece.
Kyshawn George (21 percent) would like a word, though. He leveled up every part of his game this season. The most notable upgrades came in the form of his playmaking and overall on-ball activity. Just three players saw their true usage rates—which incorporates assists and potential assists—rise by a larger margin compared to 2024-25, according to BBall Index.
Who Is Most Underrated?
2 of 10
Winner: Justin Champagnie
Realistically speaking, this one could have ended up with one of two players: Kyshawn George or Justin Champagnie
If there was a Sophomore of the Year award, Kyshawn George would be in contention for one of the three pole positions. Do we trust that enough people know that? Definitely not.
Yet, despite remaining an offensive roller coaster, Champagnie is more in the spirit of this category. He is not a primary building block, and his work on the defensive margins and the glass (at both ends) are value adds.
Who Is the Best Athlete?
3 of 10
Winner: Bilal Coulibaly
Bilal Coulibaly (49 percent) somewhat comfortably beating out Cam Whitmore (32 percent) is a legitimately big deal.
Though he only suited up for 21 games, every one of Whitmore's dunks continue to feel like an event. He is the Wizards player most likely to end up on the right end of a poster.
At the same time, can you really be "most likely" anything if you're not playing? That opened the door for Coulibaly. He gets serious air on lob catches, and if he had to choose between breathing and dunking with one hand, he'd probably pick the latter.
Who Is Most Likely To Be a 1st-Time All-Star In the Next 5 Years?
4 of 10
Winner: Alex Sarr
At the onset of this process, I was curious to see whether there would be a consensus pick. It turns out there was—to the tune of 78 percent.
Alex Sarr continues to have the highest ceiling, making him the semi-obvious pick, even if Kyshawn George (12 percent) is threatening to infringe upon that territory.
Bilal Coulibaly (4 percent) needs to find his offensive wheelhouse before entertaining an All-Star leap. The good news? His defensive disruption is impactful enough that he could have a specialist's offensive arsenal and enter waters charted by players like OG Anunoby and Aaron Gordon before him.
Who Has the Best Contract?
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Winner: Kyshawn George
Kyshawn George has established himself as no worse than the Wizards' second-best young player and will make $8.5 million total over the next two seasons. That averages out to 2.5 percent of the cap.
Nabbing "just" 41 percent of the vote would be stunningly low...if Justin Champagnie didn't exist.
Champagnie is under team control for another two years at under 2 percent of the salary cap. Paying that for a rotation-caliber three-and-D wing is a joke.
Who Has the Worst Contract?
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Winner: Anthony Davis
This one's no contest.
Anthony Davis is on the books for another two years and $121.3 million. That breaks out to $58.5 million in his age-33 campaign and $62.8 million in his age-34 season (player option).
Both amounts clock in above 35 percent of the cap. Peak Anthony Davis probably isn't worth that much anymore. Relative to his injury history, age and what he showed on the floor this season, the Wizards sure as hell can't count on Peak AD going forward.
Extending him this offseason should be a no-go—unless any deal sees him decline his $62.8 million player option and take a substantial pay cut in subsequent years.
Who Is the Best Trash-Talker?
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Winner: Trae Young
Trae Young might be the shortest-tenured player, across any team, to win a year-end award. Not only that, but his victory was never in doubt. He secured 60 percent of first-place votes.
That tracks with his career résumé. He embraced the supervillain role while with the Atlanta Hawks. Especially when it came to playing the New York Knicks. We should expect his evildoer persona to resume in earnest when he's healthy next season.
Kyshawn George (17 percent) in second place seems about right, too. If Draymond Green is going to hat-tip your trash talk, you earn auto-consideration. Them's the rules.
Who Is Most Likely To Have a Burner Account?
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Winner: Anthony Davis
After Anthony Davis obtained 55 percent of the vote, go ahead and assume any account, ever, that's opined about the importance of him playing the 4 rather than the 5 is run by AD himself or someone close to him.
Bub Carrington is the runner-up. That's also a good choice. Putting "I guess I have an IG now…" in your Instagram bio is a classic attempt to throw us off the scent of your extreme social media use. Thirty percent of Wizards fans see you, Bub.
Who Are You Taking With You Into the Zombie Apocalypse?
9 of 10
Winner: Jamir Watkins
When approaching this question for the first time, Jamir Watkins was the immediate pick who sprang to mind. I wondered whether people more in tune with this Wizards squad would feel the same way.
Judging by Watkins' margin of victory (18 percent), it seems like they do. Upon further consideration, how could they not? As far as I'm concerned, anyone who revels in defending Victor Wembanyama is a must-have teammate for the zombie apocalypse.
Kudos to Kyshawn George (23 percent) for gobbling up second place. Partners who dabble in a little bit of everything are bound to be resourceful during an undead uprising, and he plays at the highest average speed of anyone on the Wizards.
Who Is Most Likely To Be Playing Overseas In 2 Seasons?
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Winner: D'Angelo Russell
Most other fanbases gravitated toward players at the end of the bench and/or on two-way contracts. Not Wizards, fans though. D'Angelo Russell received 46 percent of the vote.
Nobody should be that surprised. Russell is the consummate "better in theory than practice" player. Two years might be too soon for teams to stop convincing themselves he's an offensive needle-mover, but he's talented enough to garner overseas offers that entice him more than what's being dangled in the states.
Leaky Black (30 percent), Sharife Cooper (14 percent) and Julian Reese (10 percent) played a ton of April basketball for the Wizards. Sadly, that's the opposite of a metric for NBA staying power.
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