The Washington Wizards are Trae Young top preferred trade destination, according to ESPN\u2019s Shams Charania.<\/p>\n
This comes two days after The Stein Line reported that Washington had emerged as a \u201clegitimate trade candidate\u201d for Young. ESPN reported Monday that Young and his representation are working with the Atlanta Hawks on a trade.<\/p>\n
Young, 27, is owed $45 million this season and has a $49 million player option for the 2026-27 campaign. While the shifty point guard boasts averages of 19.3 points and 8.9 assists per contest, the Hawks are much better (15-12) in games he has missed due to injury than they are with him (2-8).<\/p>\n
Should Young be dealt to Washington, reports indicate CJ McCollum\u2019s expiring $30.6 million contract will be sent to Atlanta. Other Wizards players who could be involved to make the salaries match include AJ Johnson and Malaki Branham, who have both seen a noticeable increase in playing time over the last two weeks.<\/p>\n
It is notable that McCollum, who has appeared in all 35 of Washington\u2019s games this season, is listed as out for tonight\u2019s game against the 76ers with \u201cquad soreness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Washington would be helping Atlanta get off of Young\u2019s $49 million salary next season, which means additional draft capital could be sent the Wizards\u2019 way. The Hawks have several first- and second-round picks they could send, including the New Orleans Pelicans\u2019 unprotected 2026 first-round pick.<\/p>\n
A notable nugget: Young was selected No. 5 by the Hawks in 2018. Atlanta\u2019s general manager at the time: Travis Schlenk, who now serves as the Wizards\u2019 Vice President of Player Personnel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Washington Wizards are Trae Young top preferred trade destination, according to ESPN\u2019s Shams Charania. This comes two…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,15577],"class_list":{"0":"post-523883","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-washington-wizards-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115857104182430347","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}