CHICAGO — When the San Antonio Spurs won the 2023 NBA Draft Lottery, it was a foregone conclusion what Spurs officials would do next. They kept the No. 1 pick and drafted Victor Wembanyama, who was widely considered the best prospect in a generation.
The Dallas Mavericks had an easy choice of their own when they won last year’s lottery. The Mavericks picked Cooper Flagg.
The Washington Wizards’ upcoming decision on what to do with the top pick this year won’t be as simple because of the unusually strong depth at the top of the 2026 draft class, according to executives and scouts from opposing teams.
“What a great (expletive) problem to have,” one front-office official from an opposing team said.
During the NBA Draft Combine, The Athletic surveyed 13 executives, scouts and front-office officials from across the league and asked them two questions: Who should the Wizards draft at No. 1? And under what circumstances should Washington consider trading the pick?
We granted respondents anonymity to give them the freedom to answer honestly, but anonymity was also necessary because few, if any, officials from other teams would provide their opinions for direct attribution.
Our conversations indicated that front offices across the league do indeed see a separation between four top prospects in this year’s draft and everyone else. In alphabetical order, the top-four prospects are Duke big man Cameron Boozer, BYU wing AJ Dybantsa, Kansas guard Darryn Peterson and North Carolina wing Caleb Wilson.
Our conversations also demonstrated that the choice the Wizards must make with the top pick won’t be as clear-cut as the Spurs’ and Mavericks’ situations.
Ten of the 13 executives and scouts we spoke with were willing to name the player they think Washington should draft at No. 1.
Dybantsa received seven votes. Peterson garnered two votes. One person voted for Boozer.
“Take AJ and sleep like a baby,” one of the seven respondents who voted for Dybantsa told us, saying that Dybantsa’s upside and floor are so high that he’s the safest pick in the draft. Dybantsa’s worst possible outcome, that respondent said, would be to have a career similar to Andrew Wiggins, the No. 1 pick in 2014, a wing who has made one All-Star team during his 12-year pro career.
When we approached another respondent and asked him to name the player the Wizards should pick at No. 1, that respondent said the choice should be an easy one: Dybantsa. “Don’t complicate it,” he said.
AJ Dybantsa starred at BYU, averaging 25.5 points per game. (Craig Strobeck / Imagn Images)
Another person who voted for Dybantsa said that several players in the draft can be the face of a franchise but added that the attribute that separates Dybantsa from Wilson is the ability to handle the basketball in traffic.
Although Wilson did not receive any votes in our poll, several of the respondents said they can envision Wilson developing into the best player in the draft.
There were portions of the 2025-26 college season when Peterson appeared to have overtaken Dybantsa as the draft’s top prospect, according to draft analysts in the media.
Doubts surround Peterson now. He missed portions of his one-and-done season at Kansas because of a hamstring injury and cramping issues. Peterson has since said that high doses of creatine caused the cramping problems.
“I think they should take Peterson,” one respondent said. “They have the infrastructure for him to reach his full potential.”
No one we spoke with denied Peterson’s talent. At Kansas, he reinforced his reputation as a gifted shotmaker, averaging 20.2 points per game while he made 43.8 percent of his shots from the field, 38.2 percent from deep and 82.6 percent from the free-throw line.
One of the people who said Washington should take Dybantsa had high praise for Peterson, saying, “Darryn Peterson did some extraordinary things, sometimes all in the same half.”
Among the 13 people we spoke with, there was a strong sense that Boozer, who led Duke to the Elite Eight in the 2026 NCAA Tournament, has the best chance among the four top players to reach his ceiling. He’s viewed as someone who always makes the right play.
The question on many of the respondents’ minds, however, appears to be just how high Boozer’s ceiling will be.
The one respondent who said Washington should draft Boozer first said Boozer has the “highest level of winning fiber” of anyone in this draft. Boozer, that person said, will be a “stabilizing” force on any team he joins and is likely to develop into “a better version of Al Horford.”
A respondent who voted for Dybantsa said the Wizards should trade back and select Boozer if they could gain a future first-round pick in the process.
Something else struck us during our conversations during the combine: Many of the people we spoke with said the Wizards should consider trading down to No. 2 or maybe No. 3 if they are convinced they could select a franchise player at either spot.
One front-office official we spoke with who voted for Dybantsa said that the Utah Jazz, who won the No. 2 pick in the lottery, would be an enticing potential trade partner. “Utah has got assets and good players,” the respondent said. “The question is: How good of a player could you get from the Jazz?”
Monumental Basketball president Michael Winger and Wizards general manager Will Dawkins have built reputations in league circles as strategic-thinking executives — so much so that one of the people we surveyed said he can easily envision the Wizards trading back to No. 2 or No. 3 if the Wizards can coax quality assets in a trade and, most importantly, still draft a foundational player at No. 2 or No. 3.
Another respondent — one of the two people who voted for Peterson — said the Wizards should consider trading down only to No. 2, and then only if the Jazz made the Wizards an offer that they couldn’t refuse.
