Washington Wizards

• 1. Introduction

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  Wes Unseld won the NBA's Most Valuable Player award and Rookie of the Year in the same season. No other player in franchise history accomplished that. He did it as a Baltimore Bullet in 1968-69. Three other players who wore a franchise uniform also claimed the Rookie of the Year award: Walt Bellamy, Terry Dischinger, and Earl Monroe.

  The franchise now known as the Washington Wizards was founded in 1961 as the Chicago Packers. It has played under five different names since. It has appeared in 28 playoffs and reached the NBA Finals four times. It has won one championship. Its story is one of constant reinvention, conducted in the shadow of a single golden decade and punctuated by arguments over what the team's name should stand for. Where it begins is on the south side of Chicago, in an arena that stood beside a slaughterhouse.

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• 2. Born in Chicago

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  Walt Bellamy averaged 31.6 points and 19.0 rebounds per game for the Chicago Packers in the 1961-62 season. He led the NBA in field goal percentage and scored 23 points with 17 rebounds at the All-Star Game. His team went 18-62, the worst record in the league. Bellamy's performance could not lift a franchise still figuring out what it was.

  The Packers' name honored Chicago's meatpacking industry. Their home, the International Amphitheater, stood next door to the Union Stock Yards. The practical problem was the resemblance to the Green Bay Packers of the NFL, bitter rivals of the Chicago Bears. After one season, the team renamed itself the Chicago Zephyrs and moved home games to the Chicago Coliseum. Former Purdue star Terry Dischinger played for the Zephyrs that only season.

  In 1963, the franchise moved to Baltimore and adopted the name of a local team from the 1940s and 1950s that had played in the BAA and the NBA. The Baltimore Bullets played at the Baltimore Civic Center. In their first year, they finished fourth in a five-team Western Division.

  Before the 1964-65 season, Abe Pollin, Earl Foreman, and real estate investor Arnold Heft purchased the franchise from managing partner Dave Trager for $1.1 million, on the 23rd of November 1964. They rebuilt the roster immediately, trading Terry Dischinger, Rod Thorn, and Don Kojis to the Detroit Pistons for Bailey Howell, Don Ohl, Bob Ferry, and Wali Jones. Howell proved to be a hustler and a fundamentally sound player. Baltimore made the playoffs for the first time in franchise history, upset the St. Louis Hawks 3-1, and reached the Western Conference finals before losing 4-2 to the Los Angeles Lakers.

  The two players who would carry the franchise to its greatest heights had not yet been drafted.

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• 3. Baltimore's Rise

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  In the 1967 NBA draft, Baltimore selected Earl Monroe second overall. In the following year's draft, using that same position, they took Wes Unseld. The Bullets hosted the 1969 NBA All-Star Game. In the 1969 playoffs, despite high expectations, the New York Knicks eliminated them in the first round. The Knicks won their rematch the following season as well, this time in seven games.

  In 1970-71, the 42-40 Bullets met the Knicks again, this time in the Eastern Conference finals. Knicks captain Willis Reed was injured going in. In game seven at Madison Square Garden, Baltimore's Gus Johnson hit a critical late basket. The final score was 93-91, Baltimore's favor. The Bullets advanced to their first NBA Finals, where the Milwaukee Bucks swept them in four games. That Milwaukee team was led by Oscar Robertson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, then playing under the name Lew Alcindor.

  Even after trading Earl Monroe to the Knicks and Gus Johnson to the Phoenix Suns, Baltimore remained competitive. They acquired Elvin Hayes from the Houston Rockets before the 1972-73 season and drafted Kevin Porter in the third round out of St. Francis. In December of that season, Baltimore posted a 10-4 record on the way to winning the Central Division title for the third straight year. The Knicks had by then beaten them in four of five playoff series, a rivalry that had shaped the franchise as much as any player.

  In February 1973, the organization announced a move to Landover, Maryland, a Washington suburb. While their new arena was being built during the 1973-74 season, the Bullets played home games at Cole Field House on the University of Maryland campus in College Park. The Capital Centre opened on the 2nd of December 1973, with a win over the Seattle SuperSonics. The team operated as the Capital Bullets that year, then changed its identifier to Washington Bullets the following season.

  By 1974-75, Washington was 60-22, including a 36-5 home record at the Capital Centre. They beat the defending champion Boston Celtics in six games and reached the NBA Finals, where Al Attles' Golden State Warriors swept them in four games. Head coach K.C. Jones was fired that summer despite a career 62 percent winning percentage.

  Dick Motta took over as head coach for the 1976-77 season. In the 1977 playoffs, Washington took a 2-1 series lead on the Houston Rockets before losing in six games. The franchise was one run away from the moment that would define it.

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• 4. The Championship

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  Although they had future Hall of Famers Elvin Hayes and Wes Unseld on their roster, the 1977-78 Bullets finished the regular season at 44-38 and were regarded as longshots for the championship. During the playoffs, San Antonio journalist Dan Cook declared: "It ain't over 'til the fat lady sings." The Bullets took those words as their rallying cry. They won through to the NBA Finals and defeated the Seattle SuperSonics in seven games. The victory was Washington's first professional sports championship in 36 years.

  In 1978-79, Washington moved to the Atlantic Division and won it in their first year there. They entered the playoffs having lost eight of their final eleven regular-season games, finishing the year at 54-28. They nearly surrendered a 3-1 series lead to the Atlanta Hawks before holding on in seven games. Trailing the San Antonio Spurs 3-1 in the Eastern Conference finals, the Bullets won two straight games to force a game seven at the Capital Centre. They overcame a fourth-quarter deficit to beat George Gervin and the Spurs 107-105.

  Game one of the 1979 Finals ended with Washington winning 99-97 on two game-winning free throws. The SuperSonics won the next four games and the series. It remains the only time the franchise has played in the NBA Finals since.

  In August 1979, the Bullets became the first NBA team to visit China, defeating both the Bayi Rockets and the Shanghai Sharks. The decade that produced that achievement was over; the years ahead would be different in almost every way.

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• 5. From Bullets to Wizards

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  Manute Bol, acquired in the 1985 NBA draft, blocked 397 shots in his first season in Washington, a franchise record. The team as a whole blocked 716 shots that year, also a Bullets record. Two years later, Washington used the twelfth overall pick in the 1987 draft on Muggsy Bogues, who at five feet three inches was the shortest player in NBA history. The franchise was accumulating memorable individuals without returning to contention.

  In 1990, the team named Susan O'Malley as its president. She was the first woman to hold that role with any franchise in NBA history. Her father, Peter O'Malley, was a Maryland lawyer and former president of the Washington Capitals. The Bullets continued to struggle through the early 1990s. Their 1992-93 season ended at 22-60.

  In 1994, Washington selected Juwan Howard with the sixth overall pick and, in the same summer, acquired the rights to Chris Webber from the Golden State Warriors by trading Tom Gugliotta along with three first-round draft picks. Webber averaged 20.1 points and 9.6 rebounds per game but recurring shoulder injuries limited him across multiple seasons. Bernie Bickerstaff, an assistant coach during the 1978 championship, was brought back as head coach in 1996-97. The Bullets won their final regular-season game against the Cleveland Cavaliers 85-81 to end the franchise's longest playoff drought. They were swept by the Chicago Bulls in the first round, losing all three games by a combined 18 points.

  In November 1995, owner Abe Pollin had already announced his intention to change the team's nickname. The word "Bullets" had accumulated violent associations he found increasingly uncomfortable, particularly given Washington's high homicide and crime rate in the early 1990s. The change was widely attributed to the assassination of Pollin's longtime friend, Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin. Pollin said that was not the reason.

  A public contest was held. The choices were narrowed to five: the Dragons, Express, Stallions, Sea Dogs, and Wizards. On the 15th of May 1997, the franchise officially became the Washington Wizards. The new name generated its own controversy: "wizard" is a rank within the Ku Klux Klan, and Washington has a large African American population.

  The traditional red, white and blue of the Bullets era gave way to the blue, black and bronze already used by Pollin's Washington Capitals of the NHL. Forward Juwan Howard sat on the committee that designed the new logo. The team moved to the new MCI Center that same year, playing their first 1997-98 home games at the old Capital Centre before the new arena opened on the 2nd of December 1997. In 1998, the Wizards became the sibling organization to the newly established Washington Mystics of the WNBA. Chris Webber was traded to the Sacramento Kings for Mitch Richmond and Otis Thorpe in May 1998.

  Within three years, Michael Jordan would arrive at the organization as its president of basketball operations.

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• 6. Jordan in Washington

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  Michael Jordan became the Washington Wizards' president of basketball operations and a minority owner in January 2000. He had retired from the Chicago Bulls in early 1999. In September 2001, at age 38, he came out of retirement to play for the team he was running. NBA rules required him to give up his ownership stake in order to compete. He said he was returning "for the love of the game."

  Before the All-Star break of the 2001-02 season, Jordan was one of only two players in the league averaging more than 25 points, 5 assists, and 5 rebounds per game. He led the Wizards to a 26-21 record before the break. A knee injury ended his second half of the season. The team missed the playoffs.

  For 2002-03, Jordan accepted a sixth-man role to manage his knee through the full 82-game schedule. He traded for All-Star Jerry Stackhouse and signed Larry Hughes. He ended the season as the only Wizard to play in all 82 games, averaging 20.0 points, 6.9 rebounds, 3.8 assists, and 1.5 steals in 37.0 minutes per game. He was 40 years old. The Wizards missed the playoffs again.

  After the season, majority owner Abe Pollin fired Jordan from his role as team president. Jordan had expected to regain his ownership stake when his playing days ended. Pollin justified the dismissal with specific decisions: Jordan had benched Larry Hughes in favor of Tyronn Lue, had made trades Pollin found damaging, and had used the team's first-round draft pick on high schooler Kwame Brown. Ernie Grunfeld replaced Jordan as general manager.

  One of Grunfeld's first significant moves was to sign a young guard named Gilbert Arenas.

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• 7. Arenas and the Run

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  Gilbert Arenas arrived in Washington for the 2003-04 season during a period when the Wizards were not expected to win. The following year transformed the team. Arenas paired with Antawn Jamison and Larry Hughes to form the highest-scoring trio in the NBA that season. Hughes led the entire league in steals with 2.89 per game. Both Arenas and Jamison were named to the Eastern Conference All-Star team. It was the first time Washington had placed two players in the All-Star Game since Jeff Malone and Moses Malone represented the Bullets in 1987.

  On the 13th of April 2005, a 93-82 win over the Chicago Bulls clinched Washington's first playoff berth since 1996-97. Fans bought over 16,000 playoff tickets in two and a half hours the day they went on sale. In the first round against those same Bulls, the Wizards won their first playoff game since 1988. Arenas hit a buzzer-beater to win game five in Chicago. In game six at MCI Center, Jared Jeffries grabbed a loose ball and dunked it uncontested with 32 seconds left to seal a 94-91 win and the series. Washington was only the twelfth team in NBA history to win a playoff series after falling 0-2. That series victory also ended the second-longest streak without a postseason series win in NBA history. The Miami Heat swept them in the conference semifinals.

  Caron Butler and Antonio Daniels joined before the 2005-06 season, giving Arenas a new set of running mates. On the 17th of December 2006, Arenas scored 60 points against the Los Angeles Lakers, a franchise record. Eddie Jordan became the first Bullets or Wizards head coach to coach the NBA All-Star Game since Dick Motta in 1978-79. By the 2006-07 season's close, both Arenas and Butler had been lost to injuries. A Washington Post accounting calculated that the team had lost 42.3 percent of its offensive production, a figure the newspaper described as quite possibly the most costly such loss for any team in a playoff hunt in NBA history. Washington still made the playoffs and was swept again by the Cleveland Cavaliers.

  In December 2009, it became known that Arenas had stored unloaded firearms in his locker at Verizon Center. The incident grew from a dispute with teammate Javaris Crittenton over gambling debts. Commissioner David Stern suspended Arenas after he pantomimed shooting his teammates with finger-guns during pregame introductions before a game against the Philadelphia 76ers. Arenas had signed a six-year, $111 million contract the summer before. In February 2010, the Wizards traded Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood, and DeShawn Stevenson to the Dallas Mavericks. Days later, Antawn Jamison was traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers. The core of the team that had been to three straight playoffs was gone.

  The 2010 draft lottery would give Washington a chance to start over. Despite holding only the fifth-best odds, the Wizards won the first overall pick.

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• 8. Wall, Beal, and the Long Rebuild

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  John Wall, a point guard out of Kentucky, became the centerpiece of the franchise rebuild when Ted Leonsis took over in 2010. Leonsis published a list of 101 planned changes. Among them was a return to the red, white and blue of the Bullets era. The 2011-12 uniforms were modeled closely on those worn from 1973 to 1987.

  Bradley Beal joined via the 2012 draft. In April 2013, center Jason Collins, who had joined the team in February, publicly announced he was gay. His announcement made him the first openly gay member of a North American professional team sport.

  Washington returned to the playoffs in 2013-14 with a 44-38 record. Wall made his first All-Star appearance that season. The Wizards defeated the Chicago Bulls 4-1 in the first round, their first series victory since defeating those same Bulls in 2005. The top-seeded Indiana Pacers eliminated them in six games in the conference semifinals.

  The 2016-17 season proved to be the strongest in recent franchise history. Beal averaged a then career-high 23.1 points per game. Wall set career highs in both points (23.1) and assists (10.7) per game and earned an All-NBA team selection. Washington finished 49-33 and won the Southeast Division for the first time since 1979. Wall and Beal combined for 73 points in a game six closeout win over Atlanta in the first round. The Boston Celtics eliminated them in seven games in the second round.

  The 2023 offseason brought a formal rebuild. Bradley Beal was traded to the Phoenix Suns. The franchise finished 15-67 in 2023-24, led in scoring by Kyle Kuzma averaging a career-high 22.2 points per game across 70 games. In June 2024, Washington drafted Alex Sarr from France with the second overall pick.

  On the 7th of January 2026, the Wizards acquired All-Star guard Trae Young in a trade for CJ McCollum and Corey Kispert. Less than a month later, on the 5th of February 2026, they added Anthony Davis from the Dallas Mavericks for Khris Middleton and two first-round picks. Both Young and Davis were recovering from injuries when they arrived. Washington finished 2025-26 at 17-65, the second-worst record in franchise history. Whether two newly arrived All-Stars could stay healthy long enough to play together in the same lineup remained the question heading into the following season.

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