The prodigal wing has returned to D.C. after the whirlwind of trade rumors that was last night. After another disappointing loss in Brookyln, Ernie looked deep into his bag of tricks and pulled out an old favorite: A panicky midseason trade with Phoenix for a disgruntled vet. While the Suns couldn’t swindle the Wiz out of a pick this time around, one has to wonder if Kelly Oubre is going to be the newest addition to the long list of homegrown talent that the Wizards have given up on too early.

Pros

Trevor Ariza, a well respected vet and friend to Wall and Beal replaces two of the more polarizing figures in the locker room in Oubre and Rivers. While this isn’t to suggest Rivers and Oubre were solely responsible for the toxicity surrounding the Wiz this season, Rivers has had trouble with teammates in the past and is likely responsible for some of the earlier leaks from within the locker room. Additionally, Oubre and Rivers are taking the 3rd and 7th most shots per-36 of the rotation players on the team while having only the 10th and 14th best TS% on the team. When Wall and Beal talked about players “having their own agendas and worrying about their shots”, it’s hard to not look at Oubre and Rivers as the biggest offenders.

Addition by subtraction: not having all those FGAs going to the teams less efficient scorers will (hopefully) open up more shots for players like Otto and Sato.

TROY BROWN TIME. Seriously if Brooks (Scott, to be clear) can’t find any reserve minutes for a rookie that the Wiz reached for in the draft (over other players mocked in that range that would’ve filled more important positional needs) then I will have officially given up on any coaching improvement from him.

The Wiz will have added another strong defender and decent rebounder on the wing, something they’ve sorely lacked this year.

Sato can now move back to the bench and help the Wiz have some semblance of a functioning offense without Wall and Beal on the court.

Cons

Kelly Oubre is still an immensely athletic, young prospect. Watching a player who the Wizards traded up for blossom into what the Wizards were hoping for is a pretty likely scenario. Some fans have become disillusioned with Kelly due to his inconsistency and low offensive IQ, but both of those things could easily describe this Wizards team as a whole so I’m already preparing myself for the pain of seeing Kelly making an all-defense team and shooting 40% at some point in the near future.

The Wiz almost certainly won’t be able to retain Ariza after this season and if they’re able to, it’ll likely be because he underperformed for the remainder of the season.

Over the past few weeks, Mahinmi has been almost completely cut from the rotation, as Scotty opted to move Green and Morris to the PF and C positions respectively. Without Oubre to fill the backup SF role, Wiz fans will either have to get used to more Mahinmi again, or preferably, they’ll give Devin Robinson the backup SF minutes. Given Scott Brooks history with playing younger prospects, it’s safe to say that opposing bench players will be going to line a lot courtesy of Ian.

Grade: C+

This trade will make the Wiz better in the short term on the court and there’s a chance Ariza’s leadership and veteran presence could do more to right the team than anything he does on the court, but in the end this trade is just another classic Ernie season salvager trade that does nothing to fix the long term future of the team.