Wizards lean on five starters with a thin bench behind them

The Washington Wizards are expected to start Young, George, Sarr, Davis and Dybantsa against the Memphis Grizzlies tomorrow, and all five play between 27 and 36 minutes a game. Trae Young is at the top of that range, Alexandre Sarr at the bottom.

Behind them, the rotation thins out quickly. The top reserve plays under 20 minutes, and the injury report has eight names on it, four of them only questionable, with a starter and the second man off the bench among the four. That matters for a team that is 2-8 in its last 10 games and has little room to lose another rotation piece.

The starting five is built on heavy workloads. Young plays 36.1 minutes a game, Anthony Davis 34.1, AJ Dybantsa 33.9 and KyShawn George 33.1. Sarr is the lightest load of the group at 27.2, and he is still fifth on the team in minutes, with Bilal Coulibaly right behind him at 26.0.

These are also the top five scorers on the roster. Davis leads at 25.6 points a game and 10.5 rebounds, Young is second at 19.7 and runs the offense with 8.8 assists, George is third at 18.2, and Dybantsa is fourth at 15.0. Sarr adds 11.2 points and 7.4 rebounds. Davis has played 11 of the 13 games and Dybantsa 9, so the numbers for both come from a shorter run than the rest.

The five is picked from recent starts, minus anyone ruled out, and it allows for everyone on the injury report. Confirmed lineups arrive about 30 minutes before tip-off.

The reserves, ranked by minutes from sixth man down, are Bilal Coulibaly, Tre Johnson, Anthony Gill and Deandre Ayton. The first of them plays 19.6 minutes a game as the projected sixth man. That is more than seven minutes fewer than Sarr, the lightest-used starter.

Bilal Coulibaly is the top reserve by that measure and scores 6.8 points a game, with 4.2 rebounds, 1.2 steals and 1.1 blocks. Tre Johnson is next at 16.3 minutes and is the better scorer of the two at 9.7 points a game, which makes him the first man off the bench with a real scoring role. Anthony Gill comes third at 15.8 minutes, and Deandre Ayton fourth at 13.6, averaging 4.5 points.

Justin Champagnie (18.3 minutes over four games) and Carlton Carrington (18.3 over 13) sit in the same range as the top reserves, but Champagnie is out and Carrington is questionable. The depth below the five is made up of players who are either hurt, unsure or barely used.

There are eight names on the injury report, split evenly. Tristan Vukcevic, Jamir Watkins, Justin Champagnie and Reece Beekman are out, and Carrington, Johnson, Felix Okpara and Sarr are questionable. Vukcevic is listed as back on 16 Nov, while Watkins is not due back until 2 April.

The questionable list is the one that matters for tomorrow. Sarr is a starter and Johnson is the second man off the bench, so a single status change would reshuffle both units. Carrington is also on the list, which takes a second guard option out of the picture at the same time.

That is why the projected five allows for everyone on the injuries list. The names are fixed for now, but the picture can change before the lineups are confirmed.

The obvious fallback is Deandre Ayton. He plays 14.1 minutes a game, scores 4.5 points and pulls down 4.8 rebounds, and he shoots 66.7% from the field, the best mark on the roster. He has not made a three this season, shooting 0.0% from beyond the arc. Davis is listed at forward-center, but with Davis already playing 34.1 minutes a game, the question is what changes around him.

Alexandre Sarr gives the starting five a different profile: 7.4 rebounds, 0.9 blocks and 53.0% shooting in 27.2 minutes. Ayton rebounds at a similar rate per minute but plays about half the time, so the comparison is between a full starter's workload and a reserve's.

The guard question is separate. If Johnson sits, Carrington is the other option, and he shoots 42.5% from three in 18.3 minutes, though he is questionable too. Coulibaly, the top reserve, shoots 13.8% from three. Those are the figures each replacement has produced so far, and the minutes tomorrow will depend on who is cleared to play.

George is the only starter above 40% from three, at 42.1%, and Carrington is the only reserve above that line, at 42.5%. Everyone else in the main rotation is under 33%. Davis hits 32.1%, Young 31.5%, Sarr 27.5%, Johnson 24.2% and Dybantsa 23.3%, and Coulibaly and Ayton sit at the bottom with 13.8% and 0.0%.

On overall field-goal shooting the picture is better. Davis (52.4%), Sarr (53.0%) and George (49.2%) all shoot well, and Coulibaly is at 46.4%. Young shoots 39.3% overall and Johnson 36.4%, the two lowest marks among the regulars apart from Carrington's 35.7%.

That leaves the bench short of both minutes and shooting. The reserves who play most are not the ones who space the floor, and the one who does, Carrington, is on the questionable list.

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