The Wizards selected Johnny Davis with the 10th overall pick in the 2022 draft, but as of today, the partnership has not been easy for both parties.
2023 is an unkind year for Wizards rookie Johnny Davis. After coming to the NBA stage, the rookie only scored 11 points in 50 minutes of playing time, and his performance on the court can be said to be close to zero.
Looking back at the 2022 offseason, Wizards director Tommy Shephard made the team’s reinforcement goals very clear: the first task is to upgrade the combat power of the point guard position. Several rumors also emerged at the time, including the Wizards’ interest in several big-name point guards such as Dejounte Murray and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
However, the rumors were just rumors after all, and the Wizards ended up selecting Johnny Davis with the 10th overall pick in the 2022 NBA Draft. Ten days later, the Wizards sent Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Ish Smith to the Nuggets for Will Barton and Monte Morris.
This series of operations has caused doubts in Washington, DC, because it is obvious that Davis is about to be thrown into a deep and experienced shooting guard club, including Will Barton, Corey Kispert, and of course Bradley Beal are all waiting to be assigned shooting guards. time. Faced with such a high-intensity internal competitive environment, people from all walks of life are questioning when Davis will wait for his opportunity.
The development so far this season is not surprising at all. Davis averages only about 5 minutes per game, and most of it is concentrated in garbage time. The lack of playing time is obviously starting to eat into his on the court. self-confidence. Even when there was an open shot, Davis dropped the ball, something that never happened when he was at Wisconsin.
At the University of Wisconsin, Davis was an outstanding scorer, averaging 19.7 points per game, but in other aspects of the game, he was clearly ineffective: he averaged only 2.1 assists per game End almost never shines.
Considering that Davis’s function on the court is limited to scoring, everyone knows that he must be given the ball and given a chance to perform, so that he may perform. But this condition is in conflict with the status quo of the Wizards, including Kyle Kuzma and Bradley Beal’s style of play are quite similar to Davis, and the focus is to have a scoring quality of several levels.
Another dilemma for Davis is his meager 3-point shooting, a flaw almost never seen among other shooting guards drafted in the top 10 in the past. Davis shot 30 percent from 3-point range in his senior season, raising doubts about his future NBA career.
Taken together, we can draw an inference: Davis is a shooting guard who needs the ball to perform, but lacks outside firepower, and still has the trust of the coaching staff on the defensive end. What kind of factors made the Wizards choose Davis with the 10th overall pick? In other words, what kind of contribution do they expect Davis to make after entering the NBA?
what should a wizard dohelpDavisBreakthrough?
While it is true that Davis lacks opportunity, on the other hand, he has yet to show any contribution that would earn the trust of the coaching staff. Davis’ struggles were predictable from his first day on the stage: He went 1-for-9 from 3-point range in his summer league opener.
In summer league, most rookies drafted in the lottery can take opponents lightly, but Davis has only struggled: averaging only 8.3 points per game, shooting a low 29.6% from the field, and playing an average of 24.8 minutes. During the time, he did not show the stability he should have, averaging 2.7 turnovers per game.
Forget about the trek, the point is that Davis didn’t get too many opportunities to hone. Davis has only appeared in six games in the D-League so far and faces the same struggles.
In any case, if the wizard has no plans to give him playing time in the NBA, he must be sent to the development league as soon as possible, so that he can get the training opportunities he needs, instead of sitting on the bench and watching, facing challenges and finding solutions This is the only law of growth.
For now, we can only conclude that picking Johnny Davis in the draft just reaffirms the Wizards’ lack of appreciation for talent and lack of a proper development plan.
Failure after failure just made Wizards fans sigh: If they can do it all over again, what are the possibilities? Is it possible for the Wizards to pack the 10th overall pick, or add other assets, to add to the trade bid for Dejounte Murray or another guard? Or choose other rookies such as AJ Griffin, Jalen Duren, Jalen Williams, who are obviously more suitable for the Wizards than Davis? But these imaginations only make people more heartbroken.
