Once upon a time, the NBA exhibition season was eight games. When players were suspended or pay was pro-rated in some way (say for a 10-day contract), the salary was divided over 90 games, not the 82-game regular season schedule.
While eight games isn’t much, it weirdly provided a surprising amount of information about what was to come in the regular season. For example, for established good teams, the preseason meant basically nothing. They could go 0-8 and still roll in the regular season. In practice,
better teams didn’t crater in preseason — they were usually measurably better than opponents, even while not going full bore.
For up-and-coming teams, performance in exhibition games provided a decent barometer on team quality. If they played well in preseason action, they tended to play similarly well in the regular season. If they were bad, they tended to be similarly bad in the real games.
This year — I assume specifically to annoy me and make useless my habit of running statistical analysis on small sample size events like summer league, international tournaments, and preseason games — the Wizards played just three exhibition games to “prepare” for the 2025-26 season.
Yes, I know reducing the preseason schedule was a smart move to trim the length of the schedule, try to reduce the number of injuries, and get more quickly to the games people actually want to see. Me included.
The numbers don’t mean much, so I’ll share a few impressions amalgamated from the three games they played:
- As would be expected for a team so young, the Wizards aren’t going to have many games this season where they’re as strong or stronger than their opponent. Maybe that comes after a couple more years of grinding in the weight room.
- If I could give Tre Johnson a “work on this” list, it would include getting stronger and working on his ball handling.
- Lacking strength or not, Alex Sarr looks like he’s going to be a defensive presence at the rim.
- Corey Kispert didn’t look bad as a ball handler in pick-and-roll sets. He made a couple nice passes in the preseason finale against the Detroit Pistons.
- Will Riley has good length and skills. He has a very long way to go physically.
- Justin Champagnie is going to be a solid pro for several years. I would not be shocked if a contending team that needs a boost came calling for a Kispert-Champagnie package.
- Head coach Brian Keefe is adamant about pushing the pace. He hectored the team to get the ball over half court fast, and yelled repeatedly at his team to “RUN!”
- If preseason is any indicator, the Wizards will follow the Indiana Pacers in picking up defensively full court. I like it.
- Kyshawn George looked promising in preseason — he’s one guy who clearly got stronger and worked on his game in the offseason. His production was a bit uneven, but he’s the guy I’m most interested in seeing against real opponents this season.
Hopefully, Bub Carrington makes a quick return from a “sore knee” that kept him out of much of last night’s game.
Next up: My annual forecast.
