The NBA Draft is still two weeks away, but one prospect is already making promises that could shift the entire conversation around the league’s worst team. AJ Dybantsa, the projected No. 1 overall pick, sat down with New Orleans Pelicans guard Jeremiah Fears recently and laid out a bold plan: if the Washington Wizards take him first, he’s guaranteeing a playoff berth next season.
The exchange, captured in a clip posted by X user @MrCongee and later shared by ClutchPoints, shows Dybantsa laughing but not backing down. “If I go to DC, I’ll make the playoffs… I’m gonna make sure I make it,” he said. Fears, whose Pelicans finished with the second-worst record in the league this past season, pushed back. “Bro, that’s because we had no big,” Fears countered. Dybantsa fired right back: “You’re telling me how to run in the league when you had the second worst record.”
The jawing between two young guards is playful, but the underlying message from Dybantsa is dead serious. The 6-foot-9 wing out of BYU has been the consensus top prospect in this draft class for months, and his confidence has only grown as the draft approaches. The Wizards, who finished the 2025-26 season with a miserable 17-65 record, own the No. 1 pick and have the entire league watching to see how they handle the most valuable asset in franchise history.
A Rapidly Reshaped Roster
Washington’s turnaround, if it happens, won’t rest solely on one rookie. Over the past year, the Wizards have quietly stacked veteran talent around their young core. Trae Young arrived in a January trade from Atlanta, and Anthony Davis was acquired from Dallas at the deadline. That’s a legitimate star pairing — and it’s not even counting the lottery talent already in the building: Alex Sarr, Bilal Coulibaly, and Kyshawn George all showed flashes this season.
If Dybantsa lands in D.C., he’d walk into a locker room with two All-NBA veterans, a handful of promising sophomores, and a front office that has finally stopped tanking. The Wizards have not made the playoffs since 2021, but the roster — on paper — looks deeper than any Washington team in the post-John Wall era.
Big Talk, Bigger Stakes
Dybantsa is not the first rookie to talk big before playing a single NBA game. But his bravado carries extra weight because of where he’s projected to land. The Wizards won the draft lottery by sheer luck after the worst record in the league; expectations inside the organization are reportedly higher than the outside perception of the team. According to multiple league sources, the Wizards are leaning heavily toward taking Dybantsa, and the team has not confirmed any trade rumors involving the pick.
If that holds, Dybantsa will immediately become the face of a franchise trying to skip the rebuild and jump straight into contender mode. “It’s a lot of pressure for a 19-year-old,” one Eastern Conference scout told our network. “But he’s been handling pressure since high school. If anyone can back it up, it’s him.”
The draft takes place June 23-24 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Until then, Dybantsa’s playoff promise will hang over every conversation about what’s possible in Washington. For a team that hasn’t sniffed the postseason in half a decade, that kind of certainty is at least worth a listen.
Leave a Comment