The Washington Wizards are waiving Wesley Johnson, Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN writes. The 31-year-old came over from the Pelicans at the trade deadline in February earning $6.1 million.
In Johnson’s 38 games this season, he averaged 3.4 points in 14.2 minutes.
News of the release comes two days ahead of the Sunday deadline for teams to do so. After April 7, ESPN’s Bobby Marks tweets, teams are unable to waive players on expiring deals.
The departure of Johnson will have no impact on Washington’s bottom line as they sit positioned just below the luxury threshold even after eating the money owed to Johnson but it will open up a roster spot for the Wizards in the final week of the regular season.
With just five days remaining, the club could still ink a player to a rest-of-season deal, potentially rewarding a G League affiliate player with hefty pay raise late in the year.
The transaction would markTommy Sheppard‘s first move as the de facto president of basketball operations for the Wizards. We wrote earlier this week about Washington parting ways with long-time executive Ernie Grunfeld.
