One Fringe Pelicans Asset for the Wizards to Sneak Out of the Bennedict Mathurin Signing

The New Orleans Pelicans are a team whom the Washington Wizards have grown comfortable engaging with over the last year, and not just due to their close proximity toward the bottom of the 2025-26 regular season record roundups.

They exchanged high-profile scoring guards last summer, but while CJ McCollum flourished in a wide-open Wizards situation and played his way into the returning centerpiece of the Trae Young trade, Jordan Poole's stock flatlined. And now, following a recent update to the Pelicans' otherwise-dormant transaction-less summer, the Wizards have the chance to get another win over on their recent trade partner.

The western bottom-dwellers made their first real addition to last season's 26-win campaign in signing former Clippers guard Bennedict Mathurin as their new bucket-getter, a move that puts the Pelicans at 16 fully-signed players and over the luxury tax. Should the Wizards want to butt into another agreement that didn't previously involve them, as they just did in eking Tre Mann out of Peyton Watson's sign-and-trade, here's the chance to clear an expendable piece from their books.

The Pelicans will use the $15 million non-taxpayer mid-level exception to sign Bennedict Mathurin, which hard caps them to the $209 million first apron.

However, his projected contract puts them above the first apron. They'll need to shed payroll first to fit him on these terms. https://t.co/ZmgkcjhrbY pic.twitter.com/2hCWBXUPcy
— Yossi Gozlan (@YossiGozlan) August 26, 2026

Who Should the Wizards Angle to Add?

Few sub-30 win squads- specifically those who never initially intended on tanking and just ended up in the league's doldrums against their will- are loaded with desirable contributors lining their bench, but the Wizards could opt for a classic "second draft" revival project in the reportedly-available Jordan Hawkins.

He entered the pros as the lights-out shooter who helped headline Villanova's return to college basketball dominance, toting a smooth, compact jump shot form that seemed poised to support his vision as a complementary-scoring role player. Through three seasons, though, he's failed to fully-establish himself as a Pelicans fixture, peaking at 23.6 minutes per game as a sophomore before cratering to 48% true shooting and 34.8% from 3-point land in 2026 as an alleged specialist.

New Orleans Pelicans Guard Jordan Hawkins — Oct 16, 2025; Orlando, Florida, USA; New Orleans Pelicans guard Jordan Hawkins (24) shoots a three point basket in front of Orlando Magic guard Desmond Bane (3) during the second half at Kia Center. Mandatory Credit: Mike Watters-Imagn Images | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Where the Wizards lost Cam Whitmore, another locally-bred 2023 NBA Draft prospect who failed to return on his investment, the Gaithersburg, MD native in Hawkins may benefit from a fresh start in a trip home. As offensively-tilted as the present iteration of the Wizards are constructed, another floor-spacer to extend Washington's already deep guard and wing rotations may thrive alongside Young's driving-and-kicking playmaking style.

How Much Would Hawkins Cost?

Even if the Pelicans effectively punted on the 2026 draft class with their ambitious Derik Queen trade, they don't exactly need Hawkins in re-tooling around their young corps. Queen, as well as fellow prospects Jeremiah Fears and Yves Missi, are much more representative of New Orleans' future ambitions, while Hawkins has never looked more replaceable.

It helps that he's technically-eligible for a rookie extension as a rising-fourth year player, placing him in the same waiting game as fellow draft classmate Bilal Coulibaly and Whitmore before him. No one outside of obvious class headliner Victor Wembanyama has yet inked such an agreement, but the Pelicans stand as one of the less-likelier operations to hand Hawkins even more money in the face of such diminished results.

22yo Jordan Hawkins looking nasty from the midrange...

Hawk is a flat out great shooter. Off movement and and uneven platforms—it's still splashy. Adding midrange as a counter and closeout killing weapon seems like it was a point of emphasis this offseason. pic.twitter.com/sT5aCEOLCM
— Basketball University (@UofBasketball) October 29, 2024

The Wizards, not only armed with a still-vacant final roster spot and plenty of space to take on Hawkins' $7 million 2026-27 team-option, have second-round picks to deal should they look to buy low on the Pelicans product. For instance, they'll have four to cash in on over the next two years, as well as the majority of their own draft chips through the early-2030s.

His lack of production shouldn't require anything close to a first round-caliber asset, clearing the runway for just the sort of margin deal that Washington's come to regularly clean up in over years past. Again, he's likely not the player who the Pelicans initially sold themselves on, but should the Wizards look to take a chance on a deep-cut bench option, a settlement with their suddenly-cap-locked peers shouldn't be hard to come to.

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