The Washington Wizards are interviewing the Houston Rockets' Gersson Rosas to be the team's new president of basketball operations, according to Fred Katz of The Athletic.
Rosas has slowly worked his way up the Rockets organizational pecking order over the last 17 years. He is currently the team's vice president of basketball operations. Long considered one of the most well-respected front office underlings in the league, Rosas has already interview to be the Minnesota Timberwolves' president of basketball operations, as well as for the basketball operations position former Cleveland Cavaliers general manager David Griffin took with the New Orleans Pelicans earlier this month.
According to The Athletic, Washington's search for a new personnel decision-maker is being aided by consultant Mike Forde, who also assisted the Pelicans in a candidate search that ultimately ended with the team hiring Griffin. Brooklyn Nets assistant general manager Trajan Langdon and Golden State Warriors director of player personnel Larry Harris interviewed for New Orleans' opening, leading The Athletic to speculate that both could eventually meet with the Wizards, too.
Washington fired longtime president Ernie Grunfeld on April 2nd. One of the longest-serving major executives in the NBA, he spent 16 seasons with the Wizards. While announcing Grunfeld's dismissal, Wizards owner Ted Leonsis expressed a desire to emulate the league's most well-run organizations in searching for Grunfeld's replacement.
“I want to do what’s called ‘best practicing,'” he said, per The Athletic. “What do the best organizations look like? What do they spend? Maybe I made mistakes in the way we spent and invested our money. I have to be open-minded.”
Washington went 32-50 in 2018-19, and faces myriad obstacles on the route back to contention, most notably the super-max contract signed by franchise point guard John Wall, who will miss much of next season while recovering from a torn Achilles tendon.
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