Wizards Are Encouraged by Progress of Arenas

Atlanta's Josh Childress, center, draws a foul from Washington's Caron Butler (3) in the opening quarter as the Wizards' Brendan Haywood tries to help in the first quarter of the Hawks' 103-99 victory. (By Gregory Smith -- Associated Press)

Thomas was released from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., over the weekend and is continuing to recover at his home in Maryland. Neither the team nor doctors have officially ruled Thomas out for the season but the Wizards are planning to play without the veteran, according to a league source familiar with the situation.

Thomas has three years and $20 million remaining on his contract but should he be declared out for the season for medical reasons, there is a provision in the collective bargaining agreement that would give the Wizards an exception worth around $3.7 million to sign a replacement.

However, the Wizards are unlikely to use the exception and probably will carry 13 players on the regular season roster because they are close to the luxury tax threshold ($67.8 million.) Teams that go over the threshold must pay a dollar-for-dollar tax and, following the season, that money is pooled and redistributed among the teams that stay under.

If the Wizards make one more cut to remain under the threshold, the man out will probably be second-year forward Mike Hall, who had played a team-low 17 preseason minutes going into Monday's game.

Jordan said he could handle going into the regular season with 13 players (including Thomas), which would be two fewer than the league maximum. Teams must set opening night rosters by Oct. 29.

"If that's the way it is, we'll have to adjust," Jordan said. "We'll have to be creative if two or three people can't practice on a given day, so we'll have situations in practice where we can still work on things we need to work on."

The Wizards had a chance to either win Monday's game or force overtime in the closing seconds but Roger Mason Jr. missed a three-pointer and rookie Dominic McGuire missed a short put-back attempt after grabbing the rebound following Mason's miss.

Atlanta's Marvin Williams put the game away by making two free throws with 7.2 seconds left.

Wizards Notes: Rookie Oleksiy Pecherov (thigh bruise) did not dress Monday night and is day-to-day. . . . The road trip continues Wednesday night at Detroit and the preseason concludes Friday night at Toronto.