While Wizards President Ernie Grunfeld sits back and plays “wait and see” game for any offers that he likes from teams for Juan Carlos Navarro’s rights, he has wasted no time in his first step to retain restricted free agent forward Andray Blatche. Now that the Wizards lost a potential suitor for Navarro after Miami agreed to terms with guard Smush Parker yesterday. The Wizards have now apparently turned their focus Blatche.

According a report from Washington Times, the Wizards Friday night offered Blatche a three-year deal worth about $11 million.

On Sunday, however, Washington Post’s Ivan Carter cited that the amount the Wizards offered to Blatche was less than $11 million, according to a team source who refuted the previous published report. It did confirm that talks between the two parties are ongoing.

According to several reports, Barcelona, Navarro’s current team, has imposed a deadline of Aug. 3 for the Wizards to complete a deal. That means the Wizards will have to decide until the end of next week whether to sign guard Juan Carlos Navarro or trade his NBA rights to another team.

In today’s Washington Post’s report, eight teams have contacted with the Wizards with interest in acquiring Navarro, including the Miami Heat and Memphis Grizzlies, so far, no offers have been to the liking of Wizards President Ernie Grunfeld.

Now that Mo Williams chose Bew City over South Beach, the Heat has more reasons to pursue Navarro. Accorrding to Navarro’s agent, Alex Saratsis, the Heat remains “a solid possibility” for the point guard if the Washington Wizards trade his rights. The two teams are in active negotiations, according to a report from South Florida Sun-Sentinel. According to the official press release from the Miami Heat, they have signed free agent guard Smush Parker.

The Spanish team that Navarro played for has dropped his buyout number from $14 million to $3 million. However, if no deal is done between the Wizards and a team pursuing him, Barcelona will sign him to a new contract, and his buyout number will be prohibitive, at least $14 million again.

The bottomline is that he will not be playing in Washington. The Wizards are over the cap and only could have signed Navarro with money from their mid-level exception. Most of that money has now been given to DeShawn Stevenson, and the team still has to sign Andray Blatche.

So if Wizards President Ernie Grunfeld does not see a reasonable deal from teams like Memphis and Miami before Aug. 3, it might end up with Navarro playing his professional ball in Spain for a forseeable future.

Now with the clock ticking down and a complicated decision to make involving Barcelona, Navarro (and his agent), the Wizards and the team pursuing him, what do you think the Wizards will get before the deadline? Is the pressure on Navarro or Grunfeld?

Wizards President of Basketball Operations Ernie Grunfeld covered a variety of topics when he met with members of the local media Thursday afternoon at Verizon Center.

VIDEO: Ernie Grunfeld

If you’re not in the mood to watch the whole video, here are some quotes from the gathering:

On the season:
“It ended in a disappointing fashion for all of us. Overall, we started the season very well. We hit some bumps in the road during the second half of the season. We did not finish as well as we would have liked to, but I think that we have shown that when we are healthy and have all of our players we can compete with anyone in the league.

We had some great wins this season against some of the top teams in the league and I think our future is extremely bright. We have three All Stars, some outstanding young players and most of our players are in their prime. I am excited about the future of this ball club, but right now, after a loss in the playoffs, I think we are all disappointed and it hurts.”

On the future:
“We are going to use the next two to three weeks to evaluate everything. You do not evaluate the whole season in a 10-week period, or a five-game period, you have to look at the whole body of work from all our individual players and the team collectively. I think we are well positioned. We will begin to have internal meetings and we will decide what we have to do going down the road.”

More on plans for the off-season:
“We are going to take some time to evaluate everything, to see exactly where we are and what we need to do. We have some free agent issues that we need to deal with. We have some big free agents this summer. We will be making a decision about what we will be doing, but that will all take some time to do.”

On Oleksiy Pecherov:
“I anticipate having (Oleksiy) Pecherov on the roster next season. He had a very solid year playing in BC Kyiv. We anticipate bringing him over in the next month, and he will be playing with us in summer league. We cannot sign him to a contract until July, but at that time we anticipate having him here and having him next season.”

On Vladimir Veremeenko:
“We will see how that situation develops and how many roster spots we have for next season. A lot of things will unfold this summer, and we will take that one step at a time. He had a very good season also; he played with Khimki in Russia. We will hopefully bring him in to summer league, but we are not sure if we can work that out yet.”

On having eight free agents this off-season:
“Every organization wants players that they feel can help them win. We feel that if we have players that can help us win we will do everything to keep them here. If we do not feel that they can help us accomplish that then we will act accordingly.”

On Gilbert Arenas:
“Gilbert is very committed to this city and this organization. He likes it here and we all have had great success, and we are heading in the right direction. We would love to have Gilbert end his career here and put his number up in the rafters. He is very popular in this town, the fans love him and we all love him. He has a strong competitive nature and a desire to win. He does have the right to opt put next summer and get another long term contract, or he can get an extension this summer, but a much shorter term than it would be next summer.”

On the center position:
“Every team would love to have maximum production from each position on the floor. Looking over the course of the season, (Brendan Haywood and Etan Thomas) split time almost evenly, and if you put their numbers together there was good production. If you look at other teams, there are not many starting centers in the league that put up the type of numbers that the two of them do together.”

More on what is to come this summer:
“Our number one concern is to put the best possible team out on the court. It will be our goal and what we will be working towards. We have seven players under contract for next season, those seven players are in the rotation and we have the highest scoring trio returning next season. Our number one priority is to make sure Gilbert (Arenas) and Caron (Butler) get healthy and then we will address other opportunities.”

On the play of some of the younger Wizards:
“We will not use injuries as an excuse for anything because they are a part of the game and they happen. It did give other people an opportunity to play more and some players were put in different roles. Andray (Blatche) showed some promise and had good moments. Donell (Taylor) also had good moments along the way, Roger (Mason Jr.) came in and did some good things for us. I think our young players came in and did a good job of contributing.”

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More on Caron
Caron Butler has sustained a second metacarpal fracture in his right hand and will miss six weeks.

“I banged my right hand on the backboard, and I immediately felt a great deal of pain,” Butler said. “I am really disappointed because we finally had everyone back from injuries for the playoff run. I am going to stay positive and continue to support my teammates, and hope to get back as soon as possible.”

“Caron has had an outstanding season,” Grunfeld said. “We will miss his production and leadership on the court. We expect him to make a full recovery, and we will look for his teammates to step up in his absence.”

UPDATE: Just got word that Jarvis Hayes will start tomorrow in Caron’s place. You heard it here first, folks…