Lebron to Washington? Short Answer, No

I saw in the Washington Post on Sunday an article about why Washington would be a good destination for Lebron James. The author did not understand why Washington was not in the discussion arguing that Washington was a major basketball market and had lots of money to work with thanks to the trade deadline departures of most of their expensive players. I had to laugh. This article was not in the "Sports" section, but in the "Metro" section, which of course explains why the author seemed to be taking a lot for granted when discussing the Wizards.

Don't get your hopes up. Lebron will not be wearing blue and gold next season. There were some good points made in the article and there are some reasons why Washington would at least enter the discussion. Washington was completely off the radar until they won the draft lottery. Most analysts agree Lebron will try to bring another superstar with him and with John Wall waiting, you could have 3 superstars playing next season which would completely transform the team. The Wizards are now owned by Ted Leonsis who transformed the Washington Capitals and looks ready to win in the NBA. DC might not have the glitz and glamor of New York, but wherever he goes the market will follow. With the top pick, the Wizards may be an easier team to build than New York and he wouldn't have to play in the shadow of Michael Jordan like he would in Chicago. With President Obama down the street, an avid basketball fan, Lebron should seriously be considering Washington.

Now let me tell you why this is all wishful thinking. Washington's entry fee into the Lebron sweepstakes would be to fire headcoach Flip Saunders, which if they were going to do they would have done by now. With the team that was put around Lebron this season, he's got to be feeling that coaching may be the missing piece of the puzzle. When he is looking for where to go next season if coaching is a major factor, which I think it will be, then you can count Washington out. If he can't win with Mike Brown, I doubt he thinks Flip Saunders is the right choice. As head coach of Minnesota, Saunders lost in the first round in his first eight playoff appearances. He did manage to make the conference finals in all three of his seasons as head coach of Detroit, but he lost all three times even with a championship caliber team that had won the NBA championship in 2004. This is precisely the problem Lebron has had in Cleveland. Why leave to have the exact same problem in Washington?

To say that Washington is as notable an NBA franchise as say Boston or Los Angeles is completely false. The author even argued that Red Auerbach was a Washington coach before he was a Boston coach. While this is true, it is irrelevant. It's like saying New York is a basketball market since Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn. Auerbach made his name in Boston, not DC. When people talk about the storied franchises of the NBA, they refer to several teams, but not the Washington Wizards who have won a single NBA title. Yes, the market will follow Lebron wherever he goes, but if he doesn't want to resurrect the major market of the Knicks or the Bulls, why leave Cleveland for Washington? Why leave a team dedicated to winning for a coach who struggles in the playoffs, a draft pick who could turn out to be a bust, and a franchise still clouded by Gilbert Arenas? There are far too many question marks surrounding the Wizards for Lebron to consider this a possible destination for the 2010-11 season.

Wizards Win Draft Lottery, Face Choice

Representing the Washington Wizards and her late husband, Irene Pollin's jaw dropped as she discovered the team had won the NBA draft lottery. Despite only a 10.3% chance, the Wizards will now have their choice of stars John Wall and Evan Turner, a good problem to have.

"I think it's the culmination of my husband's dream because he wanted another ring and maybe this will get us another ring," Pollin said. Wall and Turner are widely considered as the top two prospects. Wall played one year for the University of Kentucky and dazzled in his time there averaging 16.9 points per game and 6.4 assist per game. He also plays point guard which is considered the most important position in basketball. Turner is a shooting guard and was perhaps the best college player in the country averaging 20.3 points per game and 9.2 rebounds per game at Ohio State. Wall is considered by most as the best pro prospect in the draft and expected to turn into a superstar player, but there is one thing standing in the way, Gilbert Arenas.

Arenas' mere presence continues to hurt the Wizards and now he has turned what looks like a no-brainer into a tough decision. The problem is that Arenas is the Wizards' current point guard. In order to rebuild this team, the Wizards need a starter and a possible star in the making from the draft. This is John Wall. Turner is a great player, but Wall is clear number one choice this draft. If the team is committed to keeping Arenas, as they claim to be, then unfortunately they will consider passing Wall for Turner who can start along side Arenas.

This is just stupid. Arenas has tainted the Wizards for too long and needs to go. They now have the opportunity to bring in a probable star at point guard and they cannot afford to pass that up. I am not down on Turner, but it is agreed among almost all NBA analysts that Wall should be the top pick. This is the team's chance to replace Arenas. They have cap space. With Wall and another superstar free agent pickup, you could see a new team next season. The Arenas era needs to come to an end because it has failed. I trust new owner, Ted Leonsis, who turned the Capitals organization around, to recognize what needs to happen and somehow push Arenas out the door.

As with all NBA stories these days, I also have to mention the possible impact this will have on Lebron's decision. The New Jersey Nets are named as one of the possible destinations for Lebron, but I feel the chances of that are now over. What New Jersey had to offer was a shot by winning the draft, but as they fell to number three I feel that is too low. Most likely the Nets will not get either Wall or Turner and so the appeal of New Jersey has now dropped tremendously. Owner Mikhail Prokhorov will do what he can to stay in the Lebron sweepstakes, but I think New Jersey's stock has now plummeted in Lebron's eyes because of the lottery.

Gilbert Arenas Gets Off Easy, Wizards Stuck

Gilbert Arenas appeared in court Friday and received a sentence of 30 days in a halfway house and 2 years probation for his gun charge. I'm not one of those people who complains about the different rules for the rich, but in the wake of this charge when you look at the questions surrounding it and the effects it will have, I'm having a hard time seeing how Arenas is being punished more than the Wizards.

Arenas was facing a felony charge for his little gun prank. Even with a guilty plea, the district attorney's office presented a case for jail time. This was a serious charge. The judge remarked that while Arenas was very irresponsible, he showed genuine remorse and was unlikely to be a repeat offender. Being a celebrity in this case helped him because Arenas is going to be under the microscope for quite sometime. He won't be able to carry a water pistol without every person in America seeing four different camera shots, but I'm really not sure about the 'genuine remorse.' Before charges were brought against him it became a team joke. Arenas even pretended to shoot his teammates during a pregame pump up. So while some reports say that Javaris Crittenton pulled his own gun and cocked it in response to Arenas' prank, he was only remorseful after he got in trouble. It's easy to appear remorseful when every television station in America runs quotes and interviews of you saying you're sorry, but he really didn't seem to act that way.

As a celebrity, you can't dismiss how much money he's losing because of his season suspension and cancelled endorsements. One figure says he's lost $7.4 million so far. That's a fair point, but Arenas is already a multi-millionaire. The richer you get, the less that money really means. Think about it. Whatever percentage of Arenas' salary that makes up, take a proportional amount out of your salary and you're in trouble. Arenas isn't going to be sitting at the old halfway house wondering how he will manage to make ends meet. With celebrities, monetary penalties really don't mean that much. That makes it imperative that they receive some other form of punishment because this is the only thing that really affects them.

One example you should consider is that of Plaxico Burress. Burress accidentally shot himself at a night club with his gun, was arrested, and accepted a plea deal for two years in prison. Arenas brought four guns into DC which is against DC's gun control laws and received 30 days in a halfway house. One got shot and is now in prison, the other thought it was no big deal and is headed to a halfway house. Doesn't it seem like the justice system got it wrong here?

Even if you feel Arenas' punishment is fair, the punishment for the Wizards is entirely unfair. Their star player is out for the season and too expensive to buy out. His trade value has understandably dropped and the Wizards can't really begin to rebuild their team until they deal with the giant elephant in the room. Best case scenario would be to void Arenas' contract, but this is not a realistic solution. Arenas is already suspended for the season and will be out of the halfway house before training camp this summer so the Wizards can't argue that his sentence will affect his ability to train and play. There of course is the morals clause of his contract. Yes, the NBA has a morals clause, but the fact that it's in the NBA is evidence enough of how useless it is. It's not even worth discussing.

The Wizards felt out interest for Arenas before this little gun incident and the prospects weren't encouraging. No one wanted an injury prone, unproven leader with an obscene contract. Add convicted felon to that resume and you could be describing a lot of NBA stars, but specifically for Arenas it's not promising that the Wizards will get any where near his value. Buying out Arenas, however, will cost the team $80 million. If Arenas is really desperate to get back on the court and leave Washington, which he hinted he would like to do, he may void a portion of that amount, but it still means a significant amount of money for a team poised for a massive rebuild.

So out of this entire situation, who really got the short end of the stick, Arenas who received no jail time for a gun felony or the Wizards who can't move forward without paying Arenas $80 million, trading for nothing, or rebuilding around a player who has proven he doesn't have enough to get this team over the threshold? New owner Ted Leonsis probably acquired the Wizards with the idea of rebuilding much the same way he did with the Capitals. The team already unloaded all their expensive talent at the deadline and acquired several prospects. Add a top draft pick the team can begin building around and this young team will be poised for future success. With this hanging over the team's head, however, it is difficult to start that process. Somehow after this big mess, Arenas still essentially holds the upper hand between himself and the Wizards and that's just not fair.

Wizards Unload, Look to the Future

Fifty games into a hugely disappointing season, the Washington Wizards have begun unloading their big name players and rebuilding for the future. Washington first sent Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood, and DeShawn Stevenson to Dallas in exchange for Josh Howard, Drew Gooden, Quinton Ross, and James Singleton. They then traded Dominic McGuire to Sacramento for a 2010 second round draft pick. Finally, in a three team deal, the Wizards sent Antawn Jamison to Cleveland and newly acquired Drew Gooden to the LA Clippers. In return they got Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Al Thornton, a 2010 first round draft pick (from Cleveland), and the rights to Emir Preldzic, a second round pick from last year.

This is clearly a step in the right direction for a team that was going nowhere. It can be very hard for teams to recognize that they have no chance of going forward and that they need to get rid of the talent they have. Butler, Haywood, and Jameson are all very good players. The problem is, it wasn't working. You can load a team with talent, but if they don't win, it doesn't matter (are you listening Dan Snyder!?!?!). You have to start over. The Wizards' 2009-2010 season is over. Now it is time to save money and build a team that will be in a position to win two-three years from now.

That may seem steep, but that is how long it takes. The obvious example comes from the team that shares the Verizon Center, the Washington Capitals. Despite star players Jaromir Jagr, Peter Bondra, Sergei Gonchar, Robert Lang, and several others the team could not win. They then unloaded all their large contracts for draft picks and prospects. The team grew together and in three years won their division and now sit atop the NHL with the best record in the league. While the financial situation for the Capitals was more dire with an NHL lockout looming, it is still something the Wizards need to be aware of. There is no point in continuing to lose money when you've already thrown in the towel.

So let's look at how the Wizards have done so far. Step one is to get rid of the expensive talent. Trading Butler, Haywood, and Jameson had to happen. They all are on the older end of the spectrum; 29, 30, and 33 respectively; and have high contracts, the lowest of which being Haywood's $6 million this season. Step two is to acquire draft picks and younger players. First round picks are always great regardless of how low that pick will be. A second round pick from Sacramento is also good, as Sacramento is likely to have a very high pick. That's two good pickups, not including the very high picks the Wizards will get themselves. As for their player pickups, they got what they could, but not really what they needed. Ross and Singleton are both 28 and have contracts of $1.03 million. Older than the Wizards would have liked, but perhaps future leaders over the next few years. Thornton is a very nice pickup at 26 years old, a $1.9 million contract, and a lot of potential. Right now he averages 10.9 ppg, 3.8 rpg, and 1.2 apg and those numbers are likely to continue to go up.

The two guys that make you wonder are the big name pickups. Howard is 29, an inconsistent shooter, and expensive ($10.89 this season). While the Wizards may be thinking that Howard will be the team leader over the next few years, what is more likely is that Dallas wanted Howard included in the deal. To add around $19 million to the salary cap, someone has to go. Howard was the obvious choice. The same goes for Ilgauskas. The Cavaliers needed to add more support for LeBron James for a title run and picked up Jamison. To clear room for his $11.64 million they needed someone to take the $11.54 million Ilgauskus who is in the last season of his contract. Hopefully the Wizards have zero expectations for him. He has been a Wizard for less than a week and is already talking about buying out his contract. With his departure at the end of the season, the Wizards will have plenty of cap space to make some moves.

The biggest question for the Wizards, however, remains unresolved. Gilbert Arenas is still a Wizard. At the moment there is really nothing that can be done. No one will trade for a suspended player and as Arenas has already been punished by the league for his idiotic gun joke, the Wizards cannot release him without having to buy out his ridiculously huge contract. Yet, despite all the controversy surrounding Arenas, team president Ernie Grunfeld said that he would be back. "He's under contract and he's going to be with us. He's part of our organization. If he wants to play, he's going to play here." This statement is rather odd. If Grunfeld thinks he is going to build a team around Arenas, he's dreaming. He already tried and it didn't work. Arenas will be even less dependable when he returns as he continues to get older. Arenas has yet to show that he can continue to play at a superstar level and to assume he can lead the Wizards after failing to do so in the past is just plain stupid. I hope the motivation behind this comment was to encourage Arenas to come back. If Arenas were to buy out his contract, it would save the Wizards a lot of money, but the Wizards would still lose his trade value. Even so, Arenas buying out his own contract may still be the best option. The Wizards need young, cheap talent. Teams can't afford to trade draft picks for Arenas since his contract is so expensive (over $16 million per year). The Wizards might be able to get two or three prospects for him, but ultimately teams may not want to take the risk or pay him that much money. This would leave the Wizards with the choice of buying out his contract themselves or keeping him for another season which would honestly be the worst case scenerio.

Sit back Wizards' fans, the next few seasons are going to be pretty long. If they continue to do things right, they may be playoff bound in two or three years, but they cannot get impatient. Keeping Arenas are bringing in players that just don't fit the system will only set them back. If the Wizards want to rebuild, they need to commit and go all in.

Player's Union Protects Arenas, Wizards Take the Fall

The NBA announced this week that Gilbert Arenas and teammate Javaris Crittenton would be suspended for the remainder of the season following the well known gun incident between the two. It looks as if Arenas' days as a Wizard are numbered, but the team cannot really bring closure to this situation because of the player's union. The team is unable to void Arenas' contract because teams are not allowed to punish players for an incident in which the league has already punished them for. Now in order to release him from the team, the Wizards will have to buy out his contract.

Thanks to the players union thugs and criminals get protected. This is ridiculous. Arenas brought out four guns in the locker room and has pled guilty to a felony. Now he is entitled to millions of dollars? The rule in itself is absurd. If a player does something serious enough to be suspended by the league, why can't a team void his contract, especially if that incident includes a felony conviction? I'm sure glad that there are players unions out there to protect these millionaires from missing out on their already obscene salaries.

I understand that players need a voice to protect their rights. I'm all for that. I also understand the need to protect players from having their contracts voided because of simple one game suspensions. But these rules end up helping people like Arenas. Let's be real. Professional athletes in most sports have a real discipline problem. You see football, baseball, and basketball players getting into legal trouble all the time. Most of these players grow up knowing they will be superstars. Nobody can deny them anything because they all want their talent for their teams. Then they are paid millions of dollars to stay in shape and play games. As a result some of these guys have a real problem with discipline. There is a laundry list of star players who get into legal trouble. Players unions, with their broad rules, end up protecting people who should have the book thrown at them. Arenas certainly needs a harsh wake up call. He truly believed that he hadn't done anything wrong and even pretended to shoot his teammates during a pregame pump up. I'm sure his lawyer had to sit him down and tell him, point blank "You committed a felony and if you don't plead guilty then you will go to jail." Luckily for him, it entitles him to a nice payday from the Wizards.

Let's take a look at who will be punished by this. Arenas may face jail time, but I imagine he pled guilty for a deal with little or no jail time. He is suspended for the rest of the season, but he is used to sitting out for significant periods of time. Not only that, Arenas will now miss the rest of an extremely frustrating season in which the team was going nowhere. He has also said he wants out of Washington. Now he has a free pass to sit out the rest of the season and force the Wizards to buy him out. The Wizards who have done nothing wrong will now lose millions of dollars and any hope of competing this season. Arenas' trade value has plummeted because of his little gun slinging episode and voiding his contract was the only real option for the Wizards. They can't do that because the league has punished him. Their only option now is to buy him out or void his contract anyway and face arbitration. The most likely scenario is that Arenas will be given a slap on the wrist by the DC courts maybe without even any jail time and will be paid millions by a team he wants to leave and freedom to explore opportunities with other teams. Lesson learned?

Wizards Get Desperate as They Seek Help From the Fans

ESPN Insider is running a contest for the Washington Wizards. Fans can submit an inbounds play for the team to use during an actual game. Contestants submit their play to ESPN by Wednesday December 23 and a panel of experts will then choose the best and give it to the Wizards.

No doubt many fans have felt frustration over the Wizards' lack luster performance this season. I can certainly understand the feeling of watching a team and knowing you can do better, that is partly the motivation for this blog, but this is simply appalling. Head coach Flip Saunders is being paid $18 million to design these plays. He has an entire coaching staff to design these plays. If he can't figure out a way for the team to get the ball inbounds, then he can't coach the team. Period. What does this say about the state of the Wizards? Can you imagine this happening with the Lakers or the Celtics? Absolutely not. This contest reeks of desperation.

There isn't much the Wizards stand to gain from this contest, other than actually managing to get the ball inbounds without turning it over, but it clearly shows that this team has no idea what they're doing.

The Wizards aren't going to find hidden coaching talent somewhere among their fan base through an in bound play. I don't see what they gain from this contest other than scrutiny from real teams. Best case scenario is that they receive a well drawn up play that works a few times. That's it. The Lakers manage to keep filling the stands without stupid contests. This doesn't give much hope to an already skeptical fan base. It seems as if Saunders is already throwing in the towel after only 25 games. If a fan can help the team get the ball in bounds, that is a sign of Saunders inability to coach more than anything else. A contest such as this is a sign shows to the rest of the NBA how bad the Wizards really are.