Gilbert Arenas (seen above dancing and pantomiming shooting guns at his teammates at Tuesday night's game) may have played his last NBA game. He's been suspended without pay for the rest of the year (thereby forfeiting $10 million), and if he is convicted and jailed, the $80 million he is owed over the next four years by the Washington Wizards (formerly Washington Bullets...ha!) will not be paid.
For those of you not following this story, evidently Agent Zero and teammate Javaris Crittendon got in an argument over a gambling debt. It got pretty heated in the locker room, so Gilbert pulls out several guns from his locker and sets them on the table and asks Crittendon to "pick one." Arenas swears he was just fooling around and they were unloaded. Reports are now circulating that Crittendon then pulled out a weapon of his own that was loaded and he cocked the gun, loading a bullet in the chamber.
Arenas has always been an eccentric guy, and not in the Ron Artest kind of way, so this is quite surprising. Also, knowing how Arenas loves to joke around, it is actually possible that he was just kidding around. What is amazing to me, though, is how Arenas acted in the aftermath once the NBA and the DC police decided to investigate. You see, unfortunately for Gilbert, handguns of any kind are illegal in D.C. Additionally, handguns are forbidden in NBA facilities by the agreement currently in place between the player's union and the NBA.
But instead of playing the game and acting contrite and apologizing and appearing on Oprah, Arenas tweets that he's "the new John Wayne" and pretends to shoot his teammates in pre-game warm-ups for Tuesday night's game. NBA Commissioner David Stern had no choice at that point. Arenas has been "suspended indefinitely without pay" (meaning, at the very least, the rest of this season). His NBA career may be done.
A sad turn of events for a guy who was an All-Star only a couple of years ago.
10 comments:
OK. I haven't followed this story at all so my comments are only based on what I just read in your post. You made it sound like his tweet and his pantomime were the last straw that forced Stern's hand. YOU CANNOT BE SERIOUS (to quote one of my idols). Who cares if he jokes around? It sounds like possession of handguns is the issue, not his joking in the aftermath.
Absolutely his actions after the incident made it worse. Stern was going to wait to act until after the official investigation was complete before taking any action. But the DAY AFTER Gilbert did his pre-game warm-up stunt, Stern decided to suspend him immediately. I'm not saying that he wouldn't have been suspended/punished otherwise, but both the speed and severity with which his punishment was handed down was directly related to his tweets, statements to the press about "I'm just gonna make fun of it," and his actions before that game. Absolutely.
He was basically taunting Stern to act immediately. He even tweeted some things about Stern personally.
I am still shocked that this was in a locker room and the story leaked. I mean I am sure a million and one things happen back there that we could never dream of. Leave it to Gilbert to find a way to make it happen
Unless there have been more developments, I don't think he's been officially suspended for the rest of this season yet.
"Indefinitely." It will be the rest of the season.
I know it could be the rest of the season -- and looks more likely as time passes. But "indefinitely" does not mean "the rest of the season." It means indefinitely ("not clearly defined or determined").
It will be the rest of the season.
Maybe it will be. That doesn't make you right.
I am right.
Dez - you really crack me up. I laughed my head off.
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