Washington Wizards owner Ted Leonsis finally has stopped insulting our intelligence with the community hug of Gilbert Arenas.
If you want to embrace Arenas, as Leonsis suggested when he was trying to conjure up some reason for taking him back after he wrecked the franchise last year, you will now have to do it all the way from Orlando.
The Wizards — hereby known as the Washington Lockouts, for a team built to discard when the NBA new world order begins after the anticipated lockout — traded Arenas to the Magic on Saturday for Rashard Lewis. The 6-foot-10 Lewis’ contract is better suited for the franchise to come out of the NBA lockout with money in the bank to spend.
Albert Haynesworth suspended, Gilbert Arenas traded, Donovan McNabb benched, Ralph Friedgen fired … has Moe Greene been shot yet?
Speaking of shooting, Gilbert now will be closer to his gun collection. According to court papers, he supposedly donated his 500-gun arsenal to an unidentified Orlando law enforcement agency.
This is the best move for all concerned — well, save for Orlando general manager Otis Smith, described as Arenas’ “mentor” from their days together at Golden State. That’s a dubious distinction, and Smith now has to justify the rest of Arenas’ bloated contract by winning an NBA title.
The Lockouts, if they were truly going to get a fresh start under Leonsis, had to deal Arenas because of the gun incident that led to his conviction and halfway house sentence and the destruction it caused the organization.
And Arenas, after his top-dog status here in Washington and then his fall from grace, had to get a fresh start somewhere else — someplace where he did not rip the heart out of the team’s fans with his immature and irresponsible behavior.
I wish him well. Given his track record of destructive behavior to those around him — dating back to his days in college at Arizona, where his so-called pranks nearly ran him off the team — Arenas appears to be a person with deep-seated behavior issues and is probably in pain. I don’t wish that on anyone.
That’s about as compassionate as I can get for a multi-million dollar narcissist.
Apparently, Leonsis, who owed Arenas $80 million upon acquiring the Lockouts after the death of Abe Pollin, wanted more from us.
“I think it’s very important that Gilbert be re-embraced as a person and as a player,” Leonsis wrote on his blog earlier this year. “So suffice to say that Gilbert knows that the most important thing for him to do is to get in shape, and to be a great teammate, and to be a pillar of our community, and that he will show atonement. But his major deliverable is to come back and be a great part of this next generation Wizards franchise and what we’re trying to accomplish.”
Look, what they were trying to accomplish was not to devalue Gilbert’s worth while they were trying to get him out of here. I get that. But it was insulting to embark on this whole “re-embrace” campaign.
It was time not just to let go. It was time to run away.
Examiner columnist Thom Loverro is the co-host of “The Sports Fix” from noon to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday on ESPN 980 and espn980.com. Contact him at [email protected].
