Wham-Bam, What the F--k Just Happened?

Many of you know my vested interest in basketball, both as a sport of leisure and as a gentleman's game of wits and words. Unfortunately, I know few personally who share this interest, and fewer still who want to play the game. But this blog will no doubt be filled with many basketball posts and references. Hopefully by the end you all will have been inundated with so much basketball that you'll have no choice but to become a devoted fan of the sport. With that said....

If you told me that the Wizards were going to beat Boston twice in a row, I'd have called you a goddamn liar. A lousy, no-account goddamn liar. I would've called you the worst human being since Hitler, and I'd be right too. But here we are: the Wiz now sit at a not-too-bad 20 and 16, and the Celtics (2-3 in their last 5) no longer seem invincible. Even more amazing though is what the Wiz are doing all this without Arenas.

The Wizards were one of those teams like the Lakers and the Bucks--without their best player they were nothing. Guaranteed creampuffs. But this Bullets team is different. They have chemistry and maturity. Jamison and Butler form a great two-man combo; Jamison is one of five 20 point/10 rebound players in the whole league, and Butler is playing the best basketball of his career. Together, they are the highest scoring forward tandem in the league. They're also getting decent production out of their role players--Blatche is only going to get better, and Haywood, although he never will be a top tier center, is having a better-than-average year. (Perhaps knowing that he won't have to compete with Etan for the starter's spot gives him less to worry about.)



Of course, the tempting assumption is that when Arenas does return the Wizards will become even more powerful. But should we be so hasty? No doubt Arenas is an offensive force, and everyone in D.C. will be cheering his return, but let's not forget some basic facts:

1. Arenas is so concerned with proving all his nay-sayers wrong and building himself up that he's becoming something of a diva. Sure, he's no Randy Moss, but I see his burgeoning arrogance becoming a problem down the line. Will he be able to mesh with the Wizards nicely, now that they've found a collective strength? Or will he again become the focus and force the rest of the team--more or less--into a secondary role?

2. It's a well-known fact around the Verizon Center that Jamison is considered the team's locker room leader. Even though Arenas is the star, he's repeatedly stated that he doesn't want to be the locker room leader, that he's not serious enough, that he'd rather be the joker. You're telling me that this doesn't at least have the possibility to cause locker room problems? He's the star, but he's not taking advantage of this to be a real leader?

Of course, I'm not saying he should hold himself to 20 points, or 20 field goal attempts, and then just pass the rest of the way. But ideally, when he returns, Arenas should lower his PPG totals a little bit (from his typical range of 27-29; he's at 22 this season which should suffice), raise his assists per game to 7 or 8, maybe even 9, and acknowledge that this team is no longer Arenas' wizards. He can still be the star, but fortunately the Wiz have evolved beyond the point where he needs to carry them on his back.

(Of course, let's give the man credit for being the funniest player in the NBA. His blog is already famous, but here's a link anyway--humorous and insightful.)

1/15 Update: How the Wizards are going to be Boston twice and then lose to the Knicks is beyond me. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now, but they better not start playing to their competition, the scourge of nearly all D.C. metro area teams.


------More links!

Everyone knows there's no one more basketball than Frank Sinatra, so I've included a link to a groundbreaking article from 1965 by Gay Talese. If you have 30 minutes, it's a fascinating look at Sinatra's unique gravitas and power. You think Zak Efron has a chance of turning his own heartthrob-singer career into something like Frank's? Maybe once he starts kicking people out of Hollywood bars he doesn't even own for wearing Italian boots...we'll see.

This is a link I stole from ESPN.com's Bill Simmons, but dammit it's fascinating. It's an article on David Simon, creator of "The Wire" (which you'll definitely see a post about in the near future, trust me), that analyzes the neutrality and authenticity of Simon's alternate-reality Baltimore.


Lastly, here's a bizarre photograph of me and current Cincinnati Bearcats quarterback Ben Mauk for no reason. I'm the one who looks really fucking weird.