It's too late for Arenas to get serious
Bruce Arthur, National Post Published: Wednesday, January 06, 2010
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It wasn't the real guns that got Gilbert Arenas suspended indefinitely on Wednesday. Well, it was, and it wasn't. Bringing four unloaded guns into the Washington Wizards locker room, putting three of them on a teammate's chair as a joke - that's as far as we know, anyway - that was dumb. Like, five-years-in-prison dumb, if everything goes wrong in court.
But the reason the NBA came down on Arenas like a vengeful god - an indefinite suspension, without pay, and threats of something more punitive than that - was that Arenas just wouldn't take his problems seriously. His Twitter account went from silence to sideshow. The joker joked away, saying of the NBA commissioner, "[David] Stern is mean." He apologized in a sombre statement, then two days later said "If I really did something wrong, I would feel remorse in what I did, but I didn't do anything."
And Tuesday night in Philadelphia, Arenas stood in the middle of a pre-game circle of his teammates and made finger-gun gestures as they laughed and pretended to fall down. He told The Washington Post's Michael Lee that his teammates egged him on.
"They said, ‘Do it. Do it. Do it,' " Arenas told Lee. "You wonder why I can't be serious?"
Arenas then went out and compiled 19 points and 14 assists as security officials confiscated Gilbert-themed signs in the audience, and was heckled mercilessly ("Don't shoot, Gilbert!"). Typically, Arenas sought out and hugged one of the hecklers after the game.
But it was likely those finger-guns that finally pushed Stern, who had previously said he would await the outcome of the pending criminal investigations, to act. It's one thing to pull a stupid prank involving guns in a locker room; it's another to mock the incident, and to an extent the league. And Stern's willingness to go Old Testament should never be tested.
"The possession of firearms by an NBA player in an NBA arena is a matter of the utmost concern to us," Stern said in the statement announcing the suspension. "Although it is clear that the actions of Mr. Arenas will ultimately result in a substantial suspension, and perhaps worse, his ongoing conduct has led me to conclude that he is not currently fit to take the court in an NBA game."
Now, this last bit rings a little hollow, since Sebastian Telfair of the Los Angeles Clippers carried a loaded handgun onto a team plane in 2008 and was suspended for three games, and Cleveland's Delonte West, suffering from serious depression, was arrested in September for carrying a .357 strapped to his leg, a Beretta in his waistband, and a shotgun in a guitar case while speeding through the night on a motorcycle. He's playing this season. Criminals of various stripes have plied their trade in the NBA.
But Stern's statement was ominous. The words "perhaps worse" indicate a lifetime ban is at least possible. All options, nuclear and otherwise, appear to be on the table.
The Wizards, meanwhile, released a statement signed by the heirs of late owner Abe Pollin that read, "We fully endorse the decision of the NBA to indefinitely suspend Gilbert Arenas." You can bet that deliberations over voiding the remainder of Gilbert's US$111-million contract are well underway, pending Stern's next step.
"I feel very badly that my actions have caused the NBA to suspend me, but I understand why the league took this action," Arenas said in a statement yesterday. "I put the NBA in a negative light and let down my teammates and our fans. I am very sorry for doing that."
Too late, Gilbert. And you know what? For all the comedy this has engendered - "Gil's lucky he didn't shoot himself in the leg with the finger guns," SLAM magazine's Lang Whitaker wrote on Twitter - it's sad, too.
Gilbert Arenas should have known better. He should have listened to sound advice, if he got any. It's true that while this was a serious crime, he didn't shoot himself (like Plaxico Burress) or anybody else. He didn't drive drunk and kill somebody (like St. Louis Rams defensive lineman Leonard Little), or sexually assault anybody (like former NBA player Ruben Patterson).
But Agent Zero acted like it was a traffic citation. Yes, Arenas is a near-complete goofball. But he's not stupid; just unthinking. Why couldn't he understand that this wasn't a joke?
Maybe it's just that some people can't stand success. The great columnist Mike Wise of The Washington Post wrote what I consider to be the definitive story on Arenas in 2007, unearthing the forces that drove Arenas from a troubled childhood - he and his half-brother were abandoned by his drug-addicted mother in a crack house when Arenas was three, and she left them when he was five - to stardom, despite being a second-round pick. From zero to hero, as Gilbert put it.
In it, Arenas' high school coach Howard Levine was asked by his college coach, Lute Olson, why Arenas was acting out in practice. Levine, who had known Arenas a long time, knew why.
"Gilbert has to know you're going to be with him all the time," Levine told Wise. "In Gilbert's mind, he's thinking, I want to see if you let me go, like my mom let me go. At some point, if you're going to get close to Gilbert you have to tell him: ‘You can push me away, you can fight me, but I'm not going anywhere. I'm here for you. I'm staying.' "
Arenas confirmed it, saying that was the only way to know what was true: "If you push them away and they leave, it was never meant to be. You're just a leaf on a tree that just blew off."
Eventually, though, everyone loved Gilbert Arenas. Everyone loved his quirkiness and his gifts and his fearlessness, and he became a star. And subconsciously or otherwise, he has pushed a lot of them away. The great underdog, as he climbed back towards stardom, sabotaged himself. Suddenly it's hard to remember just how different, just how refreshing, Gilbert Arenas used to be. It's easier now to realize the kid never grew all the way up.
In that same piece by Wise, Arenas said, "Whatever happens in your past, you get second chances." Not always, you don't.
National Post
barthur@nationalpost.com
Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/sports/story.html?id=2413631#ixzz0bxllTQKX
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