Why Gilbert's Guns Were the Best Thing to Happen to the Wizards

It seems completely counterintuitive. The face of the franchise, a guy making $111 million, breaks the law and every conceivable standard of professional and decent behavior by bringing guns into the locker room to either tease (if you believe Gil's account) or threaten (the prosecutor's) his teammate. He embarrasses himself and the organization, and sends the franchise from meandering poor play into a catastrophic tailspin that depresses everyone who cares even a little bit about the team. And yet, that moment will probably be looked back upon as the day the Wizards began their turnaround.

Because if Gilbert hadn't brought those guns to the Verizon Center, and if he hadn't subsequently gone on his bizarre Twitter binge and broken out the finger pistolas in Philadelphia, he wouldn't have gotten his 50 game suspension. The Wizards probably would have won just enough games for Ernie Grunfeld to have held off on any kind of trades until after the season, since this year's Wizards were built with designs on winning now. The team probably would have missed the playoffs anyway, but won enough games to ensure that they had no real shot in the lottery.

If Gilbert hadn't decided to go John Wayne on Javaris Crittenton, the Wizards would probably still be debating the idea of breaking up an aging Big Three and whether to re-sign Brendan Haywood. They'd have almost no cap room and a double digit lottery pick.

Instead, the Wizards are weeks away from grabbing a 19 year-old franchise point guard with the number one pick in the draft. They've shed the undesirable contracts of Antawn Jamison, Caron Butler, and DeShawn Stevenson. All of a sudden, the future has gone from untenable to unimaginably exciting. And it's all because of Gilbert and his armory.

There have been lots of rumblings about Ted Leonsis changing the team name from the Wizards back to the Bullets, but the consensus seems to be that Gilbert's foolishness ruined any chance of that happening. I'd argue the opposite. There could be nothing more appropriate than changing the name back. Because anything good that happens to this franchise in the next few years will be owed almost entirely to guns.

So, thank you Gilbert. We couldn't have done it without you.

The Great Wall of Chinatown!

I'm stupefied. I'm astounded. Needless to say I am ecstatic.

Despite years and years of getting kicked in the stones at the lottery, and coming off one of the worst seasons in the history of seasons, a little luck finally swung the Wizards way. Check that, a lot of luck. WE WON THE FUCKING DRAFT LOTTERY!!! And unlike last time, there is a clear cut number one franchise talent sitting there waiting to be taken. Unless something horrible happens to him between now and then, or unless Ernie bones it up (a possibility that can't be ruled out), John Wall will be a Washington Wizard on June 24th. Let me say that again...

John. Wall. Will. Be. A. Wizard.

Excuse me while I do my John Wall dance.

Yeah, that's right.

Next step: road trip to NYC for draft night!

To-night, to-night...

Gilbert Returns! 7p.m., @ the Phone Booth and on CSN.

--Mike Jones has a preview, which includes a picture of Gil holding what appears to be a man purse.

--Mike Wise also talked to the Gil the Thrill, who blamed himself for not helping the kids get better this season (I still blame Tapscott). This has offended said teammates, who are INDIGNANT at the idea that they might need to get better after helping lead this team to one of its worst seasons ever.

Here's a thought: if Andray Blatche lifted a weight everytime he whined about someone questioning his work ethic, maybe he'd be the player everyone wants him to be.

--But here's a guy with unquestioned work ethic. And, with any luck at all, he'll get all of Blatche's minutes next season and a bunch of other people's too.

The first day of the rest of our lives...

Ok, so unless you've been living in a hole, you realize that this season has been, as Emmitt Smith would say, "debacled." The Wizards are flirting with having the worst season in the history of the franchise. Which, if you know this history o' Les Boulez, is something of an accomplishment.

Much of the credit is owed to Ed Tapscott, who, despite winning his first game, has proven himself to be a stunningly incompetent head coach.

All of this, plus a variety of personal reasons (first among them, laziness) has resulted in no blogging activity since the Thanskigiving disaster at Orlando.

But...

As they say, t's always darkest before the dawn, or something. Hope is alive and well in the Nation's Capitol, and not just because of 44.

No, hope is arriving this Saturday, when Agent $111,000,000 dusts off the cape and shows us if there's something left of the man who electrified the City from 2004-2007.

And, despite a win last night, the Wizards are in excellent draft lottery position, meaning that we can all pray that the balls bounce right and we can add the Terminator Blake Griffin to our starting five next season.

In true sports fan tradition, we say wait'll next year! And there's reason to mean it.

So, in the honor of hope, we're hitting the reset button. Blogging will resume starting... now.

Thanksgiving Turkeys

Superman entered the Phone Booth and carved up the Wiz like a Thanksgiving turkey for the second time this season. PMLB (he's back to that after last night) showed that while he can run the alley-oop like no other, he has miles to go on defense. And I guess we shouldn't have expected much from Andray Blatche the day after the busiest bar night of the year. But unless one of them learns how to at least slow Howard down, it could be a long time before the Wizards win the Southeast again.

And so the Wiz have once again matched the 1966-67 Bullets for the worst start in franchise history at 2-11. Maybe we should cease engraving that Tapscott Hall of Fame plaque for a few days after all.

Who's feeling lucky in the lottery?

Ed Tapscott: Great Coach, or GREATEST Coach?

Change has arrived in Washington, and the Wizards played Obama to Golden State's McCain and beat down the Warriors to raise Ed Tapscott's career winning percentage to a whopping 100%, which for you basketball historians would be the best ever (Go ahead, look it up).

So the only question now is, do we have to wait, or can we just induct Tapscott into Springfield this afternoon?

Also, Andray Blatche has suddenly morphed into Kevin Garnett (25 points, 12 rebounds, 5 blocks, 5 assists, 29 minutes) and JaVale McGee (he gets to be called by his real name now) has turned into a dunkalicious man-beast.

Sure it's only one game... or is it?

IN TAPSCOTT WE TRUST!

Moving On...

The 1-10 Bulle... er, Wizards, play their first game of the second post-Jordan era tonight against Golden State. They will be led into battle by someone named Ed Tapscott, who last coached a basketball game almost 20 years ago at American University. So that should be... something.

Game is live at 7:00 from the Phone Booth on CSN.

Reactions on the firing:

*Sally Jenkins blames Eddie's lack of focus on defense for his departure, and in the process writes the greatest sentence ever written about Etan Thomas:

Etan Thomas plays D exactly like what he is, an amateur poet.

Harsh, but fair.

*Wilbon, typically, uses this as an opportunity to tell us how much better the Eastern Conference is today and blame Grunfeld for not improving personnel.

*Tawn says the team is to blame, not the coach.

*Caron isn't saying anything.