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...ones getting high on the addictive Arenas are the denizens of D.C., who can cheer for a team with playoff potential and an MVP-caliber player in the prime of his career. Led by Arenas, the NBA's second leading scorer (at 29.4 points per game) and least conventional superstar, the Wizards (28-19) had the second best record in the admittedly woeful Eastern Conference as of Feb. 6. In Washington, only the Pentagon has a longer-range arsenal than Arenas does. And Arenas may be more accurate. He has scored more than 50 points three times this season, including...
...enjoying every minute of it, which in today's image-driven sports world is also, sadly, somewhat strange. "NBA players are so scared of being viewed in a certain way that they can't be who they want to be," Arenas says. "They put on a mask." Arenas takes it off--just for fun. During the home opener this season, he wore a satin boxing robe for pregame introductions. He reaches out to struggling kids on MySpace and has sponsored a video-game team...
...University of Arizona--where he took the number 0--in his mind, the number of minutes his doubters thought he would play as a freshman. After helping the Wildcats reach the NCAA championship game in 2001, Arenas watched every team bypass him in the first round of the NBA draft. He cried. "The teams in this league said no to Gilbert Arenas," says an amazed Dallas Mavericks general manager Donnie Nelson--whose team didn't have a first-round pick...
...would make the World Championship roster. "They flew me all the way out there, and I thought I had a big shot. It was frustrating." Firing a dart at Team U.S.A. and Duke University coach Mike Krzyzewski, Arenas wrote on an nba.com blog, "I'll give up one NBA season to play against Duke." He swore to score 50 points against both the Phoenix Suns and the Portland Trail Blazers, whose head coaches, Mike D'Antoni and Nate McMillan, were Team U.S.A. assistants. He's halfway there, having dropped 54 on the Suns. The Blazers are on his calendar...
Then Arenas will relish his trip to Las Vegas for the NBA All-Star Game, on Feb. 18. He has finally made the starting five. It's a chance for him to win over a global audience, and--surprise, surprise--his mind is firing from long range. "I'm trying to get two blimps," he says, smiling. "They'd just fly around the city and say, AGENT ZERO HAS ARRIVED." Let's hope he's just getting started...