Gilbert Arenas Talks About His Gun Incident, 'What He's Learned'

When I heard Gilbert Arenas was the subject for Esquire’s latest “What I’ve Learned” series, I couldn’t help but yawn. Boilerplate concessions to “mistakes” and “immaturity,” I assumed. Just another opportunity for good PR.

But for the first time in a while, this sounds like the Gilbert Arenas that the world fell in love with a few years back. And it doesn’t hurt, as far as sympathy’s concerned, that he finally tells his side of the gun story:

I throw my cards down in the middle of the hand, tell them all, “I’m done. I’m getting on up.” Javaris is saying, “No, this is some street shit. Where I’m from, you gotta finish the game. My money’s on the line.” He and another guy say it’s a misdeal and they want me to match the pot. “You gotta pay that debt,” Javaris says, “or we gotta take it outside.” Take it outside? He said, We gotta fistfight.

I start joking. I put on some music. Michael Jackson. “You wanna be startin’ something …” Everyone’s laughin’. He’s like, “Nah, nah, homey. This is real. You ain’t gonna joke with this. You owe me my money.” So I start to play “Beat It.”

It continues from there in great detail—it should be noted that when Crittendon said “let’s take this outside,” they were on an airplane—until we see Gilbert and Crittendon alone in a hot tub, the confrontation behind them. Fascinating stuff.

But more important, this is the Gilbert Arenas we always knew. Funny, unpredictable, and most of all, genuine to a fault. Over the past few months, that hasn’t always been true. Had he told this story from the start, would the NBA have looked upon him in a softer light? Maybe?

In any case, it’s good to have Gilbert back. With that, here’s Gilbert’s thoughts on Tiger Woods:

At the end of the day, that’s not the reason I love Tiger. I got three Tiger Woods games for my Xbox just in case one gets scratched. On the cover, it doesn’t have him walking next to his wife. It just has Tiger Woods, hitting shots.