Gilbert Arenas is becoming one of the most polarizing players in retirement as he was on the hardwood. However, his list of detractors is growing, and now Richard Jefferson has joined the pile.
The two have a history as players on the Arizona Wildcats team that reached the 2001 national championship game. Jefferson was selected as the No. 13 overall pick, and, despite being viewed Jefferson’s equal as a first-round talent, Arenas fell to No. 31.
To Arenas, the draft selection was perplexing, and it was beyond Arenas’ comprehension how Jefferson went ahead of him on draft night.
Richard Jefferson absolutely eviscerated Gilbert Arenas in 2 minutes flat. pic.twitter.com/MwhcA6dEy9
— Barstool Sports (@barstoolsports) February 23, 2022
Gilbert’s Opinion
“I don’t see what everybody sees but then when you get drafted, all right Joe Johnson, 11,” Arenas said on a TikTok podcast. “What?! Richard Jefferson, 13; What?! He was the fourth option on my team. I said they must have already called me, bruh.
“It was already, like, ’cause I called it like that. You know 10, 11, so they must have already called me. Like, ‘Yo, Pop, where they pick me at?’ He said, ‘You didn’t even get picked yet.’ I said, ‘You know they already picked Richard Jefferson.’ He’s like, ‘Yeah, they already picked him.’ I was like, ‘How did they pick Richard Jefferson, I’m the No. 1 scorer on our team, and I’m the best player on our team.’
“He [Jefferson] is option three, four. It just don’t make no sense, and just its going boom, boom, boom, boom, and I’m just sitting here like, ‘Who is Kendrick Perkins? Who is Radmonivich? Who’s Tony Parker? Who are these people?’ I’m like, you know I played college back two years, like, I know Joesph Forte; I know these guys. So I went straight into anger and just started working out like, ‘Nah.'”
Jefferson Claps Back
Jefferson heard the chatter and made it clear that Arenas went from a first-round to a second-round draft pick due to his behavior.
“Gilbert was an immature a**hole. That’s just who he was,” Jefferson said in a social media clip. “We all were little d***heads. Like, I get it, but what Gilbert did was a little bit more special.”
Jefferson then reveals Arenas’ alleged questionable behavior as an NBA prospect, like showing up for a cardiac stress test in Converse’s classic Chuck Taylor sneakers then refusing to finish because it was “messing up” his shoes.
Richard Jefferson Sounds Off
According to Jefferson, the test group administrator reported the player’s actions to every team in the league.
Additionally, Jefferson said that Arenas answered a question that surprised the moderator at a pre-draft symposium.
“The microphone gets to Gilbert after talking to a couple of different players, and they’re like, ‘Hey, what do you want to do?’ He’s like, ‘I want to be a pimp,'” Jefferson said.
“Now, all of us giggle and laugh because we’re 19 years old. This guy doesn’t know who Gilbert is and how crazy he is. So, he’s like, ‘Excuse me, sir. What did you say?’ Gilbert doubles down. He’s like, ‘I want to be an international pimp.’ This man lit into Gilbert in a way I still have not seen.
“So, all of these things are the reason why Gilbert just kept dropping, because he’s an idiot. The fact that his brain still doesn’t process why he dropped down just lets you know who Gilbert is. And I Iove my guy, but he’s a little bit special.”
Flashback
But the ESPN analyst was not done with Arenas.
Jefferson reminded the world of the box score from the fated 2001 national championship game. Arenas scored 10 points on 4-for-17 shooting from the field in the loss to Duke.
“Gilbert, how many points did you score in the national championship game? And, for extra credit, do you want to tell everybody what you were doing the night before the national championship game?” Jefferson said.
“[It was] the biggest game of our lives, and looking back, it was the biggest game you ever played in. You want to tell anybody? No? OK, we’ll just keep talking about how I was the fourth option.”
Between Kwame Brown’s consistent excoriation of Arenas, now Jefferson is holding the former guard accountable and bringing in the receipts as the finishing blow.
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