Gilbert Arenas isn't going anywhere, Wiz fans

The recent flurry of action by the Washington Wizards as the trade deadline approaches has been something to behold: In the last few weeks they unloaded all star forward Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood, and DeShawn Stevenson to the Mavericks for what amounts to cap space, and then traded Antawn Jamison to the Cavaliers for what amounts to more cap space. What they’re doing is pretty obvious at this point: They are attempting to clear enough room under the cap to make a run at one of the marquee free agents hitting the market in the offseason later this year:

But the offseason of 2010 is not just the Summer of LeBron. It’s also the Summer of Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Amare Stoudemire, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Tyson Chandler, Manu Ginobili, Richard Jefferson, Joe Johnson, Tracy McGrady, Yao Ming, Dirk Nowitzki and Michael Redd, each of whom can become an unrestricted free agent in 2010.

What this really means, however, is that the Wizard’s lawyers have looked at the mess Gilbert Arenas has gotten himself into and decided that even with jail time on the horizon they can’t void his horrendous, horrendous contract. Because if they could void his horrendous, horrendous contract, they could clear up enough cap space in one clean move while maintaining a nucleus of Butler-Jamison-Haywood that might appeal to a Bosh or a Nowitzki. LeBron and Wade were probably never in play for the woeful Wizards, but grabbing one of the second tier guys wasn’t out of the question, especially if they had $25M a year to throw at the guy.

But who’s going to want to come to this team now? The only guy with any talent who remains on the squad is a shoot-first point guard who bogs down the offense by jacking up too many shots, a guy who has injury problems and, oh yeah, is probably going to be in prison for the start of training camp (and maybe even the start of the season). Why would any right-thinking player join this squad? Get ready for five years of sub-.500 basketball, Wizards fans. It’s going to be a fun half-decade.