Each NBA team’s best trade in franchise history
Washington Wizards
Antawn Jamison for Devin Harris, Christian Laettner and Jerry Stackhouse (to DAL) (2004)
Once Michael Jordan retired for good in 2003, the Washington Wizards needed to clean house and start fresh. Signing former Warriors point guard Gilbert Arenas and giving him the keys to the castle was a good first step, but it wasn’t until they traded for Arenas’ former Golden State teammate Antawn Jamison in 2004 that the team righted the ship and made the playoffs for the first time since they were known as the Bullets.
Bringing Jamison on came at the “hefty” price of an unproven Devin Harris, the NBA’s top heel Christian Laettner, and Jerry Stackhouse, who was only with the Wizards because he attended the same university as Jordan, and Jamison’s 19.6 points per game in his first season in D.C. made it easy to forget about those guys.
Once Caron Butler was brought in to for a nice little “Big 3” with Arenas and Jamison, the Wizards became a constant presence in the Eastern Conference playoffs, though their seasons often ended at LeBron James’ hands in the first round.
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Frankly, any team that had Jamison on their roster had a lowered ceiling, but considering how awful this franchise has been for most of its existence, the Arenas/Butler/Jamison era provided a level of consistency that the team hadn’t experienced since the Wes Unseld days and wouldn’t experience until the drafted John Wall in 2010. Yes, most of that success was thanks to Arenas’ brilliance but Jamison’s value as a stand-still shooter and post scorer made “Agent Zero’s” life a little easier on the offensive end.