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A lot has changed in the NBA since 2009. The Washington Wizards were a promising young team at the time but the adjective regarding their age eventually was their undoing. On Christmas Eve of that year, Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenton engaged in an infamous standoff in D.C.’s Verizon Center with loaded guns.

In the ensuing years, Arenas never reached his potential as premier player and is now more recognizable for his Basketball Wives-esque drama in the news than his contributions to the hardwood. And Crittenton easily has one of the biggest downfalls of a professional ball player after he was sentenced to 23 years in prison this past April for his role in gangbanging-related murder in Los Angeles.

NBA vet Caron Butler was there on that dreadful Christmas Eve and he retold his version of the events Tuff Juice: My Journey from the Streets to the NBA.

Via The Washington Post:

The two of them kept arguing as we buckled up for the landing.

They were still going at it when we all got on an airport shuttle van to take us to our vehicles.

Ernie Grunfeld, the team president, leaned over to me and said in a pleading manner, “Talk to them.”

“I did,” I told him, “but they keep arguing.”

Everyone could hear Gilbert and Javaris going at it as we rode along.

“I’ll see your [expletive] at practice and you know what I do,” Gilbert said.

“What the [expletive] you mean, you know what I do?” replied Javaris.

“I play with guns.”

“Well I play with guns, too.”

Butler also wrote extensively about the scene in the locker room two days later when he tried to play peacemaker, drawing on his roots in Racine, Wisconsin, when he dealt with violence:

When I entered the locker room, I thought I had somehow been transported back to my days on the streets of Racine. Gilbert was standing in front of his two locker stalls, the ones previously used by Michael Jordan, with four guns on display. Javaris was standing in front of his own stall, his back to Gilbert.

“Hey, [expletive], come pick one,” Gilbert told Javaris while pointing to the weapons. “I’m going to shoot your [expletive] with one of these.”

“Oh no, you don’t need to shoot me with one of those,” said Javaris, turning around slowly like a gunslinger in the Old West. “I’ve got one right here.”

He pulled out his own gun, already loaded, cocked it, and pointed it at Gilbert.

Other players who had been casually arriving, laughing and joking with each other, came to a sudden halt, their eyes bugging out. It took them only a few seconds to realize this was for real, a shootaround of a whole different nature.

They all looked at each other and then they ran, the last man out locking the door behind him.

I didn’t panic because I’d been through far worse, heard gunshots more times than I could count, and seen it all before. This would have been just another day on the south side.

I talked calmly to Javaris, reminding him that his entire career, not to mention, perhaps, his life, would be over if he flicked that trigger finger.

I looked back at Gilbert. He was silent as he removed himself from the scene.

Javaris slowly lowered the gun.

Butler’s new book is available on Amazon right now.

Photo: Judy Eddy/WENN.com