After last year’s little bang-bang incident, Gilbert Arenas couldn’t get an endorsement contract from Smith and Wesson, much less a shoe company. So, at the start of the 2010-2011 NBA season, Gil found himself in the extreme minority of professional basketball players: he had no shoe deal.  Even the scrubbiest of scrubs get deals that at least nets them free shoes, if not gear, thousands of dollars, and much more.  Gil used to have this with Adidas.  In fact, the legendary shoe company actually created a line dedicated to Agent Zero himself.  After Gilbert decided to take his guns to town, it all went bye-bye.

Despite all of this, Gil was not to be perturbed.  A well-known sneaker-fiend from his days back at the University of Arizona, Arenas decided to forgo seeking a shoe contract for this season and instead dipped into his own personal collection of incredible kicks.  Each night, sneakerheads were mesmerized by rare Air Jordans and retro Nikes.  The coup de grâce: a pair of hi-top Dolce & Gabbana sneakers that retail for around $400 (but now on sale for $277!).  Suddenly, the much-maligned Gil was developing an underground following that dare I say it — started to admire him.

Well, so much for that:

What happens when you REFUSE to pay your pregnant babys moms her CHILD SUPPORT CHECK for nearly 3 months . . . if she’s a hood chick like Laura Govan . .. you get JACKED!!!

NBA superstar Gllbert Arenas found that out the HARD WAY!!! According to a VERY WELL PLACED insder, Laura was SICK and TIRED of Gilbert dodging her and not giving her any money, so she sprung into action.

Many of Gilbert’s possessions, including his sneaker collection, wardrobe, and his shark tank are now in Laura’s posession. According to our snitch, she’s “Going to sell his stuff, so that she can have diapers and formula for their [fourth child].”

While Gil hasn’t confirmed this report, feel free to hop on over to the DC Craigslist and try to confirm it.  I hear he wears a size 14.5.

h/t Nice Kicks

The man sitting next to Michael Jordan in the picture above is legendary sneaker designer Tinker Hatfield.  Take one look at Hatfield’s portfolio and you will quickly surmise he is responsible for some of the most iconic sneaker designs of all time.  Naturally, when Nike signed Jordan’s heir apparel apparent LeBron James, they assigned Hatfield to King James in order to develop the next line of legendary basketball shoes.  Just like Mike, right?  Well, not exactly.

Apparently, Hatfield jumped off the LeBron account because of the entourage Bron-Bron surrounded himself with (skip to 1:30):

Money quote [sic'd]:

Tinker stated that he used to work on the signature lines of Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James; however, in regards to LeBron, he said, “I used to work on LeBron’s [shoe line], until his entourage kind of pissed me off.” He later stated that LeBron was ‘cool’ but his entourage is obviously Hatfield’s problem.

Now, let’s keep in mind that LeBron’s line of shoes and apparel do pretty well without Hatfield on board: the eighth edition of his shoe released last week with a $160 price tag and there is no doubt they’ll sell well.  However, none of the previous seven versions of his shoe have reached iconic status like Jordan’s — leading one to wonder if things might be different with someone like Hatfield on board.

Regardless of what LeBron’s biggest detractors have said about him, there isn’t much disagreement about the effort he puts in to becoming the best player he can be on the court.  However, Hatfield’s comments, taken within the context of “The Decision,” tend to make me think he could stand to put at least half as much effort in selecting the people he has represent him off the court.

(h/t to Nice Kicks)