Rip Hamilton says he ‘didn’t want to leave D.C.’ originally appeared on NBC Sports Washington
Richard Hamilton’s NBA résumé will always be topped by the championship he won in 2004 with the Detroit Pistons. An elite shooting guard and three-time All-Star in Motown, Hamilton was a critical component of that underdog team that defeated the Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal Lakers.
But before Hamilton climbed the basketball mountaintop, his career began as a 21-year-old kid out of UConn who was drafted seventh overall in 1999 by Washington. If he had had it his way, Hamilton says, he would’ve spent a lot more time in Wizards threads.
“I didn’t want to leave, though,” Hamilton said in an interview with Chris Miller regarding his departure from D.C. to Detroit. “I did not want to leave Washington, D.C. I didn’t. It was home. It was the place that drafted me, was the first place that believed in me. I love the fans, I love the city.”
Hamilton, better known as ‘Rip,’ spent the first three seasons of his career in D.C. where he developed from a raw rookie into a polished scorer. He put up 20.0 ppg in 2001-02, nearly tying his career high.
His time in Washington would be short-lived, though. After 212 games as a Wizard, Hamilton was traded to the Pistons alongside Bobby Simmons and Hubert Davis for Ratko Varda, Brian Cardinal, and All-Star Jerry Stackhouse. But his tenure in D.C. is remembered fondly by the future NBA champ.
“I was bought in, I just loved everything about it,” Hamilton said. “I went to my first Go-Go spot a couple times…I just loved the culture of Washington, D.C. so it wasn’t a place that I wanted to leave.”
Washington’s squad around the turn of the millennium featured an aging core of Juwan Howard, Mitch Richmond and Rod Strickland. However, there was a bevy of young talent to build around and potentially construct a contender, Hamilton says. If they had more time to mesh and evolve into their primes as Wizards, they really could’ve made noise in the east.
“I just felt like if we had more time to grow, good things could’ve happened for us,” Hamilton said. “But I wouldn’t change anything now, just knowing how the future happened for me. But I didn’t want to leave D.C.”
