Frustration With Mystics' Direction Points to GM

The first major move came early in her stint as general manager when she sent an unhappy Chamique Holdsclaw to Los Angeles for DeLisha Milton-Jones and a draft pick. Holdsclaw, the team's first draft pick and first legitimate star, was battling depression and searching for her competitive drive to play basketball. Milton-Jones was a proven forward who could fill the void.

In 2006, Hargrove brought in point guard Nikki Teasley to run Coach Richie Adubato's complex offense. The Mystics finished 18-16 that year -- the best record in franchise history -- and the following season seemed like the perfect opportunity for Washington to make its move into the upper echelon of the WNBA.

Instead, the Mystics melted down. The defining trade in 2007 sent center Chasity Melvin to Chicago for Monique Currie. Management believed Currie was needed to replace the retiring Crystal Robinson at small forward and that it could get along without Melvin. The front office also wanted to gain room under the salary cap by exchanging Melvin's maximum salary for Currie's rookie contract, which still had three years remaining on it.

But Adubato thought the move was at odds with trying to build a championship team and saw the trade as a signal of the organization's lack of faith in him. He quit hours before a game.

"I'll admit I was unhappy when I wasn't offered a new contract" after the winning season, Adubato said in a phone interview. He declined to comment specifically on Hargrove. "If you have confidence in a coach you try to keep them around, but then to make a trade over my wishes that I was not happy with made me think. 'I guess I don't belong here.'

"I didn't feel like it was rebuilding time," Adubato said. "Once we got rid of Melvin that's what it was. It knocked that team down a level."

Hargrove's draft history has brought mixed results: Four of Hargrove's 12 picks are still with the Mystics, one is elsewhere in the league, and the rest are either playing overseas or have left the sport. Hargrove knew there were major holes to fill for the 2008 season.

"We went after every free agent point guard out there," she said. "We felt like we had to get a veteran point guard to lead our team."

She targeted Ticha Penicheiro and Helen Darling, and when they both decided to stay with their current teams she began fashioning a trade that would move the Mystics up in the draft to acquire prime point guard prospect Candice Wiggins.

"We had a trade done that would have brought the third pick [from Minnesota] and Wiggins here," Hargrove said. "We really thought she would be someone who would fit in well here, but DeLisha refused the trade. She was a core player, had to approve the trade and wouldn't."

When draft day arrived, Milton-Jones was still unsigned and Washington had lost four of its reserve post players in the offseason. Hargrove and the organization decided the priority was finding a player that could start immediately if necessary.

They chose Crystal Langhorne as the sixth overall pick with that intention, even though many available players, including her Maryland teammate Laura Harper, were considered better professional prospects. Hargrove eventually completed a trade that sent Milton-Jones to Los Angeles for Taj McWilliams-Franklin, but the Mystics were still without a point guard.

"I told [Sheila Johnson] at the time, 'You don't replace two all-stars, two veteran starters,' " Hargrove said. " 'You don't lose two of them in one year and get better.' "

Rollins, who took over after Adubato quit, felt he didn't have the players -- specifically a point guard -- necessary to put together a consistent, winning team.

Kenlaw, who has made her own comments about inconsistency at point guard, said that in yesterday's exit interviews several players spoke of a lack of veteran leadership as a key problem. When McWilliams-Franklin was traded to Detroit in August, it made the Mystics the second-youngest team in the league and added a new deficiency.

"We did feel a lack of that leadership," Kenlaw said yesterday. "Taj was a great leader and we definitely missed that. But it was also an opportunity for someone else to step up and I don't think we ever accomplished that."

Now the Mystics face a situation eerily similar to the one they were in a year ago. They don't have reliable leadership, a proven point guard or permanent coach, but they have five draft picks (two each in the first and second rounds and one in the third in 2009) that could help meet Johnson's demand for a plan with a "long-range view on winning."

"I don't know that our plan is complete," Hargrove said when asked about the Mystics' future. "I don't know that we put together a full, long-range plan until the season's over and we evaluate our personnel. . . . We haven't sat down and put that plan together yet but we will."