Sports

Who is #42 on this random Bullets jersey?

By May 14, 2012June 18th, 2018No Comments

Washington Bullets #42 jersey

Our friends over at Total Sports Blog captured this picture of a random Washington Bullets fan rocking a throwback #42 jersey and set it our way. There are few Wizards/Bullets fans out there so I’m not surprised that this person is old, hobbled, and afraid to show her face. I wouldn’t want to be recognized as a Washington fan either.

The real meat to this story is whose jersey is she rocking? Because of her jacket all that we know is that it’s a #42 Washington Bullets. My first thought was that it was Wes Unseld but then I remembered that he was #41. I did some digging and here’s the potential options:

1. Mark Acres (1993) – I don’t know a thing about Mark but I’m going out on a limb and saying that he’s a white dude. *Update* Just checked and he most certainly is (though I couldn’t find him in a Bullets jersey).  He only averaged 4.8 ppg in the 7 games that he started for the Bullets so I’m guessing that it’s not him.

2. Greg Ballard (1978-85) – He was on the 1978 Washington Bullets team that won a Championship and he was pretty decent (even though it wasn’t until a year later where his playing time increased and he became productive) . He averaged 13+ ppg for six straight seasons and even had consecutive 18+ ppg seasons. That sounds like a good number three player to me. I don’t see this lady rocking his jersey.

3. Greg Foster (1991-93) – He was drafted by the Bullets in the 2nd round in 1990 and played like he was drafted in the second round. He only started 6 games for them and averaged less than 5 ppg. This guy looks like Mark Acres but is more white. I also thought that this was Jeff Foster but then realized that he is a different player. No way it’s this guy.

4. Tito Horford (1994) – He only appeared in three games for the Bullets totaling 28 minutes of PT and he went 0 for 2 from the floor. Interesting fact about our boy Tito, he was the first Dominican born player to play in the NBA. He may have been a pioneer but I get a hunch that this women isn’t that much of a historian.

5. Cedric Lewis (1996) – It’s no wonder the Washington Wizards/Bullets were so putrid in the 90’s. It seems like every player we feature that rocked this jersey could score about as well as Dwight Howard shoots free throws. Lewis, like Tito, only played in three games for the Bullets. If you can believe it he actually got less of an opportunity than Tito did. Lewis only received 4 total minutes of PT but did go 2 for 3 for four points. Talk about instant offense off the bench. If you took those numbers out to a 36 minutes per game average he’d be a 36 ppg scorer! Unfortunately this jersey is not Lewis.

6. Jay Murphy (1987-88) – His name sounds like he should be a comedian but he was actually just a mediocre player that started zero games for the Bullets in 30 total games. He averaged 3.4 and 2.2 ppg over those two years and only played 187 total minutes for the Bullets. His son now plays for the University of Florida and is a big boy. Definitely not this guy.

7. Jeff Webster (1996) – This is our second player from the 1996 Bullets team. He only played in 11 games, 58 minutes, and averaged 1.6 ppg. The most interesting thing about him is that he was involved in a trade where he and some other guy I’d never heard of were traded from the Miami Heat to the Washington Bullets for Rex Champan and some other random scrub. This was most definitely not a good trade for the Bullets. The jersey isn’t this guy either.

That’s the list. That’s all that we are working with for guys on the Washington Bullets that wore #42. Based on those seven choices I’d have to say that it is most likely that Greg Ballard is the player….but I don’t believe that’s the answer. I think that this is a throwback jersey of a Washington Wizards player that has the Bullets logo to make it look more bad ass. We’ll open this up a bit and now include ex-Wizards players too.

8. Etdrick Bohannon (1999) – 2 games played. 2 total minutes. 0 ppg. 2 turnovers. His name looks like it was chosen by randomly pulling letters out of a scrabble bag. This isn’t him.

9. Mike Hall (2007) – I had no clue that the guy who won season 1 of ESPN’s Dream Job also played for the Wizards. This guy, like many who have rocked #42 before him, only played 2 games and 13 minutes while scoring 2 points. This was his only NBA action of his career. This isn’t him either.

10. Nene Hilario (2012) – DING DING! We finally have a legitimate player. The thing going against Nene being the guy on this jersey is that he just got traded to the Wizards midway through this year and he only played in 11 games. That’s not a lot of time for fans to warm up to a player and buy his authentic throwback jersey. If this woman was going to be rocking his jersey she must have been a Javale McGee fan and instantly thrown away his jersey and bought Nene’s. That means that she’s a die hard Wizards fan and I’m not sure that exists.

11. Jerry Stackhouse (2003-04) – I believe we have a winner! Stackhouse averaged 21.5 ppg his first season with the Wizards. That season he was the leading scorer on the team ahead of some guy named Michael Jordan (MJ averaged 20.0 ppg). That team was littered with a ton of garbage: Larry Hughes, Christian Laettner, Kwame Brown, Bryon Russell, and our boy Brian Cardinal. Naturally Stackhouse injured his knee the following season and missed most of the season. After that he was off to the Dallas Mavericks. That, my friends, is what happens to crappy teams. You get a guy who averages 20 ppg and then he blows out a knee and is off your team one year later.

So there’s the answer to our question. This woman who is likely on crutches because she watched John Wall turn the ball over so many times this year that she kicked the table in frustration and broke her foot is rocking a Jerry Stackhouse jersey.

As always, if you see a random jersey on the street snap a pic and send it to us on Instagram or Twitter @BaconSports and use #randomjersey. Click here to check out the most comprehensive guide to random jerseys ever.

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Rob Cressy

Rob Cressy

Sports loving free throw specialist and yinzer living in Chicago who is awesome most of the time, has run with the bulls in Spain, and is a graduate of Second City's Improv program.