The past year-plus has been the "most high-profile stretch" for Monumental Sports & Entertainment since Chair & CEO Ted Leonsis "founded the company via merger" in '10, with a reorganized Monumental Basketball and plans for a sportsbook moving ahead at Capital One Arena, according to Adam Zielonka of the WASHINGTON TIMES. Leonsis said, "It was just wonderful to see this plan come together." The Wizards Owner believes that it is the NBA team's "turn to follow what their sister and brother teams accomplished," as both the WNBA Mystics and Capitals recently won their first championships. Leonsis: "We can believe in the formula because we've seen it work. ... Now we have to focus on how we can do the same kind of development to win a championship at the Washington Wizards." Leonsis and Wizards GM Tommy Sheppard last week met separately with G Bradley Beal's agent, Priority Sports & Entertainment's Mark Bartelstein, and Leonsis "seems to have sold Bartelstein and Beal on the vision he has for the Wizards' rebuild." Beal's two-year, $72M extension is a "major sign of commitment." Leonsis, a "believer in synergy and 'cross-learning,'" hopes that Monumental Basketball "creates a closer partnership" between the Wizards and G League Capital City Go-Go. Only "time will tell if the Wizards can copy what the Mystics achieved," though "nobody expects it to happen this year." But if the Monumental Basketball model "someday does lead the Wizards all the way back to the playoffs and into the NBA Finals," Leonsis will "hold it up as one more thing Washingtonians can revel in together" (WASHINGTON TIMES, 10/22).
