There’s something to be said in this day and age for an athlete playing their entire career with one team, and when you look at the list of this generation of players in any sport, it’s very small.
We’ve had a pretty good one semi-locally in Cal Ripken, and now again with Alex Ovechkin…and Ted Leonsis is not lost on the fact that all 895 of Ovi’s goals have come in a Caps uniform, and what that his done for the organization as a whole.
Alex is in fact, to Leonsis, the most important athlete in DC sports history.
“Alex is in a class by himself right now. When you break an all-time record in the league…we’ve had MVPs pass through here, Wes Unseld is an all-time great, but for Alex to do what he's done? I mean, it can be debated, I'm certainly open for the debate, but I have to say, he's the most important athlete in a professional sport in Washington DC,” Leonsis said. “Certainly, when we drafted him 20 years ago, I don't think that would have come into the conversation, so he's earned it. His longevity, his body of work, his accomplishments, and what he's done for the community as a person - his charitable work, his outgoing personality and nature. He loves the fans, he loves the community, he loves the kids, right? He gives back, because it’s organic and authentic to him. And every accolade, every statue, everything that he gets, he deserves, he's earned. I'm gonna be forever grateful to him.”
And as the most important athlete in DC history, speaking of statutes, Monumental plans to have a statue garden at Cap One once all the renovations are done, and No. 8 will be there.
“We're gonna have a statue garden. We’re going from 900,000 square feet to 1.6 million square feet, and we will have a gallery, a museum, a restaurant and sports bar and a lot of memorabilia, important artifacts in our past, and we’ve been curating to be able to celebrate the great players that have passed through,” Leonsis said. “Elena Delle Donne retired last week, she’s a two-time MVP and won a championship, she should have a statue, and (Ovi) will have a statue.”
Take a listen to Leonsis’ entire visit with Grant & Danny above!