Ability to shoot threes could be Josh Harrellson's ticket to NBA comeback

The Legend of Jorts originates at Kentucky's 2008 Blue-White spring football game.

Josh Harrellson, a 6-foot-10 junior college center being recruited to join the basketball team, didn't think much of wearing jean shorts to the game at Commonwealth Stadium. Growing up in the St. Louis suburbs, they were accepted attire, as common as a Cardinals fitted cap or a pair of Air Force Ones.

"It's just something you slide on over your gym shorts and you go," Harrellson explained. "Everybody wears them."

But Harrellson learned denim shorts were a fashion no-no in most places when a reporter posted the photo online and the image went viral among the faithful at the basketball-crazed university. By his senior year, Harrellson was known as Jorts across the Bluegrass State. The nickname made "SportsCenter," and Harrellson embraced it. He had to.

"It just blew up," he said.

Seven years later, the face of cropped denim is attempting to resurrect his NBA career with the Washington Wizards, fighting for a roster spot that does not currently exist. It is a reunion for Harrellson, who played one season with John Wall at Kentucky, and he has become a fan favorite of sorts through three preseason games, generating amplified cheers from the Verizon Center crowd and social media excitement with each of his three-pointers.

Harrellson, 26, is 4-for-7 (57.1 percent) from three-point range in a Wizards uniform. It is a minuscule sample size, but Harrellson has exhibited efficiency in the past: he's a 34.7 percent three-point shooter in 74 career NBA games since being selected in the second round of the 2011 draft. He believes he can improve to between 40 and 50 percent over the course of a season. Being nearly 7 feet tall with shooting touch should bolster his job prospects as NBA teams seek big bodies who can step behind the three-point line.

"He's strong, he can guard in the post," Wall said. "But the thing is he always does the little things, not trying to block shots but take charges, help. He just knows the little principles that you need for a guy that's not super athletic. And he gives you extra effort on the other end because he can shoot the ball so well."

Harrellson's shooting ability is why Washington elected to sign him to a non-guaranteed deal for the preseason; the Wizards wanted a big man who could stretch the floor in order to both work on their revamped offense and to defend those types of players in practice.

"He understands who he is and how he can be effective on the floor," Wizards Coach Randy Wittman said. "He's kind of stayed away from things he can't do. That's an important thing with guys like himself, stay with your strengths and stay away from things that would get you in trouble."

Harrellson worked out for the Wizards two weeks before agreeing to join the team last month. He left Washington thinking it could be the right place for him to showcase his strengths even though the Wizards' 15-man roster was already full and the chances of a spot becoming available were slim. He views this month as an audition for the other 29 NBA franchises and, perhaps, a chance down the line in the District that could result from the expected roster turnover next summer (the Wizards have just four players currently under contract for the 2016-17 season).

"It's just a good opportunity for me to build chemistry with the guys and the guys that will be here next year," Harrellson said. "It will be a good opportunity to show the offense how I work, how I play. Just build those relationships with these guys so in the future you never know what can happen."

Harrellson isn't a typical recent Kentucky product in the NBA. He wasn't a highly touted recruit or a one-and-done talent. He began his collegiate career at Southwestern Illinois, a community college, and transferred to Kentucky after one season. As a junior, when he played with Wall, he logged just 88 minutes in 22 games because he was stuck behind DeMarcus Cousins, Patrick Patterson and Daniel Orton — all first-round picks in the following NBA draft.

But as a senior Harrellson was a key component in Kentucky's unexpected run to the Final Four as a fourth seed and he was selected in the second round of the 2011 draft. He recorded 14 points and 12 rebounds in his fourth game and was a rotation regular for the New York Knicks. But the rookie campaign was torpedoed 16 games in by a broken shooting wrist.

Since then, he's spent one offseason month on the Houston Rockets, played in six games for the Miami Heat, and was hired for a pair stints in both Puerto Rico and China. His last NBA stop was in Detroit, where he appeared in 24 games for the Pistons during the 2013-14 season. His year was cut short by a herniated disk in his back that required surgery.

The back is healed and @BigJorts55, as Harrellson is known on Twitter, is confident he can find a home in the NBA. The denim shorts, however, will stay in the closet.

"I haven't worn them probably in around six years," he said. "It's been a while."