In this edition of Jarvis Hayes’ Rookie Diary, Hayes reflects on his experiences at All-Star weekend, his rookie campaign thus far, and the recent success of the Washington Wizards

Hayes represented the Wizards in the Rookie Challenge during the All-Star weekend festivities. NBAE/Getty Images

This season has been kind of a whirlwind. I’m glad that I started out well enough in the first half to earn the recognition as one of the top nine or ten rookies in the league. Being selected to the play in the Rookie Challenge during the All-Star break was a thrill. It was a good experience. I had a lot of camaraderie with the other rookies in the game, and we had fun, partied a little bit, and even though we lost, it was a good weekend.

I did hurt myself a little during the game, but it was only a slight setback. Although, with all of the injuries that we have had this year, when I first got hurt out there, I was thinking ‘wow’ this injury bug just won’t leave us alone. Stackhouse said we have buzzard’s luck. It was tough that I couldn’t play as much as I wanted to in the rookie game because of the injury, and since the game was on Friday, I thought it might take a little bit of the luster off the rest of the weekend, but I ended up having fun anyway.

It was great to be out there representing my family and the Washington Wizards organization. I was the lone Wizards representative out there so I had to do the organization proud. And for me personally, since I didn’t get to play in the postseason in college last year, and we haven’t been on national TV this year, it was probably the first time that a lot of people got to see me play. The game was in L.A. and there was all the glitz and glamour of Hollywood, but I didn’t get caught up in meeting all the stars. I went there to have fun, and whoever I met, I met. Overall it was a great experience.

Back here in DC, we are starting to get up a head of steam. I can’t believe we have played 60 games already, but I am holding up well. I am getting my second wind, and we are on the verge of doing some big things at the end of the season. People always talk about the concept of the rookie wall, and maybe I might have hit the wall, but I’m getting over it now. I feel great and I am ready to go.

Throughout the season, my minutes may have fluctuated a little bit, but that is primarily because of the injury situation with Stack. I can handle it; whatever Coach needs me to, I’ll do, and when I’m called upon I am going to do whatever I can do to help the team win. Right now, I am getting a lot of minutes, and I am going to make sure that I make the most of them by giving it all I have.

At this point in the season, I don’t feel like a rookie anymore. I’ve been around the league for awhile now, and I’ve become familiar with it. Nothing really surprises me anymore. I know I belong, and my teammates need me to be confident in what I can do. As a team, we just have to go out there and play good, winning basketball.

We are on a good stretch now, and you start to hear people talking about the playoffs or whatever, but we are not going to get caught up in that. Obviously, that is always the goal, and you want to win every game, but you can’t look ahead. We are going to continue to take it one game at a time, and stay together as a team. We are just going to try to finish strong. On April 14th we'll see where we stand.