New York KnicksAlan Hahn
+ Trust
Fourteen years after a draft blunder, Metta World Peace says, "Yeah, finally baby. It happened." More:
There were times he vowed to make the Knicks pay for passing him on draft night. Times he vowed he would never play for the Knicks. And there were times, more often than others, he admitted his desire to come home.
In 1987, the Knicks made Mark Jackson's dream come true. He went from Brooklyn to St. John's to the Knicks. Back when he was Ron Artest-which is how he is known, and will forever be known, in New York-he went from Queensbridge to St. John's and was there for the Knicks in the 1999 draft, but they went with French center Frederic Weis in an epic fail of all draft epic fails.
But Artest's career came full circle on Monday when he agreed in principle to a reported two-year deal with the Knicks after the Lakers put him on amnesty waivers. Artest will still receive his salary from the Lakers and is reported to get the remainder of the Taxpayer's Mid-Level exception from the Knicks.
"It was simple for me," he said when he announced it on MSG Networks during a live broadcast of the Knicks Summer League. "No need to look at the contract. What's the number? A dollar? Just give me the paper where I gotta sign that. Give the rest to charity. Let's go."
If Artest wanted to really be charitable, perhaps he would have taken the $1.4M vet's minimum, to allow the Knicks to use the $1.6M left on the MLE for someone else (Aaron Brooks?).
Nevertheless, in Metta World Peace/Ron Artest, the Knicks get an infusion of something that this team was lacking in the series loss to the Pacers: toughness. They also get a player who, though at the end of his career, has a passion for the city he's about to play in unlike any other that has been here in years.
"I stayed at St. John's because it's tough to play in New York," he said. "And being in New York City, it's the hardest thing to do, to win in New York. The easiest thing to do is, you know, go where it's easier, maybe get an extra few bucks, and it'll be OK.
"The media's tough. I need something that is tough and I want to win where it's the hardest to win. And that's home. That's home."
At 33, no longer a headliner, his presence will certainly be an attraction. Metta just wants to "be a soldier for Melo and Amar'e" and simply "add my molecules to that chemistry they have already" among the core Knicks.
Already quote of the year.
To think of what we missed over the last 14 years.
7/16/2013 12:36 PM
