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Silverfuel
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Ron Artest now a man on a mission
The enigmatic NBA star took time from his mission trip to Kenya to speak with Newsday's Ken Berger about basketball, life and his future.
BY KEN BERGER
The enigmatic NBA star took time from his mission trip to Kenya to speak with Newsday's Ken Berger about basketball, life and his future.
Ron Artest has seen poverty. Growing up in the projects of Queensbridge, he lived in it. But nothing like this.
It was really the babies that got to him -- 1- and 2-year-olds, some HIV-positive, playing in dirt-filled huts adjacent to ditches filled with feces. The stench was overwhelming, not to mention the emotions.
"These people are not eating," Artest said on his cell phone from a tent on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya, where he joined several other NBA players to bring food and necessities to the hungry and impoverished. "They haven't taken showers, and the sewers are right outside their house. And it's not even sewers with running water. It's like a little ditch so they can throw their feces in.
"And little 1-year-old babies are walking around and playing right next to it, wearing clothes that look like they've been in a New York train station and run over by a '7' train 100 times. All the ghettos in New York City, the only thing that can compare to this is New Orleans when Katrina happened. And this is worse than Katrina."
The Sacramento Kings forward was joined on the trip by NBA Players Association president Billy Hunter and fellow players Theo Ratliff, Maurice Evans and Etan Thomas in conjunction with "Feed the Children" co-founders Larry and Frances Jones. The goal was to distribute 44 million meals to 1 million residents during the past week.
"It's about a 5,000-square-foot area, and it's filled with rice and peas and porridge and everything," Artest said. "If we didn't bring that rice, they didn't know where their next meal was going to come from."
It was 4 a.m. in Africa Monday when Artest, whose ancestors were brought to the United States from that continent as slaves, huddled with a flashlight and iPhone and opened up. An hourlong phone conversation revealed all the contradictions that have made Artest one of the most talented, enigmatic stars in the NBA.
His most recent mistake, a domestic dispute with his wife outside their suburban Sacramento home in March, cost him a seven-game suspension from the NBA that will commence at the start of the 2007-08 season. Artest pleaded no-contest in May to corporal injury to a spouse, a misdemeanor, and was sentenced to probation and community service.
Artest apologized for the incident, saying: "I'm not trying to be in the public [eye] for anything negative. That's not what I'm trying to do anymore, but unfortunately, things happen. People also need to understand it was a misdemeanor. And people also need to understand that me and my family are working things out and I truly, definitely love my family."
Artest's wife, Kimsha, who accused him of grabbing, pushing and slapping her, is taking nursing classes in Indiana, where Artest has several homes.
"We're still together," Artest said. "We've got problems, but we're still married."
Then there is the Artest who did heart-wrenching work in Kenya, including a visit to Kermit Washington's clinic for children with HIV and AIDS. And the Artest who opened up about basketball.
He said he's not asking to be traded, but wouldn't mind if it happened. He said he's not pushing for a trade to the Knicks, but sounded like someone who wants to come home in the worst way.
He said he wants to stand by the Kings because they've stood by him. But he reopened the door to exercising his opt-out clause after the 2007-08 season, a possibility that could help precipitate a trade.
"A team doesn't want to lose you for nothing when they could have gotten something," Artest said. "So people need to understand that, also."
Interestingly, he was not at all offended by reports that Knicks coach and president Isiah Thomas would be unwilling to include David Lee in an Artest deal. He even agreed that the Knicks shouldn't make that deal after his experience playing streetball with Lee at 115th and Lenox last summer.
"If some crazy scenario happened where I was with the Knicks, I would want David Lee there," Artest said. "I love David Lee. I played with him in the 'hood last summer, and he showed so much heart. They were trying to rough up David Lee, but David Lee got rough right back. And this was the projects, you know? And I respected that.
"I wouldn't trade myself for David Lee at all. I love his game. I love how he rebounds. To come off the bench and average close to 10 rebounds, you can't trade a guy like that. You don't trade a guy like David Lee, and Isiah made a great call. I would have done the same thing."
Artest, 27, said he doesn't think the suspension will cause the Kings to recoil from supporting him, nor does he think it will scare potential trade suitors away -- particularly Thomas, his former coach with the Pacers whom he referred to as "my family."
"Some people, they're good guys and want to be bad boys," Artest said. "I've already got that hard core in me, but I'm trying to be a good guy. And I think I deserve to try to change the views of people about me."
Evidently, he's changed a few. The last time he was in New York, he said he saw three guys wearing Knicks jerseys with the name "Artest" on the back.
"All the people in New York give me a confidence that no one else could give me," he said. "The respect that I have for New York City, it'll never go anywhere. It's like tattooed in my blood."
Among the many aspects of Artest's complicated personality is a fierce sense of loyalty, something he regrets abandoning when he demanded to be traded from Indiana about a year after he set off one of the ugliest sports brawls in American history.
Artest was suspended for 73 games, the longest ban in NBA history, for his role in the brawl between the Pacers and Pistons that spilled into the stands at the Palace of Auburn Hills in November 2004. Now, he is torn between getting a fresh start and sticking with a team that has embraced him.
"You don't run out on people that supported you like that," he said. "You don't do that. You stick with your family."
Asked whether he'd play the trade-demand card again, Artest said, "That's something I won't do. I have a deep respect for Isiah and everything, but that's just something that I haven't thought about."
But Artest also wondered aloud whether a small market such as Sacramento "is not really for a guy like me sometimes ... I'm totally capable of playing in any major city -- L.A., Miami, Houston, New York City -- and at the same time, I'm happy to be a Sacramento King."
After saying in a recently published report that he wants to retire as a King and probably won't exercise his opt-out next summer, Artest offered a different take from his tent in Nairobi.
"It depends on what happens or what offers are made," he said. "I'm not saying I'm not going to look at the offers. But I'm not really chasing the money like that."
It was classic Artest when moments later, he said he's underpaid at $7.8 million next season with a player's option for $8.45 million in 2008-09.
"I'm on the same level as any of the top players in the league just because I'm a lockdown defender and there's no one that could stop me," Artest said. "I can score when I want ... I know the Knicks got some money. I know Mr. Dolan's got some money over there, but we'll see what happens."
For the record, Artest made it clear what he thinks about the Knicks team he would join if a deal ever got done.
"That's definitely like a championship roster," Artest said. "Zach Randolph is so good. When the Knicks got him, I was like, 'Man, major problems in the East.' Zach Randolph is a monster. He's a straight beast."
As for the potential mayhem that could ensue from pairing two players with long disciplinary resumes, Artest said: "People want to play with Zach Randolph. He might not have the Tiger Woods image, but people want to play with him. And you have Eddy Curry, a legit center, and now you're talking championship."
But that is all speculation for now, and the reality of what Artest saw in Kenya will stay with him for a long time. He's been shooting video and plans to put it on the Web when he gets home.
"We just were like, 'Yo, we gotta pick up these babies,' you know?" Artest said. "We gotta touch these kids. And we went over there and we made sure we made contact with them. It felt like being at home, just from being from slavery and everything ... I really felt happy to be around them, just knowing their history. I feel so much a part of them."
[Edited by - Silverfuel on 07-17-2007 05:34 AM]
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
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7/17/2007 12:59 PM