So, let me get this straight. Let’s see if I can understand. Just a few weeks ago, the Lakers won the NBA Championship. And while Kobe won the MVP and Kobe got all the attention,that title would not have been possible without the strong defense and shooting of the 24-year-old Trevor Ariza who is only going to get better. Yet the Lakers walked away from the kid to bring in an aging nutjob whose greatest hits landed on fans in Detroit. The locker room that just won with teamwork has now opened the door to a hog. Artest just wants the ball, he just wants attention and he has a whole lot of anger. Nice to welcome that to the team.
Artest’s talent is just not worth it. He does not fit. Even if the younger Ariza is not as good a player as Artest, Ariza was a better team player. He fit in with the team. When was the last time you thought of Artest as a team player? I’m still waiting for you to come up with an answer to that one.
Yeah, Artest is a better defender than Ariza but Ariza quietly hounds a guy during a routine inbounds pass and is willing to make a small play to win a game. Artest is a good shooter but Ariza is willing to stand in the shadows for three quarters and step out to make a big three-pointer before disappearing again and letting Kobe and Fisher have the glory. Those happy with this trade will say that Artest will make the Lakers tougher. Will he? What’s so soft about showing up every day and playing hard every play and fighting your way to a championship? That was Ariza. Is Artest tougher than that?
Maybe the Lakers forgot these little annoying details.
1. Ariza is 24. Artest is 29 – an old 29.
2. Ariza shot 48% from the three-point line in the playoffs. Artest shot 28%.
3. Artest is signing a three-year deal for $18 million. That’s about the same as what the Houston Rockets are giving Ariza. However, Ariza got two more years from the Rockets. Jeez, Dr. Buss, it would just be crazy for you to give a rising young star two more years. Why that would mean you would have to spend some of that $1 million -per-playoff-game bounty to do it!
The Lakers seem to have forgotten what happened the last time they acquired an aging superstar in a postseason move. I haven’t. It was 2004 and the Lakers signed Gary Payton and Karl Malone. What happened next? Anybody? Anybody? By the end of that season, the team chemistry blew up in a Finals loss to the Detroit Pistons. It was so bad that afterward, it seemed that half the team either quit or was traded.
Everyone says that Artest was a changed man when he was traded from the Indiana Pacers to the Sacramento Kings. Then why, as a King, was he suspended for a playoff game in 2006 for a flagrant elbow and the Kings lost that series to the San Antonio Spurs?
Did he change again when with the Houston Rockets, during this year’s playoff series against the Lakers, he was thrown out of two games while finishing the series hitting 17 of 61 in the last four games?
The Lakers won the Championship. I guess the only thing left was to blow up the team. Boom goes the dynamite.
Tags: Lakers Artest
