It’s just not Ron Artest’s week.
First, he was linked to Dancing With the Stars -- a pretty insidious affiliation, if you ask me. Then, his admirable gesture of changing his name to Metta World Peace was temporarily denied on the basis of outstanding traffic violations. A bummer, but one that will hopefully be resolved post-haste.
And on the professional front, Artest’s arrangement with the Cheshire Jets of the British Basketball League has hit a rather substantial snag. Mark Medina of the L.A. Times explains (via Yahoo’s Scoop du Jour):Though Artest declared his intention to The Times two weeks ago that he’s “definitely going to play” for the British Basketball League’s Cheshire Jets, his agent, David Bauman, said the team hasn’t offered Artest insurance. That issue, Bauman said, poses a “major problem” and would prevent the Lakers forward from joining the team. “It’s still on the table,” Bauman said Tuesday in a phone interview. “But again, this insurance thing is a significant and a serious obstacle for any of the NBA players.”
Artest has a three-year, $21.8 million deal remaining with the Lakers. Without insurance, Artest could risk his contract becoming void should he suffer an injury with another team during the NBA lockout. That issue, said Bauman, also partly explains why Artest postponed his trip to the U.K. to speak with Jets officials, hold a news conference, mingle with fans and, in his words, “make sure it’s a good fit.”...Meanwhile, Jets director Pete Hawkins told the Cheshire Chronicle last week that the deal isn’t dead, saying: “The next few days we need to work really hard. Insurance was always an issue from the outset,but we are still trying hard to ensure Ron has the protection he needs to play.”So rest easy, Artest diehards across the pond: there may be a positive resolution to this insurance issue yet. For now, though, Ron Artest is still Ron Artest, he’s got some tickets to pay, a rumor to quell, and a substantial setback that could keep him from playing pro ball in the U.K. Here’s to better weeks, Ron.
