In all honesty, westkoast, how on earth would Kobe and Artest work together on the court? Ron has a psychotic sized ego problem, while Kobe just needs to be the #1 guy, period.
Hmm we have one guy who is a hot head, has a massive ego, and rides his teammates for mistakes....and then they would have a guy who is a hot head, has a massive ego, and has rode teammates for mistakes (at least he had in Indiana, don't know abotu SacTown). They wouldn't work together. They would strangle each other before the all-star game.
Ron works best, for his way of thinking, at least, with the ball in his hands on offense. Defensively, I see little problem, and Phil likes an enforcer on his squad and nobody quite fits the bill in that regard like a nutcase such as Artest. He would get away with much of it as well, playing in LA. However, his defense from what I have observed is clean.
And the Lakers are most dangerous when Odom, Gasol, Kobe, Fisher, and Walton are moving the ball. This is the problem I have with trading Odom for Artest. Odom and Gasol make the Lakers deadly. Adding a hell of a defender would make them stronger defensively but I wouldn't' say it would make them 'dangerous'
The thing with the enforcer role that PJ gives to certain players is he expects them to be a defensive enforcer first, a defensive enforcer second, and if they get an open jump shot they take it. If you notice both Rick Fox and Sasha are told to focus in on defense and every once in a while will get a bone throne to them behind the 3 point line. Ron Ron is not a good jumper shooter and while his back to the basket offense is solid because of his strength the coaching staff is going to have enough problems figuring out how that space will be shared with Gasol and Bynum.
But Ron has what you might politely call A.D.D. <in MY day, we used to just say so and so was stupid - those were the days> Ron loses focus at times. Small games do not interest him. Put him in a showboat game and he will be all over the court. He still has games he misses for "personal" reasons. He only played 56 games combined the year he was traded from Indiana; 70 games the next year, and only 57 this past year. Need I add the season prior to that he played all of 7 games? What he gets paid under his current contract would be fair market value, except it would still be too much for the number of games he has missed.
This is another spot that Kobe and Ron will butt heads. Kobe takes every game seriously. He will play pick up with a 7 year old and try to beat him to a pulp 120983109283 to 2. Then challenge the poor kid again and again and again until he doesn't score any points. Then finally when the street lights come on and he has to go home Kobe will call him a different variation of wussy for not playing against him all night.
Don't get me wrong, I think the Lakers could use Ron Artest's defense. I'd love to see him on the squad on that end of the floor and I think he could help Trevor Ariza much like he helped some of the Kings players. I just don't think the lakers need his ego, attitude, and offense. I also don't think what you lose by moving Odom can be made up for by getting Artest. Sadly you can't zap powers from players and put them into others ala classic kids movie Space Jam.
