Last Night's Winner: The Voices In Ron Artest's Head

In sports, everyone is a winner—some people just win better than others. Like Ron Artest, who is either a crazy person or an ongoing piece of performance art or both.

At this point, after last night's postgame interviews, it's pretty plain that the only difference between Ron-Ron and the sort of people who pull scrolls from their vaginas is that Carolee Schneemann probably had a better jump shot. Other than that? Well, consider the press conference above, in which the following exchange occurs (transcript via Andrew Sharp's wonderful story on SB Nation):

Reporter: 20 points, five rebounds, five steals. It seems like you had your hand in everything for the Lakers tonight. Is that why you came here?

Ron Artest: Oh, man. First I want to say... Before I go real crazy on y'all, which I'm going to do here shortly. God put me in this situation and, you know, good or bad, I was going to thank him for the blessing. A Game 7, home-court advantage, we give away Game 2. Or, I give away Game 2... Game 7, you want to win. Good or bad I was going to thank God for this blessing to be here. And one thing I said earlier was, you know, when I was younger I bailed out on my Indiana team.

I was so young, so egotistical. And I bailed out. On Donnie [Walsh], Larry [Bird], Jermaine [O'Neal], [Jamaal] Tinsley, [Jeff] Foster-who never bails out, he just fights for you, for his team. Steve Jackson who already had a ring, but continued to fight for us, etc. And I sometimes feel like a coward when I see those guys, because it's like, man... I'm on the Lakers, we got a chance to win, [but] I had a chance to win with you guys. You know, and I felt almost like a coward. I never thought God would put me in this situation again, because of that. So, I'm blessed, and, um... I totally forgot the question you asked.

The craziest part? He actually said "et cetera."

We should all be grateful that a real-deal flake like Artest is the face of Los Angeles' Game 7 victory, if only because it makes a Lakers title a smidge more tolerable. While everyone else goes yammering on about Kobe and his legacy and whether or not he's the Greatest Laker Ever — someone explain to me how his morphing into a knock-off World B. Free yesterday should argue in his favor — let's appreciate the fact that a man who does the following is now an NBA champion. From Sharp's account of passing an evening with Artest in a hotel room:

Upon entering, Ron surveyed the scene for a second, and immediately jumped on the bed, grabbed the remote, and announced, "We gon' charge a porno on the rookie's room!" And just like that, Latex Soccer Moms accompanied the rest of our evening, while Ron and a few others mercilessly hit on our college girlfriends. It lasted like that for another half hour or so, just hanging out, talking jibberish back-and-forth, while these gigantic millionaires hit on our friends.

Say Queensbridge, et cetera.

Ron Artest Is An NBA Champion, And It All Makes Sense Now [SB Nation]