Ron Artest wins NBA citizenship award. I literally double took when this popped up on my home screen. I truly do not like basketball and I honestly do not know much about the players or teams which makes this award for him even crazier. Even with my lack of knowledge about the NBA I still know a few things about Ron Artest. He is infamously known for the NBA player who went into the stands and started a brawl with a fan who threw a drink at him. Yeah that would be frustrating for sure, but you get paid millions of dollars, the price you have to pay is to sit back and take stuff like that. Once you become a professional athlete you instantly become a role model and unfortunately every move you make is being watched. On another “Ron Artest” moment in history he is known for is smashing a television monitor at Madison Square Garden. One piece of information that was news to me is that he asked for time off so he could promote his album. Now that we have a little background information about Ron Artest now we can see where I was very shocked to read that he had won this award.
The citizenship award honors a player or coach for outstanding service and dedication to the community. Granted Ron Artest in his recent years, post-brawls and outbursts, has seemed to exemplify these qualities. The major word in the description is dedication, which to me means over time exemplified, not just in the past couple of years. Also just giving money away does not mean you are an outstanding citizen.
He has recently indulged his time, efforts, and money into the community. More than likely mostly money. Ron Artest raffled off his championship ring for $650,000 which will be given to mental-health charities along with his recent pledge to give out his entire 2011 salary of 6.79 million. He has been advocating mental health issues and has donated millions of dollars to charities that associate with these issues. Don’t get me wrong I think it’s great that the money went to these charities, because well not many things can function properly without money. My main point to all this is that I’ll be honest I do not think they picked the right person for this award.
On the other hand, this may be the way the National Basketball association wants to kind of give Artest a pat on the back and let him know that they recognize his efforts to change. I am not saying that people cannot change, because I hundred percent think that they can, and to be honest I have no idea if Ron Artest has changed or not. He may doing all of these things on his own will, and if so that is great. I still do not feel that at this point in time he was the right pick for this award, but hey what do I know? Ha
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