Ron Artest describes Jesus Christ's basketball skills

Like few other problem children before him, Ron Artest has come to terms with his imperfections to a startling degree. He realizes who he is and isn't shy about it, either to the press or in life in general.

Tuesday night, following Kobe Bryant's ejection from the Lakers' surprising 98-79 home loss to the Bucks, Artest decided to teach everyone a little bit about the nature of perfection, and the one man who never got ejected from a basketball game. From Chris Tomasson at FanHouse:

"It happened in the past, it happened in the present, it happened in the future,'' Artest said. "Not just for him. All players (get ejected). That happens a lot of times. You see guys get ejected. Rip Hamilton got ejected (recently) in Detroit. Bob Cousy got ejected ... The only person who never got ejected was Jesus.''

Artest was asked if he had checked Jesus' box scores.

"No ejections,'' Artest said. "He was 10 for 10s, a lot of 20 for 20s (in shooting). Perfect from the free-throw line. Infinity rebounding stats.''

There you have it: Only Jesus Christ can be perfect on the basketball court, although I'm not quite sure how it is possible to get infinite rebounds in a 48-minute game. I guess that's why Jesus is the alpha and omega and I'm just a stupid blogger.

However, we may not be able to take Artest's quoted figures at face value. In The Onion's 1996 piece "Christ Returns to NBA," Jesus averaged a mere 18.2 points and 7.3 assists over the first 10 seasons of his career, far worse than what Ron-Ron suggests. How do we register a final judgment on this argument? Perhaps that decision can only come later.

For now, heed Artest's advice when it comes to criticizing players for ejections. In the words of the best basketball player ever, let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

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