Ron Artest Brings Biggest "If" to Rockets Team Already Full of Them

When you've got a volatile mix of something or other, it's not advisable to throw an even more unstable ingredient into the mess.

The Houston Rockets chose to ignore this particular principle when they acquired Ron Artest from Sacramento, hoping for an optimistic future while ignoring his red-flagged past.

Artest has said all the right things thus far, going on about how he'll play third fiddle to the one-two punch of Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady.  Granted, that's easy to do in the offseason, but it's the thought that counts, right?

Sacramento fans are surely laughing, because that's the same thing Artest said when he arrived there from Indiana.  Did Artest get into any brawls while wearing a Kings jersey? No. But there was never too long a break between Artest's distractions that wound up in the news.

The Kings swallowed it while they could, until they finally found a sucker, er, a taker to take him off their hands.

The Rockets won't put up with Artest's distractions.  They can't afford to.  Their star players are in their prime, so their time is now.  That time can't be wasted restoring team unity that's destroyed by a cancerous, albeit talented, newcomer.

That message was delivered by none other than Yao Ming, who, upon learning of Houston's acquiring of Artest, expressed concern about his effect on the team's chemistry.  Artest did all he could (publicly and privately) to soothe those concerns.

All of this just emphasizes the fact that Artest is the biggest "if" acquisition since the Bulls signed Dennis Rodman in the '90s:  a) Houston doesn't have Phil Jackson on the bench and b) it's not like the Rockets didn't already have enough of their own.

Tracy McGrady is a walking conglomeration of physical "ifs" ranging from his back to his ankles to his migraine headaches.  The Rockets' brass must get migraine treatment for the stress they get over McGrady's health.

Yao Ming must be a distant cousin of the Cavs' Zydrunas Ilgauskus.  Both are talented, huge, foreign big men with feet made of glass.  It doesn't help that those glass foundations hold up frames of over seven feet and 300 pounds.

In other words, the Rockets already had enough to gamble on going into the season before picking up Artest.  If history is any indication, the Rockets may blow up before they even get a chance to take off.