If you had to make the decison right now it would have to be no. Dude is going to command probably $70 million plus and as of this moment he still has not gone a full year without getting into trouble.

If by the end of the year Ron has (1) stayed out of trouble and (2) continued to play as he is right now you have to at least consider it.

But here's the rub. If he does stay clean and plays out of his mind his trade value is going to be very high. Given that we're a team that is deep at the swing position could you sign and trade him (I'm figuring that he is going to opt out) to a team that could solve our low post and/or up front athleticism issues? Get some young talent and draft picks?

Me thinkst perhaps this is why Mr. Petrie did not give Ron-Ron away over the summer?

Signing Artest to a long term deal would be insanely stupid.  He's liable to go nuts at any time, and you're on the hook for five years guaranteed money.  

Yeah, it all depends on how the year plays out, as well as Artest's behavior. If they (everyone else besides Artest) play hard nightly for the whole season, I think Artest might be one of those players that would come back for cheaper money than he could get elsewhere. He just seems like that type of dude to me. I say keep him. Dude is gonna be a mismatch every game. Sometimes on O, sometimes on D and sometimes both. Not too many players that bring it at both ends. Lebron, Kobe, Dwight Howard, KG and Artest. Not too many more besides that.

There are several possibilities and scenarios at work here. First is that you trade him for less than he's worth. Or you keep him and run the risk of his personal issues rearing it's ugly head again. The problem for the Kings as I see it is essentially this: You have a center who creates shots when he's playing well (key word: when)in Miller, 2 swingmen who do a good job creating shots for themselves and no one else (Garcia & Salmons), a great off the ball slasher who essentially is boosting an already good advantage at the FT line (Martin), a young shooter in Douby that is still an unknown quantity, a young Center in Shawes who is essentially in the same boat (but with better standing at this moment in time), and Kenny Thomas, Shareef Abdur Rahim and Justin Williams. This isn't a team that isn't anything but en flux. (I purposely left off Mikki Moore Ron Artest and Mike Bibby).

I wonder if Mikki would be a better fit for Charlotte (especially as Dec 15 creeps closer and Sam Vincent mouths off again about needing another big) than even Anderson Varejao as Mikki does have offensive skills that Varejao doesn't. Oh well, I've beat this drum before.

For me, it comes down to the question of your priorities for the future.

If your goal is try and make the playoffs as soon as possible, then try and keep Artest, hell keep Bibby too then keep 'em all. Sign more mid-level guys. Maybe make the post season as a 7 or 8 seed next year. My problem with this approach is we end up drafting in the mid teens for the next 3-4 years.

The other approach is identify who on your team is/hopefully will be a key piece in 3-4 years when you plan to make a serious title run, then dump everyone else for young talent(key pieces or trade value), draft picks and/or cap space.

I'd much rather be very bad for a couple of years and make a serious run than linger on in mediocrity.

I think the main question is, if Martin is a part of the Kings future(which we all agree yes), is Artest a good fit together him to be the centerpieces of this team? What type of team would you try to build around Martin and Artest? Are those two alone enough to be your franchise players are do you have to find a way to bring in another second-tier star?