June 30, 2011 – Kevin Burke

Earlier in the week, we told you that Ron Artest has taken steps towards legally changing his name to Metta World Peace. Ron has been very unpredictable in his career, especially during his younger days, so something as outlandish as this falls right in line with what is expected of him. Personally, I was interested in learning why he decided to undergo this change and what the new name means. Yesterday, he appeared on ESPN’s Pardon the Interruption, where Mike Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser spent Five Good Minutes with him, to primarily ask him just that:

In case you weren’t paying attention, here’s what you should have noticed:

Chad Ochocinco is the inspiration behind Ron changing his name. When Chad changed his name a few years back, Ron thought, “wow, that’s cool…”. That was all he needed to realize that he wanted to change his name too. But the problem was that he didn’t know what he wanted to change it to. That reminds of when people say “I want to get a tattoo, but I don’t know what to get.” Then you know what, you probably shouldn’t get one then. If you have no clue what you want to change your name to, that’s probably a sign. My question is, so what if Chad cut off his left pinky three years ago too?

He was going to change his name to One Love World Peace but was told that was corny. Very true, because that would sound ridiculous.

Changing his name to Metta World Peace is “about connecting with the youth around the globe…especially the youth that’s lost, the ones that don’t know what they want to do with their lives…so they have something to look forward to.” Yeah, I can definitely see troubled teens turning around their lives and becoming prominent world leaders as a result of Ron’s name change. Ron is saving our planet and we don’t evn realize it.

I’m still caught up on the name change so I won’t focus on the fact that he thought he could’ve won the MVP at some point if it were not for the brawl in 2004.

But, I get it. I really do. Chad Johnson was a talented football player, but wasn’t quite a household name and didn’t have many (if any) endorsements. Chad Ochocinco is now a less talented football player now that he’s older, but has many endorsements, had his own reality show and is surely much more wealthy now than he was years ago. Mission accomplished. Sounds like Ron is interested in the same type of attention and heightened publicity. Well, it’s working so far because he was on PTI and now I’m talking about him. But is it wrong to initially think that he, like Chad, is a clown for doing so?

If you’re looking for your everyday, predictable basketball talk, then you’ve come to the wrong place, because Kevin Burke of The Kevin Burke Project brings provocative, thought provoking content about basketball as only he can. Kevin also hosts The Hoop Doctors weekly podcast show, which you can subscribe to for free on iTunes. Follow Kevin on Twitter and Facebook