BUM RAP Portrait of the Artest BY MIKE MILIARD

With an average of 24.6 points per game, suspended basketbrawler Ron Artest is — or, rather, was — one of the leading scorers in the NBA. The erstwhile Pacers forward is also, alas, one of the worst rappers in the league. (Yes, worse even than Shaq.) Following an interview on AOL’s The Show last week, Artest, who’s slated to release his debut solo album next month, busted some stilted freestyle, his rhymes seeming to foreshadow the fracas last Friday night at the Palace at Auburn Hills:

My name is Ron Artest

And I can ball

I can shoot threes

And you know I can play that D

I’m unstoppable

All you fools is actin’ funny tryin’ to badmouth me

Tryin’ to take some money out my pocket

But I don’t care

I’ll smack you in the head

Smack you up in the air

Then I’ll kick you in the rear

You know how I do it

I got a left and a right hand

and you know I love this music

And if people keep botherin’ me

I just might lose it

But, naw, I ain’t gonna do that

Cuz I ain’t gonna be actin’ foolish

Well, act foolish he did. And his suspension for the rest of the season is gonna cost him most of his $5 million salary. But there’s a silver lining: Artest, who is also the CEO of TruWarier records and who recently produced tracks for R&B divas Allure, caused a kerfuffle a few weeks back when he asked for a month off from the court to finish his own album and promote Allure’s just-released Chapter III. His request was denied, of course, but now he’s got limitless time to do all that — and, we hope for the sake of his own hip-hop career, to study up with a rhyming dictionary.

Visit the TruWarier Records at www.truwarier.com. For a RealAudio sample of Artest’s freestyle, visit journals.aol.com/cmottram04/ShowMeYourBlog/entries/167.