This might shock you, but Metta World Peace né Ron Artest had something weird happen to him! He got ejected for an incredibly tiny scuffle in the final game of his Italian team’s playoff series, as World Peace’s Pallacanasto Cantu got eliminated by Reyer Venizia.
Metta World Peace got ejected in Italy while wearing a ‘THE PANDA’S FRIEND’ jersey
Very normal, very good.
Several reports say that World Peace was given five fouls in under a minute, but it doesn’t really seem like this was the case -- Sportando reports that it was a box score glitch. It looks like the refs ejected him and then the best way to justify that in the box score was hitting him with four consecutive fouls.
World Peace has not had the most graceful post-NBA career. After getting cut by the Knicks in February 2014, he went to China, playing for the Sichuan Blue Whales and insisting people call him “The Panda’s Friend.” Because there are pandas in China! And he wanted to be their friend! He even had shoes made with panda heads on them! Not real panda heads -- plush panda heads.
But his knee kept getting hurt and Chinese teams only have a limited number of slots for foreign players, so they cut him and signed a healthy player.
So World Peace was off to Italy to play for Pallacanastro Cantu. He finished second on the team in scoring behind ex-Marquette standout Darius Johnson-Odom, and the team made the playoffs. But they lost their series 3-2.
But here’s the weird thing. Even though World Peace now plays in Italy -- where there are no pandas -- he still wears THE PANDA’S FRIEND gear:
There is a website selling THE PANDA’S FRIEND gear clearly modeled after World Peace -- some of them have Italian flags, some say Los Angeles, many have “37” on the back -- but it never says his name or anything. Very normal and good!
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