Everybody thought I was nuts when I pleaded for Yi Jianlian to consider Sacramento as the place he wanted to eventually land after summarily dissing Milwaukee. But the rumors are escalating, after the Sacramento Bee's Scott Howard-Cooper says the 7-footer power forward-center would be interested in doing time at Arco.

The whole situation around Yi following his being drafted by the Bucks has been sensitive, so real facts are lacking so far, and no sides involved told the Bee much. And Howard-Cooper's story does mention one critical sticking point that could derail the whole thing:

Interestingly, though I missed the Bee story this morning (too d**n busy), the way I found this rumor was gaining traction was due to a spike in visits to my own site where I had also posted the initial Yi to Sacramento speculation. A lot of people are out there scouring the Web looking for information on Yi Jianlian possibly coming to the Kings. (See a screenshot of the searches)

I think this just crossed the line from "A snowball's chance in hell" to "The chance that Artest plays a full 82-game schedule in Sacramento".