wildyams

If you haven't seen it, I'll describe what happened. The Pacers (who were eliminated in the Eastern Conference Finals last year by the Pistons, who went on to win the championship over the Lakers) were up by 15 points with about 45 seconds left to play, so they had basically come into Detroit and thoroughly beaten the Pistons. As Detroit's center, Ben Wallace, went up for a layup he was fouled hard from behind by Pacers' forward, Ron Artest. Now let me be clear, this was a hard foul, but it was probably not even a flagarant foul, and really was not that big of a deal; but Ben Wallace walked up to Artest and shoved him with both hands as hard as he could in the face as a retaliation. Artest flew backwards, but regained his balance and just stood there while all the players from both teams got in between the two guys to try to break it up, as usually happens in fights at sporting events. Artest decided to let cooler heads prevail, and rather than going after Wallace he sat on the scorer's table, and then laid down on it, appearing to be relaxed. Wallace was still upset and threw a towel at Artest, but Artest didn't bite, instead remaining reclined on the table. Artest even began to talk with the reporters at the scorer's table and appeared to be doing an interview while the refs calmed everything down on the court.

As things on the court were winding down, a fan threw a plastic cup full of beer (a thick plastic cup, like a sports bottle, not a dixie cup) from the stands and it hit Artest in the face, who was still laying on the table. At that point, Artest jumped up and raced into the stands after whoever threw the cup. Since he hadn't seen who threw it, he grabbed the wrong guy and threw him down while another fan grabbed him from behind to restrain him. Meanwhile, Artest's teammate, Stephen Jackson, followed Artest into the stands, presumably to grab him or watch out for him; but as Jackson arrived to Artest's aid, another fan took a full cup of beer and threw it point blank into Artest's face as he was being held from behind. Jackson, who was standing right there when this happened, punched the fan who did this, and other fans tried to grab him as well. Artest seemed to sort of back away from it as he was grabbed by another fan from behind, but as Artest seemed to stop, that fan that had him from behind began to hit him with closed fists in the head, so Artest turned around and punched him. Meanwhile, another Pacer, Fred Jones, who had also rushed into the stands to help his teammates was thrown down and punched repeatedly by a very large fan, even though Jones was basically just standing there watching.

Eventually the Pacers players got away from all of these fans and got back down to the court in time for the refs to announce that the game was being called, so Artest began walking towards the tunnel which led to the locker room, but at that point two Pistons fans jumped out in front of him, one with his fists balled in a stance implying he wanted to fight Artest. Artest, not taking any chances, punched the fan right in the face, which prompted the other Detroit fan to try to wrap him up and help his friend fight him. A Pacer coach of some kind (he was wearing a suit) got between them and pulled Artest away towards the center of the court where a Detroit Police Officer was there waiting with a pulled can of pepper spray, which he was shaking in case he had to use it. Artest allowed himself to be restrained by the coach, however, and from that point forward didn't fight anymore. However, his teammate, Jermaine O'Neal (the Pacers' best player) had just come rushing to his aid and punched out the fan who had wrapped up Artest in an attempt to help his friend fight him moments earlier.

At that point, Artest and Stephen Jackson made their way back to the locker room while fans threw beer, popcorn and soda on them; but meanwhile, O'Neal was now the one who was really enraged and was having to be restrained by a number of people who were trying to get him off the court, as the crowd was really beginning to surge towards the Pacers' bench and their tunnel. O'Neal was soon in the middle of a large crowd of people, and people were throwing things at him, one person even threw a folding metal chair at him, but instead hit some other fan in the head with it. Security and Pacers' personnel (and who knows who else) finally began to drag O'Neal towards the locker room, when another fan threw a full, large tub of popcorn right in O'Neal's face, prompting O'Neal to try to get to that fan. He was sufficiently restrained at that point, however, so they continuted to drag him towards the tunnel. As fans continued to throw everything imaginable down on top of O'Neal, another of the Pacers' players, Jamaal Tinsley, came out of the tunnel carrying a dustpan by the handle, and brandishing it as if it was going to hit somebody with it. Luckily he didn't have to, and eventually O'Neal was taken off the court and into the locker room.

Throughout all of this the Pistons players basically just stood there and watched before leaving the floor themselves. The Pistons' coach, Larry Brown, tried to get on the microphone to address the crowd, but the mic wasn't working, so he slammed the mic down in disgust and walked away. After all this, the cameras scanned the crowd and found one shot of a child of maybe 5 years old who was clearly scared and crying, and that shot said a lot about what it must have been like to be there, because it was certainly disturbing to watch.

The NBA released their response to all this yesterday, suspending Detroit's Ben Wallace for 6 games, suspending Jermaine O'Neal for 25 games, suspending Stephen Jackson for 30 games and suspending Ron Artest for the rest of the season (73 games). There were other minor suspensions in there, but those were the main ones. Let me say this: I think the NBA is absolutely wrong for making the suspensions as tough as they were. I think that those players all should have been suspended, but the suspensions are way, way too long. I would have given Ben Wallace 2 games (because all he really did was shove Artest in the face and then throw a towel at him; even if it did start the whole thing, I seriously doubt all that was what he had in mind by pushing Artest); I would have suspended Jermaine O'Neal and Stephen Jackson between 3 and 5 games apiece (because they were fighting out of a desire to protect themselves and to protect their teammates from fans who were attacking them), and I would have suspended Artest for 10 games for going into the stands. None of the players, in my opinion, are responsible for the melee that broke out there, that was the fans that instigated it, and escalated it. Artest added to it by going into the stands, and mainly for making himself such a target in a sea of angry fans, but he was simply going after someone who had thrown a large cup of beer at him, and I can't really blame him for being angry at that (if some stranger, totally unprovoked, threw a large cup of liquid on me, I would probably have a hard time just sitting there and doing nothing about it, as I'm sure anyone would).

The decision by the league worries me, because I believe in effect they have rewarded the Detroit fans for the entire incident, which those same fans mainly caused. Look, the Pistons' main rival was the Pacers, and the Pacers were the only team in the East with a real shot of knocking them off, but now with the suspensions the Pacers are going to be without both of their All-Stars for months, and one of them (Artest) for the rest of the year. Artest is the reigning Defensive Player of the Year as well, and Jermaine O'Neal is a legitimate MVP candidate, while Stephen Jackson is a very good player; so losing those three players basically puts an end to Indiana's chances of winning this year, thereby giving the Pistons a red carpet back into the Finals. This is not right. Sure the Detroit Police will certainly arrest a few people, and some season ticketholders might lose their seats or something, but the bottom line is that it was the Detroit fans who were out of control and physically attacking the Indiana team, and it is the Detroit fans who have got to be extremely happy about the decision. They started it, and they're being rewarded for it. Shame on the NBA for sending the message that the fans really can affect the outcome of not only the game, but the season. Don't be surprised if you see other incidents like this where fans decide to try to grab some of the spotlight by attacking players in an effort to goad the players into lengthy suspensions, thereby helping their team, and making them heroes in the eyes of their fellow fans. :nono

UPDATE: If you haven't seen it, here's a link to the video of the local Detroit TV station that was covering the game.