Quit being so naive. It doesn't get any more intentional than that. To throw it that hard, that accurately and have it hit the kid that was bugging him the most in the face is no accident. He could've thrown it on the floor likes he's done before or another normal reaction would be to chuck it as hard as you can to the nosebleeds.
Here is video of Aaron Brook literally flinging his mouthguard hard into the stands in a REGULAR SEASON game in November 2012. Look at the far right at 2:13 https://youtu.be/AN1rhaBkGCs In fact Brooks and Curry threw it in nearly identical manner and in the same direction and just as hard and fast. But Brooks was fined BUT NOT SUSPENDED. Even if you think that throwing mouthguards into the stands should merit a suspension, that is NOT the precedent. And Brooks did it in a meaningless game in freaking Nov 2012 when they could have easily suspended him without causing any kind of backlash unlike in a Game 7.
He says he didn't mean to do it. You don't have to believe him. I have no reason to doubt him but only he knows. I can say from the video that at the moment he was throwing it, he looked AWAY from where he was throwing it so I don't see how he could be aiming at all. Regardless, how are you going to justify suspending him when there is no way you prove he meant to aim at him, he says he didn't aim at him and there is plenty of precedent of players throwing mouthguards just as hard into the stand in meaningless regular season games AND NOT GET SUSPENDED?
You don't have to look at your intended target to hit him. He knew where he was dude was court side the whole game. This is a the GOAT shooter that has all kinds of tricks and marksmen accuracy and not just with putting a ball in a hoop. Nailing the kid was a piece of cake compared to this. No look, behind the back, over the head, towel toss and hit a bottle of water? https://youtu.be/ZfwhGu5VZGE
Whatever. You believe that if you want. Maybe it is even true but there's no way to ever prove it. I doubt that he was any more obnoxious than a lot of other fans there especially at that moment he fouled out so anyone else he might have hit was just as likely to have been nearly equally obnoxious. Regardless it doesn't change the fact that suspending him is UNPRECEDENTED. Others have throw their mouth guards into the stands just as hard and received fines and NO suspension. So anyone calling for his suspension and now given the fact that OTHERS were NOT suspended for doing the same thing (in meaningless Nov games to boot) should at least admit that they are asking that Curry be given "special" harsher treatment rather than equal treatment. If the league wants to make a new rule that throwing your mouthguard into the stands is an automatic suspension, they can do that for future seasons. That's not the rule now. And that's not how players were treated in the past (unless it was in the direction of a ref).
Funny that the press conference for the Cleveland big 3 was Tristan, LerBon, and Kyrie. No Love in sight.
Funny if Curry wasn't that good a shooter, it might have passed as unintentional. :grin: Can someone post a video of Curry throwing the thing? His motion and line of eyesight would tell whether he aimed or not. My intuition is that he was not intentional, or else it would have escalated real quick. Nobody seemed to be reacting that way, including the guy who got hit. But seriously, Curry needs to ditch that mouthpiece chewing addiction. It's not gonna do him any good.
http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showpost.php?p=10550753&postcount=2427 curry looks right at the guy and pegs him straight in the mouth. no arc on that trajectory, it's a direct fastball. not a toss into a stands, he winds back and pegs the guy in the face looking right at him.
The reason is its Game 7 of the NBA Finals, and personally I think that's reason enough. If this was the regular season, I think he'd probably be suspended. You can't expect the NBA is enforce its rules and dole out punishment without considering the bigger picture like player history and impact on the fans. In the end, its a balancing act where the league needs to consider a bunch of factors. Suspending perhaps the biggest star in the game from a Finals game 7 for an out-of-character thing he did in the heat of the moment where no one really got hurt is just self-defeating for the league.
If you allow rules to have that much latitude and subjectivity, then that defeats the purpose of having the rules IMO.
Rules only exist to preserve human decency and fair play, so allowing flexibility to preserve that is ok. Letting Curry play, even though I hate him, is fair play. Had his actions resulted in a fan frenzy or riot, I think it would be justifiable to suspend him. His action, yes, could have resulted in a riot, and suspending him is done to prevent a future riot, but I think in the big picture, fair competition in game 7 would be deemed more important than a preventing a hypothethical riot.
There are too many differences to enumerate. Just a few: Curry's history with the fans is stellar. Curry didn't run into the stands and start punching dudes. Curry immediately went over to the fan and apologized. It didn't result in an arena-wide melee. It was a flagrant foul. Different. Of course. And he should be fined. Heavily, if need be. But don't ruin the most important game of the season by suspending him. No one who actually enjoys watching these games wants that, and the league needs to take that into account.
Regardless of what happens in Game 7, the Cavaliers have earned my respect. They are a legitimate great team, much better than I thought they were coming into the series. The east is just such a joke, you can never tell whether the team that comes out is actually that good (like Detroit years back), but Cleveland is good. Although they would be even better if they traded Wiggins for a player that actually contributes to winning basketball.
The Horry incident in 2007 comes to mind. Amare and Diaw were suspended for stepping inside the court, which probably cost the Suns the series, maybe the title. Their action was much less serious. The suspended players didn't look like they intended to escalate the situation, just a natural instinct of standing up and walking to the scene. A lot of people thought it was not a wise decision for suspending two key players who at a critical point of the playoffs series. The league's said it "a rule is a rule." That said, it was not game 7 of the finals and those were not the best players of the team (although Amare was arguably their second best player, kind of like Klay to the Warriors).
Curry did apologize to the guy, didn't he. This video didn't show that. To me, apologizing means that he either didn't mean to hit the dude or it was a heat of the moment emotion that it was not a malicious action toward the target.
Remember when the media was all amazed Curry could make a no-look throw to knock Greens cup out of his hands, because it was fun. The master of throwing things. But he didn't mean to hit the taunting fan with his pacifier, because he was having a tantrum. hmmm <iframe src="https://vine.co/v/iIBveE1OxeV/embed/simple" width="600" height="600" frameborder="0"></iframe><script src="https://platform.vine.co/static/scripts/embed.js"></script>
