So, you see, officer. Not only was she wearing a revealing dress, but she was asking for it and a total slut.
They should make a name change part of Ron's return to the league. Anything but "World Peace." Perhaps Metta Violent Chump, or Metta Clueless Idiot Thug. Something along those lines. If nothing else, it would give us a groovy lawsuit to follow, with which to entertain ourselves as we await the start of next season. I hope Harden is OK.
Everyone is paying attention to that slow motion close up and not looking at it real time/wide view. In real time/wide view, Harden is there to get the inbounds pass before Artest even makes contact with him, and after the contact starts, Harden starts to brace himself and back pedal, which is why he ends up laying near the FT line after the elbow.
Baiting him...by moving to a place on the court where he needs to be? Well, then by that logic, can we say that Artest was baiting Harden to bait him, by celebrating? The point is, Artest can celebrate after a dunk. There's nothing wrong with that. But if you watch the video, right after Artest celebrates by beating his chest with his right fist, he cocks back his left elbow and completely bashes it into Harden's neck. I'm not sure how you're able to defend Artest, calling the pro-Harden posters "sensitive." You're even saying it was Harden's fault, or saying that Harden was asking for it. Gimme a freakin' break.
If person A bumps into person B, then the obvious thing to do is for person B to bash person A's neck with their elbow, right? Oh, and Artest meant to elbow the air. He didn't mean to hit Harden at all. That's what you're saying? And seriously? What kind of logic dictates Harden getting suspended? For bumping into Artest? Softly bumping into someone after a play is over isn't even a foul in the NBA. If you're truly a Harden and Artest fan, I'm not sure how you can condone Artest getting a lighter suspension, and Harden getting suspended at all.
that kind of makes me glad if it had to happen to someone, it was harden. the most ref-protected guy on the most ref-protected team in the league wants to pull crap like that? i guess ron ron gave him something to flop around about. that said, i'd still suspend artest/mwp for the rest of the season and wouldn't care if it was a lifetime ban. no one will miss him. you start the brawl at the palace and throw the most vicious elbow since probably malone on isaiah 20 or so years ago and you're no star who anyone really needs to see to enjoy the nba? you can go watch the games from home from now on.
Yeah, that damn Harden had the refs drapped all over his arse, lookin' out for him, ready to put the hammer down on Mr. Metta "Fill in the Blank." Honestly, how can anyone make an excuse for this, not matter how obscure or arcane the excuse might be? I simply don't see an excuse to be made. I could also care less about the past history of either player. This crap simply can't be allowed to go on. This isn't 80's basketball, so don't bring up how rough the play in the past got. I remember watching it. This is just brute force used to knock the crap out of another player, without that player having a chance of any kind to protect himself. It isn't a hard foul. It's not even foul. It's beyond foul, residing somewhere else, someplace that isn't supposed to be on an NBA court.
That's not it at all. JayGoogle and I made a similar point earlier and everybody had their pitchforks out saying we're tolerating and defending his behavior which wasn't true at all. Then people came out with "you're a moron, your an idiot" comments.
well no one said the refs could pre-emptively keep ron artest from going crazy . the best meds in the world apparently can't do that. and man that angle makes it look even worse than it already did (i think that video image of the nba is about what runs on loop in david stern's nightmares). as for the rest of your post, i agree. this is cheap shot and brute force combined into one and while you sometimes see one or the other, you basically never see that combination on an nba court. that's why anything less than the rest of the season just seems lenient.
Exactly. Take all the past history out of the equation. It doesn't change what happened. Artest knew Hardin was there because the players were in physical contact. Artest cocked his elbow back, swung it, and connected. That's all anyone needs to know in order to crack down on the incident. The NBA needs to put its foot down. It doesn't matter if we changed the players to Grant Hill throwing the elbow, and Ron Artest being on the receiving end. It's not acceptable for anyone to do that. The NBA needs to wipe that crap out.