How about the guy he went up to and coldcocked on national TV? Perhaps your living room has an obstructed view seat.
Anybody who can justify a player going in the stands is a fool. It doesnt any effort at all to call security over and have the fan ejected and laugh at them while they are getting escorted out in handcuffs. I hope Artest, jackson, & oneal all get suspend for the rest of year and get assult charges brought against them. Whoever said wallace is to blame is a fool too. At worst eject the two players. Artest just ruined the game for everyone. Thank you Detroit fans for showing how classy you really are.
What a joke. In case you've been away, the NBA has had some pretty negative events happen recently, such as the Kobe incident, the Calvin Murphy garbage (puke), rampant drug use, shooting at girlfriends, choking coaches, etc. How did I bring up race? You should be ashamed of YOURSELF for bringing it up.
That's why I feel there is no way to justify him going into the stands. This is just sick all the way around. When I go to a Rockets game I usually take my nieces and nephew and just the thought of this happening when we are there, scares me to death. I can understand him getting mad, pissed and even wanting to beat the crap out of the fan but actually acting on those thoughts...that is pathetic. Everyone involved makes me sick.
I certainly will never condone what the fans did. The people who were directly involved should be prosecuted either through fines, community service or jail if they were involved in assault of players or other fans. Whoever threw that chair needs to do some time, even if it is 60 days in the city jail. HOWEVER, I find the whole concept of self-defense and justification from the players' side bizarre in this situation. All Artest has to do when this starts is walk away. That's it. All Stephen Jackson had to do was walk away. That's it. All Jermaine O'Neal had to do was not flatten some guy laying on the floor. That's it! I've played gigs where I've been spit on, had stuff thrown at me, told I sucked and just about everything else. I've had black and Latino friends playing with me taunted with racial slurs. Not ONCE did any of those incidents result in someone in the band charging into the audience to kick someone's ass. No one is denying that you sometimes want to jack someone up for a moronic thing like that. No one should be surprised if you feel like that or even jaw back at the people doing it. That is a natural reaction. But, to charge into the stands and engage a person (or persons) one-on-one is just insane. I don't care what happened. I mean, what if you trample a little kid or an old person in your blind rage? What if someone is SERIOUSLY hurt? I mean, what if O'Neal (given the fact that he is a a very large, very strong athlete) crushed that guy's jaw? We all know what happened to Rudy when he was hit by Kermit Washinton. Self defense is not kicking someone's ass for hitting you with a beer. I could see yelling back. I could even see heaving that cup back at the guy. But, hauling ass into the crowd? I also think that a lot of sports folk are going to find that, in the court of public opinion, the athletes are not going to be the one's considered the victims here. When the Monday talk shows roll around, I can almost guarantee you that the vast majority of Americans will reserve the title of "thug" for guys like Artest. That doesn't mean the fans won't get their share of the blame as they very well should. But, if it is down to a drunk fan and a multi-million-dollar professional athlete, most are going to say the onus is on the athlete to restrain himself. Again, this isn't defending the fans. I hope the police bust as many of those idiots as possible. What they did was dispicable and it isn't surprising some of them got their asses beat down for it. But, clearly, the players are responsible for containing themselves in that situation and not escalating the violence. Chances are, this would have calmed down had Artest been hit with the beer and both teams left the floor. Instead, when he goes into the stands, all hell breaks loose. I remember the Rockets game in Indy when the fans started raining down stuff onto the court. No one charged up into the stands then. There was a survey a couple years back among athletes that found some 60 percent of them consider themselves practicing Christians. I think the number is like 70 percent in America, many of whom refer to themselves as "born again." What exactly happened to the concept of "turn the other cheek?" What part of that don't people get? It is just really surprising to me that people can go so quickly from fun to violence.
Only '2-5 games' for that - guys get two games for leaving the bench during brawls. I think rep and history should factor into this. Artest, 1) Isn't it odd he's always in the middle of things like this? 2) WTF was he doing chilling like he was at the beach, lying on the scorer's table? IMO, he was just egging someone to mess with him. 3) You want to act like a tough guy then you should be treated like one. 25 games. Wallace, 1) He has a good rep and no history (I think) of being a dumbass. 2) His brother died a week ago. 15 games. Stephen Jackson, He has issues, man. This guy was out to kill someone out there.
The refs are to blamed too. They should have eject Ben instantly but instead Ben was left on the court adding fuel to the fire. After Ben threw the towel at Ron, that's when fan start to throw things.
This quote came from the article. back to people killing their wife, killing people during the superbowl, money laundering, cheating in schools? I guess RM95 covered the rest. Anyhoo. Ron Artest was stupid enough to foul Ben Wallace hard. That was not needed, because the game is over. Ben Wallace didn't throw a punch, but he did do a violent push of both hands into Artest's throat, and then Wallace decides to go after him some more. Wallace should get a game a few games, maybe three or so. Artest doesn't get one....yet. Artest gets the water or the beer thrown at him. Fine, let security take care of it. But instead he goes into the crowd, and attacks a fan. Not even the right fan though. If I remember correctly, Maxwell got a ten game suspension and a hefty fine. Not only did he go after the fan in the stand, but the idiot fan that got on the court. No fan should EVER be on the court. Plain and simple. You don't belong there, do not be there. I won't say it's justified because its not. Then O'neal comes from 15 feet away, RUNS, and clocks that guy. I think that should get seven games or so. Stephan Jackson should sue that one guy that sucker punched him from behind. But man, is SJ an idiot. Did anybody see his act. He threw up his hands like he wanted to fight somebody. I think he was also instagating the fight, so you have to tact on atleast three games. Fred Jones, maybe just a suspension. As for the fans, that guy who was clocked by artest should sue the Pacers/Pistons/NBA. That fat dude in the Pistons gear should uh well? Go see a doctor for his jaw. That guy that punched Jones or Jackson from behind, should also lose some weight. I think that stupid ass PA annoucer should have said something onthe mic telling everybody to stop. That guy is the most annoying PA annoucer next to ours.
It was bad enough that Wallace fell to the floor after being in mid hair. It was bad enough that Artest wasn't even going for the ball and just shoved Wallace in the upper back with both hands. Flagrant? Maybe, maybe not. Ive seen softer fouls called flagrant though. Wallace should be fined or suspended for retaliating, just like normal, but Artest going into the stands is what touched all of this off. If Wallace had retalited and the refs assesed the proper on court penalities for both Artest and Wallace, then nothing else would have happened IMO.
Heres how i see it - Artest gives a hard foul at the end of the game.. it wasnt that hard, it certainly didnt deserve the reaction it got out of Wallace but still its understandable. Now heres the weird part - Artest did the RIGHT thing by walking away. What does it matter if he layed down on the scorers table, he was most likely trying to calm himself down so he wouldnt do anything to wallace. Then the fans get involved by throwing a beer bottle right at him. Well lets see.. hes pretty fired up from being shoved in the face by wallace..someone just threw beer at him, of course hes gonna react. Was it smart? No. Was it what 99.9% of all guys would have done..yes.. He didnt even punch the guy, just kinda pinned him down. Stephen Jackson was out there to protect his teammate. The guy who threw that glass at Artest deserved what he got from Jackson. Its really sad that Artest is going to get punished for this when he was obviously doing the right thing. Jermaine and Jackson were backing up their teammates when the fans kept further instigating things. Larry Brown also should have talked to the fans and told them to calm down. The reaction from Joe Dumars and the Pistons CEO is absurd. To blame things on the Pacers when it was clearly your teams (wallace instigating) and fans fault is ridiculous. Hopefully legal action will be taken against fans and not players as they were the ones assaulted first.
Having something thrown at you is considered assault RocketPimp. You can legally defend your self. You don't know what is thrown at you, or what he is going to throw next.
Meanwhile if you visit http://www.nba.com/ you will not even know something this huge went down. Its Dwayne's world indeed I love this game.
Yes, lets, because if the players had not gone into the stands, the majority of this episode probably never happens.
Ben is a big ol guy. The refs probably had trouble ushering him out of the court and into the tunnel. He was probably going to get ejected anway because he reacted, and kept reacting instead of going to the freethrow line.
Wallace retaliated simpley because it was freaking crazy ARTEST who gave him the foul. He might not do so if it was somebody else.
That's complete crap because had they not gone into the stand, more crap like popcorn, bottles, liquids, buckets, anything, would have started raining down on the players.
Please I hope you are not serious because that is flat out ignorant. Anyone who shares similar sentiment is flat out ignorant. PS. Rasheed Wallace should be suspended for one game at least for generating bad kama.
