NBA or WWE you decide...

[Kyle Love]

OK I just saw the Pacers vs Pistons vs Fans fight. I think this is totally ridiculous! These pro athletes need to show themselves as a role model. The fans were a bit over the line though. Theres no need for fans to throw bottles, cups, etc on the court or at the players. Artest and all the Pacers did go over the line when they went into the stands, I can't really blame them though...sounds sad yes I know but put yourself in their shoes. The Detroit fans were way out of line. This whole thing was started by Ben Wallace who was fouled by Artest with like 49 sends left. If he would have had some self-discipline he wouldn't have punched Artest. So, I just want to know everyones input on this thing that just happened. If you haven't seen it yet I am sure you will see it on the news....

[Cory]

I really couldn't care less... although I am pretty pissed about the ramifications for my fantasy team since I have Artest...

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Kyle45

OK I just saw the Pacers vs Pistons vs Fans fight. I think this is totally ridiculous! These pro athletes need to show themselves as a role model. The fans were a bit over the line though. Theres no need for fans to throw bottles, cups, etc on the court or at the players. Artest and all the Pacers did go over the line when they went into the stands, I can't really blame them though...sounds sad yes I know but put yourself in their shoes. The Detroit fans were way out of line. This whole thing was started by Ben Wallace who was fouled by Artest with like 49 sends left. If he would have had some self-discipline he wouldn't have punched Artest. So, I just want to know everyones input on this thing that just happened. If you haven't seen it yet I am sure you will see it on the news....

The fans were totally wrong. They think purchasing a ticket gives them the right to behave in any manner they please whether that is abusing atheletes or other fans ( I go to Bills games and there have been fights and ejections at every game. Some people have written the local people about how nasty the fans have been including the motehr of an 11 year old boy who was verbally abused after his Jacksonville Jaguars defeated the Bills in the opening game). Fan behavior has deteriorated to dangerous levels.
I just hope we never see that in FIRST (even though we had issues with a grumpy mentor at the championships who was snapping at everyone around him. Gracious Professionalism won out and there was no problem).

[Karthik]

I've watched the footage of the melee a few times now, and I can't stop shaking my head. The whole situation was ridiculous. Here's list of all the culprits.

The Fans -- You can't start throwing things at the players. It's stupid and immature, amd dangerous. Not just dangerous for the target, but as we saw tonight, dangerous for the thrower and for anyone sitting near him.

Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson et. al. -- I don't care if you got hit with a water bottle, that does not give you a right to go charging into the stands. Artest can talk about self defense all he wants, but let's be serious. He was not in imminent danger. There were security and police officers who would have dealt with that fan.

So Artest runs into the crowd, attacks a first guy who actually had no part in the situation, and then attacks the bottle thrower. While all of this is happening, a riot erupts. This is why players shouldn't go charging into the stands, even if they've been wronged. Inciting riots is not a good thing. In this riot many innocent people were shoved and trampled.

So the bottom line, everyone involved in this situation is to blame. The drunk cup tossing fans, the players who started attacking the fans. The porous security who did very little to stop the whole thing. Good grief.

Honestly, I'm not going to another NBA game, until I'm given some sort of assurance that this won't happen again. Knowing my luck, I'll be the guy who's sitting beside the drunken moron who throws the next cup, that ends up getting mistakenly attacked by Ron Artest.

This is going to leave a huge black mark on the NBA, it's fans and the entire city of Detroit. It's sad considering that most of the fans and players and had nothing to do with it. 'Tis life...

I really hope there are some major ramifications for those involved. We were very luck that no one was seriously injured (as far as we know). If proper punishment isn't handed out (to the players and the fans), I fear there will be a repeat down the line, where we aren't so lucky.

[Brandon Martus]

Yes, the fan(s) who threw stuff at the players were 100% out of line, and disgusting. The players, however, shouldn’t have went into the crowd. There are security and ushers, especially down courtside, who would’ve taken care of the situation. They would’ve done so without causing, more or less, a riot to erupt.

It was a plastic cup and cold liquid – if they can’t shrug that off and let security take care of the rude fan, they’ve got serious anger problems they should be dealing with.

I don’t think you can blame one group of people in this thing. The fans were wrong to throw stuff, and the players were just as wrong to go up in the stands and ‘defend’ themselves.


Disgusting.

[meaubry]

Everyone losses when situations like this occur. Why would you commit a blatant foul with less than a minute to play while you team is winning by double digits? I watched the entire game, it was a very emotional game to begin with because it was between the 2 teams that had played a very physical series during last years playoffs. The league sends a rookie ref as part of the crew and there were multiple technical fouls and a ton of whining for calls by both teams. You could see that the situation was not a typically friendly game between 2 cross town rivals on Friday night. There hasn't been a good ending to any situation where the opposing teams players (in any sport) goes into the stands. Too bad some folks didn't see this one coming, I thought it was an accident just waiting to happen.

[Elgin Clock]

I didn't see any of the game, but it sounds like bad news for the NBA's image.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._pistons_brawl

By the way, this is one of the reasons that venues only use plastic bottles for beer and other drinks or just use plastic "party cups" now.

Just imagine if that was a glass bottle...

Plastics make it possible.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Elgin Clock

I didn't see any of the game, but it sounds like bad news for the NBA's image.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._pistons_brawl

By the way, this is one of the reasons that venues only use plastic bottles for beer and other drinks or just use plastic "party cups" now.

Just imagine if that was a glass bottle...

Plastics make it possible.

Back in the 70's during a Cowboys/Vikings game when Preston Pearson of the Dallas Cowboys caught a hail mary in Minnasota by commiting a blatant offensive pass interference (it's in the NFL films achive and you can see him shoving the defender in the back and knocking him to the ground before the catch) an angry fan threw a bottle at a ref hitting him squarely in the head and knocking him out.
And don't forget that Cleveland/Jacksonville fiasco a few years ago...

[Wetzel]

Artest should just be gone from the league. He keeps getting in trouble for foolish fouls, punished, and doing it again after he gets back. I guess the politics will just give him another 10 game suspension.

That punch as he was leaving was wild, and he should get charged with assault for that.

Wetzel

[EddieMcD]

Originally Posted by meaubry

Why would you commit a blatant foul with less than a minute to play while you team is winning by double digits?

Okay, that was not a blatent foul. When someone goes up for a layup, and someone else goes to block him, there's usually contact. All Artest did was go up with Wallace. If anything, Wallace was in the wrong for what he did after.

Back on subject, I won't get into who started the whole thing. Hey, the benches cleared, a few staredowns and a couple nudges occured. That happens all the time (not that it should, I'm just saying it does). And suprisingly, Artest was staying out of it. Then he got hit with a cup. And I have to say, in that situation, I kinda don't blame Artest for what he did (even though I don't think it was right). Then we get our domino effect.

In summary: Wallace started it all. Okay, deeper summary: I'll hold both Artest and the fan who threw the cup at him responsible. The players who followed into the stands are all in the wrong too (and since I still believe in chivalry, I kinda see why they did it as well; they were defending their leader). However, any fans on the floor got what was coming to them.

And for a second there, I thought the NHL had resolved their lockout.

BTW, the WWE is docile compared to what happened last night.

[Cory]

Originally Posted by Karthik

There were security and police officers who would have dealt with that fan.

The porous security who did very little to stop the whole thing. Good grief.

Karthik, I agreed with the content of most of your post, but these two statements directly contradict each other.

As I understood it, there was all of one security personnel on the floor at the time.

So while security and police would have dealt with the fan, they obviously didn't, and I'm sure that changed Artest's reaction.

By no means does that mean Artest isn't responsible for his actions, but had there been an appropriate number of security personnel there, I think it's safe to say the incident would not have escalated so much

[David Hoff]

First off, many people have the wrong impression about Ron Artest because all they hear about him is what the national media tells them. Living in Indy, I get to see him play almost nightly and he very rarely does something that is dirty or illegal. In fact, he received a flagrant foul about a week ago because of his reputation. A few days later, NBA took back the flagrant and cleared his record of it since he did nothing wrong. This has happened to him many times in the past as well. I'm not saying he hasn't messed up before, but I don't think he's as crazy as some make him out to be.

The melee that occurred was not completely Artest's fault or Ben Wallace's fault. I think a good portion of the blame needs to go to the few people in the stands who instigated the brawl by throwing things at the Pacers. I'm not saying Artest should have done what he did, but it is understandable. Also last night when Shaq was asked about the situation, he said he would have reacted the same way that Artest did.

[Brandon Martus]

Originally Posted by EddieMcD

Okay, that was not a blatent foul. When someone goes up for a layup, and someone else goes to block him, there's usually contact. All Artest did was go up with Wallace. If anything, Wallace was in the wrong for what he did after.

Don't watch the hand thats going up to block the shot, watch the hand that is pushing him in the back of the neck/head. That's what Wallace was so angry about, I'm guessing.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Brandon Martus

Don't watch the hand thats going up to block the shot, watch the hand that is pushing him in the back of the neck/head. That's what Wallace was so angry about, I'm guessing.

Ben Wallace overeacted alot to what had happened.

[Ryan Albright]

hands down artest, jackson thrown out of the league and criminal charges filed. Artest has been a loose cannon his whole life i was just waiting for him to snap. This is a disgrace to any pro sport