Brawlers' punishment should be modeled on soccer

[drdtroit]

re: Pistons & Pacers brawl on Friday evening

By Marc Stein
ESPN.com
 
As commissioner of the world's second most popular team sport, David Stern makes frequent references to No. 1.

"Which is soccer," Stern says.

Which is why you can safely assume that Le Commish, as part of his punishment deliberations this weekend, has studied and considered how player-fan unrest has been handled in world football.

Which is why Indiana and Detroit should be worried. Very worried.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/columns/story?columnist=stein_marc&id=1928030

[AngryAmish]

1. Soccer is punishment

You have to play when you have been bad. Or if you are worse you have to watch.

[drdtroit]

2. LOL! n/t

[frogfromthenorth2]

15. lol

[Garage Queen]

3. As a Detroiter, I just want to apologize to the rest of the country

for the ABYSMAL behavior demonstrated by our "fans" at Friday night's game. It just broke my heart to wake up Saturday morning and see that the entire first 30 minutes of Sports Center was dedicated to the brawl at the Palace. Oy vey. After Detroit has come so far to improve its image, we get these Punk "fans" who go and throw it all away just so they can get the pleasure of pouring a Mountain Dew on the head of a basketball player.

I am sickened. Disgusted. and Ashamed.

So, sorry everybody.

[RivetJoint]

4. No need to apologize

We expect that from Detroit fans...

[0007]

5. No apology is necessary! This is life and nothing is perfect

we learn by making the same mistakes over and over and over.....and then sing "God Bless America" while our youth is being slaughtered on foreign soil after the biggest lie in history had been sallowed by the American people.

Be sorry for the men that died for a lie!

[theboss]

6. The punishment should be watching soccer

That would learn 'em.

[rooboy]

7. Kick them out of the competition for a year.

After they Heysel stadium disaster in the European Cup, English football clubs were banned from competing in Europe for three years, as I recall.

This should apply to clubs that can't control their fans as well as those who can't control their players.

[Atlant]

8. Just have the police review the videotape, proffer charges, and...

The heck with sanctions by the teams -- just have the police review
the videotape, proffer charges as appropriate, and throw a few people
(including the team members) in prison for assault-and-battery.

Atlant

[gratuitous]

9. I thought one columnist got it incredibly right

I'll probably butcher the name, but as I recall, it was Bill Plaschke of some eastern paper, who noticed in his column that Ron Artest didn't do anything when Ben Wallace gave him the retaliatory shove/slap in the face. He theorized that it was because Artest respects Wallace. But when a fan had the temerity to toss a drink at Artest, all restraint ended and Artest headed up into the stands to pummel the guy he thought had doused him with a soda. So, what does Artest feel for the fans? Clearly not respect.

I thought it was a very perceptive comment.

[theboss]

10. I thought it was a matter of guts

Wallace has four inches and fifty pounds on Artest. Artest wanted no piece of him, which I think shows that Artest still possessed the ability to reason too.

But the 5'10'' guy in the stands was another matter.

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[tedzbear]

12. Was the fan that threw the drink a white guy?

I only watched some CNN coverage last night and I was struck by the obvious incongruity of white reporters and white fans discussing these black players' bad behavior.

I didn't analyze the tape but I was wondering how many of the fans that Artest and his buddies were fighting were black?

It appears the white controlled media is going out of its way to make the black players the "villains" who crossed the forbidden "boundary" of fighting back against white people who were tormenting them.

The media seems to be avoiding the race angle to this...


Anyone have opinions on the racial element to this story?????

[OneMoreDemocrat]

13. There is no 'race angle'............

Only a dangerous and stupid and irresponsible behavior angle.

[DrWeird]

14. Yup.

And apparently from a well-to-do, predominately republican neighborhood.

All the fans that I saw were white, with the possible exception of the guy who charged onto the court, who may have been hispanic. Hard to tell.

Nevertheless, there are significant race elements in this story. Go on over to the Yahoo! message boards for a look.

[tedzbear]

16. That's what I thought.

When I watched the video on CNN it looked like a white guy started it by tossing the drink in the black player's face. Not a smart move.

[Tomee450]

17. Yes

The white pundits and sports announcers are so outraged. You rarely see this level of outrage when its whites who are misbehaving as in the many hockey incidents we've seen. No such outrage when fans overturn goal posts and do all kinds of damage after football games. It's when blacks are involved that we see such anger and dismay and we hear the words "animals" and "thugs" used. The man who reportedly threw the cup has a record with the police but that's not being widely reported. He was not even supposed to be drinking alchohol. I don't like what Artest did but a lot has been going on behind the scene that goes unreported. I heard a black commentator say today that black players are continuously taunted with racial slurs while they are playing. He said he has been in the stadiums and has heard the slurs. It takes great self-control not to respond when you are being called the N word or some other derogatory term but the black players usually ignore the name calling. It seems that both fans and pundits seem to believe that millionaire black players should be willing to accept any kind of abuse. What good is having money when you can't enjoy it if you've been rendered disabled with a serious injury as the result of the actions of fans?It was interesting to hear both Larry King and Bill Mahr say they would have responded exactly as Artest did.

[m berst]

18. help me out

There is so much commentary about the incident, but I can't find the straight up what happened. I caught a little on TV but I can't stand watching the commentators, and I agree there is a double standard on this because of race from what I heard. Whites riot, it's "sad and tragic" - African American athletes involved in any way and we hear something else altogether that slurs everyone through innuendo and association.

What happened? A guy threw something at a player? Players entered the stands? Sorry to be so poorly informed, not much of a TV person and I don't trust and can't stand to listen to the TV commentary.

Can one of you give me a couple of who what when where descriptive sentences? I trust DUers a lot more than the media people. Much appreciated.