crule81
24 Nov 2004, 03:45 PM
So here's another sports thread.
I live outside of Detroit so all that's been talked about recently is the melee last Friday night between half of the Pacer's team and several dozen fans. I'm just wondering what all of you thought about it.
I believe that the incident was demonstrative of the widening gulf between athletes and fans. Many believe this gulf is primarily a racial one, but I think there is much more to it. The fact is that Ron Artest represents much of what most fans dislike about professional athletes and the NBA in particular. Just a week earlier, he told the media that he wanted time off to promote his new album. Prior to that, he was involved in numerous episodes on and off the court. Fans just cannot understand such behavior from those who make several million dollars to play a game that most engage in as recreation. Pistons fans, on the other hand, see their team as everything that is right with professional sports: players with good character (even Rasheed Wallace and Derrick Coleman) who work hard as a team and are upstanding members of the community. These men took down the empire of selfishness that was embodied in Kobe Bryant and the Lakers. It doesn't surprise me that many fans who provoked the Pacers felt that they were somehow standing up for their heros.
At the same time, fans often pay a substantial portion of their income to attend these games. For the Pistons, it is not the "wine and cheese" crowd such as at other NBA arenas. The fans seem to believe that because they are paying so much to contribute to the players' salaries, they have some kind of right to physically interact with the game. My boss, who is a season ticket holder who wasn't at that game, says that he would have gone over to the railing and dumped drinks on the exiting Pacers players. I don't understand these beliefs and this behavior, but they seem to exist even among the more intelligent and better educated fans.
For me, it's sad to see the image of my city tarnished once again.
I live outside of Detroit so all that's been talked about recently is the melee last Friday night between half of the Pacer's team and several dozen fans. I'm just wondering what all of you thought about it.
I believe that the incident was demonstrative of the widening gulf between athletes and fans. Many believe this gulf is primarily a racial one, but I think there is much more to it. The fact is that Ron Artest represents much of what most fans dislike about professional athletes and the NBA in particular. Just a week earlier, he told the media that he wanted time off to promote his new album. Prior to that, he was involved in numerous episodes on and off the court. Fans just cannot understand such behavior from those who make several million dollars to play a game that most engage in as recreation. Pistons fans, on the other hand, see their team as everything that is right with professional sports: players with good character (even Rasheed Wallace and Derrick Coleman) who work hard as a team and are upstanding members of the community. These men took down the empire of selfishness that was embodied in Kobe Bryant and the Lakers. It doesn't surprise me that many fans who provoked the Pacers felt that they were somehow standing up for their heros.
At the same time, fans often pay a substantial portion of their income to attend these games. For the Pistons, it is not the "wine and cheese" crowd such as at other NBA arenas. The fans seem to believe that because they are paying so much to contribute to the players' salaries, they have some kind of right to physically interact with the game. My boss, who is a season ticket holder who wasn't at that game, says that he would have gone over to the railing and dumped drinks on the exiting Pacers players. I don't understand these beliefs and this behavior, but they seem to exist even among the more intelligent and better educated fans.
For me, it's sad to see the image of my city tarnished once again.