It looks like Ron Artest will be getting some time off to promote his soon-to-be released rap album after all.

Actually, a lot of time after NBA commissioner David Stern handed down suspensions Sunday in the wake of the brawl that ended the game between the visiting Indiana Pacers and the Detroit Pistons on Friday night.

Artest was suspended the rest of the regular season, a total of 73 games, for his part in the riot that ensued after he fouled Ben Wallace hard while Wallace was on his way to the basket. Indiana was up by 15 points at the time with just about three and a half minutes to go and Wallace, judging by the hard shove to he gave to Artest’s throat, didn’t feel that it was so prudent at that juncture.

It should have been left at that. What followed however was one of the ugliest incidents of violence ever at an American sporting event — outside of a goalie on goalie fight in the NHL which by the way is nowhere to be found at the moment.

As Artest, who admittedly does not take medication prescribed to him, was laying on the scorer’s table in a mocking fashion he was pelted by a beverage container — probably alcoholic — and promptly tracked down the fan he thought threw it and beat the living crap out of him. It turns out the fan was not actually the guy that threw it, just a guy laughing at the fact that Artest had been assualted. I don’t feel sorry for that guy at all, seeing as how if he had any sense once he saw Artest coming at him, he should have high-tailed it ouf of there faster than you can say Tayshaun Prince.

As I was discussing this with friends and colleagues today I realized that I was actually one of the only people that I know who thought the fan deserved exactly what he got. So did the fan that Stephen Jackson pummeled and so did the morons that came on the floor — a big no-no at any sporting event — whom Artest and Jermaine O’Neal went to town on. Jackson got hit with a 30 game suspension while O’Neal will miss the next 25 contests pending appeals.

What the fans who threw objects at players did was assault plain and simple. The law states that you have a right to defend yourself if assaulted and even it that weren’t the case, how does he show his face in Queens again after taking beer to the face and not responding? He doesn’t! This is a man who picked a fight with Michael Jordan for god’s sake!

Artest is an unstable human being, yes. But he is a very good basketball player and plays hard every second he’s on the floor. He fouls everyone hard and never allows an uncontested lay-up, something Wallace should have known and been prepared for having played against him so many times. Wallace for his part in inciting a riot was suspended only six games.

I can remember in my early basketball watching days growing up hating Dennis Rodman. This could have had a little to do with the fact that I was rooting on the Utah Jazz at the time but also to do with the fact that Rodman was and is an ass. And he played like it.

Now I have respect for the guy because he laid it all on the line to win and was a major contributor to the third greatest dynasty in NBA history. I also don’t recall anyone taking the kind of offense to Rodman that Wallace and the Detroit crowd did.

After watching the replay of this mob scene over and over a few things are clear to me:

1. Stephen Jackson is street.

2. The security at the Palace of Auburn Hills dropped the ball.

3. The fan that O’Neal drilled is lucky to be alive. If all 6-foot-11 242 pounds of O’Neal hadn’t slipped before he hit him, it could’ve been a Rudy Tomjanovich situation — or worse.

4. The fans got what was coming to them.

Fan etiquette in American sports is deteriorating at an alarming pace. Sometimes it’s just the small stuff like walking in front of someone while play is going one; that one really pisses me off. Wait for a dead ball! Or the guy that makes a super human effort to take away a foul ball or thrown T-shirt from a woman or a child. Not to sound preachy, but I caught a T-shirt at the Sacramento State basketball game tonight and without a second thought handed it to the lovely woman seated next to me.

People could really stand to exercise more etiquette at ball games, it makes everything run smoother and more enjoyably.

I would come down a little harder on the Pacers players if this were an isolated incident. Coincidentally while attending a Pacers-Warriors game in Oakland last March I witnessed O’Neal get no fewer than three bottles thrown at him after he was scuffling with one of the Warriors players. He was eventually ejected from that game, more for his safety than anything else.

Maybe I just don’t understand. Maybe it’s me. Or maybe it’s the larger-than-life league bowler seated next to me trying to live vicariously through his chosen team to make up for his own adolescent athletic failures.

By the way, that guy is also drunk.

That guy rambles on and on about how another player is killing, “us” like he’s a member of the team. That guy was probably the same idiot that threw his cellular phone at Carl Everett at an A’s game in Oakland a couple years back, again, a game I happened to be at. I promise you it’s not me; I have more respect for what these guys do even if they’re killing, “us.”

That guy also bears a striking resemblance to the fans in Chicago that attacked Royals first base coach Tom Gamboa a few years back and that idiot in Philadelphia that climbed into the sin bin to go a round with Tie Domi in 2001. He might even be related to the guy at Sac State that hit Idaho State forward and Citrus Heights native Sale’ Key in the head with a Gatorade bottle at last year’s infamous blackout game.

When a player is assaulted physically I don’t care how much they are being paid — it’s not to take abuse, it’s about market value — he has every right to defend himself. Some do as in the case of Artest and Domi and some don’t, but just because it hasn’t happened much it doesn’t give fans the right to peg them.

In arguing on behalf of the players I’m not calling into question what Stern did in levying such heavy punishments — he did what he had to do. The NBA or any other pro sports organization can’t have players turning vigilante on a nightly basis. In handing down those suspensions the commissioner set a precedent and sent a message to the players in his league. Play nice.

And the players in his league sent a message not only to basketball fans but fans of sporting events everywhere Friday night. Play nice.

Contact John Parker via email at [email protected]