Assault Charges Meted Out To NBA Players
Hockey Continues To Get Off Scott-Free

Looks like you've got your choice of maladies for professional sports these days. On the heels of baseball's steroid scandal, you've now got real, live NBA players, five Pacers in all facing midemeanor assault charges for their involvment in the November 19 brawl at the Palace of Auburn Hills, the Oakland Country district attorney's office announced Wednesday.

Jermaine O'Neal was charged with two counts of misdemeanor assault and battery while teammates Ron Artest, David Harrison, Stephen Jackson and Anthony Johnson were charged with one count apiece.

Apparently, in the absence of an NHL season, the NBA has to assume the mantle of being the brawling sport with athletes facing charges for assault at games but they needn't bother - look, even at the lower levels, a hockey mom and her daughter assaulted a player. Where's the outrage for that? Muted because they aren't spoilt billionaires with the tats to prove it?

The Pistons are allegedly happy about the charges being brought because they're tired of hearing about it and hope that filing charges will bring some sense of closure - what, before the trials even begin? This story isn't going away any time soon.

Palace president Tom Wilson said he doesn't feel that the incident is a reflection on the Pistons, the arena or the fans, and joked that it might have been just a case of cosmic revenge. Three teams owned by Bill Davidson - the Pistons, Shock and Tampa Bay Lightning - won league titles in a 10-month span of 2003-04.

"Maybe this was payback for winning three championships in a year," he said. "We've had 15 million people in this building, just for Pistons games, since it opened, and never had anything like this. It could have happened in any arena with the right guy throwing the right beverage at the right player."

Yeah, and look again, this stuff happens all the time in hockey, what's the big deal? Even in Montana, brawls break out in hockey arenas. 19-year-old Helena resident Jeremy M. Sanchez is facing a felony charge of assault with a weapon in connection with the incident along with misdemeanor assault. Where's the big headlines on that one?

Again, Mr Sanchez is not a spoilt billionaire athlete with the tats to prove it so he's relegated to the back pages.

In hockey, you've even got team owners get charged with assaulting linesman. Yeah, the owner!

"I hope someone will have learned something from all this," Danbury ice hockey fan Scott Britton Britton said. Danbury Trashers owner James Galante, 51, was accused of striking linesman James Harper, 39, in the visitor’s penalty box after the game. Galante was later charged with third-degree assault, a misdemeanor, and is expected to appear in court this week.

The team's nickname is "Trashers" - what can you expect?

Anyway, I agree with the Pistons. Enough hand-wringing about a lone incident, a single riot in one basketball arena. If people want to get indignant about violence in sports, they ought to train their focus on hockey, the most evil sport of all.