Another Pistons Fan Sues Pacers For Palace Brawl
September 14, 2006 by Angelo Fernandez
Filed under NBA Basketball
It seems like it was a long time ago that the brawl in the Palace of Auburn Hills in 2004 during the game between the Indiana Pacers and the Detroit Pistons took place. A lot has happened since that day. The players involved were given the necessary penalties and the man responsible for agitating Ron Artest to do what he did by throwing a platic cup of beer at him was convicted too. Ron Artest has moved on to the Sacramento Kings and Ben Wallace is now a Chicago Bull. Reggie Miller has retired and Larry Brown who was the Pistons coach at the time took on the Knciks coaching job and got fired from it a season later. So much has happened since that time it appears to have been out of everyone’s conscious memory. Until now…
It strikes me as strange to read the news that another Pistons fan is suing the Indiana Pacers and players Ron Artest and Stephen Jackson for the brawl just now. A Michael Ryan from Clarkson, Michigan claims that the two players assaulted him during the incident.
Ryan claims that when a fan threw a plastic cup of beer at Artest late in the Nov. 19, 2004, game, Artest mistakenly believed Ryan threw it. He alleges that the former Pacers forward charged into the stands and attacked him, soon joined by Jackson.
Just when things have seemed to clear up and the NBA teams and players are doing business as usual preparing for training camps that will open soon, the league and the people involved are given a reminder of that sad day in sports history. Hopefully everything will be cleared up as soon as possible so that the league can focus on dealing with the future instead of its past.
