Maybe Artest isn't THAT bad--

[rotationslim]

Count your blessings.. be glad that you don't ref overseas-- Artest would be a choir-boy over there, apperantly:

(I thought we, the US, was the center of all bad things in the world... maybe not)

From today's (11-29-04) Detroit News:

Overseas fighting

wilder than in NBA

Though the American sporting public was shocked and disgusted by the fight between players and fans at The Palace, those who have played basketball overseas say they have seen much worse.

Cavaliers guard Jeff McInnis said he spent a season in Greece that he will never forget. He said fans threw so many objects at players during games that teams had to sit in a courtside dugout, similar to what baseball teams occupy.

"I saw a fan die at a game," McInnis said. "The fans were fighting, and this guy got trampled and had a heart attack and died. In those games overseas, fans would throw things and threaten you. Fans would heat coins with a lighter and then throw it at you."

Another Cavaliers guard, Sasha Pavlovic, said the events at The Palace were commonplace during games in his home country of Serbia-Montenegro.

"Every security guard in my country carries a machine gun because something always happens during every big game in my country," he said.