Throwing Basketballs at Kevin Garnett

I was planning on doing a piece today on Stuart Scott and exposing that he does not respect you, but again, that has to be tabled. I just want to make it clear that I'm not delaying it because I'm intimidated by ESPN ombudsman George Solomon or because I've had a change of heart. Things are still the same, Stuart Scott is still a fraud, and he still doesn't respect you, but I won't tell you why until Thursday. Today, there are more pressing needs to address for sports fans.

It's time to throw the basketball back at Kevin Garnett.

By now, surely most people have seen the highlight of Kevin Garnett throwing a basketball into the stands after getting called for a phantom charge. It drilled a fan squarely in the face and caused much grief for him and his family. It was surely the defining moment of his life, and now that man will never be the same. What may have been a careless act to Garnett has totally disrupted the life of a paying fan who did nothing to deserve this heinous act.

Am I over exaggerating it a bit? Absolutely. I thought it was fitting after the performance the fan put on. He looked stunned for a while, too stunned to attend to his crying daughter, and eventually was carried out on a gurney. There are several things with this whole situation that have me utterly confused.

First, the fan. No matter how hard the ball hit him, make no mistake, the hardest hit he took that night was to his self-respect, as he actually got on a gurney to be administered first aid. The guy was a little on the bigger side, so I have a hard time believing this was his first time being hit in the face with a ball. I'd wager a fair amount that he was hit in the face with a ball every single gym class he has participated in or witnessed.

Even if this is his first time being hit in the face with a ball, I still think he may have overreacted a tad. This isn't entirely bad for him, as I think he could have a chance to spin this into a reality TV show. The premise, like most reality TV, is simple: cameras follow him around to record his interactions with other people on a daily basis.

Imagine an elderly woman bumps into him on the subway: he responds with the blank, confused stare (as if the stranger just revealed she was his mother), eventually needing a wheelchair to be transported to a waiting ambulance. He bumps into a wall in his house, he gives it the blank, confused stare (as if the wall revealed it was really his mother), eventually needing a wheelchair to be transported to a waiting ambulance. His daughter gives him a hug and he responds with the blank, confused stare ... I think you can see where this is going.

Second, the daughter's incessant crying. I know it's traumatic seeing Kevin Garnett casually toss a ball in your father's general direction, only to see his slow reflexes allow the ball to hit him squarely in the face. I know that's embarrassing. I'm embarrassed, and I don't even know anything about this guy. Still, he looks like the type of guy who may have been in an embarrassing incident or two in his years, so his daughter (or whatever her relation was) should be used to it by now. Actually, I'm quite certain that she wasn't crying because of what happened to him, but that it was actually something that Garnett said.

Everyone seems to accept he apologized, but why take his word for it? You can only really see him walk up to the guy and the daughter and say a few words — he could've been saying anything. My theory is Garnett didn't walk up to them to apologize — he was simply looking to add insult to injury and told the little girl one of two things that could produce the amount of tears the girl had — that Santa Claus is fake or that Clay Aiken is gay. Make no mistake, those tears had nothing to do with the old guy that got hit in the face with the basketball.

I imagine that Commissioner David Stern's office is working on something right now to make the girl feel better. It will probably be something along the lines of an NBA executive stopping by her house to deliver an assortment of balloons. Of course, the employee would then have to immediately pop all of the balloons so the little girl can learn a valuable lesson — David Stern has the power to bring happiness, but can take it away at the drop of a hat.

I'm still in shock over this whole situation. I think the reason Kevin Garnett feels so terrible about this is because of the hit the male sex took from this fan's embarrassing move. Personally, after spending several years as a wrestling fan, I thought he was a plant. I was expecting the gurney to get near the tunnel, and then for the fan to heroically rise up and limp back to the playing surface. The crowd would erupt at this courageous feat, Jim Ross would lose control over all of his bodily functions, and then this fan would sneak up on an oblivious Kevin Garnett and extract his revenge with a folding chair shot to the head. He would then leave the arena to the thunderous cheers from the rest of the arena. Unfortunately, it didn't play out that way.

Even if the guy acted like a complete and utter tool, what Garnett did is wrong. It's about time that players are held responsible for their actions. I don't think fans should be able to sue players for thousands and thousands of dollars, but they deserve justice. They shouldn't have to cheer in fear that Garnett will get fed up with officiating and throw a ball at them, or that Kenyon Martin will dispatch members of his posse to "deal" with his hecklers.

The simple way for sports fans to get this justice is to adhere to the rules established by an 18th century B.C. Babylonian king by the name of Hammurabi. Garnett did apologize, which was kind of him, but the only way to make things right here is if the fan gets the chance to throw a ball at Kevin Garnett. The fan only gets one shot to hit him, from the same distance, if he misses, too bad (after all, Garnett was able to hit him in one attempt, it's not like he was throwing balls at the fan all night long). An eye for an eye, or in this case, a throw for a throw.

This would be applied to any incident where athletes overstepped their bounds and affected sports fans. Kenyon Martin sends someone to rough up a heckler? The heckler gets to pick someone from his posse to rough up Kenyon Martin. If this sounds extreme, it's because it is. Frankly, fines and suspensions just won't get through to players with an abundance of cash and an indifference to playing.

They will think twice, however, if they know the victims of their tantrums and outburst would get the shot to knock them down a peg. It's one thing to pay a fine and move on, it's an entirely different matter when the highlight of an average fan pelting an athlete in the face with a basketball becomes America's favorite download. The entire process would be so demeaning to an athlete that fans everywhere could take comfort in heckling players and ignoring courtside action at games.

The next time a Garnett or any other athlete makes the fan a target of their outburst, there's only one fair thing to do — throw the ball back.

The Sports Gospel According to Mark is sponsored by BetOnSports.com. BetOnSports.com gives you the greatest sports action to bet on. Wager on football, cricket, boxing, rugby, horse racing, and more. Mark Chalifoux is also a weekly columnist for SportsFan Magazine. His columns appear every Tuesday and Thursday on Sports Central. You can e-mail Mark at [email protected].