"Untold: Malice at the Palace" Does Not Tell the Whole Story
The Netflix documentary "Untold: Malice at the Palace" purports to tell the "untold" story of perhaps one of the most "re-told" basketball events of the past two decades: the melee that took place on November 19, 2004 in the Palace of Auburn Hills after a "fan" named John Green threw a cup that hit Indiana Pacers forward Ron Artest, who jumped up from his reclining position on the scorer's table and bolted into the stands to confront the person who he thought had assaulted him (Artest's initial target was, in fact, not the person who had thrown the cup). Artest's teammate Stephen Jackson followed him into the stands, "fans" threw objects at players, players hit fans, and the NBA took a figurative black eye as players and fans attempted to inflict literal black eyes (and worse) against each other in a nationally televised game that featured a rematch of the 2004 Eastern Conference Finals.
NBA Commissioner David Stern swiftly suspended Artest for the remainder of the season plus the playoffs. Stern also suspended nine other players, most notably Pacers Jackson (30 games), Jermaine O'Neal (25 games, later reduced to 15), and Anthony Johnson (five games), plus Piston Ben Wallace (six games). Four other players were each suspended for one game. It has become popular in some quarters to say that Stern overreacted and issued punishments that were too harsh--the documentary takes that stance--while not addressing the bad behavior by Green that started the melee, as well as the bad behavior by other fans during the fracas. The only power that the NBA Commissioner has over fans is to have them thrown out and/or banned from arenas; it is up to the criminal justice system to impose penalties on fans for criminal conduct. Stern understood that--no matter how badly fans behave--if players go into the stands and get into altercations with fans this is very bad for the league for a whole host of reasons that any intelligent person should be able to comprehend without too much explanation. The NBA can and should do everything possible to protect players, but players are in no way deputized to enforce laws, nor do they have the right to impose vigilante justice.
John Green was eventually arrested, convicted of misdemeanor assault and battery and sentenced to 30 days in jail plus two years' probation. A "fan" named Bryant Jackson who threw a chair pleaded no contest to felony assault plus misdemeanor assault and battery, receiving a sentence of two years' probation plus being ordered to pay $6000 in restitution. Charlie Haddad, a "fan" who wandered onto the court seeking a confrontation with players--and who had a history of seeking such confrontations--received two years' probation, 100 hours of community service, and 10 straight weekends in a county work program.
The documentary glosses over this part, but Artest, Jackson, O'Neal, Johnson, and their teammate David Harrison each pleaded no contest to charges of misdemeanor assault and battery, and each received sentences of one year of probation and 60 hours of community service plus a $250 fine. The documentary portrays the players as a band of brothers engaging in self-defense against a horde of thousands of crazed fans, but self-defense is defined clearly under the law, and the actions of several of the players went far beyond that legal definition. Artest did not have to go barreling into the stands to "defend" himself. He was without question the victim of assault, but he was not being assaulted when he ran into the stands. He could have saved himself several million dollars in lost salary and endorsements had he stayed on the court.
O'Neal often says in reference to the Malice in the Palace, "What would you have done?" He is right that unless you are placed under the duress of those circumstances you do not know for sure how you would react--but the point that he misses is that, even if many other people might have reacted the same way that does not change the reality that there is a right/legal way to react and a wrong/illegal way to react.
Considering that O'Neal is one of the documentary's executive producers, it is perhaps not surprising that the documentary largely frames the incident and the aftermath in terms of how it affected his life. A significant portion of the documentary is devoted to telling the story of O'Neal's rise from poverty in South Carolina to generational wealth as an NBA player. O'Neal's story is inspiring--and a reminder of the kind of upward mobility available in the United States that exists in few other places around the world--but you don't need that much background material about O'Neal to understand the Malice in the Palace. Perhaps if this documentary had lasted 10 hours then it would make sense to provide deep background on all of the principal participants, but devoting so much time to O'Neal's life story did not leave nearly enough time to shed much new light on the Malice at the Palace.
Much interesting material was left on the cutting room floor, or never even sought in the first place. For example, Indiana Pacers' play by play announcer Mark Boyle had a front row seat for the drama. After the infamous cup infamously hit Artest in the chest, Boyle can be seen engaging in a futile effort to prevent Artest from going into the stands. Boyle suffered five broken vertebrae in his back. As Boyle wrote on Twitter regarding the documentary, "I was [as] involved in this as anyone, assuming you would consider five fractured vertebrae being involved, yet nobody producing this documentary reached out to me."
The documentary has no interview footage of then-Indiana Coach Rick Carlisle--who later led the Dallas Mavericks to the 2011 NBA title--and there is no footage featuring then-Detroit Coach Larry Brown, a Hall of Famer who is the only coach to win an NCAA Division I title (Kansas 1988) and an NBA title (Detroit 2004). It would have been interesting to hear their perspective. Even if you say that the documentary is meant to show the players' perspective, keep in mind that Carlisle is a former NBA player and Brown is a former ABA All-Star.
We do hear a lot from Artest, whose honesty and self-awareness are refreshing. He describes how at that stage of his life he was battling both anxiety and depression. As Artest put it, he was worried about the future, and upset about the present. He knew even at that time that he needed help, and he was under the care of mental health professionals who were trying to guide him toward ways to manage his mental illness and control his anger. The reason that Artest was lying on the scorer's table is that he had been counseled to withdraw physically and count to five whenever he felt like he was about to lash out; in the prior moments, he had committed a hard (and unnecessary) foul against Ben Wallace with the Pacers up 97-82 and less than a minute remaining in the fourth quarter. Wallace responded with a two-hand push to Artest, players from both teams squared off in classic "hold me back" stances, and the referees were sorting out how to proceed. Artest may have been well-intentioned when he lay down on the scorer's table, but doing so in an opposing arena was not a great idea, and it placed him in a much more exposed position than he would have been in if he had just sat on his team's bench. The referees and his teammates both failed to the extent that they did not remove him from his "resting spot" before trouble happened. This is in no way meant to exonerate Green, who is an idiot and a criminal, but deescalation should have been the order of the day. The referees should have promptly ejected Artest and Wallace, which would have not only been appropriate based on their actions but would have also enabled the teams to likely finish the game without further incidents.
Did you know or remember that Tim Donaghy, who soon became infamous for other reasons, was one of the three referees that night? Donaghy appears on camera in the documentary.
Stephen Jackson gets a lot of air time in the documentary, and almost every time he opens his mouth he reminds you that logical, analytical thinking is not his strong suit. Jackson is an antisemite and he seems to be confused about what he wants to be when (if?) he grows up: as Kwame Brown memorably put it, Jackson cannot decide if he is a gangster or a Black Lives Matter activist. O'Neal is the only player whose initial suspension was reduced on appeal, but Jackson defiantly states that he refused to show any remorse or say anything in his own defense. I don't know if Jackson's suspension would or should have been reduced, but that kind of shortsighted thinking is what led him into the stands (and a host of other negative situations throughout his life and career), costing him millions of dollars.
The documentary tantalizes the viewer with a promise that after you see "previously unseen" footage frame by frame your perspective on the night's events might change. The documentary does not deliver on that promise.
Here is what I saw and knew that night that I also saw during the documentary and still know today:
1) Nobody on the Pacers wanted any part of physically confronting Ben Wallace. If "Hold me back" were a person, his name would be Stephen Jackson. That, in turn, strongly suggests that Artest, Jackson and the others had the ability to hold themselves back--or be held back--from going into the stands, which changed the dynamic from one idiot criminal throwing a cup to a whole bunch of people reacting to the sight of large NBA players hitting normal-sized civilians.
2) Many of the Detroit fans behaved in a criminal and horrific manner. Every one of the people who threw things at the Pacers should have been banned for life from going to an NBA game.
3) I understand why O'Neal felt threatened in the midst of an out of control situation during which fans were on the court and also throwing things at players, but his description of his infamous sliding punch seems more than a little self-serving. After Haddad confronted Artest on the court, Anthony Johnson hit Haddad and then jumped on Haddad while Haddad was on the ground (that is why Johnson was not only suspended multiple games but also successfully prosecuted). O'Neal's version is that he saw Haddad hitting Johnson and thus he came running/sliding to Johnson's defense, but the footage clearly shows that Johnson went to the ground to hit an already fallen Haddad and not the other way around. Haddad did not belong on the court but it was not Johnson's job to subdue Haddad, who was in any case pretty well subdued by that point. If O'Neal had not slipped, the blow that he attempted to deliver would likely have caused serious if not fatal injuries to Haddad. O'Neal should have been gathering Johnson and the rest of his teammates together to head to the locker room. It is important to remember that not every fan acted like a raving lunatic, and not every Pacer decided to just randomly start punching people. Even in the midst of chaos, it is possible to at least attempt to utilize sound judgment.
4) Reggie Miller is perhaps the most sympathetic figure, at least among the players. The 2004-05 season was his last, best chance to win the NBA title, and that chance disappeared in a flurry of foolishness and criminality. I am not as convinced as some people are that the Pacers would have beaten the Pistons in a playoff series had the Malice at the Palace not happened--I think that the Pacers lacked focus and mental toughness, two shortcomings that were on display not only during the Malice at the Palace but also both before and after that seminal event--but it is clear that at full strength the Pacers posed a viable threat to the Pistons. Miller was no longer at the peak of his powers as a player, and he needed O'Neal, Artest, and Jackson to be the leaders/standard bearers, but those guys failed him (and themselves) colossally.
In short, the documentary did not show footage that I had not seen, nor did it change my overall impression of what happened.
By the end of the documentary, I had mixed feelings about O'Neal. The arc of the documentary is meant to portray O'Neal in heroic fashion. He has admirable qualities, and I respect the way that he rose out of adverse circumstances to be successful. He has expressed remorse for his actions, and he has said that he deserved to be punished. O'Neal admits that he failed as a leader to keep the team together and try to win a title for Miller.
However and as noted above, the documentary inaccurately portrays O'Neal's sliding punch, which was not a noble act of defending his teammate but rather an act of aggression against a fan who was on the ground and being hit by Johnson. Also, O'Neal states that the court system vindicated him at every turn after Stern issued the 25 game suspension, a claim that does not withstand careful scrutiny.
First, O'Neal pleaded no contest to two criminal charges. Vindication is acquittal, not a no contest plea.
Second, O'Neal was ordered to pay $1686.50 in restitution to Haddad. I have little sympathy for Haddad, but from a legal standpoint he was a victim of assault by both Johnson and O'Neal (Artest just shoved Haddad away but did not hit him; Artest got in trouble because of what he did when he went into the stands, not for his reaction to Haddad approaching him on the court).
Third, O'Neal's assertion that he won in federal district court misrepresents what happened. The judge most assuredly did not say that O'Neal's actions were justified; that was not, in fact, what the federal case was even about. After Stern suspended the players, the Players Association requested that an arbitrator independently review the penalties. The arbitrator determined that O'Neal's suspension should be reduced to 15 games--again, not a "vindication" of O'Neal, but just an assessment that the punishment should have been less severe. The NBA contended that this was an "on court" incident over which the NBA Commissioner has total authority that cannot be diminished by an arbitrator, while the Players Association argued that this was not an "on court" incident. Without getting into all of the labor law and arbitration law semantics, in layman's terms the federal district court judge agreed with the Players Association and thus held that the arbitrator could reduce O'Neal's suspension to 15 games.
So, in sum, while O'Neal spends the documentary claiming that the legal system vindicated and exonerated him, the reality is the opposite: he suffered a criminal penalty for his conduct, he paid a civil damage award, and an independent arbitrator determined that he deserved a 15 game suspension.
I am not saying that O'Neal is a bad guy. He comes across as infinitely more intelligent than Jackson (admittedly, that is a low bar to clear), and I believe that O'Neal is genuinely remorseful about the impact that his actions had on his team and his teammates in spite of his apparent denial of the extent to which he was in the wrong.
The point is that his telling of the "untold" story distorts the factual record, which is available for anyone to independently examine: watch the footage yourself and, if you are so inclined, look up the judicial proceedings and read them as well.
A final note concerns the use of the word "thug." The etymology of the word traces back to a group of robbers and assassins in India in the 1800s who strangled their victims before stealing their property. Journalists and commentators throw the word around a lot, often in reference to young Black people. I first realized how the word "thug" is received and understood in the Black community after I interviewed Warren Jabali, who deeply resented being called a "thug" in Terry Pluto's ABA oral history Loose Balls. Jabali readily admitted to me that he was wrong "and had no defense" for hitting and then stomping opposing player Jim Jarvis during an ABA game, but Jabali passionately insisted that he was not a thug but rather someone who resented things that had transpired and chose the wrong way to demonstrate that resentment. Talking to Jabali and learning his perspective helped me to understand that the word "thug" has a specific and deeply felt negative connotation in the Black community. The linguist John McWhorter has explained that "thug" has become a code word for the "N-word" but that many people do not realize this because they resist accepting that the meaning of a word is not fixed forever but rather evolves. What "thug" meant in India in 1830 (or even in this country 100 years later) is not what the word means or connotes now. The Pacer players were not/are not "thugs." It is not helpful or productive to categorize a whole group of people as "thugs." That being said, it is also not helpful when entertainers and celebrities promote any form of "thug culture" or "thug life," either.
What happened during The Malice at the Palace was not about "thuggish" players or a "thug" mentality in the NBA; it was a perfect storm of referees not deescalating a situation after a hard foul, fans engaging in criminal behavior, and several players overreacting under adverse conditions.
Labels: Anthony Johnson, Ben Wallace, Detroit Pistons, Indiana Pacers, Jermaine O'Neal, Malice at the Palace, Reggie Miller, Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson, Tim Donaghy
posted by David Friedman @ 12:46 AM
