Pacers Brawl With Fans During Pistons Game

By LARRY LAGE, AP Sports Writer

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. – Indiana’s Ron Artest and Stephen Jackson charged into the stands and fought with fans in the final minute of their game against the Detroit Pistons (news) on Friday night, and the brawl forced an early and ugly end to the Pacers’ 97-82 win.

Officials stopped the game with 45.9 seconds remaining after pushing and shoving between the teams spilled into the stands once fans got involved by throwing things at the players near the scorer’s table.

“It’s the ugliest thing I’ve seen as a coach or player,” said Pistons coach Larry Brown, who was in the middle of the confrontation, trying to break it up.

After several minutes of players fighting with fans in the stands, a chair, beer, ice, and popcorn were thrown at the Pacers as they made their way to the locker room in one of the scariest brawls in an NBA game.

“I felt like I was fighting for my life out there,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. “I’m sorry the game had to end this way.”

The Palace announcer said the game was being stopped and pleaded with fans not to throw things.

It all started when Detroit’s Ben Wallace went in for a layup and was fouled hard by Artest from behind.

Wallace wheeled around and pushed Artest in the face. The benches emptied and punches were thrown.

As the players continued shoving each other near center court and coaches tried to restore order, Artest sprawled out on his back on the scorer’s table, looking relaxed.

Just when it appeared tempers had died down, Artest was struck by a full cup thrown from the stands. He jumped up, and charged into the stands, throwing punches as he climbed over seats.

Fans were punching back, and Jackson and another teammate joined Artest in the melee.

“I was worried about Stephen Jackson and Artest, as silly as they were acting,” Brown said.

Security personnel and ushers tried to break up the fighting. Former Pistons player Rick Mahorn, who was seated courtside as a Detroit radio analyst, tried to stop the brawl in the stands.

“The police investigation is ongoing and that’s it,” said Pistons spokesman Matt Dobek, who refused to further comment .

Detroit’s Rasheed Wallace and Indiana’s David Harrison were also in or near the stands. Both were trying to break up the fights.

As the crowd roared, drinks and debris showered the court and the Pacers players covered their heads as they hustled through the runway leading to the locker room.

A man in a Pistons jersey approached Artest on the court with fists raised, shouting at him. Artest punched him in the face, knocking the man to the floor before leaving the court. Artest was pulled away, and the fan charged back. O’Neal stepped in and punched the man.

“The NBA is withholding comment until it can review the incident,” NBA spokesman Tim Frank said.

Players from both teams left without comment.

Quentin Richardson of the Phoenix Suns (news) watched the brawl on television.

“I have never seen a fight like that in a game since I was in high school,” he said. “Man, there are going to be some lawsuits. You don’t think some of those fans aren’t going to want some NBA money?”

Lamar Odom of the Lakers saw it for the first time as he was being interviewed:

“Whoooo. When you see things like that, just think about what it takes for NBA players to go into a crowd,” Odom said. “Sometimes fans get kind of out of hand, but it must have taken a lot for NBA players to go into a crowd and start a fight.”

Police prevented reporters from crossing the loading dock to get to Indiana’s locker room or the area where the Pacers’ bus was located.

“I’m just embarrassed for our league and disappointed for our young people to see that,” Brown said.

Before the contest was stopped, Artest had quite a game and the Pacers were dominating the defending NBA champions in their first meeting since the Eastern Conference finals.

jack bog + sk smith + just a girl

Rev. Tony Meets the Joke Man

Interview by tony pierce · Oct. 16, 1998 · Tabloid.net

Editor’s note: To inform his unique gospel, the Rev. Tony Pierce is a faithful — perhaps even fanatical — listener to the Howard Stern radio show. Some have even said that he has read two separate books about Mr. Stern. The following is Rev. Tony’s e-mail interview with Stern’s star joke-writer, Jackie Martling, who started the discussion off by saying: “First of all, anywhere you put my name, ‘The Joke Man’ has to be three separate words … Jackie ‘The Joke Man’ Martling.” He also gave typography recommendations, and an average of one plug per paragraph. If you’re looking for a foul-mouthed catalog behind-the-scenes trivia from the Howard Stern show, you’ve found it. If you’re not, well, here it is anyway.

Q. The Howard Stern Show appears to be a laid-back, spontaneous comedy show where a group of close friends tease each other and joke about celebrities. Other than the pre-taped bits, what do your duties as the “Head Writer” entail?

A. I’m on “The Howard Stern Show” for the entire duration every day, spontaneously writing notes that Howard sees on a television monitor, that he can either work into his conversation or not. The notes are punchlines that fit in with what he’s talking about, suggestions for a direction to take, questions for guests or callers, insults aimed at anyone in the room or in the newspaper or wherever … basically, whatever it takes to keep the show rolling and keep it funny.

Howard is absolutely brilliant alone. With me and Fred Norris both contributing, he’s the funniest and fastest thing that ever hit the airwaves.

Q. Now that you guys are in the new studio it looks like that it isn’t physically possible for you to pass your on-the-fly jokes to Howard by hand. Are you still sending him jokes? Is it done by computer?

A. In the old studio, for years I tossed the notes on the easel-like thing that holds the commercial copy and other crap. Now I place it under a television camera, and that is fed to a television monitor in front of Howard.

Q. Robin once said that you guys have meetings after the show. Is this true? How long do they last usually? What goes on in them usually?

A. After the show, we’ll usually stand around a few minutes and finish fucking with each other. Most days after the mikes are shut off I’ll say “Great show,” and they’ll all do my voice for a few minutes until they burn out. Once a week we have meetings with all of us, including the interns, to flush out ideas, but for the most part we communicate via IBM’s Lotus Notes program.

Q. Do you guys plan out a general sketch of the morning’s show the day before, or is it all pretty spontaneous?

A. We know who is coming in approximately when, or approximately when someone is going to call in, and Howard has a list of the zillion things we could get to. But what winds around all of that when is anybody’s guess on any day.

Q. Why is it that when E! shows your ad for your CD “Sgt. Pecker,” they censor out the “Pecker”? Since when is pecker a dirty word on TV, though it’s not on the radio?

A. That is the question of the decade. E! has a very strange morality, or whatever you’d call it. Personally, I think they look like idiots bleeping and covering an innocent word like “pecker.” That word is actually many people’s last name, look in any phone book. And in the dictionary, “pecker” is a chicken’s beak. But I got smart … I named my new CD “Hot Dogs & Donuts.” If they see the double entendre of that being too obvious and want to censor it, they can [**censored**].

Q. In no particular order, who are your top five comedians?

A. Red Skelton, The Marx Brothers, Redd Foxx, Rodney Dangerfield, Sam Kinison … and anybody who has the balls to do it.

Q. They always say that comedians are unhappy people, but it seems to me that between you, Fred, Gary, Robin and Howard, you lead the most happy, comfortable life, and you’re the only real comedian. How do you explain this?

A. I’ve got a beautiful wife, I drink like a bastard, and I love to smoke pot. Plus, I put up the best phony front. Fuck you and everyone you know.

Q. Do you think that pot will be legal in the next 25 years in America?

A. Yeah, I honestly do. The pot laws are ridiculous. But changing them takes so much effort, and potheads like to sit around and get stoned, not run around getting out the vote. You know, maybe it will be exactly like it is today in 25 years. I’ll still smoke pot, illegal or not. It grows. Fuck anybody who thinks it’s wrong.

Q. When Billy West was a regular on the show, were you ever intimidated by his humor? Did you feel like he was competition? Do you think he’ll ever be back as a regular?

A. I loved Billy, and I of course was never intimidated by his humor, because I wrote so much of what he was saying (as did Fred). Was I intimidated by his talent? Absolutely. The guy plays the guitar so well it’s uncomfortable for me to be in the same room as him when he plays. His fucking impressions are so dead-on it never failed to amaze me.

On the show, he was in no way competition in any form … he was simply another terrific piece to the puzzle. He added lots to the great whole of the show, and I have fond memories of when he was with us. Whether he’ll ever return, I have no idea, but I would welcome him with open arms. His “Jackie Puppet” riffs and his endless “haws” and other “Jackie” shots probably did as much for my popularity as it did for his and the show’s.

Jakie Martling’s new CD, “Hot Dogs and Donuts,” is published by Oglio. Ordering information can be found on Martling’s Web site, www.jokeland.com.

stern show on E! schedule + howard gives away 100s of sat boom boxes + king of all media.com

when we were in kindegarten at keeneyville school my mom said that they were all, tony you are bouncing off the walls, bob youre super shy, we will sit you two together.

somehow it worked and we were best friends from k-12. around 5th grade they gave the school kids aptitude tests and me and bob were at the top of the school. so to reward us they sent us to the back of the class and gave us different work to do than everyone else. i took this as punishment. bob didnt. i rebelled by doing the busy work as fast as i could so i could pay attention to what they were doing in the front of the class.

this only encouraged them. they gave us harder work. big whoop, it wasnt that hard and during my downtime i wrote little stories, drew little cartoons, folded them up and handed them to the girls.

in junior high a new girl showed up named dianne. they figured out that she deserved being in the back of the class with me and bob too. she loved it. difference between she and bob and i was she wasnt nerdy, she was hot and fun and the first Leader ive ever met. she would throw little 8th grade parties and make us all play spin the bottle and light as a feather and bloody mary.

she ended up getting her highschool diploma at 16.

bob passed all the AP classes in high school but since i didnt want to be in classrooms of nerds i intentionally answered as many questions wrong as possible so as to flunk these aptitude tests.

they werent buying it and stuck me in Advanced classes anyway, although i wasnt allowed into the AP ones. oh boo hoo i snickered.

the day after high school graduation i moved to los angeles.

bob went off to get an engineering degree at bradly but my grades were so bad from all the sabatoge that i had to go to junior college with all the stoners, rockers and punks of southern california.

exactly the sort of people that i loved.

when i transfered to uc santa barbara i found myself surrounded by hippies, i loved them. they poisoned me with lsd when i slept. they held my hand when i woke. they forced me to drink large quantites of every booze on campus. they made me listen to the grateful dead and go to several of the shows.

some of them even made beautiful love to me.

everything was fine. i was a year away from graduating when i was taking English 10, a class that did nothing for my english requirement as it was a poetry writing class that was taught by a little shorthaired woman who looked very much like emily dickinson. even wore old school dresses. i loved her immediately.

until she said, tony your writing is really great. how would you like to apply to get into the college of creative studies, which is another college here at ucsb but seperate?

i was being asked to sit in the back of the class again.

this time they were offerring up no grades, no tests, no finals, and full access to everything that grad students got: instant enrollment to any class on campus, full quarter library book priveleges, free pizza on fridays.

once i accepted i joined the daily nexus and my life was complete.

bob and i talked for several hours last night as it had been close to 100 years since we had talked last.

he told me how his wife let him name his son ryne sandberg, he told me how his work blocks the busblog from being viewed, he told me how one of our friends married right and is now a millionaire.

it was nice to talk about the old days.

what was hard was explaining why i never go back to illinois any more. not even for holidays. but hes a smart guy so i think he understood.

my problem is the past really bugs me. thats why it was almost impossible to compile the blook that im still trying to get published. i hate looking back. all i see are mistakes ive made. id much rather make new mistakes.

like doing everything i can to stay with the pack. like blogging instead of journalisming. like refusing ads. like taking the bus. like working at the xbi.

but as that famous fortune cookie once read

what you resist persists

and the cheerleaders keep trying to take me behind the velvet ropes

and one day i might take them up on it

but only if it leads to another nexus.

problem is you never know what’s behind the green door unless you leave where you are.

it will be called the Annas + something of flagrant‘s was just nominated + isou + jimh made that great header + six years ago i interviewed jackie the jokeman for tabloid