The NBA is dealing with another confrontation between players as the Orlando Magic’s Arron Afflalo and the Minnesota Timberwolves’ Nemanja Bjelica got into a fight. In light of the recent altercation between the L.A. Clippers and Houston Rockets, the NBA removed clips of the incident from both the Magic’s and the Timberwolves’ League Pass streams.
This is certainly bad for the NBA’s image which markets itself better on a global scale than any major sport. You can see from the clip below that there’s a huge chunk of action that’s missing with the cut but the announcers still reference it.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BeCez5FBR5B/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=embed_legacy
Less than a day after the league had to investigate events following the Clippers and Rockets game, the NBA has to deal with Afflalo and Bjelica going at each other in the second quarter of their game.
WHOA. Afflalo threw a haymaker at Bjelica. Heavy suspension coming… pic.twitter.com/MAQ2MEidmp
— Dime (@DimeUPROXX) January 17, 2018
The video above shows Afflalo swinging hard at Bjelica during a loose ball as the Magic guard was preventing his opponent from getting in the lane. Bjelica pushed hard to escape Afflalo who didn’t appreciate the extra shove and decided to take a couple of roundhouse punches at the Timberwolves’ power forward.
Neither connected as the 6-foot-10 Yugoslavian was able to avoid contact. He then put Afflalo in a headlock to keep both of them from getting into a full-fledged boxing match.
As expected, the officials ejected both players from the game with a suspension and a possible fine likely to be handed to the Magic guard within the next day or two.
For Bjelica, the NBA might still punish him for taking a part in the incident though they have to investigate further whether he instigated the fight in a previous encounter.
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