Altercation or Sucker Punch? Puhhleeez!!

I'm glad to see my exclamation point key is back at work. I tried to go easy on it to give it a little recovery time...not as much as Yao Ming's foot is going to require or Andrew Bynum's back, but then I don't change the rules for word processing as fans scream for more action on the keyboard...not like professional sports seems to do.
I'm seriously beginning to think that WWE is the only honest sport left: at least it admits to being "scripted." Everything I've seen lately in the sporting world has left me shaking my head more and more. Let's start with the Scott Walker/Aaron Ward dustup of the other day.
Now, you probably don't know who either of those guys is, but they are hockey players who, get this, HAD A FIGHT! Walker smacked Ward in the chops, Ward fell down, and now the NHL has fined Walker $2500 for the hit. I watched the replay: typical hockey fight--one guy grabs the other guy by the jersey and smacks him. The smackee falls down, and the fight is over. In showing his surprise at the hit by the NHL, Walker had this to say, "I thought I was in an altercation." Now, I don't watch hockey, but that would seem to indicate that there are degrees of fighting, with the "altercation" being an acceptable one. Let me repeat: this is hockey! People watch hockey for the same reason they watch NASCAR, UFC, MMA and rodeo: they know there is violence involved, and they cheer when it erupts...though not as much, maybe, as when fans throw octopi (pre-calamari)on the ice in Detroit.
Now, it seems we watch the NBA for the same reason. Since when are there three or four categories of fouls from the basic foul to the "hard foul" to the "technical one-shot foul" to the "Ron Artest, You Are Out of Here foul." Honestly, let me say this to the officials: Call the damn fouls in the first quarter, and you won't have all the ridiculaous crap going on late in the game. It's gotten so bad that in the Mavs/Nuggets game the other day, a player TRIED to foul Carmelo Anthony to keep him from shooting the ball, and the officials DID NOT CALL IT! (though later, the NBA office said it should have been called...Mavs lose by one).Throw Kobe Bryant out of a game and watch everybody take notice! That elbow that he smacked Artest in the head with didn't merit ejection? Oh yeah, and the semi-circle in front of the basket in which no fouls will be called...let's just mug a guy going to the rim! Honestly, this is getting ridiculous, but maybe not to the degree baseball has fallen.
Brian Wilson of the Giants is mad at Casey Blake of the Dodgers for mocking his game-ending gesture (OOOOOH!!!)which he adopted from some clothing line but says it's to "honor my father and my faith." Wilson, like so many pitchers (Joba and Papelbon may be the worst) has a demonstrative gesture he makes whenever he triumphs. Players point to the sky to thank God for letting them hit that big home run (God has THAT much time on His/Her hands to watch baseball?); everybody, it seems, has to say, "Look at me" whenever they do something they're getting paid a gazillion dollars to do. I don't get it. So now, there's a "feud" between teams because players get cocky: "He started it." "No, HE started it." Isn't winning and losing enough anymore? Childish.
Almost as childish as coming out of a retirement (begun one year too late) just to shove it in somebody else's face with a hated rival...and the media (like God--having little else to do) playing and replaying that story like it's the parting of the Red Sea.
And, sadly, I've devoted an entire blog and FAR too much time to giving the ego-driven figures of the sporting world MORE notice.
sigh.