Smart and Orr: Both Are At Fault

Most people did not know who Marcus Smart was until Saturday night's Oklahoma State-Texas Tech game in Lubbock. Other than the Texas Tech faithful, nobody knew Jeff Orr, either.

But there is one thing we can say about the shoving incident: Both Smart and Orr were wrong for what they did. There is no innocent victim here.

First off, Smart was stupid for what he did. Without a doubt. Every athlete gets heckled and called terrible things. Even if Orr deserved to be shoved, you cannot put your hands on a fan. No matter what someone says to you, whether it was offensive or not.

Orr, on the other hand, is a man in his 50s, taunting a student athlete, like Smart, who is old enough to be his son. Orr is an alumnus of Texas Tech, and shows his support by making round trips from Waco to Red Raider basketball games each season. While many would not condemn Orr for being a big fan of his alma mater, he took it a step too far last night, video also shows a game back in 2010 when he made a not-so nice gesture towards a Texas A&M player that the cameras caught.

Jeff Orr is not the only middle-aged guy acting like this at a sporting event. There are Jeff Orr's in every arena, stadium and field in America. I witnessed it this weekend at the Peterson Event Center during the Pittsburgh-Virginia Tech game Saturday afternoon.

He has become a highlighted figure at Texas Tech games and the incident with Smart makes him a the poster child of fans who go a little too far in their fanaticism. It opens up that can worms that involves fan behavior at sporting events. Especially college ones. 

A middle aged man taunting athletes who are as young as 18?  I think most would expect a young guy like Smart to do what he did, but shouldn't Orr, the older, supposedly maturer one, know better than to provoke a student athlete?

Whether or not he called him a "piece of crap" according to the university or a racial slur as some out of the camp from Oklahoma State are claiming, Orr is the older of the two in the incident. Perhaps he should act like he is?

Smart is suspended three games and Orr will stay away from Lubbock for the rest of the season. That tells us that they both screwed up and neither of them deserve any real sympathy.