Last Saturday, the Oklahoma State men’s basketball team lost a conference matchup to Texas Tech 65-61. It was the Cowboys’ fifth loss in their last six games at the time. The team had been struggling and so had their star point guard and highly-touted NBA prospect Marcus Smart. 
But all of that was overshadowed by one incident late in the second half of the game. OSU made national headlines when Smart shoved one of the Texas Tech fans during the game. The fan he pushed was an older white man named Jeff Orr. 
Smart claimed after the game that Orr verbally assaulted him with a racial slur. However, Orr said in a statement that Smart was mistaken and that he called him a “piece of crap.” 
Orr insisted he never said anything racial toward Smart. After Smart initially accused Orr of using a racial slur, the majority of the world immediately assumed Orr used the N word. There were also rumors via Twitter that Orr told Smart to “Go back to Africa.” 
There is a video of the incident, and it pretty much validates what Orr said and not what Smart said. From the audio or from trying to read Orr’s lips, there is no evidence of any racial slurs being directed Smart’s way. 
However, at the end of the day, I believe the whole “What did Orr say?” conversation is extremely irrelevant. It simply does not matter what he said to Smart. He could have called him any of those three things, or even all three at the same time, and it still does not change the fact that Smart was 100 percent in the wrong. 
As an athlete, you cannot go around putting your hands on fans because you do not like what they said. Positive or negative, there are no rules prohibiting fans from trash-talking players. As a matter of fact, it is any fan’s first amendment right to do so. 
First of all, athletes simply have to be smarter than that. There are those who say, “Well, what about Orr? He should be punished.” My attitude is who cares about Orr? What Orr did goes on at just about every major basketball or football game in this country. 
Fans will try anything to get into the heads of an athlete. That is their goal when they say hurtful things. As an athlete, by getting mad and hitting one of them and getting yourself ejected and suspended, you just made that fan’s day. 
Guess what? Smart did not even hurt the man. He pushed Orr and then had to be restrained by his teammates, and the last images we saw of him were of him exiting the court furiously. 
Meanwhile, Orr stands up in the stands with a big grin on his face feeling mighty proud of himself. So, who do you think got the better of whom in that incident? This is why athletes must have thick skin and simply ignore negative fans. 
I have seen fans here at Mississippi State University try to do what Orr did to Smart. You should hear some of the things coming from our very own student section directed at Ole Miss guard Marshall Henderson. 
Athletes must understand they have so much more to lose than fans. At the end of the day, was Orr wrong for how he behaved? Absolutely. I do not want it to come across as if I am defending him. My point is simply it does not matter if he is wrong or not — what Smart did was worse. 
Smart is the one ESPN and all the other media outlets are still talking about. In June, when it is time for the NBA draft, the teams thinking about picking Smart will look back on this incident and talk only about Smart. 
In not one of those draft room discussions will the name James Orr come up. 
Smart lowered himself to that fan’s level, and he is way worse off for it than the fan is.