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10 of the wildest brawls in sports history

From all of the countless fights that have happened throughout time in sports, only a few can be so high on a list. Here are 10 of the biggest brawls in various sports.

At the end of the day, it really is just a game. However, when stakes are high with championship aspirations and egos on the line, that old saying literally goes out the window. Some fights break out due to poor officiating when the player feels that they have to take action themselves.

Many times though these brawls could have been prevented. There’s nothing wrong with a good tough fight at times during a sporting event, but when fans get involved anything can happen. Here are 10 of the biggest brawls that are still talked about today.

Andre Johnson vs. Cortland Finnegan

Nothing went right for the Tennessee Titans during this game. Cortland Finnegan was a very talented cornerback that gave a lot of receivers trouble, but not on this day.

Finnegan was successful in getting under the skin of Houston Texans star wide receiver Andre Johnson, but it resulted in a beat down that will live on forever. To add insult to injury, the Titans got blown out 20-0 that day.

Ron Delorme vs. Jamie Macoun

How the heck was not one of these guys knocked out? It was nothing like today’s fights in professional sports in which you see one or both guys dancing around for a bit. The pain was brought when both gentlemen stood in front of one another with their fists held up.

There have been many memorable hockey fights over the years, and they are essentially rooted in the sport. Macoun and Delorme would have won the fight of the night with Macoun possibly taking him of the performance of the night bonus.

Seeing their smashed up faces afterward when they were being interviewed in the locker room showed the damage that both men took.

Myles Garrett vs. Mason Rudolph

Watching Mason Rudolph get whacked upside the head with his own helmet can be very entertaining, but this current ongoing case is not a good look for the NFL and everybody else involved. Just look at Antonio Brown right now after all those hits to the head.

Garrett claims that the motive for this vicious attack was due to Rudolph using a racial slur towards the star defensive end. Rudolph denies this claim and even filed a lawsuit.

It will be interesting to see how these two react to each other when they meet each other twice later in the 2020 season.

Braves vs. Padres

Come for the Jheri curls, stay for the brawls. This is the baseball version of malice at the palace. 13 ejections happened on this day and five arrests were made. Tensions began early in the second when Padres Ed Whitson threw a fastball at Pascual Perez behind his counterpart.

The fighting continued all game even after Whitson was ejected in the fourth. Fights flared in the dugout and a massive brawl would soon end on the mound. Nine players and four managers were ejected from the game. The senseless melee took a frightening turn though, when five fans threw beer at players and hopped over their seats to join in the action, that led to their arrests.

Kansas vs. Kansas State brawl

Brawls are rare in college basketball. There have been few over the years, but none get very far. On Jan. 22 of this year, Kansas player Silvio De Sousa forcefully made a huge block on K-State’s Dajuan Gordon, that knocked him down to the ground.

It wasn’t just the hard play that caused the ruckus though. Sousa stood over a fallen Gordon and talked his trash before this massive brawl spilled over to courtside. Punches were thrown, and at one point Sousa picked up a stool. Luckily he didn’t use it and tempers were settled. It was unlike anything seen in the Big 12 in recent memory.

Blue Jays vs. Rangers brawl

Jose Bautista already had several other guys calling him out for his bat flips after hitting homers during the season as most called it disrespectful.

Bautista’s controversial slide into Rougned Odor at second base caused a massive brawl between the Rangers and Blue Jays. Like many baseball fights, fist did not fly very long. If anything it was more pushing with guys being held back.

It was the punch heard around the league. Bautista bit off a little more than he could chew. He mouthed off at Odor, but Odor wasted no time shoving him then followed up with a hard right that sends Bautista’s hat and glasses flying off before the two were separated.

Aqib Talib vs. Michael Crabtree brawl

This was a brawl waiting to happen. Early in the 2017 season, the bad blood started between Aqib Talib and Michael Crabtree when the locker room trash talk ended up in the field and Talib got the best of Crabtree by yanking the gold chain off of his torso.

During the second meeting between the Raiders and Broncos, things did not end pretty as Talib was back to his old ways with Crabtree. Talib snatched the gold chain off again, but this time Crabtree drove Talib onto the floor and was able to land some punches in before the two were broken up.

Dodgers vs. Diamondbacks brawl

For the most part, this was your standard MLB game up until the sixth inning. Yasiel Puig was hit by Ian Kennedy’s pitch in the face that put him down for several minutes. The scary moment calmed for a bit when the Cuban was able to get up and head to first.

When it was the D-backs turn at bat, starting pitcher Zach Greinke held nothing back after he pummeled D-backs Miguel Montero that led to the first bench-clearing incident. No punches were thrown, but tempers flared between the two teams going forward.

Greinke would step up to the plate soon and was hit by Kennedy’s pitch on the shoulder and bounced off his shoulder. Usually, managers and coaches are the ones separating and calming down their players during fights, not on this day.

Dodgers manager Don Mattingly started hitting coach Mark McGwire and D-backs third base coach Matt Williams also got in the middle of all this chaos. This could have been prevented after Greinke hit Montero.

Barcelona vs. Athletico Madrid brawl

To make sense of the brutality during this game, Barcelona’s Diego Maradona had a lot of tension built up inside personally and on the field. He was coming back from nursing a broken ankle. Maradona was difficult for opposing teams to deal with, and because of this he was and his legs were targeted almost consistently during games.

Andoni Goikoetxea was successful in breaking Maradona’s ankle in a previous meeting between the two teams. This intense moment came after the final whistle of the 1984 Copa Del Rey final. Diego was given the Spanish gesture for “screw off,” that’s the nice way of saying it.

With Maradona already in a foul mood, it led him to leave the opposing player that gave him that horrible gesture on his backside. All hell would break loose literally as Maradona went on a spree of kicking and throwing flying knees at players. The signature of this brawl came when Maradona kicked the goalkeeper knocking him down then hit a Jorge Masvidal inspired knee from UFC 239, that left the goalie out cold.

That wasn’t it though, Maradona continued to kick and punch his way through other players with a few of his teammates also landing flying kicks on Athletico Madrid. Barcelona lost the game, but without a doubt won the war.

Pistons vs. Pacers brawl

Labeled as “Malice At the palace”, this frustrating game for Pistons fans and everybody else watching from home drew horrors with the following actions. The Pistons were already getting blown out in a pointless, game after taking a hard foul in the fourth quarter, Ben Wallace would go on to shove Ron Artest and the rest is history.

Ron Artest charged back at Wallace, but when a fan threw a beer at Artest, he did not expect an enraged defensive player of the year to go come charging at him and punch him in the face. Artest’s teammates Stephen Jackson and Jermaine O’Neal quickly jumped into the stands to separate the incident, but they ended up brawling within the stands.

Debris like beer, popcorn and trash were hurled at the players. It was one of the darkest days in NBA history indeed.

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