NBA fighting is back and Scotty Pippen Jr. was 100% justified in attacking Myron Gardner

Nobody asked for NBA fighting to make a comeback in 2026 but here we are and the people have spoken and the people are into it.

We’ve already had Mark Williams and Jose Alvarado actually exchanging punches, which was a perfectly acceptable opening act. Then the Hornets and Pistons gave us a full scale brawl earlier this month that had players racking up multi-game suspensions and Twitter completely losing its mind for 48 hours straight.

The “HOLD ME BACK” era of NBA conflict, where two guys square up, get immediately separated, and spend the next three minutes talking trash from fifteen feet apart, appears to be over. These guys are actually fighting. It’s a little jarring. It’s also great television.

Saturday night’s entry into the 2026 NBA Fight Season came courtesy of the Grizzlies and Heat, specifically Scotty Pippen Jr. and Myron Gardner, and this one had a pretty clear villain from the jump.

Grizzlies and Heat: Scotty Pippen Jr. and Myron Gardner

Here's video of the fight between Scotty Pippen Jr. and Myron Gardner (with replays) pic.twitter.com/hNfOBHYRyY

— eric (@EricTweetsNBA) February 22, 2026

Gardner ran up from behind and leveled Pippen Jr. with a blind side hit that had absolutely no place in a basketball game. No play on the ball, no warning, just a full speed collision into someone who had no idea it was coming.

That’s not basketball, that’s a personal injury lawsuit waiting to happen.

Markieff Morris missed four months back in 2021 after Nikola Jokic hit him from behind in almost the exact same fashion. These plays look reckless because they are reckless and the refs completely whiffed on the call in real time.

If you’re calling that foul when it happens, which you should be because it is extremely obvious, Pippen Jr. never has to do what he did next.

But the refs didn’t call it, so Pippen Jr. took matters into his own hands. Got up, ran the length of the floor with purpose, found Gardner in the corner and made his feelings known clearly and immediately.

No NBA theatrics, no posturing. Just a guy who got hit from behind and wasn’t going to let it go unaddressed. Respect the decisiveness.

It spilled toward the crowd a bit, which the league office is going to love as much as a root canal, and there are definitely suspensions coming. The Grizzlies are not exactly in a playoff race right now so the timing could be worse. You eat the games and move on.

The bigger picture here is that the NBA has quietly stumbled into one of its more entertaining side narratives of the season and it has nothing to do with standings or MVP races. Guys are out here actually fighting and it turns out people like watching that.

Who could have seen it coming.

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