Marcus Smart Suspended Three Games For Punching Charles Bassey, And It Costs Him $125,462

Marcus Smart in his Houston Rockets jersey© Instagram/@youngamechanger

Marcus Smart will miss three games after the NBA suspended the Houston Rockets guard without pay for throwing a punch at Golden State Warriors big man Charles Bassey. The punch came late in the third quarter of Wednesday's 115-108 Rockets win and grazed Bassey's nose. Smart was given a Flagrant 2 foul and ejected. He begins serving the ban on Friday against the Jazz, and it will cost him about $125,462 in salary.

The punch, the ejection and the suspension

Smart and Bassey got tangled under the basket during a rebound battle. Smart then chased Bassey toward the top of the key, and the two went chest to chest. Yaxel Lendeborg tried to separate them before Smart swung a right hand that brushed Bassey's nose. Officials reviewed the play and called it a Flagrant 2, which brings an automatic ejection. Crew chief Mitchell Ervin said the call was for “contact to the nose.”

James Jones, the NBA's head of basketball operations, announced the ban on Thursday. Smart will sit out Friday's home game against Utah, then Sunday at Washington and Monday at Miami. The Friday game also counts toward the NBA Cup.

Bassey did not hold back afterward. “It didn't surprise me. I knew he was going to do something,” he said. “I don't think he was trying to play. I think he was trying to get himself out of the game. ... That was fake, fake toughness.” Rockets coach Ime Udoka said Smart felt challenged, and that after the two tangled up, Bassey told him, “What you gonna do?” Eurohoops reports that Udoka said Smart reacted after Bassey bent his injured elbow during the rebound fight, while Bassey admitted he provoked the swing.

This is not new for Smart. He was suspended one game in 2015 for hitting Matt Bonner in the groin and another in 2021 for threatening language toward an official. He has also been fined at least 12 other times, including $50,000 for shoving Joel Embiid in 2019.

A small financial silver lining for Houston

The Rockets are not hurt much on the books. ESPN's Bobby Marks said Houston gets a tax variance credit of $62,731, which is half of what Smart forfeits. Before the suspension, the Rockets were just $14,077 under the luxury tax. The credit lifts that cushion to $76,808.

That matters because Houston paid the tax last year and wants to get under the line and reset its repeater-tax clock. The extra room could help when filling the last roster spot or in trade talks near the deadline.

On the court, the loss still stings. Smart signed with Houston as a free agent this summer and is averaging 8.6 points, 2.6 rebounds and 1.1 steals in nine games. The Rockets are 9-3 and third in the West.