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Earlier today Matt Watson showed you the vicious elbow that Renaldo Balkman threw to the face of Sasha Vujacic. Believe it or not, this wasn't called a flagrant foul at the time, but the league looked at the play today and dropped a one-game suspension on Renaldo for the needlessly violent act.

Balkman was assessed the foul for throwing an elbow that hit Vujacic in the jaw in the second quarter of the Lakers' 120-109 win Tuesday. Besides the suspension, Balkman was assessed a flagrant foul, penalty two, NBA executive vice president Stu Jackson said in a press release Wednesday.

So the league office saw that it was a flagrant two -- which would have resulted in an immediate ejection -- but the refs in the arena saw it as a run-of-the-mill offensive foul? Please. But this isn't the first time that Sasha has been the victim of violence on the court this season. In a blowout win over the Nuggets, Carmelo Anthony had had enough of Sasha, and went as far as to choke him near the end of the game. What is it about Sasha that drives the opposing team to violence?

I think it's a combination of things. First and foremost, Sasha is considered a one-dimensional, BS player by most of his peers. He's there for his outside shooting ability, and not much else. But defensively, he plays the up-close type of physical D that most players aren't that fond of. So they're like, "who is this fool?" and then they elbow him in the face. It's also not helping his cause that he's a pretty-boy Euro with long hair, and doesn't exactly have the look of a legitimate NBA baller. So if you're Carmelo or Balkman you probably get tired of looking at him real quick, especially if he's all up on you and your team's on the losing end of things.

All of this though, I'm sure, is just fine by Sasha. I'm not saying he enjoys being elbowed in the face, but if he's driving his opponents to do this, it means he's doing something right. It means his defense and shooting is getting under their skin, and after a career-high five three pointers in beating the Knicks, I would say that the flagrant from Balkman did something to pump him up a little, too.