Austin Seferian-Jenkins punched by a fan following 2012 Apple Cup

We're going to run through this from the top now that we've looked at multiple videos, slowed things down and blown them up. Thanks to Mark's sleuthing and a quick check of a few things, we know the player being punched by a fan in the video posted earlier is Austin Seferian-Jenkins. He was on the field for the final field goal of the Apple Cup and is pretty recognizable anyway.

There's a second video, but this one just misses the punch.

Since the whole incident has blown up, we'll run down what happened as best we can. First, the GIF again:

That should make it perfectly clear where the incident happens. The question is why in the world a fan threw a punch at Seferian-Jenkins following the game. That's something we can't really answer, though, beyond pointing out the stupidity of the act. It looks like Seferian-Jenkins bumps into the woman running onto the field a second or so before he was punched. Seferian-Jenkins was looking forward and the woman appeared to have her head turned in a different direction. It actually looks like he reaches out to catch her.

Moments later, it appears two fans converge on him. Enhance...

This is the same GIF, slowed down and blown up. The man in the dark jacket comes out of nowhere and swings with his right arm. At the same time, there's someone in front of Seferian-Jenkins and I can't tell what they're doing. Either way, the fan in the dark jacket came out of nowhere with a sucker-punch to the face of Seferian-Jenkins -- a punch that came as the Washington tight end was looking away.

And you know what? It doesn't matter if Seferian-Jenkins was punched or shoved. Either way, this was absolutely stupid. The fan, or fans, took a moment of joy and jubilation and turned it into a awful incident. This shifts the way the Apple Cup is framed. It turns the narrative into "WSU has bad fans" again.

That's a damn shame. On Friday, you had a team that never gave up and fought back, as well as a ton of great storylines. But thanks to a couple idiots, this is what people will be talking about.

Rushing the field is fun -- a moment that fans and players can bond and share in joy. It's also dangerous. Mixing fans, alcohol and angry players is a bad combination, and it's a wonder this doesn't happen even more. It's a problem, especially when incidents like these happen.

If you know who threw the punch, tell someone. Tell us, or let the proper authorities know. There's absolutely no reason to punch a player, and there should be consequences.