Ejections, by design, tend to come late in games. It takes players time to accumulate six personal fouls, and while the technical foul path is numerically shorter (with only two as the threshold), it typically takes quite a few injustices to anger a player enough to draw them. First-quarter ejections come once in a blue moon. First two-minute ejections? Those are practically unheard of. 

But it happened in Friday’s game between the Washington Wizards and Portland Trail Blazers. Isaiah Thomas got into a bit of scuffle that ended with him making contact with referee Marat Kogut, triggering an ejection. 

As far as instantaneous ejections go, this is about as tame as it gets. If anything, Thomas seems to stumble backward inadvertently because of his scuffle with Carmelo Anthony and Damian Lillard. Where the ejection likely comes is in the extension of his arm, which could be viewed as a hostile or aggressive act towards the referee. On subsequent viewings, though, it looks more like Thomas is just trying to stabilize himself. 

The idea of Thomas being angry enough with a call to attack a referee less than two minutes into a game seems pretty farfetched, but the NBA has little tolerance for contact with officials. Setting a precedent that any contact leads to an ejection helps prevent the sort of meaningful contact that could come if lesser infractions weren’t policed. And so, Thomas wound up earning one of the lightest and quickest ejections you’ll ever see.