The elbow that Rondo threw at Hinrich didn’t connect with Hinrich. So he shouldn’t be suspended or ejected. I looked at the Hinrich/Rondo incident again and it really wasn’t that serious.
However, Melo was suspended for a long time b/c he escalated the situation even more. It’s not b/c Melo isn’t liked by the league. That’s poor logic. If you remember the incident, Nate and JR Smith were going at it and they were both being separated. Then Melo swooped in after the situation was becoming calm and sucker punched Mardy in the face. It wasn’t one measly punch. It was a pretty huge punch actually.