Punks apparently playing 'knockout game' wallop wrong victim — a retired NYPD officer who doesn't go down: 'They were all running for their lives'

A group of males apparently playing the notorious "knockout game" — in which unsuspecting individuals are sucker-punched in public as the deed is recorded on video — definitely picked the wrong victim Tuesday in Brooklyn's Brighton Beach neighborhood.

The guy they walloped from behind is 66-year-old Harvey Kraft, a retired New York City police officer who was shopping for a sweatshirt on Brighton Beach Avenue, WCBS-TV reported.

Image source: YouTube screenshot

Except Kraft didn't fall to the pavement as the punks likely expected.

What are the details?

"It was one o'clock in the afternoon. Broad daylight, crowded street. It was just something you don't expect," Kraft told WCBS.

Kraft's back was facing the street when police said a group of males attacked him — with one delivering a vicious punch to his head from behind, the station said.

"They hit me in the temple," Kraft recounted to WCBS. "But I could tell it was a full impact, roundhouse blow, because it felt like a brick."

Image source: YouTube screenshot

You'd think most anyone, particularly someone his age, would've dropped like a brick — but this former cop, who's almost certainly faced down scarier perps during his 20 years on the job, wasn't about to.

“I just absorbed it," Kraft told the New York Daily News. "They were still standing there. ... They were prepared to see me go down.”

He added to WCBS that "as soon as they saw I wasn't knocked out, and I pursued them, they were all running for their lives. Not that I'm a Superman, but I'm just glad it wasn't an individual or someone that would've been seriously hurt."

What happened next?

Video shows Kraft chasing after his alleged attackers, who got away. Video also shows two of the alleged assailants walking down a sidewalk prior to the punch.

Image source: YouTube screenshot

He was treated at the scene and declined to go to a hospital, the Daily News said, adding that after giving a statement to police, he asked officers to drop him off at a coffee shop so he could finish his errands. Kraft retired from the NYPD in 2002, the paper noted.

Kraft is pretty sure his assailants were playing the knockout game because "they had their video cameras ready to record. They thought, I guess, it would be a jokey matter to put on YouTube or get some media publicity," WCBS reported.

However, "it’s no game,” Kraft added to the Daily News. “That does a disservice to anyone who’s attacked. ... I was just minding my business, then ‘bam.’ It shouldn’t be that way, obviously. I’m glad it wasn’t someone more elderly, frail. It looks like it was planned.”

Kraft told WCBS he wasn't carrying his gun at the time of the attack.

Anything else?

"I want to advise people that they have to be aware of their surroundings, and unfortunately, it's like you have to have two sets of eyes in front of your head and the back of your head," Kraft warned, according to the station.

WCBS said that those with information about the attack can call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782) — or they can confidentially submit a tip via their website or via DM on Twitter @NYPDTips.

Retired NYPD officer speaks out after sucker punch attackyoutu.be

This story has been updated.