1 of 2 scenarios will no doubt happen.

1) Faced with the prospect of may and hammond leaving, clarkson will be reinstanted, following media focus on he and the guy he punched "settling their differences", and lots of reminding everyone that jeremy is on his last chance, again, this being either before the 2016 season starts or midway through when the BBC sees the impact of their choice on ratings/viewers/sales.

2) BBC stubbornly stand by their choice, may and hammond leave and are replaced with three new members who try to hard to be like clarkson may and hammond and fail miserably, because you cant force that dynamic, specials would be atrocious, ratings would plummet, program would eventually be scrapped, while clarkson hammond and may reunite for a new program on another channel.

What people don't seem to get is that clarksons role in Top Gear was much more than just being the silly old fat bloke cracking jokes, he put in the most work in organizing each show, the jokes, the puns, the planning, was virtually all clarksons roll, and in removing him even if may and hammond stayed, that portion of the show would be lost, and i think hammond and may are acutely aware of that, so their desire to continue, without clarksons input, all the while trying to shoehorn in a false dynamic with a new addition to the team would just fall short and miss the mark entirely.

tl;dr, if the BBC don't go back on their descision by mid 2016, Top Gear will be dead by 2017, and the three will most likely be hired by another channel to continue their antics, the very antics which made Top Gear what it is (or WAS) today.

He had to go to the hospital? Fucking hell...

he got a fist to his mouth... 

What? a quick x-ray to check out the jaw pretty standard, if you trip and sprain your ankle you go get an x-ray just in case you fractured it.

Clarkson should NOT have hit the producer, plain and simple, but I do think BBC had the opportunity to be a bit smarter about how they handled this situation, particularly since Oisin Tymon did not report the incident and was seemingly interested in working it out. After all he has as much or more to lose than Clarkson here.

It's absolutely the BBC's role to protect its staff, but personally I think the BBC could have left the decision with Oisin to determine whether he felt the incident should be classified as a fight or an assault, and then proceeded accordingly. A fight at work, although not preferable, is not the end of the world and happens in workplaces around the world every day without people losing their jobs.

If Oisin felt that Clarkson should be punished, then yes, the BBC would likely have been obliged to throw the book at him. On the other hand if Oisin was happy to see the issue amicably resolved, the BBC could still have leveraged the incident to impose whatever restrictions they deemed necessary in Clarkson's new contract. That would have allowed them to save face, Top Gear to stay intact and all those involved to keep their jobs.

The end result now is: Top Gear is living on borrowed time, BBC will soon be down 50 million/yr, Clarkson (along with probably Hammond and May) will successfully find work elsewhere and Oisin Tymon is production poison who will not find work with big talent ever again after his Top Gear role becomes no longer necessary. Nobody wins.

Fight implies violence from both parties. 

This would have to happen behind close doors. If Oisin was vocally responsible for Clarkson getting fired that would make his life a living hell, he's already getting death threats for simply being the victim.

The downside, my favorite show is pretty much over... :(

The upside, one less thing tying me to cable. Since it was the only BBC America show I watched.

The scenario I'm describing would certainly have been behind closed doors.  I feel sorry for the guy because with Clarkson being fired,  Oisin is very likely to be the biggest loser in this situation. The backlash fan is/will be horrible and when not directed at the BBC, it will be directed at him.

Christmas just won't be the same without the top gear special.