I always get kind of sad when this bothers people, because for me, Hutch's weird adorable campaign of pushing and tormenting is like, one of my favorite things about their friendship. He kind of reminds me of a kid punching his fist into his favorite baseball glove repeatedly to reassure himself that it's strong and sturdy and it's not about to fall apart on him. He has some kind of anxiety thing going on.

Anyway, I think an important thing to remember is that the second Starsky gets seriously upset over anything, Hutch drops all his superiorism and stuff immediately and is totally sweet and nice and gentle for as long as he needs to be.