Casualty of the lockout: Officiating

[kozlodoev]

I don't think the league is fixed. Many of the refs are simply incompetent and/or too old, and the most arrogant man on earth, David Stern, will never admit this and get rid of the incompetent refs. Then you have the star treatment, which has been around forever.

hit the nail on the head

What was it, "never suspect a conspiracy where simple stupidity will do".

Yep. Why he chose to give Joey Crawford his job back is beyond me. It's not like he is actually a good ref and he's broken the law and NBA rules.

I am ambivalent on Crawford. I don't think he's that bad of a referee, but he will let grudges get in the way of good reasoning.

[FLCeltsFan]

When reading comments on boards, if both sides are complaining about the bad calls, I know that the refs are horrible but at least calling it even. That's usually the case.  But if one side is complaining about the calls going against them and the other team's fans are agreeing that the refs are screwing the other team, then you know that the refs are obviously biased and making calls one sided.   Last night, the Heat players were commenting on how many bad calls went against the Celtics.  The TNT commentators were also commenting about the bad calls.  Even Dan Crawford couldn't take it any more and reversed one of the Crypt Keeper's calls against the Celtics. 

In cases like this, the refs aren't just bad,  they are biased and and something crooked is going on.  If they are just bad, the bad calls go both ways.  That hasn't been true in the Celtics first two games.  The bad calls have mostly gone one way. 

[RebusRankin]

Vinnie, do you think they try to influence games, series etc with the refs? I think they do. I'm asking seriously.

[Finkelskyhook]

I don't think the league is fixed. Many of the refs are simply incompetent and/or too old, and the most arrogant man on earth, David Stern, will never admit this and get rid of the incompetent refs. Then you have the star treatment, which has been around forever.

hit the nail on the head

What was it, "never suspect a conspiracy where simple stupidity will do".

Yep. Why he chose to give Joey Crawford his job back is beyond me. It's not like he is actually a good ref and he's broken the law and NBA rules.

I am ambivalent on Crawford. I don't think he's that bad of a referee, but he will let grudges get in the way of good reasoning.

Respectfully, a good referee wouldn't let grudges get in the way.  The rulebook is the rulebook.  Of course, in the NBA, there's about a half dozen rulebooks.

[wiley]

The NBA game continues to suffer with far too many stoppages.

I think some of the higher ups are totally blind to the concept of game flow...their minds are in other places.

The refs get a certain number of calls right and a certain number wrong.  The number wrong that can be described as phantom calls continues to be a much too high percentage of these wrong calls, verses non-calls. 

The game will remain stagnant (occasionally unwatchable) until the powers that be remember the point of basketball is not to watch people standing around....

[Jon]

I don't think the league is fixed. Many of the refs are simply incompetent and/or too old, and the most arrogant man on earth, David Stern, will never admit this and get rid of the incompetent refs. Then you have the star treatment, which has been around forever.

hit the nail on the head

What was it, "never suspect a conspiracy where simple stupidity will do".

Yep. Why he chose to give Joey Crawford his job back is beyond me. It's not like he is actually a good ref and he's broken the law and NBA rules.

I am ambivalent on Crawford. I don't think he's that bad of a referee, but he will let grudges get in the way of good reasoning.

Respectfully, a good referee wouldn't let grudges get in the way.  The rulebook is the rulebook.  Of course, in the NBA, there's about a half dozen rulebooks.

True.  And my larger point is that after the tax evasion issue and the Tim Duncan issue, I don't understand why Stern gave him his job back. 

It's one thing to let the personal grudge thing go (as crazy as that is), but Stern had two easy reasons to fire him that no one would question and didn't.  I don't get it. 

[ballin]

The refs really need to be instructed to just "let em play."

Here's why:

1. First of all, as has been pointed out, fans don't like game stoppages. It makes it boring for fans and kills the energy of the crowd watching the game.

2. Let's say refs make a mistake on 10% of all calls they make. If they make 100 calls a game, hypothetically, then they will make 10 incorrect calls. However, if you let the players play and only call 10 calls a game, they would be expected to only make a single mistake and they would therefore have a much smaller negative effect on the game.

3. I would also suggest by "letting them play" refs would reduce the percentage of incorrect calls that they make. If you're calling every ticky tack foul, you're relying on your eyes to perceive minuscule events happening at high speeds and attempting to determine their impact. Now, if you ignored those types of ticky tack fouls and instead focused on the obvious ones, you would be much less likely to get things wrong since you'll only blow the whistle when the violation is obvious.

4. Lastly, flopping would be hugely discouraged by letting the players play. The reason is this: flopping creates the optical illusion that a ticky tack foul was committed. It works for ticky tack fouls because, if a hard foul was committed, 1) there is no reason to flop 2) it's impossible to fake genuinely hard contact, like Barea getting leveled by Bynum. So if you ignore ticky tack fouls, you ignore flopping. If flopping becomes ineffective, people will stop doing it.

[ballin]

The refs really need to be instructed to just "let em play."

Here's why:

1. First of all, as has been pointed out, fans don't like game stoppages. It makes it boring for fans and kills the energy of the crowd watching the game.

2. Let's say refs make a mistake on 10% of all calls they make. If they make 100 calls a game, hypothetically, then they will make 10 incorrect calls. However, if you let the players play and only call 10 calls a game, they would be expected to only make a single mistake and they would therefore have a much smaller negative effect on the game.

3. I would also suggest by "letting them play" refs would reduce the percentage of incorrect calls that they make. If you're calling every ticky tack foul, you're relying on your eyes to perceive minuscule events happening at high speeds and attempting to determine their impact. Now, if you ignored those types of ticky tack fouls and instead focused on the obvious ones, you would be much less likely to get things wrong since you'll only blow the whistle when the violation is flagrant.

4. Lastly, flopping would be hugely discouraged by letting the players play. The reason is this: flopping creates the optical illusion that a ticky tack foul was committed. It works for ticky tack fouls because, if a hard foul was committed, 1) there is no reason to flop 2) it's impossible to fake genuinely hard contact, like Barea getting leveled by Bynum. So if you ignore ticky tack fouls, you ignore flopping. If flopping becomes ineffective, people will stop doing it.

[jdpapa3]

Vinnie, do you think they try to influence games, series etc with the refs? I think they do. I'm asking seriously.

My thing here is, why do they wait until the day of the game to announce who the ref is going to be? Can't they eliminate a lot of the doubt if they pre-publish that info? My point is that I get the impression that certain "company men" are rolled out when they want to extend a series or to ensure a certain team advances.

[syfy9]

Taking my green goggles off, I noticed last night that the refs were making poor decisions on both teams.

Evidence was that Bass charge on Cole when it should have been a blocking foul, and another time where a Celtic (I think it was Bass) got a blocking foul and an and-1 opportunity even though it should have been a charge. I believe at first it was called as a charge, but was changed later. 

[CoachBo]

To be candid, one of the encouragements I took from the second half last night is Doc's willingness to go publicly on display with his reactions to calls.

I always believed the referees were my problem. I've been ejected before, and I had no hesitation whatsoever to take a T to a) get an audience with an official so I could b) remind him that I and the crowd knew exactly what he was up to.

You can't timidly stand by and watch things like that which has happened in the first two games. Told an official once, "Even it up or I'm going to make a public spectacle of you right here."

More often than not, it's effective. Referees, honesst or otherwise - and I've been told before a high school game, "Your undefeated season ends right here: - don't like to be publicly humiliated.

[Thruthelookingglass]

Between the lockout BS and the tragicly one-sided calls early in last night's game (hell, I didn't even see the 4th against the Knicks), I am afraid I'm done with the NBA for a while.*

I tune in for competition, not theater.  From what I've seen over the last couple seasons, I can't shake the belief that the referees are acting like directors enforcing the NBA season script.  It's back to college (and maybe some overseas) ball for me.  I'll willingly sacrifice talent for real competition.  Thank goodness the NBA isn't the only game in town.

* Don't worry, I'll still keep up with Celticsblog. 

[Jon]

To be candid, one of the encouragements I took from the second half last night is Doc's willingness to go publicly on display with his reactions to calls.

I always believed the referees were my problem. I've been ejected before, and I had no hesitation whatsoever to take a T to a) get an audience with an official so I could b) remind him that I and the crowd knew exactly what he was up to.

You can't timidly stand by and watch things like that which has happened in the first two games. Told an official once, "Even it up or I'm going to make a public spectacle of you right here."

More often than not, it's effective. Referees, honesst or otherwise - and I've been told before a high school game, "Your undefeated season ends right here: - don't like to be publicly humiliated.

I agree.  I would love to see Doc go public even more to the media and take some fines. 

Would it seem like whining?  Sure.  But if he went as far as to suggest a conspiracy theory, while people would laugh at first, the next time the C's played the Heat, people would pay attention and the refs might actually go out of their way to show that there wasn't one. 

Given the ridiculous calls that happened last night (some which were phantom and/or totally impossible (like when Bosh didn't have the ball or when LeBron had a "clear path" foul when he didn't even have the ball), I think he should. 

[twinbree]

You really think so? Bavetta and Crawford were their usual crappy selves. I didn't notice any difference from prior seasons. NBA officiating is a mess. And it's not going to get any better because our only chance for better officiating is to land one of the league's class pets. That or get a new commissioner who cares about putting out a quality product for fans.