Whistles Aren't Made of Tinfoil, But Hats Can Be
Trying to remember when it was I came up with the NBA maxim "In case of tie, call goes to the player with the higher salary." I believe it was around 1973. David Stern was still in law school. There was no ESPN.Wailing about admittedly erratic pro basketball officiating is fine with me, as long as I don't have to listen to or read it, and as long as the wailers acknowledge the following truths of basketball history.
NBA refs have always given the home team the vast majority of breaks when making the calls, and that's been true since the first game the league played back in the 1940s. NBA refs have always given the star players the vast majority of breaks when making the calls and that too has been true since forever.
Those facts are deplorable. They are also immutable. So bitching that the officials have it in for YOUR team or are looking out for ITS opponent are foolish, especially in the playoffs. Surely your team will have some home games. If it doesn't have any stars, it has far deeper problems than the referees.
If a conspiracy deciding games in 2012 began back in 1947, then Stern shouldn't be commissioner. Dan Brown should.
PS: The best way to get a fan to stop complaining about NBA refs is to make them watch more college basketball. The officiating in the pros is often questionable. The officiating in college is not questionable at all -- it's comical.
posted by Michael Gee @ 3:03 PM
1 Comments:
And so on down the line. You haven't seen abysmal officiating until you see them ref 7th grade girls basketball. They just figure no one cares, so they don't have to either.
And of course my girls are *huge* basketball players. I won't last.
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