Weekend Thoughts: Conspiracy?

by Dave on Jul 21, 2007 12:35 AM PDT in News

The Tim Donaghy scandal, which you can read about by clicking any number of diaries in the right sidebar, is sure to bring up nation-wide discussion of whether there are conspiracies in the NBA. We've all heard a hundred theories from the fix being in on Game 6 of the infamous Kings-Lakers series to the "cold envelope" caper in the Patrick Ewing lottery. It's a topic that comes up seriously every 2-3 years. It's unfortunate for the league but really they haven't done themselves any favors.

Here's the skinny as far as I can tell:

First of all, there is absolutely no organized fix in the works. You will never find a smoking gun memo. You will never hear tapes of any phone calls where David Stern tells Steve Javie to help the team from the major media market win. That's iron-clad. First of all, it would be a logistical nightmare. If there were an organized effort pretty much all of the referees would have to be in on it. If they weren't they'd at least know about it because one of their number would be making odd calls and not getting reprimanded. That's an enormous number of people to keep quiet over two decades. Somebody somewhere--retiree, disgruntled employee, or just some honest Joe--would have leaked the info by now. Second, if a fix were in effect it would almost have to have better results than this. The Spurs aren't exactly a ratings magnet. If they are trying to pre-determine outcomes either they stink at it or it's just not possible. Third, nobody in the league would actually take that risk. We're talking prison time and probably millions in damages if it ever came to light. David Stern and his cronies make way too much money to risk that. (As Paris Hilton proved recently rich people just hate going to jail.) Referees probably don't make enough money to risk it. A formal conspiracy simply...doesn't...exist.

That doesn't mean that bias is wholly absent, however. The most obvious example is the well-chronicled star system, which referees themselves have admitted following. Big names get the benefit of the calls. This favors major media markets because it's exponentially easier to become a big name in New York or L.A. than it is in Milwaukee. Besides the overt star system there's also the subliminal permeation of the "NBA culture". It's widely believed that the league does better when glamour teams with charismatic stars come to the fore. It's also true that the league has been marketed as an entertainment vehicle far more than a pure basketball vehicle in the last two decades. Referees are as aware as anyone of that ratings/marketing bias. They know that a call that keeps L.A. out of the next round is far more likely to be questioned by the fans, media, and league than a call that keeps Seattle out of the next round. They also know that in the long run they do better when the league does well. Neither of these biases guarantee anything, but they do mean that the Bucks are always going to have to work a little harder to get where they want to go than the Lakers will. Because they're there you don't really need a formal conspiracy. People being what they are the calls will probably favor the league's pet teams and players a reasonable percentage of the time. Everybody knows it. That's just the NBA.

In addition you have to factor in personal and corporate bias among the referees. Part of the Tim Donaghy story today was how borderline he had been in some of his off-court behavior. "Self-absorbed" and "unrestrained" would be a kind way to describe it. I don't think that's an isolated case among referees. In fact I think it's a prerequisite for the job that you're a little wacked. These guys are pretty much forced to always believe they're right. They're conditioned to accept no arguments. They're trained to ignore continuous insults thrown their way. Eventually that single-minded obsession with the supremacy of one's own view has to sink in. When it's coupled with an immense amount of power over the proceedings on the court you wonder why cases of vendetta-filled rogue referees aren't more prevalent than they are. They do exist. Nobody around here will ever forget the Jake O'Donnell-Buck Williams feud. I don't know what Mark Bryant did or said during his first season but he was blacklisted by the refs the entire rest of his career and it killed him. You do see personal agendas get in the way out there and it's very hard to weed that out of the game. The Donaghy case is an extreme example but there are plenty of smaller ones. How seriously the league takes those cases and how it deals with them are questions that need to be asked in light of this situation. It's pretty darn likely that something along these lines could have been surmised earlier...if not the specific gambling charges at least the fact that Donaghy was probably not an appropriate candidate for an NBA referee. Between legal protections, union protection, and the lack of suitable replacements the league may be between a rock and a hard place, but it still needs to address these issues.

The Donaghy scandal is going to be an enormous black eye for the league. I'd surmise it's going to lead to an amazing amount of scrutiny of referees' off-court behavior, especially related to gambling, but probably won't affect their on-court practices much at all. There might be one or two witch-hunt experiences where a particularly bad call is denounced but that's about it.

The biggest problem of all is going to be the same problem the league has always had: perception. If you took a poll of Americans asking which sports league is most likely to be crooked the NBA would win by a landslide. The above-mentioned biases open the door to those thoughts. The relative isolation of the league from its fans invites people through those doors. For the most part in the Stern era the NBA has been an elitist, detached, monolithic entity with little or no connection to, or response to, the average fan. It's natural for the average fan to wonder why. One possible answer is that you're just arrogant and don't particularly care about the little guy. Another is that you do care about reaching out but you're incompetent with your public relations. Those answers make it hard to remain a fan, however, so many people reach for option three: you're detached because you have something to hide. It's natural for every fan in every sport to think that some cosmic force is cursing their team when the team doesn't win. Because of the gap between the common guy and the NBA it's easy for fans to put a name to that mysterious, shadowed cosmic force: David Stern, the league, the refs. This scandal is going to be more grist for the mill.

There were probably a hundred things the league could have done differently in the last twenty years to lessen that perception but it chose to go a different way. The shoddy perception is a direct cost of the way the NBA has chosen to do business. Without the star system, without the Shaq and Kobe Lakers marketing, without the league's insistence on entertainment as the steak with basketball a small lump of green beans on the side, without the elitism, arrogance, flaunted wealth, and detachment this incident probably would have drawn a response of, "How horrible that ref did that!" much the same way the Pete Rose gambling incident was perceived in baseball. Instead this is going to be seen as one more piece of evidence that there's a systemic problem even though it's largely the actions of one man...a man who's apparently a nutcake at that. That's sad, but again...that's the NBA. The chickens are home, and it looks like they're roosting.

--Dave (blazersub@yahoo.com)

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Thanks

for that analysis. I'm glad you gave all those reasons for there not being a conspiracy. For some reason, Americans grasp at the thought of a conspiracy for just about anything ... perhaps an offshoot of the personal denial (it's always someone else's fault) - it's easier to believe in a conspiracy than in an individual or two going bad?

I hadn't thought of what kind of personality is necessary to be an NBA ref - that needed "single minded obsession." There can't be tough love, there can only be tough.

If you were given the comissioner's crown, what would be your first steps to remedy the biases? My first thoughts include a much bigger use of instant replays (multiple views) which might make the refs more accountable to the fans. Perhaps a 4th ref? (I remember when there were two) - or line judges who watch only for out-of-bounds? Better evaluation of the refs? Post-game analysis of every game? Better explanations for the fans of what constitutes fouls - I want to see exactly WHY this one was called an offensive foul while something very similar was not.

And what can be done about the "lack of suitable replacements?" Summer League showcased some pretty awful rookie ref calls. It seems like someone who has single-minded obsession could be trained to see only the game and block out the individuals.

It's a huge understaking and I'm not sure Stern is even interested, but I'd like to know the first steps.

by jorga on Jul 21, 2007 7:15 AM PDT reply actions

Extremely OT but I gotta respond to this

I think the reason Americans are quick to say conspiracy is due to the plethora of obvious american style in your face power plays by various elites. Whether it was the 4 count em four assassinations of progressives in the 60's King, RFK, JFK, and Malcolm X to the corruption of the stock market and SNL's in the 80's to Enron in the 00's America has been a place where you can do a hamfisted job of a behind the scenes power play and walk away scot-free with a little help from mainstream media. Europeans are SOOO much better at pulling the levers of power in a NON-obvious way as are folks in some Asian countries.

Elites get away with otherwise poorly executed plots largely due to ignorance on the part of the average american and the constant slide in our education system along with a complicit and increasingly centralized media. Whenever you have sudden spikes of extreme concentration of wealth in our country or big money makers like wars corruption flourishes. These things are nothing new, I give you William Randolph Hearst "Yellow Journalism" and the Spanish American war.

That being said it's a simple matter of perception plain and simple. Some folks go for the ostrich head in sand approach because the implications of various conspiracies are too much to bear and others always think some monolithic world conspiracy is in effect when they don't get ketchup with their fries at the drive through.

A more accurate reading of things is that money corrupts and conspiracies DO exist (Enron, the assassination of Julius Caesar etc. etc.) but alot of times it's just a few bad apples. The problem is unless you have 100's of years of retrospection in effect it's virtually impossible to tell. Some folks still don't think Hitler burned down the Reichstag to seize power and some don't think Game 6 of LA vs. Sac wasn't a fix. To me both are obviously inside jobs.

Paul if you have to sell your kidneys on the Chinese black market to Resign GO, LMA and ROY all I can say is you can still watch the games during your dialysis!

by Idog1976 on Jul 21, 2007 3:48 PM PDT up reply actions

err

...

by Gargen on Jul 21, 2007 11:49 PM PDT up reply actions

I Refute It Thus

I consider the fact that the Spurs have won four of the last nine championships to be incontrovertible proof that the league is not "fixed".

by Toast on Jul 21, 2007 7:16 AM PDT reply actions

NBA conspiracy

Well said all around; the chickens are coming home to roost. I rejected NBA conspiracy talk until that Lakers-Kings series you site. I was no Kings fan, but it was obvious to me or to any other objective viewer that, once the Kings got ahead in that series, the offiating changed. Most blatantly, Vlade Divac wasn't allowed to get within three feet of a Laker player in the first quarter without drawing a whistle. It was almost comical. And the sad thing is that that season was the Kings' window of opportunity; they were never that good again.

I agree that probably no official directive went out--on that occasion or any other. There are much subtler ways for the league office and advertisers to let the refs know which way the wind is blowing. Like any employee, an NBA ref wants to please his boss, and unless the league makes it abundantly clear that the officiating is to be absolutely unbiased regardless of the size of a team's market or the reputation of a player, most refs will take the path of least resistance: i.e., favoring the "rich & famous." And when their biased officiating receives no rebuke from the league, they're tacitly reinforced in that pattern. None of it happens thru an order; rather it's accomplished thru a wink & a nod.

Now the NBA finds itself in crisis. A league with unimpeachable integrity would survive an offiating scandal like the current one with little difficulty. But the NBA, with its deserved reputation for arrogance and biased offiating, is in serious trouble. Long ago, David Stern allowed the almighty dollar to corrupt the great game of pro basketball. Now, particularly if more arrests of referees are forthcoming, look out. To mix bird metaphors: not only are the chickens coming home to roost, but the golden goose might be done laying eggs. And Stern may be looking for a new job.

by hurryup09 on Jul 21, 2007 7:38 AM PDT reply actions

Hear Hear!!!!

The sooner Stern goes the better. Bring back the independant Referee system!!!

Paul if you have to sell your kidneys on the Chinese black market to Resign GO, LMA and ROY all I can say is you can still watch the games during your dialysis!

by Idog1976 on Jul 21, 2007 3:51 PM PDT up reply actions

my feeling

Is this is not really going to have as much of an impact as most people are assuming (i.e., not armaggeddon), especially outside of the more dedicated NBA followers. It just feels like one of those scandals that seem like it should be big... but never really gets traction. Its certainly not going to bump the Vick scandal or the dark clouds around Bonds' HR chase off the front page for long.

And I also disagree most people think the NBA is the most crooked. Baseball would win that contest by a mile between the Black Sox, steroids, corked bats, Pete Rose, and a thousand other things.

Do we know yet how many games he interferred with actually resulted in the other team winning, and how many it was just to cover the spread? Were any playoff games involved?

I'm not saying this is good for the NBA, just that this sort of stuff is inevitable in any organized sport over a long period of time. The personal drama and/or criminal stuff is way worse for sports (the Pacers rushing the stands, Vick's dogfighting, Pacman Jones, etc..) because they tend to resonate more with casual fans and even non-sports fans, and thus gain more media traction.

My guess is people are going to be worked up for about a week, then this will turn into a joke. I.e., every bad call will cause at least one of your friends to blurt, "who Tim Donaghy in the arena!"

by matthewcc on Jul 21, 2007 7:39 AM PDT reply actions

If you asked

what sport has the most individuals circumventing the rules baseball would win. That's as old as the nail file and the vaseline ball. But if you asked which league is the most likely to be rigged (which is a far more damning accusation) the NBA would dominate everyone else by a factor of three or more to one.

--Dave

by Dave on Jul 21, 2007 11:15 AM PDT up reply actions

maybe our disagreement is semantics, maybe not

I would agree that the NBA has the most opportunity to be rigged because the referees are more involved on every play.

But I would argue if you polled everyone in America who follows sports at least casually and asked what sport they trusted was most above-board, the NBA would not be at the bottom. Obviously there's no way to prove this, but my feeling is people are far more suspicious of baseball, college football and basketball, and probably even the NFL than the NBA.

In all those sports there's is a never-ending stream of news about cheating: either steroids in football and baseball, or the booster and academic stuff in football, and on and on. Just think about the Oregon-Oklahoma game, the entire state of Oklahoma (and most of Big 12 country) was totally convinced the ref threw the game to the Ducks because he'd sat next to Bellotti at an ice cream stand 28 years ago or something.

As far as people who believe games are rigged from up high, there's nothing you can do about that. There was actually a really interesting article at NewScientist.com about the rise of conspiracy theories in the US (link).

There has never been any evidence I am aware of in any major American sport that the people who run the league do anything to determine the outcome.

I'd also like to add that while I like to complain about refs as much as the next guy, almost everyone of these guys in all sports are really, really good at what they do. I think its amazing how high a percentage of their calls are correct at the speed the games are played at today and without the benefit of HD TVs and slow-motion replay that viewers have.

by matthewcc on Jul 21, 2007 12:36 PM PDT up reply actions

BBall versus BBall

Baseball certainly has had its share of horrible umpiring incidents throughout its history. As a Cardinal fan, who can forget the fiasco in the 1985 World Series during the 9th inning of game 6 when Don Deckinger made clearly one of the worst calls in the history of the game. Double D, who was actually considered one of the best umpires around in his day, received death threats for the next two years of life after that incident. But I digress....

REFEREE ROTATION: Just seems that the nature of the referee rotation in basketball is naturally going to provide constant adjustments by the players during the course of the game, which of course is not ideal consistency's sake. The big disadvantage that basketball has in how the referees oversee the game is that they have 3 different sets of eyes evaluating the action from various angles on the court and each referee, while probably consistently and thoroughly trained, has their own unique interpretation of how to apply the rules. For instance, I'm sure each ref on the court will have a slightly different interpretation of how to call defensive hand checking. And because officials rotate their assignments on the court, the flow of the game can slightly differ depending on which particular set of eyes is watching a particular section on the court. Inconsistency in this case seems inevitable.

ONE UMPIRE: Compare that to baseball where a strong majority of the action during the course of the game is occurring between the pitcher and the hitter. At least in baseball, you have one umpire throughout the entire game behind home plate who can consistently dictate the strike zone, and thus, allowing pitchers and hitters to adjust accordingly.

Of couse with the human element involved, nothing is perfect and with basketball, it's difficult to imagine a better way for the refs to govern the game.

by VegasNed on Jul 21, 2007 11:53 AM PDT up reply actions

An idea...

...for your 'So you want to be...' series: a recently retired NBA ref. It's not directly Blazer related but it might give some perspective from an official's viewpoint...and a chance for you to throw some hardballs.

Thought: if Donaghy does time, he already has the duds...

Nice piece, Dave.

" If you can do it in black wingtips, it aint a sport!" Ken

by Dr Dave on Jul 21, 2007 8:27 AM PDT reply actions

Haha

I was just thinking that yesterday. Just turn those stripes from vertical to horizontal and viola, there ya go.

I guess they don't wear stripes anymore but it was still funny.

by jamon51 on Jul 21, 2007 1:31 PM PDT up reply actions

Well done as usual Dave.

Like Jorga, I hadn't thought much about "the singled minded obsession" personality trait that may be conncected to NBA ref's. But it makes sense.

I also wholeheartedly agree that there can be no conspiracy happening, although I think Fatty will be trying to change my mind.

Also like Jorga, above all else I'd like to see steps taken to "remedy the biases" that exist in the current officiating approach. In my mind that issue is far more significant than the occassional bad referee being uncovered (that's not to say the NBA shouldn't put better checks in place to minimize the chance of it happening again.)

by TwoDeep on Jul 21, 2007 8:37 AM PDT reply actions

No conspiracy

Great article, Dave. I think people forget that the NBA is not a David Stern dictatorship. Stern works for the owners and the owners can have him replaced. The NBA bylaws aren't public, but I would suspect that a majority vote would oust the guy.

In effect, this means the 16 (out of 30) smallest market, most "discriminated against", least loved, and least successful teams think Stern is the man for the job. By extension, this is a vote of confidence to the refs.

So, either the game is fixed and the owners don't know (unlikely), or the game is fixed, the owners know and don't care (unlikely). Imagine the scene if there were five Mark Cubans openly questioning the NBA. The league office would wilt under that kind of pressure.

I wish this could explain the SAC-LAL game 6 debacle. I wouldn't be surprised if Stern took some calls from NBA owners after that game.

by Engineering Problem on Jul 21, 2007 8:53 AM PDT reply actions

The Spurs and a pet peeve

Toast makes a good point re/ the Spurs. Here's a relatively small-market team playing an unglamorous brand of basketball that keeps winning championships. How could that happen if there's a conspiracy? But as Dave said, there's no conspiracy--just a pattern of officiating bias that's subtly encouraged by the league.

In the case of the Spurs, I suspect any bias the refs have towards their club is been offset by Coach Popovich's masterful and unrelenting ref-working. It's annoying to watch, as Pop or one of his assistants strenuously argues absolutely every call that's even remotely borderline. But this tactic seems to wear down the refs to the point that the Spurs' OPPONENTS end up getting the short end of the stick. So chalk one up to great coaching.

On another subject, going back to what I wrote about Stern long ago letting the almighty dollar corrupt the NBA: this has happened in both obvious and subtle ways. A pet peeve of mine dating back to the end of Bird and Magic's careers has been enforcement of the travelling rule. As Bird and Magic's skills declined, I noticed that they began to be allowed a truly innovative more. That is, they'd dribble to within about 15 feet of the basket, then tuck the ball under their arm and simply run to the hoop like a running back!

I couldn't believe my eyes the first time I saw this. I called it "the Bird/Magic lifetime achievement award." But soon other players started getting away with the same thing. More dunks resulted, which clearly pleased casual fans and helped league revenue. So the officials let this obvious rule violation slide. But it was like what steroids did to the home run in baseball: the dunk was robbed of much of its excitement because it became easy and commonplace. Plus, the elimination of travelling calls on drives to the hoop meant defenders had to clutch and grab more to avoid being continually beat.

Worst of all, even many casual fans, who cheered the spectacular slams regardless of what preceded them, sensed on some level that what they were looking at was fake--like pro wrestling. Sure, they came to the games, but they no longer viewed them as sport so much as entertainment. Just like when watching a movie, fans "suspend disbelief" when watching NBA games these days.

It's like the story of the emperor with no clothes. It's not that people can't see something's wrong--they just choose to ignore it. Even my wife, who's no sports fan, comes into the family room, sees someone pick up the ball and go running to the hoop, and says, "that's travelling!" But the refs bite their whistles and the announcers say, "Great move!"

This is just one example of the often subtle corruption of the NBA that has chipped away at its integrity, ultimately leading to the predicament the league now finds itself in with this officiating scandal.

A comical note: last season the league announced a new crackdown on travelling. But it soon became apparent that this supposed crackdown was very specific. I.e., the only change to enforcement of the travelling rule (in which a player is allowed 1 1/2 steps after establishing a pivot foot) came when a player shuffled his feet as he began a drive to the basket. Once that drive began, he was still allowed to take 2, 3, or even 4 steps after picking up his dribble. Hey, rules, shmules: you can't stop players from making those crowd-pleasing dunks, can you?

by hurryup09 on Jul 21, 2007 9:02 AM PDT reply actions

With the Spurs

once you crack the perceived "elite" you're in no matter what market you come from. It's just harder for smaller market teams to pass that test. You pretty much have to win a championship first, whereas I think glamour markets get the benefit of the doubt as soon as they get reasonably good whether they've won anything or not.

--Dave

by Dave on Jul 21, 2007 9:48 AM PDT up reply actions

Hurryup09 -

Have you considered trying to get these excellent points, written just as you have them here to Stern? What you described has aggravated me for years. I guess I just can't understand how Stern and the club owners do not see that what is happening is bad for the game.

How you'd get it to Stern I suppose could be a challenging matter.

by TwoDeep on Jul 21, 2007 10:59 AM PDT up reply actions

The thing is

the foot shuffle before the move has never bothered me, so I was perplexed that they would crack down on that minor violation. It really doesn't give the offensive player much of an advantage, and it's annoying to the fans to see a potential offensive move disrupted by a petty traveling call.

Now, the Ginobili tuck-the-ball-under-your-arm-and-walk-to-the-hoop move has bugged me for a long time. Call that!! I don't even want to see Roy making that move.

by jamon51 on Jul 21, 2007 1:35 PM PDT up reply actions

great, great comments...

what an informed bunch of readers you have dave.

I've been bothered by the turn the nba has taken for a long time. I'm 54 and well remember the 60s nba. It was much purer basketball. The problem i think is the nba's pursuit of the 'casual fan.'

the marketing, officiating, playing has gone after this fan to increase the league's/players' bottom line.

so away with the knicks v lakers. and in with magic v bird, oden v durrant, palming, traveling, phantom fouls on mj, et. al., and crappy, crappy officiating, fixed or not.

of course mj is be the greatest player ever, especially when allowed to do ANYTHING virtually unimpeded by defenders. he was great, don't get me wrong, but why give him any help?

the league simply gave in the the dark side's temptations in pursuit of the all mighty dollar.

the remedy for this is objectively simple.... the game itself. the game in it's old, original form is a thing of beauty and will always draw the true fan. the casual fan will be drawn in by its beauty.... eventually.

look at nascar. true to its fans, THEN the casual fan looked in.

As always, great job.

by rburg on Jul 21, 2007 10:33 AM PDT reply actions

Bias

Wasn't Donaghy the one who got into it with Rasheed in the Rose Garden loading dock? Come back, Sheed! We were all wrong about you!

As far as referee bias goes, I'm afraid it's going to be there as long as the NBA employs human beings to call games. Instant reply is not the solution, nor is increased "accountability" for officials: the first would slow the game down, the second overlooks the fact that A) NBA officiating is never an exact science, and unavoidable mistakes are routinely made, and B) the real problem is a general lack of experience, not incompetence.* Referees at any level have an incredibly difficult job. As they advance through the ranks, some of the better ones separate themselves from the pack and make careers of calling games; a few make it to the NBA. The talent pool for league officials must be ridiculously low (I have no inside info. to corroborate this, but the same guys seem to keep popping up every year). If that's the case, why not look to expand the current training program for referees? Perhaps Stern could work out a deal with several European leagues by which new hirees would be sent to work overseas. That might give young officials a chance to get used to the speed of the professional game. Furthermore, I don't see how it would be a bad thing if the referees built a stronger, more independent union. Like MLB umpires, this would provide officials with some control over how the games are called, and it might help to erase the view that referees are tools of the owners' machinations.

These are just some thoughts. Someone out there probably has a few more concrete ideas, so I'm interested to see what everyone else has to say. Eliminating some sort of bias, however, isn't going to happen.

Nice post, Dave.

*Except maybe in the case of Violet Palmer.

by SabonisFan3386 on Jul 21, 2007 12:17 PM PDT reply actions

it's about time

you finally showed up in here welcome sabonisfan3386.

by fatty on Jul 21, 2007 5:42 PM PDT up reply actions

One of the problems with the officiating pool

...is that relatively few youngsters grow up thinking "I want to be a ref!" Who wants to be those reviled objects which your parents and friends are always yelling at and calling "stupid." So you don't get the best of the best, as in sports, but rather you get those who first have any kind of interest and secondly have an opportunity to be noticed. Heck, I don't even know how a person goes about becoming a ref, where the road to the NBA is fairly obvious: dominate the sport in high school, get recruited by a good college, play well there and get drafted, then play well enough to make the team. In officiating, who knows what the road is like? Not the average fan or high school student.

p.s. lol my subject was too long so it cut it off at "officiating poo" instead of pool...fixed now, but nice Freudian slip there

by jamon51 on Jul 21, 2007 1:40 PM PDT reply actions

The Problem is the Sport Itself

It's really that simple. Here we have a "non-contact" sport where there's contact on every play at virtually every level of play. Judging a "foul" in basketball makes judging balls and strikes in baseball seem like child's play by comparison. There's not knees-chest-plate to go by, just each ref's subjective judgement. It's the sport's biggest flaw.

by Toast on Jul 21, 2007 2:10 PM PDT reply actions

I agree

There is human error, and then there is the way the NBA game has been called for the last few years. The NBA has allowed its referees to have a huge hand in deciding the outcome of games, and now the league is going to have to look long and hard at every single aspect of its officiating. There is going to be talk next season every time there is a really bad call - that's just the way it is going to be now.

No, I don't think every NBA ref is on the take. I do think it's naive to think this was a one-time situation however.

by leeroyjenkins on Jul 21, 2007 2:26 PM PDT reply actions

toast you're forgetting 1 thing

when the lakers were winning,s.antonio got the shaft by the refs everytime,but since the laker mediocrity which i love by the way,nobody have stepped up but the spurs,bottom line if you have a marquee player you will get the calls.lebron, wade,kobe,shaq,melo,t*mac*yao no problem.but if you're portland,phoenix,utah,detroit,your not getting calls that's the way it is.when he's indicted,then i'll rip stern,the refs,the mob,and the nba bandwagon fans also a little goofs ripping too.i will go off on the nba as soon as the charges are filed stay tuned...

by fatty on Jul 21, 2007 5:02 PM PDT reply actions

Does this mean

That Las Vegas won't be getting an NBA franchise anytime soon?

How about if our as-yet-unannounced future team doesn't use NBA refs and instead has each player call his own fouls, like at the YMCA?

No?

Do we still get to have the summer league?

No?

Nevermind.

by vegas baby on Jul 21, 2007 5:38 PM PDT reply actions

I tell you this

Blazer fans; first of all: if thats true sabonisFan, Rasheed Wallace deserves a medal of black and red for true blazer honor.

2nd of all: Any blazer fan knows that in the playoffs against bigger market teams, the blazers will not get the calls.

thats a fact. watch the games.

Basketball is such a fast moving game, and calls can be so subjective that it is impossible to prove a bias.

Mere doubt has always been shouted down.

Until now.

Now we know these guys like money.

And they will change the outcomes of the games to get more of it.

I don't blame the league. Just like I don't blame the government. Neither are in charge.

I do blame the corporations.

Whose appetite for profit will never be wetted.

And who will make more money out of a LA dynasty then a P-town one.

As for the Spurs winning being evidence of no conspiracy.

I disagree.

The Spurs are a small-portland sized club.

BUT

The spurs are also the GLOBAL team of world basketball.

MVP Europe. Back up center: dutch. 6th man South America. White guy: Brent Barry.

Tim (jah-love) Duncan.

All they need is to snach up Big Ha-sung Jin and they're good to go.

News flash: the NBA is not looking to expand any more in the USA.

It is the #2 sport in the world and it is trying real hard to catch football.

(not the dog-fighting one either)

And it just might. Its the #1 sport in China. So it can't be long now.

I live in The Netherlands now and they love Elson, not as much as Rick Smits, but it matters to them.

Folks who don't think the league is a little crooked are the same as those that don't think that Bush had a little something to do with 911.

They either are tuning out. Or just wish that the world was different then it is.

It is what it is.

Accept it. Make it better.

This is our role. Thank god for KP and his international movement.

Your going to need multi-continental-ism if your going to win a championship in this League.

If you want any one to bet on you.

Especially a Zebra.

by nep4life on Jul 21, 2007 7:08 PM PDT reply actions

Power always corrupts

David Stern is corrupt. He has been in power too long. Referees are corrupt. They have a couple of hours most nights when they are the kings of the court (sorry LaBron). If you think only corporations are corrupt you have never been a disabled veteran. If you think Rasheed got treated fairly consider that there were several eyewitness accounts of his exchange with Donaghy which contradicted the ref and he still prevailed. Don't you wonder if he had some money on the Blazers over/under wins? My guess would be under (smile). Note also that Sheed had been calling out the league for its white attitudes.

The owners have not dared to mess with Stern. Only Mark Cuban has raised his voice and now he has also been silenced. If the top is corrupt the bottom will be also. David Stern is clearly at the top.

Nice work Dave. Appreciate your thoughts.

by lee3022 on Jul 21, 2007 9:11 PM PDT reply actions

I cannot believe

how many people have taken this as an oppotunity to defend Rasheed. The guy sucks independent on anything the refs do. I will never forgive him for throwing a towel at Sabonis' face on national tv. He is a terrible teammate by any definition and does not deserve any kind of sympathy or exoneration from this. One guy being a crook doesn't mean a bum is anything but a bum.

by matthewcc on Jul 21, 2007 11:14 PM PDT reply actions

Well...

I think Sheed was probably a pretty good teammate most of the time. The thing with Sabonis was unfortunate. He got smacked pretty good in the face by a way word arm by Sabonis and it must have smarted plenty. Still throwing that towel was a mistake. My problem with Sheed in that instance was that he didn't apologise publicly or show remorse. And in this way he WAS a bad teammate and it showed a great lack of character. Sabonis retired after that year. He did come back to play with Sheed the following year, and I don't know the particulars, but it seems like Rasheed may have never owned up to that the way he should have. And for that reason, unless I hear something different, I'll never be a big Rasheed Wallace fan again.

I love women and basketball... but not women's basketball.

by T REX on Jul 22, 2007 2:22 AM PDT reply actions

He was my favorite teammate...

especially when he fired that ball at me at shoot-around for laughs. I loved writhing in pain while he and Bonzi squealed with laughter. That was hilarious. The trainer thought it was funny too!
Signed,
Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje

P.S. See HoopsHype Column found here

by jon @ Blazer's Edge on Jul 22, 2007 7:38 AM PDT up reply actions

Bill Simmons ( I know ) has an excellent article

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/070722

I agree, this is really a huge huge deal.

by leeroyjenkins on Jul 22, 2007 9:34 PM PDT reply actions

I think it is all about accountability

Before this, the refs could do whatever they wanted on the court, and it seems, off the court. The NBA has to hold the refs accountable from now on. Changes will come. I hope this acts as a wake up cal for all sports. The Seahawks' Superbowl had some serious flaws as well. All sports will have to prove to their fans that the game is being called fairly.

Aaron Brooks the 2007 ROY.

by tominhawaii on Jul 23, 2007 1:37 AM PDT reply actions