I always the the refs the slack since officiating is not easy..but today's game was completely refereed in favour of the miami heat. it's hard to beat an elite team on their home court and it's even harder when you have refs on your side. i thought the rockets played hard and well today. keep it up!
I dont think people are complaining about the call its more about the consistency of it. You think they would have called delay of game on Lebron in that situation?
Exactly! No way they make the same call against Lebron. Also refs need to take into account the game situation. You don't make that call at crunch time in a closely contested game. No one wants the outcome of a close game to be influenced by a call like that.
so if the momentum of the ball from the made basket comes right at you, what is a player supposed to do if they are not to touch it? just leave it there and get back on D? Howard would have helped the Heat in that scenario by allowing them to inbound the ball faster if the ref hadn't have called it the way he did.
Van Gundy said the EXACT same thing on the air during the telecast...especially when the ball was tipped directly to that ref.
it is not only against the Rox... whenever I watched a Heats game, officiating is like this... before the heats, it was the Cavaliers... basically any team got LeBron, the team got 3 more players for free...
I swear thery was multiple times when Wade doesn't make the basket then just yell " Heyy" then gets the call.
If you touch the ball right after your teammates score, is an automatic delay of game. Said so in the rule book
Miami fan here...and it must be known...game was rigged from left to right...lol......i thought crawford would have been brought in to get it done....which is why i did not expect it today...this is the league we have chosen...NBA folks...Miami will get the same kind of treatment that the blasted lakers got throughout the 2000's....mainstream coverage...preferential treatment...
The main problem people have is that the refs choose to ignore it when it doesn't disrupt the flow of the game, until a moment like this arises. That definitely calls into question the integrity of the officials. Another huge problem I have with officiating (not just this game, but the whole year for the Rockets) is 3 seconds. It seems like Dwight is the only person that's being called for defensive 3 seconds. When I'm at the games, I will straight up yell out 3 second calls against the opposing team. These go uncalled 95% of the time. Dwight gets 2.5 seconds in the lane before the whistle blows. Other players get 5+ seconds.
Refs haven't been calling delay of game this consistently since preseason, when they were trying to get guys used to it. :-/
After the Rockets got their first one in the first half, I started paying attention. The Heat were guilty of touching the ball after scoring at least 3 times by my count. ZERO calls however.
Refs with the BS calls, Heat luckboxing some outside shots, Wade blatantly flopping and falling 5 feet when Dwight barely touches him... One thing builds upon the other.. Rockets never had a chance once all this went into motion.
Rockets players should have stood at the line and flopped backwards screaming as the Heat took foul shots in the last 2 minutes.
My take: Howard should not have touched the ball. He should have known the rule, which he does obviously. Mental lapse on his part. Why even give the ref an opportunity to make those calls? Also, blaming that call as the game changer or momentum changer is weak. If all it takes is one free to throw this team off of the rails then this team is not ready for prime time. Contenders play through the whistles that are going against them. Fact is that Rockets did not take care of the ball and made some terrible decisions in the last minutes of the game. That is why they lost. As for this particular play. The irony of the call is not to be missed. Howard was called for delay of the game for tapping the ball directly to the ref. If anything, it should have been a tech on Howard for pushing the pace of the game. Common sense is typically thrown out the window when it comes to some of the rules and the refs that implement them during the game.
