You're clueless, Smith's foul was exactly like Fisher on Scola. I'm fine with Nate getting an F1 because it seemed like a heat of the moment thing, and it wasn't as hard as it could have been.
From what I see, his whole left hand is above Gorans head, not connecting. On top of that, if what you said is true, then the refs (3 of them) with their slow mo camera multi angle view would have seen it as well. Better view then what we have on uTube easily.
I'm fine with the F1 but in Goran's scenario an injury suffered from a foul like that could have been way worse than what happened to Griffin. I tweeted this to Marc Stein to get his opinion.. unfortunately my mistake was assuming that anyone on ESPN watches a Rockets game.
This is what Matt Bullard talks about in just about every game... the NBA officiating is so inconsistent, not only game to game, but freaking minute to minute. It's annoying as hell, but until Stern is commish, i dont expect anything to change anytime soon.
I was hoping for the replay that was at Toyota Center.... They showed it from the other end. It didn't look nearly as bad. The play actually happened right in front of where we were sitting. Looked bad at first because of the thump, but there was actually space between Nate's arm and the downward motion. I really think it just looked really bad from that angle.
Yeah I was sitting right behind the basket, he didn't drag him down, his arm just went in a downward motion after he made contact with Dragic.
I don't really think that foul on Dragic was that bad. The foul on Griffin was much harder and clearly was a "take-out" hit. But I hate Griffin and the Clippers so I have no problem with it.
I watched the play frame by frame. 1. Nate wraps his left arm around Dragic as he jumps with Dragic and tries to block the shot with his right hand. 2. Where the play really goes bad is when Nate is up in the air swatting at the ball he actually grabs Dragics jersey just below the left sholder with his left hand. 3. As Nate is coming down he actually spins Dragic with his left hand by pulling his jersey. It initially looks in the video that Nate was swinging him with his right hand. 4. As Nate is trying to block Dragics shot he is actually jumping around Dragic to get at the ball while holding his jersey with his left hand which causes the spining action for both players. 5. Although it clearly appears that Nate swung Dragic around with his right hand with a follow up motion, the right hand never actually touches Dragic. It's kind of an illusion caused by the swingin motion and Nate trying to block the shot with his right hand. Nate does appear to get a piece of the ball. I originally thought this was clearly a flagerant 2 but upon carefull scrutiny I think an F1 was the correct call. I don't think there was any intent at all by Nate to even throw Dragic down. It was a careless play that could have gotten Dragic hurt but I don't think that was the intent. I still don't think Smith's foul on Griffin meets the criteria as a F2 but if the refs thought it was intentional and unsportsman like they had the right to toss Smith for that reason. Same as when Fisher knocked Scola down, it was the intent as much as the type of foul that got him tossed. Nate did not deserve to get tossed but I think there was a much much bigger chance of injury from the Nate foul than from the Smith foul.
