Audio: Zach Randolph blasts officiating for Memphis loss in Houston

For once we benefit from bad officiating, I'm not sorry!

 

ZBo just mad the refs didn't call a foul when he tried to sell the contact from Lin in the 4th. He was clutching his head like he got whacked by a hammer.

Refs were absolutely awful but let's not pretend they only favored us. We were just lucky they decided to be on our side in the 4th during our comeback.

 

I love the rockets & I am a homer so everything is always a foul

BUT this time I must admit we were on the right side of bad officiating, for once

 

Huh?

Harden is trying to score. Aint his fault guys can't stop him without fouling him. And besides: drawing foul = score

 

Sorry I'm not sorry.

And as usual, I don't understand those who get upset by Harden drawing fouls. He has a pretty unique ability to do it -- and as last night demonstrated, it is an insanely useful offensive skill when his shot is otherwise not falling.

 

That seems to be the popular belief but if you actually look at the numbers you will find that it isn't true. Harden and Durant are usually #1 and #2 in ft attempts each year. Not only haven't their attempts gone down in the playoffs, they have actually gone up every season.

Based on the numbers the officiating isn't any more relaxed in today's playoffs.

 

Meh.

We got on the good side of officiating in terms of Harden. However, Memphis gets away with murder every game (and even this game) due to having a reputation as a "physical" team. How many times did they hack Howard or Lin? And they got Howard out of the game due to a number of dodgy tick tack calls.

If the Grizzlies got called like most other teams in the NBA, most nights would be like this game.

 

Yeah, considering Dwight was limited to 18 minutes due to 5 fouls (maybe 2 of which were legit), including the 5th one on a blatant flop from Randolph himself... I think Zach needs to keep his mouth shut.

The game was called very tightly on both ends. Sometimes that happens. The same principle that for Dwight into foul trouble also got James a lot of free throws. If Memphis wants to "what if" on a few of the Harden calls, they should also "what if" the scenario of Dwight playing 35 minutes without foul trouble.

 

Zbo's right to be mad. Officiating was clearly to our benefit in that 4th quarter. Zbo got the Dwight treatment when he was trying to get offensive boards while Harden got the Kobe/Dirk treatment on the other side.

Yes, we started making some shots while they missed alot of them, but I'm not sure we had enough time to comeback if officiating didn't speed things up for us.

 

Dwight gets 5 fouls in 18 minutes of playing time... the refs were clearly harsh last night. Not like the Grizz didn't take advantage of it and mow us down. Harden just did his thing and they indeed hacked him. They don't know how to defend Harden.

 

ZBo did get screwed with terrible calls, but as The Cat points out, so did Dwight.

I won't be crying for him.

 

Memphis' defensive mindset had a lot to do with all of the free throws last night. Whenever Harden got a step on them and turned the corner they refused to just conceded a layup to him.

That refusal to conceded anything is admirable but you aren't going to have much success trying to reach and slap the ball out of Harden's hands. Harden also did exactly the right thing by continuing to drive and rack up fouls.

If you are going to depend on a single defender to try and stay in front of Harden then good luck. The most successful way to defend him is to have the defender play him as tight as possible but when he gets by them they depend on their bigs collapsing and cutting him off. That's what Indiana did but Memphis didn't have the shot blockers to stop Harden.

 

That's uglyball in a nutshell.

Live by the ref, die by the ref.

 

Grizz were hacking us all night. Harden deserved all his FT. Z-Bo is just butt hurt because him and his team was celebrating a victory in the 2nd & 3rd quarter.

Grizz were reminding me of a Sloan foul hard flop hard team - NOT a guilty win. You could tell their strategy going in was foul harden and flop against Howard

 

Zbo also lucky he didn't get called for a technical when he floored D-Mo with an elbow to the throat.

I'm sure some of the calls on Harden were borderline, just like with any other star. But Harden was NOT flopping, if you watched the game. He was driving hard to the basket and drawing contact. That is what he is supposed to do.

Most of the calls looked like fouls to me. The only reason there were so many is that Memphis plays so physically. If you push and hack on every possession, some nights it is going to be called.

 

best post in this thread! LMAO!!

 

The Grizz were flopping all night, Dwight Howard had 5 fouls in 18 mins and they still lost. Last I checked the Grizz were up by 10, all you have to do at that point is score, the refs can't block your shots if thier guys shot better they would have won.

These idiots in this thread agreeing with Zbo need to rewatch the game, we were getting bad calls from the refs for three quarters as soon as we got some energy(A rested DMO) and Harden attacked the basket it went in our favor, they called it the same the whole game. Zbo himself flopped several times and then he gets mad when someone else gets a call, GTFO! They have sucked all season that is why Zbo is fustrated, he needs to be mad at his coach for sitting his hot hands and playing father time Prince and Conley for chucking instead of penetrating.

 

Perhaps there wouldn't have been a massive deficit to overcome in the first place if Dwight wasn't taken out of the game on ticky-tack stuff, including the 5th foul that Randolph himself drew by flopping.

He shouldn't be mad if he's flopping himself to take advantage of the tight whistles. What goes around comes around, Zach.

 

Man Zbo trippin. The Memphis Grizzlies got their lead with Dwight Howard on the bench. They just mad that they lost that lead with Dwight Howard on the bench.

 

We was robbed. Hahaha