As for the Celtics, it looks like I made the cardinal mistake of underestimating the coaching matchups, as well as the league's inevitable desire to make sure Indiana makes it to the next round. I don't think the NBA fixes games, but they have one trick that they use for situations like this – when they want a home team to win the game, they invariably assign the worst referees possible to that game for two reasons: Bad referees have a tendency to get swayed by the home crowd, and bad referees never have the stones to make a tough call on the road. In a related story, I went to 35 Clippers games this year and kept a list of the referees in my pocket, which I also used to follow the referees for any televised games. And yes, the referees in the NBA – as a whole – have never been worse. But there were six referees that stuck out as being especially terrible. Here they are: 5. Tom Washington and Rodney Mott (tie) – Two newer guys who were just gawd-awful. My dad described the new breed of refs like this: "They're all built like running backs, they're all incompetent, and they all blow the whistle one-two seconds late every time." 4. Luis Grillo – He's been terrible for like 20 years. 3. Tommy Nunez – He's been terrible for like 30 years. 2. Bennett Salvatore – Always one of the worst, he took it to another level this season. If you see him on the court at the start of the game, get ready for about six technicals, two near-brawls and both coaches having to be restrained by their assistants at various times. 1. Violet Palmer – Here's what I wrote about her four months ago: "During last week's Celtics game, the legendary Violet Palmer was involved, who deserves her own 'SportsCentury' at some point. Nobody has ever been worse at their job, in any vocation – not even the people who work at Home Depot selling Christmas trees. When Violet started officiating a few years ago, she was so incompetent, players and coaches actually avoided arguing with her – whenever she screwed up, they would always glance around helplessly, the same way you would if your puppy dropped a deuce on the living room carpet. But now she's been around for a few years and people are fed up. On Monday night, Doc Rivers was one bad Violet call away from ending up in a white Bronco with Al Cowlings. I love this stuff." So why am I telling you this? Because last night's game featured two of my Worst Six – Salvatore and Washington. And I don't think it was a coincidence. In a related story, the Pacers had a 38-17 free-throw advantage, the Boston coaches were practically having a colletive conniption on the bench, and there were nearly two bench-clearing brawls. I'm not saying that's why the Celtics lost – not only are the Pacers playing better, they have a much better coach – but the officials never gave the Celtics a chance, nearly lost control of the game and nearly ended up with another Artest-Wallace situation on their hands. We should expect better in the playoffs, shouldn't we? the way he talks about the celtics and pacers reminds me of the way we are talking about the rockets and mavs. he makes some good points. i love the comment about "the nba doesn't fix games, it just assignes the crappy refs to that game." overall i agree completely. and i loved what he said about violet palmer (lol).
Worst ref? ...All of em. They can all burn in a firey hell the likes of which only Houston fans have experienced.
Anyone who never shows up in the news. If I've never heard of the ref, it usually means he's pretty good.
i don't mind steve javie, even with his quick trigger on the technicals. when's he's not assigned to fix the most important playoff games, i generally like bavetta as well.
Uh...Joey Crawford should've been on there. Who doesn't remember the game a few years ago against the Jazz when Stevie was unconscious from the floor, like 30 points in the second quarter, and Crawford gave him his 2nd tech for "throwing and elbow" at Stockton? And then a few of the players claimed that when Steve protested Crawford told him to "Get the **** off MY court." Or Kennedy ejecting Steve after he slapped the backboard in excitement during a game in Sac. The Rocks were down 23 in the first half and had just cut it to 7 at the beginning of the third. Refs shouldn't be deciding NBA games. But that's what happens. Just like Games 3 and 5 in the Mavs series. Bad calls have absolutely screwed the hell out of us.
I've maintained that Dick Bavetta is the worst in the league forever, but I also think Joe Crawford is the best... I almost always feel comfortable with games he calls. He's not perfect, no one is, but he's good.
I dont think the ref, Gundy spoke to was real. He prob was as real as 50 cent not being a snitch for the 1 times.
Javie and good ref should never be in the same sentence. A lot here will not remember this, but when the Sonics played in Houston in the 93-94 season, the first time in early december, when both teams had one loss, Javie tried his best to give Seattle that game. Robert Horry literally told him to "calm down". It was a thing of beauty.
