I don't think it's purposely rigged. I think it's a broken system that is purposely kept in place because that's what saved the league back in the 80s and brought the league to it's greatest heights during the Jordan era. I am talking about the star system, where the entire league is marketed around the superstar instead of the teams and the game of basketball itself. This is why TNT shows Lakers vs Jazz over Rockets vs Blazer even though they know the Lakers game is going to be a semi blowout while the Rockets game offers to be exciting. The league doesn't care about the quality of the games, they don't market the quality of the game, they care about the superstars getting hype and face time. The refs, the coaches, the players, everyone involved in the league is taught to think this way since the mid 80s. Therefore you have a biased officiating system that everyone is ok with: Kobe Bryant and Shane Battier could make the exact same move and get the exact same amount of contact and Kobe would get the call and Shane wouldn't. Both players know this, their coaches know it, the refs know it, the smarter fans know it. Nobody with any power speaks up about it and the league is allowed to go on with this skewed competition. Well I should say nobody, Cuban tries to speak up but he says so many dumb things and has turned himself into such a joke that no one really listens to him. JVG tried to speak up for Yao and got wacked with the biggest fine ever. Things have been real quiet since that JVG fine.
I think a poster commented on this, but I think its more of a physcological thing than it being fixed. To make the games more interesting or to lengthen the series and make it more entertaining the refs will impose their will upon the game. If it was fixed, stern would make sure the refs are more easy on Yao, if they let up even a little bit and gave him just enoug space to breath, Yao would be avging close to 25-30, and the league would be making tons of money. So I just think its incompetence and human nature that results in such ****ty officiating.
The fact that the NBA is the only major league (that I know of) that doesn't review it's officiating after each game, or on any basis, really hurts the integrity. Referees like Joey Crawford and Violet Palmer get away with the worst officiating in pro sports and are not held accountable whatsoever. At the very least they could do a performance review of the refs at the end of the year, and give them some sort of incentive to do better. And if the review was bad enough, it would give them just cause to fire an official.
games are not rigged but the NBA is a corporation aiming to maximize profits. profits go down if the entertainment factor is diminished. this is why star players get preferential treatment- stern knows where his bread is buttered. the current mannner in which games are called disrespects the intelligence of sports fans. i wish they would stop allowing travels and flops. they also need to call an offensive foul on any player initiating contact with a defender, regardless of whether his feet are set or not. just call the damn game fairly please.
Why are spurs and jazz among the top teams in the league? I guess sterns no.1 priority is san antonio and utah.
I think it is fascinating that the conspiracy theorists are so numerous here. Everyone voting is obviously pretty heavily involved with following the sport. Why would you invest that energy, time and money in something you think is a fraud? And, since you do, why shouldn't the NBA be a fraud? Obviously, honest dealing is not high on the priority list of the committed fan. They just need to keep up a veneer of honest dealing for the sake of the casual and business fan and then otherwise do what they will. I suppose if the league isn't crooked, they should probably go ahead and become crooked.
I personally do think the league does do everything it can to lengthen the series as much as possible. Just look at the Kings-Lakers 2002 WCF. The Lakers shot 27 free-throws in the fourth quarter of Game 6... 27 free throws. Half of them were weak foul calls that the Kings weren't getting on the other end. Ever since then, I've strongly doubted the league.
that's why i am undecided. there have been times my head tells me they didn't rig the game, there have been also times my gut feeling tells me that's a pretty good possibility.
Honestly, I'm not one to call for heads, but would fans really mourn if David Stern was assassinated? How many teams have been screwed and how many (big market) teams have benefited? It's becoming a little too obvious -- his intentions. The NBA is a joke. I want celebrities and big name people with brains to start calling the NBA out. City mayors, perhaps?
This would be interesting. I liked how the politician from Utah went after the BCS this year, and David Stern would not react well to such a public attack from a real politcial official.
The league isn't fixed. That said, they absolutely allow "soft" officiating and turn a blind eye to the very obvious problems. The simplest issue is this: when many/most referees stand out and are noticeable because of their differences and tendencies....it's an extremely bad thing. It's damning if you can say "this guy calls it like this....this one calls it like that" And I can run down a pretty good number off the top of my head: Dick Bavetta Dan Crawford Joey Crawford Ken Mauer Steve Javie Violet Palmer Part of the issue is that the refs have Stern by the balls - there's next to no pool of replacements to draw from. The league NEVER recovered from the lost refs involved in the plane ticket scandal. Part of the issue is that the league fell in love with the "give the superstars leeway" officiating gray area that began with Michael Jordan (steps, palming, push offs), bled over to others (Ewing traveled every time with his "hop stops" into the lane), then became rampant (no such thing as traveling as long as you're on your way to the rim, taking a charge is an automatic called foul inside the half circle), then led to the low in any sports officiating - Wade getting a title because the refs made him a phony and-1 machine against Dallas. That series was sickening starting with game 3's fourth quarter. It's awful, and I won't lie - it's cut my passion for the game (and I'm a lifer with NFL a very distant second) in a big way the last 5 years. The homecooking is absurd at this point. If this took place for a single game in the NFL, there would be Congressional hearings over it. Evan
This is very different, in my opinion. The Spurs were good enough to win a title all on their own. They had Duncan and Robinson along with a strong supporting cast full of veterans. So when Parker and Ginobili got thrown in the mix, they were already established as championship caliber. That's easy to push. I'm sure I don't need to point it out, but the Rockets haven't been relevant to the post season in more than a decade. So it's a little different.
i agree. refereeing is a hard job but I don't believe for a second this is the best they can do. The fact that most fans can name the names of incompetent refs and be in complete agreement about it is kind of sad. they rotate these same a$$holes every year. they still haven't figured out flopping? is it that hard for these guys to have some kind of awareness of players and their tendencies? You have different rules for different players, lebron can travel and you can't touch him but you can do absolutely anything you want to Yao Ming. Guards can run around without resistance because you can't breathe on them but there's no protection in the post. What we have now is inferior refs trying to officiate a game that's too complicated for them. Bring back the old rules where ron artest can hand check the f#$k out of brandon roy and then maybe I won't complain when yao ming is in headlock in the post and gets called for an offensive foul. I don't think the league or the refs are out to get any particular team, though it certainly seems easier if you have a superstar wing player who gets to play in his own set of rules.
I think it's really like this: Teams are built by their owners, GMs, and coaches. This is why some teams are better than others talentwise, schemewise, or just overall. This helps make every fan feel like their team has a chance to make the play-offs or whatever. Once you get to the play-offs you have several issues. There is nothing the refs can do if the Cavs are playing the worst team in the league to extend it. Its SUCH a mismatch that you just have to leave it alone. Sure, it would be great if that 8 seed stole a game before getting run, but they dont count on it. Now, you go to the Warriors/Mavs series a few years ago and the only game IMO that was very poorly officiated was game 2, where Dallas won on their home floor to avoid going down 2-0 heading out to Oakland. Each team then won on their own home floor again and the Warriors won it in 6. I truly believe the Warriors would have swept them had the officiating in game 2 not been so horrible late in the 3rd early in the 4th. It was just a matchup nightmare for the Mavs and there wasn't anything they could do. If two teams are equal(or close) and one jumps out to an unexpected lead in a series(like Houston/Dallas in '05), the officials surely can try to rebalance the series(thus extending) and did so by changing the way the game was called. I would offer the same critique against the Jazz last year when they won games 1 and 2 on our floor but I dont remember any bogus calls going against the Jazz in game 3. I think game 3 was probably one of the better officiated games of the series. Perhaps bringing it up to "fair" was the adjustment made by the league. Who knows? I know its dirty, and not fair for any team that isnt the darlings that year. Sure, you can win a round or even two, but the league has what they want and they will go to whatever lenghts required to make it happen. Usually the best teams are the ones they want, but sometimes, just sometimes, they have to step in when things are not going the way that they wanted. BTW, point to the 07 finals between Spurs and Cavs?? It was just that bad of a mismatch. It wasnt even close. Thats why it was a sweep. And no amount of "help" from the officials would have made a difference.
come on man, u really believe the refs came into the came with the agenda of making shane battier less aggressive guarding roy? thats pathetic. If we won last night none of this would be brought up today Some things the league does is sketchy but calling one foul on a role player in the first quarter on purpose is too much
I completely agree - but I think that in doing this you disrupt momentum and sometimes the less deserving team wins (see: Spurs vs. Suns, last 4 years)
Please dude. This Rockets team is beloved by the media. We won two championships with Hakeem and the first year they would give us Sports Illustrated cover until everyone in the city started canceling the subscription. The 2nd championship, we still didn't get enough national TV games. I can see the Rockets every week now on TNT or ESPN. I see Yao and Tmac doing adds on TV. Drexler, Dream, etc.. The only we got was a Taco Bell commercial with Shaq. PLEASE!
