Van Gundy Challenges Officials and Says an Owner Is to Blame

I agree..Yao and Tmac will develop chemistry..Yao will learn gradually and stop making the dumb mistakes to get dumb avoidable fouls..and he will learn how to dominate!!!!! He will learn. Also..getting some youth and athleticism and more skills will help.

 

This is about time and they better let them play, especially Yao...I'm going to the game and I can't wait...It's on b****es...Rox win...

 

Hey Cuban, it's not a moving screen, it's called the screen and roll. There's nothing illegal about moving towards the basket after setting a screen.

 

All this stuff is filler and distraction - psychological warfare.

Although those offensive fouls were lame. Moving picks in the 4th QTR?????? What the Hell!!!!!

Anyway, Rockets need to focus on better execution on the Defensive and Offensive end. Stop thinking about the refs geez! Start focusing on just playing their game.

 

Oh yea, there's clearly an anti-Yao conspiracy. I bet the NBA is paying them extra to make sure he fouls out and Houston loses. Having Yao Ming in the NBA Finals would be terrible, why would they want a few hundred million more Chinese watching the games?

 

Nobody is really saying there is a conspiracy, started by those officials, decided in a round table meeting and sent out the highly secret memo to give Yao fits. However, you can't just dismiss the idea that there is some general bias towards Yao among those refs. Every team deploys the "Hack-a-Shaq" in the playoffs, there is no conference call among those GMs and coaches. They just did the same thing at the same time according to the assumption that it's safer to send Shaq to FT line than to let him attack the paint. Same thing applies to Yao, refs believe that he's foul prone, so he won't get any benefit of doubt.

Nobody really accused NBA to have the rule to get Yao into foul trouble, but many believe those refs are biased. JVG and Rockets teammates agree with that too. But you don't.

 

Reading this post reminded me of what Michael Jordan said about maturing as a player. Something along the lines of "each star player goes through tough difficult losses in the playoffs, but they learn from that and the best players eventually get over the hump"

Remember Isiah and the Pistons in the mid 80s, Remember MJ in the late 80s, Shaq in the mid to late 90s, Duncan went thorough this perios with the Lakers, the Pistons losing home court series to the Celtics in 02, and the Nets in 03, only to toughen up because of these losses and win championships.

Feels like the Rockets are going through this phase right now.

 

For a longtime poster, it is unfortunate that your thought process in this thread appears to be as dense as uranium.

There is little doubt that Yao has been on the receiving end of some unusual and rarely-made calls in this series.

Cuban has now publically admitted to having complained to the League throughout the series to call the game tighter on Yao. Cuban has been seen and heard barking at refs about Yao during the games themselves.

If you are unable to recognize the cause & effect correlation between these 2 occurences, then I don't know what else to tell you.

 

Those aren't exactly unbiased sources. My point is, where do you go from here? If you believe the refs are out to get Yao, what is your solution? Because whining about the refs isn't going to get you anywhere, unless you think that they'll call the game differently now that JVG has come out publically with his comments.

 

i think these two things go a bit hand and hand together in regards to this series. as frustrated as i am with the fouls called on yao its even more frustrating to see the calls dirk gets. so far the refs havent been consistent during each and and in the series. countless times mcgrady has been bumped on the perimeter, almost falling down once and nothing has been called..i guess the refs thought it was a flop.......then on the other end bowen puts a hand on dirk as he is going across the court, not impeding progress or anything and a foul is called.

in re: to your 2nd statement
i would have no problem whatsoever if the rockets lost in the playoffs to a team that earned the victories. the mavs in my mind havent earned the ws they have, they've gotten help from the stripes. i would be ok if there was one game where they didnt get help (and i dont mean even fts, i mean the bs calls which can change the momentum of the game completely) if this team faced the pistons i would be upset at losing, livid even but at the end of the day you know the pistons beat you with sound defense and fundamental offense.

 

Nice use of the periodic table in the GARM bro. +++

Give me a motive for the refs to have an anti-Yao bias, and don't tell me it's because Cuban's called them out. They all must hate Mark Cuban, he's been "charting" them for years, complaining about calls for years, and frankly he's a tool. Why would they suddenly listen to what he's got to say?

And you make the argument that Cuban's comments "throughout the series" have caused the refs to call fouls on Yao, but the fact is he was in foul trouble in Game 1, before Cuban's griping began. And then he somehow managed to stay out of foul trouble in game 2...

 

What is really comical in all this, is Mark Cuban coming out saying that JVG's comments "are an insult to the officials". Talk about the Pot Calling the Kettle Black; the guy is simply amazing.

 

No doubt JVG is my new favorite guy we arent gonna take this crap Marc Cuban complains all the time I wrote my long paragraph already on why Cuban is a gay owner and they will never win a championship complaining in the stop flopping section. Thanks JVG.

 

just a couple of random thoughts:

1. NBA fines people for criticizing the refs. Is there a better way? I mean, for someone who said "I'm ready to be fined" (and who is also very rich), what is a fine gonna do? to me it's something like "you are gonna be fined 5 bucks for that" to an ordinary person... I say ban/suspend an owner/coach for one game if you open your big mouth publicly, then we won't see the bullsh*t lobbying...

2. I don't think the league or the refs have a league-wide conspiracy thing against the Rox or Yao. they are just doing a horrible job on the big guys --- it just hurts us more because our big guy is a critical part. but SOME refs definitely have their minds made up before the action -- someone mentioned that it is reported in China that yao was told by a ref during one of the games something like "if there is physical contact on the offense end I'll call a foul on you". What kind of sh*t is that?

3. the flopping: right now that is just no potential penalty for flopping (yes you got burnt but you are already burnt anyways). it reminds me of the situation in soccer. back then flopping was popular (especially in the penalty-zone-kind-of-thing) and it seriously damaged the game. then there was a rule for getting a yellow card (something like a technical foul in basketball) and most of the flopping was gone. wouldn't it be better if NBA has a similar thing?

4. the moving screens: yao does set some moving screens, so does every other player in the league. in one of the games (game 3?) Doug Collins was actually saying yao's screens for TMac are good ones because "TMac waits till Yao gets his feet set" (Deke was called a moving screen at that time so Collins commented "the ball handler got to wait till the big guys are set").

5. it seems everyone is criticizing the refs. I remember nba.com once had a column called "you make the call" where they show why some calls/no-calls are good calls (there was a no-call of yao's drop step which tons of people thought as a travel, but it wasn't -- they showed the video and explained it clearly). what happened to that column? (maybe there aren't many cases to show that the refs are doing a good job?)

go Rox.

 

I don't claim to be inspector gadget with all the angles of the case already figured out. I can only go on what I am seeing in the games and then Cuban's and JVG's words. It's obvious that Yao is getting bad and unusual calls. It's obvious that Cuban has been complaining that Yao should be getting these types of calls. And then JVG corroborates all this in the most respected newspaper in the country. It certainly looks like a duck. But in all fairness and humility to the high standards of our BBS, I will concede that since we do not have all the facts and reasons before us (as you have pointed out), that there is indeed a slight chance that there hasn't been any bias against Yao. So in summary, I will go with the odds and say 'bias most likely yes'......while you go with Jim Carey hope of "so you're saying there's still a chance of no bias?"

 

How about simply wanting Cuban to shut up and to stop making the league look bad?

 

Standing 8 feet tall in the paint waiting for a charge is not the way to get the refs to give you the benefit of the doubt.

Five blocks? Nice. But for every 5 block game Yao has, I can give you 15 where he gets one or LESS.

This is the playoffs. The refs look closer at the game. No doubt. But when did you ever see any great player who lacks aggression get calls his way? Reggie Miller is a perimeter player and gets more calls his way than Yao.

The refs are calling it tight on Yao. But Yao deserves alot of blame for it. These calls were there to be made when Yao scores a ton of points, getting rebounds and doing what 7'6" agile wannabe great players do!

So, why aren't they made then? Hmm....

I love Gundy. But he is full of it on this one. Scream at your center to stop standing with his hands up in the air all the damn time! We all see how Yao excels when he wants to.

 

Sorta agree Yao needs to learn and he will eventually ..how to guard a guy driving at him...and he will get better..through experience.
I remmeber when Yao got a tech after posterizing Ratliff.

I can't wait til Yao fouls someone hard but not flagrantly!

 

Typically the playoffs are more physical and there is less tight officiating.

Aggression works great when you are GETTING the calls. Stars are aggressive if they get the calls, if they don't they will back off. But when you don't get any calls over and over you tend to back off.

The only person that I have seen get the treatment Yao gets is Shaq. There are times Shaq gets hacked and no call. Then there are times he gets every call if he has position. In other words if he is close enough to the basket the officials will 'assume' he was fouled if he misses. If he steps away from the basket he won't get the call even if his wrist is chopped.

But Shaq has the power to go through the fouls and get his dunks. Yao doesn't have that power and Yao also shoots more turn arounds and more hook shots.

So when Yao is hacked on the wrist and the shot doesn't go he should get some calls. The guy is a very good shooter. If he is not getting contact on his shot its going in. There are numerous cases where his shots are missing by alot simply because he is getting hacked. Most stars will get that call. TMac gets it, Dirk gets it.

So far I think the biggest difference in the series has been the Rockets ability or inability to overcome the officiating.

Just look at the foul shot attempts by each club.

Lets even the number out over the next two games.

No way we are fouling them any more than they are fouling us.

 

So now correlation equals causation? Did you ever think there were other reasons that Yao gets bad calls?