his nba takes are usually dead on....
here is one regarding officiating in the playoffs:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/090528&sportCat=nba
it specifies how jordan (and then artest in 2004) ruined the game, it talks about this perception that better athletes are difficult to ref is garbage, how the style of play shouldhlep refs, amendments that can be made from a penalty standpoint to reduce these rash, oversensitive decisions, and proposes more accountablity and better training of refs (why is the avg age of refs like 60 yrs old or something---shouldn't they be younger like and avg age of 38).....
Thursday, May 28, 2009
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Good article once again. The NBA has a serious problem with officiating. Clearly they have the worst refs in professional sports. Inconsistency, calling the game way too tight, quick triggers on techs and flagrants... It's just a mess.
ReplyDeleteLots of factors here: Overreaction to the Artest situation (just a random event, not a result of any underlying issue), old refs (the birth years that Simmons listed are astonishing), lack of commitment by the league to develop quality refs (I like Simmons referee academy idea). I think the other thing I'd add is that the dude in charge is a nerd who has never played competititve sports. Anyone that plays basketball on any level (high school, pickup ball, college, intramurals, rec leagues), knows that the game is physical and emotional. There will be bumps, hard fouls, celebrations after big plays, etc. It's just a part of playing sports. You can't take that away. For the most part the players will police themselves.
Stern is a 5-foot, whitebread, smart, businessman. He doesn't have this perspective. He has done a lot of good for the game such as marketing the players individually, some of the rule changes, globalization of the game (yes Otis, this is a good thing), etc. But he has dropped the ball on the officiating. He let Donaghy happen on his watch, and he really hasn't done anything to fix it.
I love the NBA. I think the NBA playoffs are the best time of the year. It's hard, competitive hoops. We get to see stars rise to the occation and come up short. It seperates the greats from the just good. The problem is that people think it's rigged because the refs are so bad. This is a big perception problem that the league must address. The league is in a great place right now talent and marketing wise... great mix of young and veteran stars, great mix of American and foreign players... big market teams playing well (LA, Chicago, Miami, Boston, even NY was decent at times and will be relevant once Lebron goes there). They would be idiots to ruin it by not fixing the officiating. I think that this could be Stern's last great accomplishment before he retires... fixing the officiating situation.
i think another thing that plagues the officiating is:
ReplyDeleteTHE MAKEUP AND BY THAT I MEAN THE NUMBER OF BLACK AMERICAN PARTICIPANTS. i think people feel the need to overly police these guys "perceived to be single parent home living, ghetto children who are one white tarzan helping hand away from being imprisoned or dead TURNED spoiled brat, ego driven millionaires". i do not think it is coincidence that hockey (AND BASEBALL EVEN TO SOME DEGREE) allows the players to "POLICE THEMSELVES". hockey players, baseball players and nascar drivers are allowed to set their own rules (fighting til someone drops, pitching at each others heads, and bumping cars at high speeds all of which can KILL someone) but if you throw one punch in basketball you could miss half the season not 5 minutes like hockey. benches clear in baseball---you might miss one to five games of a LONG SEASON. you step off the bench onto the floor when your teammmate gets wallopped and you miss a game depending on who you are (the suns (knicks) got disqualified while the spurs the following series did not; what is the difference between the suns (knicks) and the spurs). the "policing" extends beyond game refereeing to dress codes, age limits, classes on how to handle baby mommas and get rid of your "posses", substance abuse policies and all other kinds of crap because there is a perception that basketball players (and football players too) need these systems in place or they will resort back to the "lord of flies" home training they learned on the southside. most sports have a code that players set and live by (lacrosse, soccer, golf a sport they totally trust the player with, tennis, etc). but in other sports for some reason the code is solely set by the commissioner. i wonder why?
Stern is definitely trying to manage the league's perception. No question about that. White folks love their baseball and love their hockey. The NFL is universally loved, so they can get away with more. Basketball, however, is played by big, intimidating, black dudes... Stern knows he has to market this carefully. When Stern came in, the league was in big trouble. It was a league of thugs and druggies. The best players at the time had major drug issues and the perception was that the league was just a bunch of street thugs. Ratings were horrible and the league was in danger of collasping. The same issues existed in baseball and football, but like I said America loves those sports.
ReplyDeleteStern came in and cleaned a lot of that mess up and since then he has consciously had to manage the league's perception. He benefited from some clean cut black stars coming into the league in the early 80's (Magic, Isiah, MJ) and had a natural rivalry with a star America could get behind in Bird. It was the perfect storm and Stern did a great job of milking it and creating a strong NBA brand. Since those days, Stern has focused on marketing his stars.
Fastforward to the 90's... the gangbang and hiphop era was in full effect. The cleancut stars were replaced with the Marbury's, Iverson's, and Shaq's of the world. Big money, big cars, rope chains, tattoos, all with an attitude. Stern's league became a league of thugs again and he had to manage this yet again. So he put in the dress code (a good thing in my opinion and players have embraced this). When the Detroit brawl happened, he knew that he had to manage the thug image even more, so he clamped down on the rough play to the extent that we see the pussified game that we have now.
The reality is I agree with Stern's tactitics for the most part. If he let the 80's crap continue and then let the gang bang era take over... then only the purists would watch, the league would be smaller, the players would get paid less, we'd be watching the games on Spike or VS. instead of ABC, ESPN, and TNT. He has down alot to clean up the image of the game... NBA cares, the dress code (which the hiphop era has embraced see JayZ, Diddy, etc), and for the most part the game is relatively popular. Obviously it's racially driven, but things had to be done and in the end the players have benefitted.
Trey's insight on this one was great, I never really thought about that. I guess it's because I didn't really start paying attention to how involved the refs are until I got older plus the fact that I don't watch regular season games.
ReplyDeleteWhen you think about it, it is some serious bullshit. In baseball and hockey fighting is a part of the game. In basketball it is the end of the world. White athletes fighting apparently isn't as egregious as Black athletes fighting, even though the tamest hockey fight is worse than almost every NBA "fight."
We need an entirely different post on Chris Anderson aka "Birdman." How much would they have hyped him if the Nuggets somehow made it to the finals?