RE: refs

["Hastings, David" <David.Hastings@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I agree that the refereeing at times leaves a lot to be desired.  I have refereed at quite a high level and the one rule that always came through was advantage/disadvantage.  Rules can be flaunted as long as someone doesn't gain an unfair advantage or someone is disadvantaged.

However the NBA also goes for you can flaunt the rules but if you're MJ or Kobe et. al. you have more leeway than the other players.

A few years back we had a referee's strike and the pre-season was refereed by non NBA officials.  We still had too many complaints because these officials weren't letting the players play.  Or they weren't refereeing like NBA referees.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that things need to be improved but you'll never please everyone.

-----Original Message-----
From: Mac Alsup [mailto:macalsup@hotmail.com]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 2:15 PM
To: tfmiii@worldnet.att.net; celtics@igtc.com
Subject: Re: refs


Mega Dittos!!  I couldn't agree more with your comments.  I was beginning to 
wonder if I were the only one on the face of the earth that thought 90% of 
the charging calls in the Nets/Celtics series were bogus.

Shaq fouls every time he touches the ball.  How about every stinking 
free-throw he shoots, he steps across the line before the ball reaches the 
goal.  NONE of his free-throws should ever count.  Am I the only one that 
this annoys the heck out of?


>From: "Thomas Murphy" <tfmiii@worldnet.att.net>
>To: "Celtic list" <celtics@igtc.com>
>Subject: refs
>Date: Fri, 7 Jun 2002 09:14:06 -0700
>
>So Ralph "Manchurian candidate" Nader has weighed in on NBA refs? Well I
>have complaints too, but they are not just about favoritism (that's always 
>a
>problem). In particular I want to focus on how the game has changed in
>response to an influx of a new generation of refs trained under Stern's
>stewardship:
>
>One of the key problems with refs today seem so focused on the letter of 
>the
>rules that they actually end thwarting the spirit behind the rules. I think
>this has a lot to do with attempting to train refs as automatons 
>conditioned
>to 'reflex calls' rather than acknowledging the fact that reffing a game
>requires judgement not just about facts but also about how a game is MEANT
>to be played. Refs should be trained to understand the relationship between
>the calls they make and the result they have upon play, taking into account
>the context of the larger game - kind of like a judge who takes all the
>available evidence into account when rendering a judgment. This would
>require entrusting the refs with the responsibility for managing the 
>overall
>flow of the game, not simply the ability to make a given call at a given
>time. Instead it seems as if they are instructed to make certain calls 
>based
>on particular criteria REGARDLESS of the overall context (and violence
>within that context) of the call - resulting in weird inconsistencies in
>levels of contact (for example: Kidd undercutting an airborne Pierce versus
>Battie's 'flagrant foul', or Kobe's non-call elbow versus Bibby's 'foul' on
>Kobe in the same sequence) - in a sense they've like judges whose judgment
>has been deliberately neutered by 'mandatory sentencing' in order to 
>comport
>with some strange Skinnerian fantasy about how humans should react to
>stimuli.
>
>Case in point, the "no charge circle": as I understand it, this was
>instituted to prevent the practice popularized by Laimbeer and other 'bad
>boy' Pistons of jumping under the basket when they saw someone driving for 
>a
>lay-up in order to draw a charge and (not incidentally) undercut the
>airborne opponent. This tactic was clearly illegal under existing rules 
>(you
>simply cannot stand under the basket and deny anyone attempting a lay-up 
>any
>place to land) but for whatever reason refs started rewarding such false
>hustle defensive play (as well as allowing all sorts of thuggery) and the
>league stepped in to attempt to return to status quo ante. The result? Now
>we STILL have people jumping in at the last moment - after the opponent is
>airborne in many cases - to draw 'charges' if only they are a fraction
>outside the circle. Meanwhile Shaq can now drive his shoulder full force
>into a defender who happens to be between him and the basket no matter how
>long that defender has held that position because that defender is now
>inside the 'no charge circle'. Not only has the actual intent of the rule
>change been thwarted (refs still allow last-second jump-in-front 'planting
>of feet' resulting in the undercutting of airborne lay-ups) but now they
>ALSO refuse to call what should be obvious offensive fouls (Shaq is not
>airborne coming in for a lay-up - he is actively dislodging positional
>defenders with all his might) all because of a slavish attention to the
>letter rather than the animating spirit behind the 'no charge' rule.
>
>Eliminating the illegal D rules was a good first step in returning to the
>NBA to a league guided by basic principles rather than pedantic attention 
>to
>minutia. The game would be further improved if refs were instructed to
>maintain certain basic principles (the concepts of defensive position,
>freedom of offensive movement and the importance of who initiates contact).
>Refs should understand HOW and WHY such principles are central to the game
>rather than being trained to focus on specific minutia intended to 
>'trigger'
>calls (the conceptual basis for the now defunct illegal defense rules as
>well as the current flagrant foul rules, the 'no charge zone' and
>jump-in-front charges among others). The way the game is called today too
>often the forest is missed for the trees.


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