TA and the officiating

[Ryan W]

--- JoeFan11111 at aol.com wrote:
> 
> Let's hope we beat the sh-t out of Atlanta at home
> tomorrow and 
> go on from there.   

Word.  Beat them on Sunday, and never think about this
series again.

> I think we match up better with
> Cleveland than
> the Wiz who beat us 3 times this season.   Pierce's
> second-rate
> actions have been disappointing and costly, and
> Garnett and Allen have 
> also been disappointing in not being able to take
> charge in the last 
> 5 minutes of each lost game.   Looks like Allen's
> legs are gone.

Doc's playing Ray too many minutes, and our offense
didn't give Ray many good looks.  Either we play
Cassell and Rondo together to give Ray rest, or we
play Tony Allen for a five minute stretch.  Ray is not
giving us what we need on the road, and I think
limiting his minutes is one way to get him going
again.

Re: Pierce--of all the terrible calls in the 4th
quarter, his 6th was the worst BY FAR.  I don't think
I've seen a cheaper 6th foul against a superstar
player in my lifetime.  That call should have never
been made.  The ref was searching for a call on that
play, and in actuality Zaza grabbed Pierce's jersey
when Childress was still driving, something that was
much more foul worthy than Pierce's *slight grab*--a
grab which occurred after the ball was already going
in the hoop.  In a million years, that should have
never been called.  That kind off-the-ball stuff
happens all the time, with much more contact, and it
is never NEVER called.  Watch what they do to Powe
sometime when he's off the ball and going for an
offensive rebound.  It was a terrible terrible call.

> 
> As for the FT disparity, if we'd have taken the damn
> ball to the hoop 
> (Garnett)
> more often instead of settling for jumpers we might
> have gotten to the FT 
> line as 
> often as Atlanta did.


Taking it to the hoop is one thing, but you can't MAKE
them blow the whistle.  And if you look at the
numbers, we actually attempted more layups throughout
the game.  Yes, in the 4th we started taking
jumpshots, but I don't think the blame lies on C's
alone.  First, there was a rash, a god awful rash of
cheap, questionable calls against the C's in the
fourth quarter which led to the Hawks having a 15-2
free throw advantage.  15-2!  That's ridiculous.  The
game was decently officiated until then, but as soon
as the 4th opened up, it turned against the C's. 
That's a fact.  Let me just recap a few.  Pierce's
fantom 6th foul.  Bibby stepping on a non-moving,
well-position Ray Allen's foot, tripping slightly, and
getting the call and getting two shots. You just can't
go stepping on other people's feet and expect to get a
call.  Al Horford's travel before getting fouled by
Posey and getting two shots.  That's about six points
right there.  There were also about 3 strips that
would have gone our way in another game, which led to
another 6 free throws.  So, we can bitch all we want
about Pierce's T, which led to one point, but let's
not forget the bevy of questionable calls in the
fourth quarter that probably added up to at least 10
points.  But of course all we see in the papers today
are stories about how Pierce's tech left us shooting a
3 instead of a 2 in the waning seconds.  Give me a
fucking break.  That game was taken from us by the
refs and the only reason you should bring up the tech
is to illustrate how poorly the officials called the
game.  

The 15-2 advantage at the free throw line had other
consequences beyond a mere point advantage.  By
calling so many fouls on the C's, there were unable to
get into any kind of defensive rhythm, weren't able to
get out on the break because of it, and lost our
offensive rhythm ultimately because of it.  So people
can whine that they should have been driving to the
basket, but in reality, the Hawks defense was set most
of the time because they had just been shooting free
throws.  The Hawks then made a concerted effort to
clog the lane and give us open shots.  We had pretty
open shots in the 4th quarter.  So, if you're a
player, and the other team's defense is consistently
set because of a run of cheap calls on the other end,
and you're always bringing the ball up against their
set defense, and they're clogging the lane, and on top
of that you're not getting the calls because the refs
have decided to shaft you, well, do you think you
might tend to take the wide open shots you were
getting?  It seems natural to me and it was all
predicated by the officiating.  Yes, Garnett should
have shot a few more times instead of passing it, and
Ray should have made more shots than just 1 of 8, but
in my opinion this game was taken from us by the refs,
just like the other two, in varying degrees, when we
played in Atlanta.  

It's always dubious to complain about the refs, and
yes we definitely could have played better and
overcome both the Hawks and the officiating.  But it's
also idiotic to ignore what is happening out
there--we're getting screwed pure and simple.  The
game is not being called fairly.  And everything we do
on the court is being affected by it.  Doc needs to
quit the nice guy act for a minute at least and get
himself a tech.  When Woodson has been complaining,
he's been able to influence the officials.  Doc
complains like a sunday school teacher and it makes no
difference.  If we're luckly enough to play another
road game in the playoffs this season, Doc needs to
change his style, because the officiating, and what I
see as a league-wide anti-Boston bias, will only
continue to get worse and cripple us more.  If I'm
Doc, I blast the officiating in the press.  I
absolutely unleash a storm of angriness.  Get fined,
who cares.  Ruffle some feathers and put the national
attention where it should be--not on gas prices, or
the war, on Hillary/Obama, but on the state of
officiating in the NBA.  If we can make it out of this
series, the C's would be best served to make the
officiating the lead story in the next series. 
Everybody should complain, from Danny on down, because
only when it's a story, and everybody is watching the
officiating, will we get a fair shake.     

Ryan 


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