Duh, like Stern has even a clue what integrity means.
Wilbon: Crawford shouldn't have been working Game 4
Non-call on Fisher, combined with Duncan dispute in '07, doesn't look good
OPINION
By Michael Wilbon
Columnist, The Washington Post
updated 1:18 p.m. CT, Thurs., May. 29, 2008
BOSTON - Calling fouls in the NBA has always been absurdly subjective. I once watched from 10 feet away as Robert Parish delivered a closed-fist combination to the face of Bill Laimbeer in a playoff game here in the old Garden, and no foul was called. Not only that, but referee Jess Kersey, looking directly at the contact as well, motioned to Laimbeer to get his butt off the floor and play on. The larger point here is that nobody has ever known what is and what isn't a foul in professional basketball.
The contact Derek Fisher made with Brent Barry with two seconds remaining in Game 4 of the Western Conference finals Tuesday night has caused a great dust storm of controversy, as only the NBA playoffs would have it. And the conversation swerves off the main road, necessarily, to everything that is exciting and tiresome about the postseason. Still, Fisher's contact, given that it came with two seconds left, was not called and should not have been called a foul. Not after Barry put the ball on the floor to avoid the contact. Had he gone straight up and into his shooting motion? Yes, that would have been accepted universally as a legitimate foul.
What cons utes a foul is as subjective as calling balls and strikes in baseball. It's a definition that moves and morphs, not just over long periods of time, but from game to game, from ump to ump. It is, as everybody says now, what it is. And it shouldn't be considered in a vacuum. The Spurs wouldn't have been within two points if something quite objective had been called correctly.
That whole sequence began with Fisher missing a shot, which was ruled an air ball, when it in fact hit the rim. The Lakers should have retained possession with the shot clock turned off. Instead Kobe Bryant had to force a shot that missed, giving the Spurs a final possession they didn't earn and shouldn't have had.
So in the end it evened out.
And it also obscured something else that was far more serious than whether Barry was fouled.
The referee who didn't make the foul call, Joey Crawford, should not have been working the game in the first place.
Little more than a year ago, the NBA suspended Crawford for throwing Tim Duncan out of a game essentially because Duncan laughed at Crawford — in other words, Crawford ejected him needlessly. It was the last straw for the league and for Commissioner David Stern, who, quite understandably given previous warnings, sent Crawford to the sideline for the rest of the season.
The NBA, more than any other professional league in this country, is concerned about its image. That's why Stern and the league ins uted a player dress code a couple of years ago, then sought to crack down on arguing with referees during games. The NBA is annoyed to no end, also understandably, about the notion that results are manipulated to favor the biggest stars and teams in the biggest or most glamorous markets. Every columnist in the country, this one included, has received at one time or another a phone call from the league asking to not use the "C" word, or conspiracy . . . as in, "You know the NBA had Joey Crawford work that game because they already know he hates the Spurs and the league wants the Lakers in the Finals anyway."
Everybody in the NBA anticipates these conversations, and cringes at anyone having such a perception.
It's not about whether Crawford can work the game fairly. Of course he can. He's one of the best referees the league has had, and certainly one of its best now. The Spurs did Crawford (and the league) a huge favor after the game by refusing to make the non-call an issue. Every Spurs player I saw interviewed, starting with Barry, said, "That's not going to be called at that point of the game."
Still, why assign Crawford to Game 5 of a series with a team he was so notoriously involved with just last season? Why allow people the chance to harbor such a perception? Why, when your league is still reeling from the Tim Donaghy betting scandal, would you not go to the ends of the earth to avoid any appearance of impropriety, no matter how small. And why put Crawford in such a position? Any controversy at all involving the Spurs was going to leave him vulnerable, and everybody in the NBA office had to know that. There's another playoff series, the one here between the Pistons and Celtics, he can work. And now, with the Spurs teetering on the brink of elimination, he can work the Finals without the Spurs.
It was terrible judgment to send Crawford to San Antonio. A lot more egregious than not calling a foul on Fisher.
It's as subjective as anything in sports, calling a foul. You can't get a consensus from people who've been in and around the game for 100 years. Former coach Hubie Brown, now an analyst for ABC and ESPN, said here Wednesday night: "No question that was a foul on the floor [meaning before the shot]. He should have been shooting two foul shots." Brown thought it should have been called a foul, as did former coach Avery Johnson, as did former coach Jeff Van Gundy. But Mark Jackson said no way, no foul. And get this: Jon Barry, Brent's brother, said no call was the right call. The debate raged all afternoon, into the evening, when an NBA spokesman said a foul should have been called. The difference of opinion demonstrates how difficult it is to call fouls in certain situations.
Contact that might be called in the first quarter isn't a foul in the fourth. A smack on the elbow of a scrub has never been treated the same way as a smack on the elbow of a megastar. Ask Bryon Russell if Michael Jordan pushed off before taking and hitting "The Shot" in 1998. The Spurs know all about tough rulings, considering they benefited from one last year at the expense of the Phoenix Suns on the way to an NBA championship. Whatever whining you hear from coast to coast about the foul that never was, it's quite honorable that none of it is coming from the dressing room of the Spurs.
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
URL: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/24866899/
Freedom of Press?Every columnist in the country, this one included, has received at one time or another a phone call from the league asking to not use the "C" word, or conspiracy . . . as in, "You know the NBA had Joey Crawford work that game because they already know he hates the Spurs and the league wants the Lakers in the Finals anyway."
It is what it is. Its game 5, and sticking with the game 4 is worthless. If the Spurs lose this series, it won't stick with me like .4, or 2006 did.
Annnnnnd it's over. Let this be the last article written about the "foul." Game 5 starts in three hours. Hopefully the Spurs can give the media something else to talk about.
Man, why did they trade Scola to Houston for nothing?
Not that something else.
God, cue the "Not this again" picture....
I can't recall the year exactly, but didn't the Spurs play the Lakers in a PO series this decade in which the Spurs were up 3-1(?) yet the Lakers came back and won? Lots of adversity going for the Spurs this year, but it ain't over until it's over.
James White!
Should we retire Malik Rose's jersey?
No @ the le of this thread but I hardly talked about it this long into it so I won't start now. For some reason I don't know why, but things linger with me.
Losing to the Jazz in the 90s...Rockets too. Duncan's injury that had us lose against the Suns. 2004. 2006. 2008 isn't over yet but Crawford's issues with us are obvious to anyone we aren't playing against.
Losing in the 90s just sucked cause we were like, a step off from being a le team. Some years I felt we would have stomped the ing Bulls we just could never get out of the damn West man. Then when we do, that follows it gets hardcore. I just don't understand sometimes why things happen the way they do but it's life I suppose. Even with your sports team life can just be crazy as .
The NBA is full of incompetent morons. I think we deserved to lose Game 4, but my god, how ing stupid can you be to even give the CHANCE for such controversy, by sending an official with a known past vendetta against one of the biggest stars in the NBA into such a huge game?
It's absolutely stupid. Giving fans and critics even the POTENTIAL to discuss a conspiracy is tantamount to rebuilding the image of the NBA. After last year's playoffs with the Suns debacle, the NBA just keeps shooting itself in the foot with this kind of idiocy.
My thoughts exactly. This is why so many people have believed for years that the NBA is fixed.
Yeah, its not just an operational blunder, its a HUGE PR blunder for a league that has successfully put the Donaughey scandal behind them and killed it.
^^ The NBA has done a great job over the years suffocating any publicity issues with scandals such as Donny boy and the Artest fight as well. I could on further as well could we all but it's a waste. is , it has the same smell but can come in many sizes and shapes.
fff
I don't like Wilbon, but his comments about Celtic Jess Kersey were entertaining.
Anyone who watched old Celtic Jess "officiate" a Celtics game knows what I am talking about.
Stern has the money. Stern has the power. We all all worthless fools. That's how the world works.
Spurs have benefited from refs for a long time so any Spur fan who can't get off of this is an idiot. Of course, if Stern was worth a damn, Craw would not be reffing any of our games but what are you going to do about it?
Cry on the internet while Craw makes 300k a year and Stern is banking 10s of millions a year? Yeah. Awesome.
Are you ing kidding me? Because if that isn't a joke then you should never be allowed to watch basketball again!
Bottom line is all of us as end-users/consumers put up with this reffing b.s.
When cox cable or Dish or whomever else monitors us we are still watching the NBA playoffs along with its crappy reffereeing. (More accurately, nothing done by the league owners and players to do anything about improving the reffing by helping them, ie limited replays, make flopping b.s. a penalty, etc).
So the National Businessball Association isn't going to change a thing as long as we keep consuming thier stuff, served with crap on the side or not. Crap as a main entree for that matter.
If the Spurs had won the series (and that's a big IF), would you have posted this message about so-called crappy refereeing? I don't think so. Typical fan who thinks there's a conspiracy, everyone was out to get the Spurs, blah blah blah. You can't face the scoreboard, so human nature being what it is, you lash out and go after the refs. It's so tired.
Absolutely. See i want things fair for both teams.
Why don't you go to sleep? Insecure Laker trolls and your need to seek constant validation. Congrats, you were handed Gasol and overcame Popavich.Typical fan who thinks there's a conspiracy, everyone was out to get the Spurs, blah blah blah. You can't face the scoreboard, so human nature being what it is, you lash out and go after the refs. It's so tired.:
Heard a group of reasonable Laker fans today saying how fortunate they were to get home seed as no way they could have overcome Phx and New Orl on the road as the Spurs did.
My take on it is this. Crawford was suspended and almost lost his JOB for LIFE. The job he had for years. He eas required to take anger management classes as a punishment. With this is mind, who here would not hold a grudge versue the player and team that caused you all this hardship?? The better question is, who wouldnt hold a grudge?
My God, we almost cost him his favorite job in the world and you think he could come back and have no grudge at all? You dont think he snickered after the fact in game#4??
Blahh, It disgusts me even to think about it. After the events with Crawford, I just dont see a way for him to ref a spurs game fairly ever.
my 2 cents...
Every columnist in the country, this one included, has received at one time or another a phone call from the league asking to not use the "C" word, or conspiracy . . . as in, "You know the NBA had Joey Crawford work that game because they already know he hates the Spurs and the league wants the Lakers in the Finals anyway."the Spurs are the victims of this non-call, they lost maybe Duncan's chance to ever repeat but dragging last yr's win over Phoenix is just disrespecting this team's 2007 le legitimacy.The Spurs know all about tough rulings, considering they benefited from one last year at the expense of the Phoenix Suns on the way to an NBA championship. Whatever whining you hear from coast to coast about the foul that never was, it's quite honorable that none of it is coming from the dressing room of the Spurs
Horry was suspended. But they're not accountable for Amare & Diaw's stupidity of leaving the bench why they were given suspensions.
Spurs is the better team. Isn't that 4-1 vs Phoenix ShaQ reloaded in the 1st rnd proof enough?v Horry for paid his act.
And what the league has done to Crawford & Co?- NONE.
So what the rest of the media wants the Spurs to do- whine?
OR
perhaps ask the NBA to -SUSPEND, or FIRE, or FINE CRAWFORD?
what for?
why can't they just take this Spurs silence about the issue is:
an act of accepting their loss gracefully?
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