Deep in the heart of Cardinals’ country, there are still a few fans of the NBA—although, you wouldn’t think so by listening to sports talk radio in St. Louis.  But after the LA/Boston game last night, I might be starting to turn away from the sport.  Last night should have been a great game, but for the most part it was ruined by poor officiating.  When you have a team like the Lakers, who get the majority of their points in the paint, have a -28 free throw disparity, something is wrong.  To make matters worse, the officials have taken it upon themselves to call needless technicals when players complain. 

So, what can be done?  I have a simple solution to the problem:  officials should call the first 46 minutes of a NBA finals game like they call the last 2 minutes.  (1) Get rid of the needless technicals.  (2) Only call touch fouls when they disrupt the nature of the play (we should never see a touch file in the first 14 seconds of the shot clock).  (3) And finally, allow contested shots.  It seems that the criteria for what is a clean defensive play changes in the last 2 minutes of the game.

If the NBA officials would follow this simple rule, I think the NBA would put a more entertaining and engaging product on the floor.  It would shift the focus from the officials back to the players where it belongs. 

This entry was posted on Monday, June 9th, 2008 at 6:58 am and is filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.