[eDebate] last heat/mavs post

[Josh Branson]

ok, i'm not talking any more sports on edebate after this, but some of this 
idiocy being posted is driving me crazy. i also hope fhat avery and the 
players dont complain about the refs and get down to business and working on 
the things we can control. but as fans, we have a right to complain. well 
mainly, i just want to silence you fools who are spouting some shit that is 
about as high-tech as Sports Illustrated for Kids.

1. The 'but Dwade drives to the bucket more' and the "heat play a different 
style" argument is boring and wrong. Yes, I know that you guys have probably 
heard your local sports caster on your 10:00 news say 'well Dianne, the Heat 
play a more attacking game, so you would suspect they would have 27 more 
free throw attempts', but come on. The mavs were THIRD the league in points 
in the paint this year. They were also third in the league in FTs made. This 
is not a team that 'plays a different style' from Miami, it's a team that is 
predominantly made up of slashers. The Mavs make their living driving to the 
bucket. And against most teams, when their center swings their elbows into 
our drivers faces, it's a foul. In fact, according to Rule 17a of the nba 
rulebook, it's an automatic one-game suspension, and intent is 
irrelevant....but that's neither here nor there.

And again, the annoying thing about game 5 was the WAY in which Wade got all 
of his FTs. My frustration was that we blanketed him early and then he had a 
parade to the line that got him back into the game, and as I've said before, 
about 60% of his FTAs came on plays that were NOT IN THE PAINT. Now you are 
obviously right that every single time he's driven to the basket in this 
series he's gone to the line, and that's obviously something that the refs 
are just going to keep giving him and we need to live with that. But him 
being 'bumped' as he tries to run around a staggered screen, or him being 
double teamed and trapped in the left corner with the shot clock at 5, then 
putting his head down (and off arm out, of course) plowing through both of 
them for the foul, the FOURTEEN FTs that dude shot when he wasn't even 
driving. You're right, we'll live with the calls that go his way at the 
bucket, but stop just reciting the tired old Heat propaganda that 'oh he 
drives.' Yes he does. He also got back into the game pretty much exclusively 
through non-shooting fouls from the perimeter. And good lord if they're 
going to call hand checks and bumps on the perimeter, then Haslem and Posey 
foul out in the first 5 minutes of the game and DIRK sets the new finals 
record for FTAs.

2. The timing of the last foul. So far you guys have essentially said 'yeah 
that was questionable.' No, it was horrendous. The ESPN Radio guy in Chicago 
said it was the worst playoff call of the last ten years. Think about it 
yourself and ask the last time a game in the finals was decided on a foul 
call with under 3 seconds left? Especially on something like that where even 
about 10 camera angles and slow mo and nobody can really show ANY contact. I 
need say no more about this. It's just tough when you fight yourself through 
another bad night, have a shot to win, and the refs decide it for you. NOT 
TO MENTION the 2 or 3 offensive fouls on wade on the way to the basket. 
Again, not something I expect to be called there, but if they're going to 
start calling ticky tack fouls in that situation, how about a foul on D 
Wade. Wait, what? He had 1 personal foul the whole game? SHOCKING

Aaron says something about "i'm unsure that refs should call things 
differently in the last 10 seconds.' Well, no matter what you think about 
the desireability of it, they sure as hell DO call it differently, they 
always have, and the rationale is pretty good, in letting the players decide 
it. You're right, DWade is a great player, and if so, then he SHOULD be able 
to fight through that just devastating 'contact' that he 'absorbed' on that 
play and make the layup, or get his own rebound like you said he would. If 
he does, then great, the game's over. He shouldn't be bailed out after 
careening out of control through three guys, hitting one of them in the 
sternum so hard that he fell over the scorers table, and then flailing up an 
out of control shot. That was simply one of the worst calls I've ever seen.

Lastly, malgor or whatever your nickname is, shut the hell up, I'm unsure if 
you actually watch/care about basketball or if you're just trying to rile 
people up, but the refs did exactly what they should do on that Duncan play, 
and what they ALWAYS (except for last night) do....no cheap foul calls on 
the last play of the game. 'three defenders hanging on him' is obviously a 
hyperbole at best and more likely flat out wrong (although it hasn't really 
been shown on too many replays because only you and Skip Bayliss seemed to 
think anything was wrong with that).

And before you get too riled up, Duncan had been going over the back on 
several rebounds per quarter in that game with no call. They were being 
leniant on rebounds that night, and that call was consistent. And dont 
worry, Duncan still got his 30 FT attempts in that game. There is simply 
precedent for not calling ticky-tack fouls in the final 5 seconds.

Consistency is all we want. If they're going to let Dwade work himself back 
into the game with 10 straight trips to the line in the third quarter, NONE 
OF WHICH WERE ON DRIVES, READ IT, ZERO---then at least just call it the 
other way. That's all we're asking.

Now, yes, the Mavs could have won anyway and they blew it. Pretty damn 
frustrating. But it's ok, I think that Steve Javie's crew is gonna be doing 
game 6 and you can mark it down that every call is going our way. I suspect 
the NBA might be slightly embarrassed about that game.

Lastly, I'll close with some ev.

HEAT DEPEND UPON THE REFS MORE THAN ANY TEAM IN THE LEAGUE---IT'LL HAPPEN 
DURING THE NBA FINALS---THIS EV, SHOCKINGLY, IS MORE QUALIFIED THAN ROY 
SINCE ITS AUTHOR HAS WATCHED MORE THAN 5 SPORTS GAMES IN HIS LIFE
Bill SIMMONS, the sports guy, the esteemed and most popular writer for 
espn.com, 6/8/06 
(http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/060608)

WHATS THE WORST CASE SCENARIO?
For Dallas, it's foul trouble -- they have the right guys to guard Shaq and 
Wade, but you can't predict those games when all the calls start going 
Miami's way. And that's the thing that bothers me about this series: No team 
depends on the refs quite like the Heat. When the refs are calling all the 
bumps on Shaq and protecting Wade on every drive, they're unstoppable. When 
they're calling everything fairly, they're eminently beatable. If they're 
not getting any calls, they're just about hopeless. I could see the refs 
swinging two games in Miami's favor during this series, possibly three. In 
fact, I'm already depressed about it and the series hasn't even started yet.

looks like that was a pretty prescient comment.

but oh wait, hey guys, he must be remiss, doesn't he know that the HEAT 
DRIVE MORE???

JB

p.s. russell---if you're going to complain, dont you think that a phantom 
foul that QUITE LITERALLY decides the swing game of the nba finals is a 
pretty legit time to do it? how would you have defended that play? was there 
any legal way to do it you think that wouldn't have drawn a foul? we put 
four guys on him....