Make no mistake about it, the Boston Celtics have a decided advantage in this series against the Chicago Bulls, even without Kevin Garnett. I am not that big into conspiracy theories as a general rule, but over the past two NBA Playoff seasons, I have witnessed the following:
- Kevin Garnett setting about 57,439 moving screens in last year’s Championship run for the Celtics.
- “Big Baby” Davis somehow getting the same treatment, which is probably even a more shameless favoring of the Celtics by the refs because Davis is a load and knows how to throw his weight around and has no problem doing so with impunity during this series against the Bulls.
- Derrick Rose getting very clearly fouled on 7 consecutive possessions in the 4th quarter of Game 5 with only 2 foul calls taking place. I know that the guy is a rookie, and I know that the Celtics winning the series could mean more money for the league, but do they have to make it so obvious? This fact probably has me even madder than the Rondo-Miller play (see below) because if the refs would have called those 7 Bulls possessions according to the rules, then the Bulls had about a 80% chance of winning the game in regulation…not to mention Vinny Del Negro would not have panicked and would have kept giving Rose the ball every possession instead of Ben Gordon, who was still special, but you could tell he was feeling the effects of the hamstring strain he suffered in Game 4. Rose, on the other hand, was able to get to the rim against any 2 Celtics defenders seemingly any time he wanted. Granted, if I were Vinny Del Negro, and they were hacking the stuffing out of my rookie point guard like that at the end of the game and not getting called for it, I might have started to explore other options as well.
- Ray Allen getting a foul called on him for lowering his shoulder and trying to bully his way through a screen, then acting like the Bulls player (Brad Miller) initiated the contact. This play looked even worse because Miller was kind of throwing Allen around like a rag doll by the end of the play. It was, without a question, a very easy call for the officials to make…just like the ticky-tacky foul Ray-Ray committed on Ben Gordon that he whined to the refs about for at least 5 minutes. Dude, you get 6 fouls, and you used them all…sit down and let the guys with enough discipline to play within the rules continue the game.
- The refs “missing” a fragrant foul call by Rajon Rondo against Brad Miller at the end of the OT in Game 5. I will admit that calling this a regular old foul was an understandable call, as it happened in real time…but there was ample opportunity for the refs to look at the play and get it right, as Miller was trying to literally stop the bleeding on the Bulls bench. There was even a question as to whether or not there was goaltending on the play, so you know damn well that the refs watched the play at least a couple of times, saw that Rondo was very clearly headhunting, as Miller’s arm was completely outstretched with the ball in it when Rondo smacked him in the face. Here’s what else you have to know, if you either live more than 50 miles outside of New England and/or have an IQ above 80 – the refs absolutely, without question, had to make a conscious decision that, despite what they saw on the replay, they were not going to call a flagrant foul on the most important play of the game, even though that flagrant foul was probably one of the easiest flagrant fouls to call in the entire time that the league has had a flagrant foul rule. If the replay is not enough for you, how about just looking at the dude’s busted grill? For whatever reason (as if we don’t already know), the refs decided to ignore the rule in this particular case.
So, is there anything that can be done about this, other than bitching and moaning? Well, I am not sure you will ever be able to get rid of the fact that smaller players usually get carte blanche to beat up on guys, even other smaller players (see Bowen, Bruce for more info)…and the refs seem to look the other way even more when you have a little guy going up against a big guy. But that does not mean that the league is powerless in this case.
The league is probably the only entity that can right this ship. The refs awarded a game of this series to the Boston Celtics unfairly. The league can award Game 6 to the Chicago Bulls. I know that we are talking about the No Balls Association here, but they would be well within their rights to suspend Rajon Rondo for Game 6, right? I mean, he did commit a violent act of whaling on a defenseless shooter’s face during a league-sanctioned contest, right? What’s wrong with taking away Boston’s most important player for Game 6? A tooth for a tooth (pardon the pun) is what I say.
I, for one, do not think that David Stern has the balls, but that is basically all that is required here – a little testicular fortitude on the part of the commissioner to right a very clear, and very easy to fix, wrong perpetrated against one of its proud franchises by the refs…assuming that the refs did not make their decision because they have been under orders to favor the Celtics, Lakers and Cavaliers at all costs since October. I mean, all of the ref problems are fixed after the league hired that military dude, right?
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