Lakers-Warriors: The Best and Worst of the NBA

For anyone who watched the Los Angeles Lakers-Golden State Warriors game last night, you got to see what is great about the NBA and what continues to drag the sport down.

First, the great.

I almost went to sleep, but was glad I stayed up because for the first 52:56, I was rewarded with a playoff-atmosphere, back-and-forth game featuring two talented and well-coached teams.

The Lakers and Warriors were playing the second of back-to-back games against each other.   On Sunday night, the Warriors edged L.A. at the Staples Center 115-111.  In the rematch on Monday night at Golden State, the Warriors had an 11-point half-time lead only to see the Lakers come back with a 35-point third quarter to lead by one going into the fourth.   

After a Lamar Odom hoop increased the Lakers lead to 110-101 with 2:36 remaining, it appeared that L.A. had the game in hand.

But back came the Warriors, ultimately tying the game with three seconds left on two Baron Davis free throws.

The excitement continued in overtime.

This time the Warriors took the lead, going up by four with under two minutes to play.  But L.A. went on an 8-2 run behind three-pointers by Derek Fisher and Sasha Vujacic and a driving lay up by Odom.

Two-point game, Warriors ball at mid-court with four seconds to play.   Golden State had one last chance to tie or win the game.

Through 52:56, it had been a great game, one of many tremendous games this season.  Kobe Bryant added to his MVP credentials with 30 points, 11 rebounds, and seven assists in 52 minutes despite taking an elbow to his face.

Odom went for 23 points, 21 rebounds (his second-straight 20-rebound game), five assists, and five blocks.

For the Warriors, Davis had 30 points, nine rebounds, seven assists, Stephen Jackson added 29 points, Monta Ellis 18 with several big hoops, and Al Harrington had 19.

This season has been filled with reasons for an NBA fan to be excited—star power, great races for the playoffs, and more teams that legitimately could make a run to the finals than I can remember in a long time.

The Western Conference receives a ton of attention, and rightfully so.  A very talented team is going to be left out of the playoffs in the West.

The Eastern Conference is not nearly as deep—but the Celtics, Pistons, Cavaliers and Magic create intriguing playoff matchups in the East too.

This should be a banner year for the NBA.

But now to the bad.

The officiating.

On a nearly game-by-game basis, the officiating in the NBA is simply brutal.

When the Tim Donaghy scandal broke, it really did not surprise too many people who watch the league—the sentiment was almost, well at least this explains why one official does such a bad job.

In the game last night, trailing by two with four seconds left, the Warriors attempted to run a side-out play.

As Monta Ellis went to run towards the baseline, Derek Fisher pulled a typical Derek Fisher play, and in typical fashion, the official fell for it.

Fisher impeded Ellis’ attempt to move, put two arms on Ellis, and then dragged him to the ground.

The official with the worst angle, Bob Delaney, saw two people fall.

Sticking to the NBA officiating rule of if someone falls there must be a foul, despite having no idea what caused the two players to reach the ground, Delaney blows his whistle.

Charge on Ellis.

Game-over.

Afterwards, despite the performances of Odom, Bryant, Davis, Jackson, the official had as much to do with the outcome as any of them.

It of course wasn’t enough for Fisher to pull this garbage, fool the officials, ruin an otherwise great game—he then exasperated the situation by faking injury.  He rolled around on the ground, grabbing his knee.  I thought at first maybe he had done something serious to himself, the way he was clutching his knee, lying on his back.

But then I remembered it was Derek Fisher.

So naturally, after getting the attention for a few seconds, he stood up, and shockingly, appeared fine on the final play of the game.

Far too often in the NBA the talk after a game is the officials.

Players flopping, like Manu Ginobli and Derek Fisher and many others, has become far too common.

Players on offense having no intention to get a shot off, but only trying to draw a foul has become far too common.

But I don’t blame the players.  It might not be the way I wish they would play, but as long as these officials are going to continually be fooled by flopping, continually reward players for this type of conduct, why shouldn’t they do it?  There is contact in all basketball games, yet the officials seem to believe that if someone falls, there must be a foul.  It doesn’t matter if the official sees how the player ended up on the ground or not.

The real problem to me appears to be that the powers that be in the NBA bury their heads in the sand when it comes to addressing the officiating problem.   They are more concerned with the global impact of the game, or in not helping the Sonics, than in actually improving the game itself.

Officiating is not an easy job, and even the best officials make mistakes.  But before an official makes a call that essentially decides a game, that official better be positive the call is correct.  

Back in 2002, the Lakers defeated the Kings in game six of the Western Conference Finals in a terribly officiated game.

Many who watched the 2006 NBA Finals attribute the Heat victory, at least equally, to the way the game was officiated as they do to the play of Dwayne Wade.

Unfortunately, these two situations were not aberrations.  This same poor officiating occurs almost nightly on a much smaller stage.

With the playoff races, the battle for MVP between Kobe, Lebron, and Chris Paul, and what is sure to be the most compelling NBA post-season since at least MJ and the Bulls, this could be a legendary season in the history of the NBA.

But as long as the officials continue to make themselves a major part of the story in nearly every game, they continue to have the power to ruin everything all by themselves.