Paul George Reportedly Fined $10K for Criticizing Officials

Indiana Pacers star Paul George did not have a successful 2015-16 debut, hitting four of his 17 shot attempts against the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday, but his postgame comments about the officials drew the NBA's attention.

According to Marc J. Spears of Yahoo Sports, the league fined George $10,000 for publicly criticizing the referees.

Following Indiana's 106-99 loss, George said he felt like the officials had quick whistles against the Pacers, per James Herbert of CBS Sports.

"We felt like it was a lot of bad calls," George said. "Close games like that, let us play. You got a guy like [Kyle] Lowry who's down on one end doing what he wants, then on the other end he gets touched and the whistle is getting blown. So we was frustrated. We was very frustrated."

The Pacers' frustration seemed to boil over in the second half, when Toronto erased a 16-point deficit by scoring 69 points. George Hill received a technical foul early in the fourth quarter after being called for a traveling violation.

The officials also handed George a technical foul midway through the fourth quarter after calling an offensive foul against him.

This is not the first time George has made headlines for criticizing officials. The 25-year-old infamously said Miami received "home cooking" during the playoffs in 2014 and was fined $25,000.

The good news for Indiana is that George was able to play 37 minutes, his most in a game since suffering a gruesome leg injury in a scrimmage with Team USA in the summer of 2014. 

Even though George's wallet is lighter, the fact that he was able to shoulder a heavy workload in the season's first game gives the Pacers a reason to be optimistic about their chances to return to the postseason.