Down here in championship city they aren't.Originally Posted by NJReds
Mike Finger: NBA faces rebuilding lost trust
Down here in championship city they aren't.
Mike Finger: NBA faces rebuilding lost trust
/r/reds
The officiating in the NBA is so bad already I don't know you'd know when it was on purpose or not.
Officiating in pro sports is pretty attrocious across the board, but the NBA is by far the worst. This doesn't help.
Grape works as a soda. Sort of as a gum. I wonder why it doesn't work as a pie. Grape pie? There's no grape pie. - Larry David
As one of the 10 diehard Ohio NBA fans outside of Cleveland, I'm taking this pretty hard. What I hope happens is that leagues start working harder to make sure their officials are taken care of. In the NFL, most officials need summer jobs to pay the bills. The NBA had a big scandal with the refs pocketing money that was supposed to be used for traveling. MLB umps have also been on strike in the past. In order to prevent these things from happening, you need to make sure the umps have little or no incentive to cheat.
From what I heard on the radio today, NBA referees are making upwards of $90K a year. Definitely not chump change.
When this story broke, the names of about 5 officials came to my mind who can be counted on to make at least 1-2 calls a game that either fly in the face of logic or appear to be driven by spite. This guy Donaghy was not one of them. I'd never even heard of him.
/r/reds
No, but in an industry that relies on these guys to maintain the integrity of their sport should take better care of its officials. Think about how much money the NFL makes. It is a complete joke that they don't pay their refs well. Also, think about the grief they take, rightly or wrongly. Ref's/Umpires are probably some of the least respected/most vilified professions I can think of.
It's a little interesting that this story comes out in the same year that the NBA held extravagant All Star Game festivities in Las Vegas and moved their summer league games to Las Vegas...
"In our sundown perambulations of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing 'base', a certain game of ball. Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our close rooms, the game of ball is glorious"
-Walt Whitman
NFL officials are not full time NFL employees. They all have regular careers and basically work on weekends.
From what I've heard today, Donaghy is ready to turn State's an implicate other NBA refs and even some players. Stern isn't going to be able to PR his way out of this jam. If the public doesn't feel the game is being played on the level, they aren't going to watch it. It's not like it's getting gangbuster ratings now but it could fall off to NHL levels by the time this is done.
The only thing that surprised me about this was that I wasn't surprised.
The playoff officiating the past 2 seasons has been god-awful. More than once I've said "either the refs are dishonest or incompetent".
To the point of $90K not being chump-change for refs, put me on the court to ref a whole gaggle of whiney multi-millionaires and pay me $90K, you are just begging for serious-as-a-heart-attack trouble. At some point, the thought of "they are getting theirs, when do I get mine" would pass through my brain. Cheap doesn't even begin to describe it.
I think this could be a dagger to the heart of the NBA. They have been sitting on a golden goose ever since Magic and Bird brought the league back from the brink of collapse. The NBA is on the cusp of joining the NHL as the "who-cares?" leagues.
She used to wake me up with coffee ever morning
Right on the money.
Incidentally, one of the refs who was busted for trading first-class plane tickets for coach fare and then pocketing the difference and not reporting it to the IRS a few years back was my Phys Ed teacher in high school.
"I can make all the stadiums rock."
-Air Supply
I don't know how much of a difference it makes, but they start out at 90k and the high end is around 250k. Plus around 25k a year for expenses and that excludes plane tickets because those are provided.
"I know a lot about the law and various other lawyerings."
Hitters who avoid outs are the funnest.
This is an intriguing point. IIRC, there was a scandal a few years back with some refs who were cashing in the first-class airline tickets mandated in their contract for travel to games, purchasing coach class tickets and pocketing the difference.
/r/reds
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