We’ve all seen superstar treatment on the basketball court (not to mention in other sports). It’s almost accepted practice that a foul by a superstar will have a blind-eye turned to it by officials, whereas the same play by a rookie/journeyman will cop an immediate whistle. The question I put forward to you this weekend is: am I the only one who is bothered by this?
Do you notice the same thing happening? And more than this, do you think it’s acceptable?
Perhaps some people just accept it as part of the game — a part of David Stern’s big marketing machine. For me it falls into the same category as allowing players to travel on big dunks and homer-tv-announcers. All of it makes me feel like the powers that be think we’re stupid. To me it’s insulting. As a viewer, you are insulting my intelligence by allowing a foul call to go unwhistled because it was committed by (for example) LeBron James on Jonas Jerebko or Kobe Bryant on Will Bynum. I can see the foul, you can see the foul. We all can see the foul — well, those of us with both eyes open anyway.
The same applies to the television announcers who come out with homer calls EVERY SINGLE PLAY. You are insulting the intelligence of the viewers to try and proclaim that every single foul call against your team is wrong. You are treating them like simpletons to say that every 50/50 out of bounds call should go your team’s way. The worst examples come when an announcer will vehemently argue his team’s case, until such time as a slow motion replay comes on totally disproving his arguments, only to hear him fall silent. It’s one thing to see the wrong call in full-speed motion the first time around, but if a replay is presented to you that clearly shows that you’re wrong, don’t sit there silently pretending that nothing has happened. Own up, man up. Tell the viewers who you are supposedly educating, that the call you made is wrong and “fair call by the referees, that was out by us.”
It’s all frustrating.
Do you see the same thing I do? Or am I imagining things? Here is just one small example from this week. Do you think that if Dwyane Wade had dunked on JJ Hickson in the same way that there would be no foul call? Do you see body contact here?
Tell me I’m wrong.
