Video replay has been near instant for decades. Why is it used so infrequently? It seems rule changes are only in response to glaring errors the year before. Two years ago, Chauncy Billups scored well after time had expired but won the game anyway because of a clock error. The NBA responded with replay to check last second shots. A year late, but good job, right? I'm not so sure.
If the goal of the NBA was to ensure the best officiating possible, with the best calls being made, they would form an investigative team mandated with the improvement the game. Now, they have a team, but they only pretend to do this, check the crack squad's results:
Officials may use replay to check...
1. Was a shot/foul taken/committed before/after the shot clock expired.
2. Who touched the ball before it went out of bounds, in the last 2 minutes.
10 NBA elites; that's all they can conjure!? The Billups shot could have been avoided in the first place. Take the common functioning replay/time rules trialed and tested in college/FIBA. Apply it. Simple, right? It should have already been in place for decades due to the duh factor. Instead we have a committee who's most visible action is inaction.
But broadcast crews have the play up and examined most times before the foul is even fully communicated to the scorer's table. Why can't the NBA have thier own review crew. Its not more then the time it takes for someone to walk to the free throw line to verify a call. If the right call is made no interruption takes place.
Why not let ref's call for replay when they are not sure what happened? It could be as simple as a ref clicking a 'Review Button' on his belt with a Replay Crew responding to his request. Right now when ref's miss a call they confer on the court to make a proverbial coin flip, interrupting the flow of the game. A quick word from a replay booth is, in fact, much more efficient.
What's Really Happening
Flip flop 'tradition' excuses don't hold water either. 40's-50's Hoop lacked replay because it wasn't instant: most games were not even taped. Bad calls are not part of a grand tradition... we just hadn't invented 'the television'. Since we did the NBA has adopted technology in every aspect of the game except officiating. They're just now checking the time on a last shot when I can use a pocket device to record the play so someone in Zimbabwe can say "bad call" before the commercial break. Its senseless. So, why?
The league likes black leather and whips, that's why. They blocked Tim Donaghy's book because they don't want their sticky garments aired in public... it has little to do with veracity. Star promotion via officiating is illegal (fraud) and if confirmed it will be a larger scandal then Donaghy. Illegal activities by some of the richest men in the world is naughty. So the NBA joined the "Entertainment Industry". Remember kids:
When In Doubt, Emulate WWE
Look no further. The most openly fraudulent sporting org in the world has the answer. Counter cheating with the "WWE Defense". Watch as countless refs are 'distracted' and 'don't see' the guy's head connecting with a steel chair. That means it didn't happen, right?
The Media is not allowed ref access to press them about calls, they'd crack under the pressure, so the NBA uses the WWE defense in their name. "Oh, the Ref just didn't see it. The player/team is whining so we are going to fine them $30,000 to shut them up. We have the best referees in the world! Our first party investigation says so." It's worked well. for the first 60 years of the league.
Replay guts the WWE's marketing, and the WWE defense, and likewise the NBA. WWE does not have replay because they know their matches are manipulated. Instead of blaming a ref who didn't see Kobe hit Lebron with a steel chair, we will know a replay crew, with a rewind button and angles, intentionally botched the call. Because it's obvious, they won't botch them, because they'll be found out. People knowing this, and seeing bad calls fixed regularly, will immediately put their faith back in the game and trust the NBA is doing their best to ensure honest competition. If the WWE started using legit replay eople would start taking it seriously as a sporting competition.
Without Star Treatment players will face much tougher defense. MJ/Kobe/Hogan types get ticky tack calls and therefore defenders know they can't guard them as closely as Deshawn Stevenson types. Then Kobe gets more open lanes. It's cheating, even though Kobe's not trying to. He just exists in a culture that cheats.
What would be the results if replay changed that culture?
Check them out:
Integrity? Fixed.
Image? Fixed.
Fan faith/loyalty? Fixed.
Griping players/teams? Fixed.
Donaghy scandal? Fixed.
All overnight.
Instead, McMahon/Stern/et al prop up the notion that a few 60 year old men trying to keep pace with the elite mutant athletes of the NBA/WWE works. (only one commits legal fraud) These benefits are so far reaching and solve so many major issues it indicates that something must be balancing the argument for it. Something they lose if these things are gained via replay.
One need look no further then the Lakers/Blazers series when LA came back from 15 down in game 7 via a 24-2 foul discrepancy, assisted by Portland's best player, Rasheed Wallace, being ejected for 'looking' at the ref in game 6.
Or game 6 vs the Kings in 2002 when a 18-6 4'th quarter foul disparity fueled another LA comeback.
For a more recent example Dwayne Wade won a title in exactly this scenario. The most exciting star on the court always gets it a bit easier because it goes a long way promoting the NBA on TV. Dallas had Miami on the ropes in 07. In game 3 and 5 Wade got unbelievable calls to save the Heat from going down 0-3 and from losing game 5 while Dallas got pounded with no calls of their own.
It's All About The Benjamins
What! What! Marquee match-ups going 7 games bring the bling. When those teams are down in this decade they suddenly have a great advantage at the line in game 5/6. Game 7's make millions, 100s of them, and while replay instantly restores integrity/faith to the league, it does not make more game 7's.
That's why these Luddites will still choose to ref the game 1800's style, instead of 2000's, or hell, 1970's style. It gives the fraudulent culture control of how money is made. But if they're going to cheat, why stop there? Go big or go home.
Lets start having pro-mo interviews and face paint. Get back to our roots with the odd cage match (they used to play in cages, tradition, right?) and let a few steel chairs slip out on the court. Chair shots are entertaining and sell tickets, right? After all, in the NBA's world of no-replay, and the WWE, if the ref didn't see it, it didn't happen. Judging by their hair, I'm not sure they'll even notice.
