Post by FLCeltsFan on Jun 8, 2010 10:06:22 GMT -5
LOS ANGELES -- The big loser from the first two games of the 2010 NBA Finals is neither the Boston Celtics nor the Los Angeles Lakers. It's the conventional wisdom surrounding the meaning of the words "playoff basketball."
Allegedly, the phrase implies a rougher, more-physical style of game in which the referees are more lenient. We expect a "no blood, no foul" mentality, especially when it comes to little pokes and reaches.
Perhaps no piece of commonly accepted thought has taken more of a beating in the past 72 hours, as the Lakers and Celtics played foul-a-thons in the first two games that had fans of both teams apoplectic at different points.
After Game 2, it was L.A.'s turn to express frustration, as the Lakers lost partly because they were whistled for 29 personal fouls and lost Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom for important chunks of the game because of foul trouble.
"Maybe I shouldn't play defense," said Odom, who had three fouls in three minutes in the first half and now has 10 personals in 36 minutes this series.
Lakers coach Phil Jackson wasn't happy either, although he bizarrely chose to complain about the most obvious of the Lakers' 29 fouls -- a sloppy moving pick by Bynum that crushed Rajon Rondo.
Even more unusual, both he and Odom voiced their protests after a game in which the Lakers took more than twice as many free throws as Boston (39-18) until L.A. began fouling intentionally in the final minutes.
Nonetheless, their big-picture point holds up: The game was officiated far more restrictively than one would prefer. A random sampling -- and by no means a comprehensive one -- of the game's more dubious whistles would include Ray Allen's flopping to draw Bryant's third foul in the first half, Rondo's flopping even more impressively to draw Bryant's fourth foul and Bryant's drawing an and-1 when he was apparently fouled by a stray oxygen atom midway through the fourth quarter.
While many calls went L.A.'s way, the more suspicious ones drew the ire of the Staples Center crowd. After Bryant was whistled for his fourth foul, the crowd was so upset it seemed a Town Hall on health care might break out.
"I wasn't happy with those foul calls," Jackson said. "Those were unusual calls. [Bryant] tried to play aggressively and got called for it."
Wait, we're just getting started. Jackson also seemed upset with fouls called on Derek Fisher off the ball, apparently looking for more leeway to employ "playoff basketball" tactics that would allow Fisher to use his superior strength to reroute Allen on his cuts off the ball.
"When they take away any bumps, when Fish is trying to make [Ray Allen] divert his path and they don't allow him to do that, they call fouls on Fish and that really gives [Allen] an opportunity to take whatever route he wants to take off those screens," Jackson said.
However, there's a bigger story here, and it gets back to that little piece of conventional wisdom. Although there's a general belief that the game is officiated more loosely in the playoffs, you would have a hard time proving it.
These Finals, obviously, provide barrels of contradictory evidence. Through two games we've had 112 fouls and 134 free throw attempts, both of which vastly exceed the league's regular-season averages of 41.7 and 49.1 per game, respectively. Since neither the Celtics nor the Lakers were particularly high-foul teams in the regular season, it's not a case of unusual teams skewing the averages.
It's also not the first Finals to see a bump in free throw attempts, either. Most famously, the 2006 Finals between Miami and Dallas produced a profusion of whistles -- including 99 free throw attempts in six games for Dwyane Wade -- that played a key role in the Heat's upset victory.
More generally, we've seen little evidence of teams' foul and free throw frequency plummeting once the postseason rolls around. If anything, fouls go up slightly, presumably because the "no layups" rule is enforced with greater vigor.
That's the historical trend, but these playoffs in particular have seen an unusual spike in both fouls and free throw attempts compared to the regular season. The league averaged only 0.3 free throw attempts per field goal attempt during the regular season, but in the playoffs that's shot up to a shocking 0.359 -- a greater rate than 29 of the league's 30 teams mustered in the regular season.
Similarly, the league average of 20.71 fouls per 40 minutes has increased to 23.26. Not one team in the entire league fouled that frequently during the regular season. Percentage-wise, the increases are massive -- 19.7 percent more free throws on a per field goal attempt basis, and 12.3 percent more fouls per minute -- and are even greater when one considers that pace slows slightly in the playoffs.
That's bad enough, but it's been worse in the Finals. In two games the Celtics and Lakers have committed 112 fouls, a rate of 28.0 per 48 minutes -- dwarfing even the 23.26 figure that the league has averaged in the postseason.
The free throw rates tell a similar story. At a whopping 0.45 free throw attempts per field goal attempt, we're talking about a 50 percent increase from the regular-season rate. Again, this amazing spike comes despite the fact neither the Celtics nor the Lakers were a particularly high-foul team in either the regular season or the postseason before this series.
Granted, two games is a microscopic sample size. But they reflect the larger trend of these playoffs. While conventional wisdom has it that the zebras swallow their whistles when the going gets tough, we've seen the exact opposite this spring. Moreover, the evidence from other recent postseasons weighs further against the idea that refs are inclined to swallow their whistles in playoff games.
All of which means the players need to adjust to the idea that the playoffs will be refereed at least as tightly as the regular season was, if not more tightly.
"You can measure it a little and see how much they allow," said Pau Gasol, "and that's the idea every good player should carry into a game, whether it's regular season or playoffs. Just like they have to adjust to different opponents, different arenas and different defenses, players have to note how a game is being called and respond accordingly."
Doing so is just a little bit harder so far in these Finals because the officiating has erred so far on the side of too many whistles rather than too few. It's had a heavy impact on the first two games of the Lakers-Celtics series, but I'm not sure it will determine the outcome. Instead, the main impact has been watching one of the game's most durable myths die a horrible, public death.
Allegedly, the phrase implies a rougher, more-physical style of game in which the referees are more lenient. We expect a "no blood, no foul" mentality, especially when it comes to little pokes and reaches.
Perhaps no piece of commonly accepted thought has taken more of a beating in the past 72 hours, as the Lakers and Celtics played foul-a-thons in the first two games that had fans of both teams apoplectic at different points.
After Game 2, it was L.A.'s turn to express frustration, as the Lakers lost partly because they were whistled for 29 personal fouls and lost Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom for important chunks of the game because of foul trouble.
"Maybe I shouldn't play defense," said Odom, who had three fouls in three minutes in the first half and now has 10 personals in 36 minutes this series.
Lakers coach Phil Jackson wasn't happy either, although he bizarrely chose to complain about the most obvious of the Lakers' 29 fouls -- a sloppy moving pick by Bynum that crushed Rajon Rondo.
Even more unusual, both he and Odom voiced their protests after a game in which the Lakers took more than twice as many free throws as Boston (39-18) until L.A. began fouling intentionally in the final minutes.
Nonetheless, their big-picture point holds up: The game was officiated far more restrictively than one would prefer. A random sampling -- and by no means a comprehensive one -- of the game's more dubious whistles would include Ray Allen's flopping to draw Bryant's third foul in the first half, Rondo's flopping even more impressively to draw Bryant's fourth foul and Bryant's drawing an and-1 when he was apparently fouled by a stray oxygen atom midway through the fourth quarter.
While many calls went L.A.'s way, the more suspicious ones drew the ire of the Staples Center crowd. After Bryant was whistled for his fourth foul, the crowd was so upset it seemed a Town Hall on health care might break out.
"I wasn't happy with those foul calls," Jackson said. "Those were unusual calls. [Bryant] tried to play aggressively and got called for it."
Wait, we're just getting started. Jackson also seemed upset with fouls called on Derek Fisher off the ball, apparently looking for more leeway to employ "playoff basketball" tactics that would allow Fisher to use his superior strength to reroute Allen on his cuts off the ball.
"When they take away any bumps, when Fish is trying to make [Ray Allen] divert his path and they don't allow him to do that, they call fouls on Fish and that really gives [Allen] an opportunity to take whatever route he wants to take off those screens," Jackson said.
However, there's a bigger story here, and it gets back to that little piece of conventional wisdom. Although there's a general belief that the game is officiated more loosely in the playoffs, you would have a hard time proving it.
These Finals, obviously, provide barrels of contradictory evidence. Through two games we've had 112 fouls and 134 free throw attempts, both of which vastly exceed the league's regular-season averages of 41.7 and 49.1 per game, respectively. Since neither the Celtics nor the Lakers were particularly high-foul teams in the regular season, it's not a case of unusual teams skewing the averages.
It's also not the first Finals to see a bump in free throw attempts, either. Most famously, the 2006 Finals between Miami and Dallas produced a profusion of whistles -- including 99 free throw attempts in six games for Dwyane Wade -- that played a key role in the Heat's upset victory.
More generally, we've seen little evidence of teams' foul and free throw frequency plummeting once the postseason rolls around. If anything, fouls go up slightly, presumably because the "no layups" rule is enforced with greater vigor.
That's the historical trend, but these playoffs in particular have seen an unusual spike in both fouls and free throw attempts compared to the regular season. The league averaged only 0.3 free throw attempts per field goal attempt during the regular season, but in the playoffs that's shot up to a shocking 0.359 -- a greater rate than 29 of the league's 30 teams mustered in the regular season.
Similarly, the league average of 20.71 fouls per 40 minutes has increased to 23.26. Not one team in the entire league fouled that frequently during the regular season. Percentage-wise, the increases are massive -- 19.7 percent more free throws on a per field goal attempt basis, and 12.3 percent more fouls per minute -- and are even greater when one considers that pace slows slightly in the playoffs.
That's bad enough, but it's been worse in the Finals. In two games the Celtics and Lakers have committed 112 fouls, a rate of 28.0 per 48 minutes -- dwarfing even the 23.26 figure that the league has averaged in the postseason.
The free throw rates tell a similar story. At a whopping 0.45 free throw attempts per field goal attempt, we're talking about a 50 percent increase from the regular-season rate. Again, this amazing spike comes despite the fact neither the Celtics nor the Lakers were a particularly high-foul team in either the regular season or the postseason before this series.
Granted, two games is a microscopic sample size. But they reflect the larger trend of these playoffs. While conventional wisdom has it that the zebras swallow their whistles when the going gets tough, we've seen the exact opposite this spring. Moreover, the evidence from other recent postseasons weighs further against the idea that refs are inclined to swallow their whistles in playoff games.
All of which means the players need to adjust to the idea that the playoffs will be refereed at least as tightly as the regular season was, if not more tightly.
"You can measure it a little and see how much they allow," said Pau Gasol, "and that's the idea every good player should carry into a game, whether it's regular season or playoffs. Just like they have to adjust to different opponents, different arenas and different defenses, players have to note how a game is being called and respond accordingly."
Doing so is just a little bit harder so far in these Finals because the officiating has erred so far on the side of too many whistles rather than too few. It's had a heavy impact on the first two games of the Lakers-Celtics series, but I'm not sure it will determine the outcome. Instead, the main impact has been watching one of the game's most durable myths die a horrible, public death.
