Replay Lies
It happened in the national title game. It actually happened twice: a screen of ref butts huddled over a monitor, poring over frame-by-frame replays of a routine, uncontroversial basketball play. Once they let the routine, uncontroversial basketball play stand. Once they said this was not Texas Tech basketball:
This clip is even better. Guy fouls Moretti and they overturn the out of bounds call. ♀️ #gamechanger pic.twitter.com/I4oPCLKIRu
— Karen Gregory (@karen_gregory) April 9, 2019
Michigan fans everywhere exclaimed I KNEW IT to normies around them, descending into paranoid spittle-flecked rants met with either polite incomprehension or, in certain cases, the nearest human saying "blarp" and falling over because they are drunk and/or an infant.
[After THE JUMP: blarp *falls over*]
This is because they were overwhelmed with dread, having been on the pointy end of another one of these worse-than-pointless review sequences last year. Michigan was down 70-69 to Purdue. Charles Matthews drove to the rim; Dakota Mathias swiped at the ball from behind.
After literally seven minutes of review the ball was awarded to the Boilers, game over.
Your author in the aftermath:
This was insane for many reasons.
One: I spent 39:54 watching a great basketball game between two good teams exchanging haymakers, and then I spent the rest of my life watching the back of a ref.
Two: any replay that takes that long surely falls in the realm of the disputed and should not be flipped.
Three: that call would never be made at any point during the first 39:54 because it does not matter if an offensive player who has been stripped of the ball going to the basket has his finger on the ball a nanosecond after the defender. The basketball rule book functionally reads "if a player is stripped going to the basket it's his team's ball unless it hits his leg or foot."
Applying a different standard to a late game possession isn't correcting a call, it's getting it wrong in the name of pedantry.
This is why Michigan fans not even watching the game felt a disturbance in the force when the monitor was activated. We have now reached peak replay: a long delay in the national title game to get a call wrong. Referees helplessly watching a reach-in foul they now cannot call and being forced to make a call they would not make if not forced to go to the monitor.
The solution here is to accept that sometimes the more you look, the less you really know and either eliminate replay for these sorts of things or put a hard cap on the amount of time that refs have to review. It can be 30 seconds. Buffalo Wild Wings can run another commercial about how they don't have any plates and every surface in their restaurant-type edifice is unexplainably sticky.
But since that's not going to happen, someone stick this in the rulebook:
"If a defender hits the ball in an attempt to dispossess the offensive player and the ball goes out of bounds as a result, the offense retains possession unless the ball hits a part of the offensive player's body other than the hand or hands the ball is in when contact is made."
Thus routine, uncontroversial basketball plays can resume being routine and uncontroversial even in the last two minutes.
I watched a game earlier this year where it was the same play we are debating here, except the defender never touched the ball, he just grabbed the offensive player's arm. Real time call was no foul, offense keeps possession. On replay, the defender never touched the ball, so they got the ball.
Clear foul on defense, defense rewarded. (also pertinent for last night?) The rules need to allow the referees to award the ball to the offense there, as well. (you could invoke the legal 'clean hands' argument. You committed a foul, you shall not be rewarded.)
Oh, and having Gene Sterator as the rules expert that they go to is just some more salt in that 15 month old wound
I fully support putting a cap on the amount of time a replay can last but I'm not sure I support intentionally getting a call wrong. I get it is frustrating but Brian's rule is ripe for all kinds of problems. How long after the defender hitting the ball out can the offensive player's hand hit the ball and have it not count? What counts as possession if it is a loose ball situation both players are going after?
Changing the rule would not be getting the call "wrong" This is the way basketball has worked since the day it was invented. Only since frame-by-frame replay has come into play has this BS started.
It's similar to catches in football, which replay has totally f'ed up, or the innane "baserunner slid into the bag but then left contact with the bag for 0.0000000000000001 seconds so he is out" replay in MLB.
Replay is great for getting blown calls right. All of this frame-by-frame Zaprudering of calls that were basically correct to begin with and would be called that way 100% of the time without replay is just stupid.
Like I said I support the idea of a 30 second cap and only live speed replays to avoid zaprudering but sports history is littered with terrible calls impacting outcomes in negative ways and replay has reduced that by a lot. Sure its come with its own problems but working to fix those is better than throwing it all out. This call was bad but if a ball goes off a player last and it is clear that it does that should be the call, no matter who hits it out. That is the way basketball has always been called.
"That is the way basketball has always been called."
It hasn't though.
You'll have a guy go up for a shot and a defender swipes down at the ball and gets it. The momentum of the shooter pushes through the swipe and propels the ball 15 feet in the air and out of bounds as he wildly flails his arms. That ball is always given back to the offense.
The laws of physics say the shooter was last to touch it because he threw it in the air. If the defender were actually last to touch it, the ball would have shot down to the court because the defender was swiping down. This happens about a dozen times in any basketball game you have ever watched.
The "spirit" of the rule is that the ball is given to the offense because the defense stripped it, even though common sense and grade school comprehension of physics could tell you that the shooter was technically the last to touch it. THAT is how basketball has always been called.
I think you are giving refs too much credit in terms of understanding basic physics. If the spirit is due to defense stripping the ball why when it goes off a knee or the foot is not given to the offense? Its the exact same idea, defense strips, offensive player inadvertantly grazes ball and it goes out of bounds.
The refs just see the defensive player hitting the ball last and that is what they call.
Think "standard of review" instead of "spirit of the rule" or "how the game has always been called." A defender hits ball and hand of the offensive player with the ball, the ball then goes directly out of bounds. Regardless of what replay you watch, the "last touching" is almost simultaneous. Perhaps one player touches the ball .10 of a second after the other. There is no way you can make that distinction with the naked eye. Hell, if the ref original says it is off the offensive player that is the way the call should stay too. Every single call that makes a determination as to which players pinky touched the ball a split second after another players should remain the original call. If it goes off the knee or a calf that is a completely different inquiry.
Yeah, that's just not the same idea at all. Moving on.
Eliminate replay
Same thing happened in a game vs. MSU this year. Teske got two hands on a rebound, Tillman swatted it out of his hands, but Teske's thumb grazed it on the way out.
I'd extend it to 1 full minute of review, but limit the replay to full speed video. If you cannot make the call at full speed, you stick with the call on the field/court/ice. Replay should be there to catch major errors only.
I get the concerns on replay but really they just need to change the way this rule is written/interpreted on these plays. No one cares that the ball was on the TTU's players finger for an extra nano-second. UVA player knocked the ball out of bounds. The way Brian writes it makes perfect sense to me. You can't call something one way for the first 38 mins (and 50+ years of basketball) and then take out a microscope in the last 2 mins and say "well technically..."
The rule is stupid because literally everytime the ball is slapped out of a player's hand by the defender it is going to touch the player's hand last. Whether its for a thousandth of a second or a tenth of a second, it is always going to and is unavoidable. The rule should be that the ball is off whoever caused the ball to go out
I agree that segment was frustrating and support your proposed rule change. I would only add a slight clarification that once there is clear, full separation from the hand(s), then if the hand (or any other body part) retouches the ball after, it's out off the offense. This allows for the foot, leg, etc. to be counted as it is now in real time.
I like Brian's rule idea or anything similar.
But this call NEVER happens if the refs call the obvious and oh so intentional foul that Guy makes on Moretti to keep him from going all the way for a layup. This is so much more irresponsible/egregious/against the spirit of the game/etc than the replay...a conscious decision to ignore a foul. What is the possible reason for swallowing the whistle there? You don't need a tinfoil hat to think that the officials (for whatever reason) wanted to tilt the game in UVA's favor.
Just stop it with the conspiracy bullshit.
Tech had an out of bounds call go THEIR way in the last minute of regulation.
Tech led by 3 with 20 seconds left in regulation and could have played great defense to win the game and national title. Instead they give up the most wide open 3 in this year's tournament, fuck around with the ball on offense and go to overtime.
It was a patently unfair decision. What you're speaking about was a missed call that happens dozens of times, if not more, in every basketball game. That doesn't mean it was a fucking conspiracy.
And if the refs were in the bag for UVA, they would have granted Guy a time out when Hunter threw the ball out of bounds after he rebounded Culver's miss, saying that he called it when it was still in Hunter's possession and giving UVA the ball with 3 seconds left.
Bravo (Dicaprio slow clap gif.com)
I was curious about that 'trip' - CBS didn't show a replay. It definitely looked weird when it happened and the two Texas Tech players who were right there were astonished and put their hands on their head.
And Guy fouled Moretti on that loose ball. It's clear on the replay - Moretti even winces a little and changes his gait in response to the contact. And I don't think there was enough video evidence to overturn that. I wish the refs could make judgment calls in situations like this and be like 'yeah it probably grazed his finger on the way out but we missed a foul just seconds earlier, so let's keep it as Tech ball.' Officiating was pretty decent all tournament but I think it shows just how difficult it is to get every call right.
Gutless decision by CBS to not show the reply of the Virginia self-trip. I replayed it myself to confirm what I thought I saw and it was extremely obvious.
*cough* big ten title game *cough*
- I TOTALLY agree with limiting replay to 30 seconds. Been banging on that drum for years. Replay sucks now. We're long past the idea of "indisputable" and have changed to "preponderance of the evidence."
- The media, having been THE driving force behind replay because they scream about every missed call, does not have much credibility in now bitching that replay is too ubiquitous.
- If the ball goes off Moretti's leg, nobody complains. His pinky is not different from the rest of his body as far as the rulebook is concerned. So the call is right. Complaining that they in fact made the right call is weird. They did not review the play to get it wrong, they reviewed to get it right by the rulebook. Of course, the suggested rulebook fix would be a very good common sense fix to change that.
- Ain't no asterisks on no banners.
Except Louisville's - pretty big, dirty asterisk on that banner...
You'd probably be right, but try as I might, I see no banner.
Completely agree. It was absolutely the correct call. Nobody would be complaining if the defensive player swatted the ball away and it "grazed" his knee.
Viewers be like:
i'm 100% old fart, but replay was never a good idea, like not ever, under any circumstances. "but if you get the call right..." nope, screw that. replay, by definition takes a human element out of the game. the games are better when they are in the hands of humans, right or wrong.
but if you say that you have to have it (and fine - i hear your argument. it's wrong, but i hear it), then at least do it with a 45-second time limit and a VERY specific list of things you can review. in basketball, it's "are the shooters toes on the three-point line" and "did it get off before the buzzer." "who touched it last" can pound sand. as noted - if it takes you three minutes to review it, then BY DEFINITION it's not clear evidence.
Just wait -- when review will utilize quantum physics. The ball will simultaneously be inbounds and out of bounds.
The rule cited doesn't apply to the TTU/UVA game because the ball handler wasn't going to the basket. I agree with the time limit in theory, but there were a lot of angles that made the difference in this place. The one angle clearly showed the TTU player was last to touch the ball, while the others didn't.
I think the proposed rule would be a welcome change, because, as I believe you wrote after the UM/PU game, the offensive player will almost always be the last to touch the ball despite not being the one who knocked it out of bounds.
rule 401(b)(1) of common sense:
pinky grazes don't count
Pinky grazes that give the appearance of a graze but can’t be definitely confirmed period should not count. The absurdity of taking that long to decide what looks like might have happened is by definition inconclusive. Why are these fucks in charge so confused?
I agree with essentially everything but I have a slightly different spin on this issue.
Why reward the defense for never having possession of the ball and just swatting or slapping at the ball. It becomes a game of hockey and not basketball. You incentivize teams to slap a lot and creates a sloppy type game.
Unintended consequences.
Here is how ridiculous the replay thing has become. You officiate a game and then you go to the replay monitor review system in the last 2 minutes?
How about having a tennis match and using the Mac Cam only in a 5th set tiebreak? The reason they don't do it the entire game is because the games would be 6 hours so I guess the supposed close calls only count in the last 2 minutes because people will remember those calls but not the 27 times in happened early in the game.
There is a Columbo episode called Exercise in Fatality with Robert Conrad. A line that is uttered at the end, the final line that is appropriate for this discussion.
You tried to contrive the perfect alibi and it's your perfect alibi that's going to hang you.
gotta be the shoes
April 10th, 2019 at 12:09 AM ^
Exactly what I've been thinking too. It's a huge reward for the defense. Just for slapping the ball?
Additionally, right after the clip above ends, before the ball lands out of bounds, Guy grabs Moretti's arm... shouldn't that be a clear foul if Moretti still has "possession" for having been the last one in contact with the ball?
also, here's a possibly stupid question that i honestly don't know the answer to: did the refs go to the replay by some sort of 'last five minutes of the game' rule, or do they have discretion on when to ask for it?
replay is stupid in general, but if the refs are the ones initiating the replays...
I like that last rule you just put down! watching refs review a play is such a buzz kill anyway.
Thank you, Brian. I have been bitching about the excessive amount of reviewing for years. This is spot on. How do these guys have jobs as refs if they have to constantly go to the monitor? They're clearly not good at their jobs. There needs to be a challenge system implemented. Putting a cap on the amount of reviews is dicey. What if they review one play that a coach deems unnecessary but then when it comes to another controversial call, the refs cannot review because they reached the cap? That will cause more problems. I think coaches should be given two or three challenges per half. No more automatic reviewing under two minutes. Why is it two minutes, anyway? Why is that number so special? Why is it not three or one? It's stupid. The Big Ten tournament - I saw so many backs of refs because all they were doing was reviewing left and right. It was absurd.
The two minute thing is so dumb. Last I checked, getting screwed out of a point in the first minute of a game subtracts the same amount from the final score as getting screwed out of a point in the last minute. So what happens if the call happens real close to 2 minutes, do we first do a review to see if the clock had hit 2 minutes or not and then review the actual call only if under 2? Video review should be implemented equally at all points in the game. Maybe they should have someone in a booth that does the review who specializes in using the tech so s/he can get the correct call in a few seconds instead of a few minutes.
Glad to see this posted. I replayed Guy's trip over his teammate 3 times and said to wife at time that bad call is going to decide the game. The announcers were so busy wetting themselves over Guy and Virginia at that point that they completely missed that bad call. FWIW, imo, that call giving Guy free throws for tripping over his teammate was biggest and worst call of the game and nobody said a peep about it on the broadcast.
Kind of agree, kind of don't. I think the problem is with the foul/no-foul situation. Defender slaps guys hands (no call), ball goes out off of offensive player, given to offense because it's fair, replay overturns (and replay can't comment on the no-foul call mistake). This is dumb.
But, if the defender hits the ball, and the ball hits the offensive player last, it is defense's ball. There is no other sane way to write the rule. It's almost impossible to call this correctly.
That said, just remove replay. It isn't helping, and it's harder to fix than it is to get right.
I hate replay.
But it's here. So do this: make them watch it in real-time speed at a "normal" viewing angle (what they would show us at home during game play, not zoomed in to micron-level magnification), with a 10 second time limit once the video starts. If they don't see enough to change the ruling, don't. Apply this to ALL sports. This would allow them to get most really egregious crap corrected, and prevent debacles like what we saw Monday night.
Just stop all reviews except for when time expires, because to do that right requires the ref to watch like four things at once. And that only gets reviewed for one minute max. Death to video review in all sports.
Couldn't agree more. If someone slaps the ball out of your hand and out of bounds, its out on him, I don't care if the ball spent one frame of video longer on your finger than the swatter. Your "rule" is well written and easy to interpret/implement.
These are all great points, but don't forget the NCAA put 3 ACC teams in as 1 seeds, and only 1 made the FF (and only then based on some help, and overtime).
They really had to try their best to get an ACC team the banner, if for nothing more than posterity.
So, would we have seen these calls were it Michigan vs Purdue in the final game? I would say not as likely.
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