Over at Awful Announcing, one of my favorite things to do is to look at what sports topics may be trending on Twitter and the conversation that takes place during games. Usually, these are the best and funniest tweets firing barbs at the likes of Joe Buck and Chris Berman.
Last night, the Twitter world’s attention was turned to the refereeing in Game One of the Celtics/Heat series. The Celtics were called for five technical fouls while the Heat were called for zero. For a while, it seemed as if there was an automatic trigger for a technical foul when the Celtics got within five points, something like a reverse Buffalo Wild Wings effect.
Of course, the Celtics didn’t lose the game because of the officiating. Allowing Miami to shoot 50 percent from the field while Ray Allen and Paul Pierce shoot a combined 6 for 25 is why the Celtics lost. But the biggest losers on the night were David Stern and the NBA.
Instead of talking about the actual stats and the players on the floor, the awful, awful refereeing is dominating the conversation around the game. In what universe is it good for your league to have people making jokes about Tim Donaghy and thinking back to the Kings/Lakers series of 2002?
At some point, it doesn’t even matter that David Stern is or isn’t pushing a small red button that triggers technical fouls or his referees are influencing games above and beyond the norm. What matters is that perception exists about the NBA. That’s troublesome enough.
As always, these are Real Tweets from Real People…
