[ma_ref]

Originally Posted by jdw3018

you're inaction forces the fouling team to escalate their contact to attempt to draw the call.

Originally Posted by RichMSN

I do not want players wondering "How much do I have to whack him to get a whistle?"

My points exactly.

Originally Posted by Texas Aggie

That's NOT the reason to call it (and no, they wouldn't be right). The reason to call it is because that's what the rules are. Don't get into this idiotic mindset where we have any control over whether players are injured. We don't. In this situation, the behavior that might lead to injury is already going on, so a whistle isn't going to heal an injury. Further, calling it isn't going to prevent it in the future if that's the strategy their coach feels is in their best interest, so later, we are back to the same issue, called or uncalled. The proper thing to do is to call it because the rules say to call it, not because we care about what anyone thinks.

I agree that's not the reason to call it. You never call a foul because you *expect* an injury to occur, nor are we directly responsible for the actions of the players on the court. My point was that once this person decided not to call it, they have, in fact, potentially put a team in harms way and it was totally avoidable. Imagine what the players on the team trying to foul are thinking: "Hmmm...I just tried to foul the kid, but the ref didn't call anything...maybe I didn't get him enough?" So next time they try to foul again, only this time they do it harder because it didn't get the ref's attention the 1st time. I'm no lawyer, but negligence is not something I'm willing to spend a small fortune to defend myself against. And in today's litigious society, don't think this wouldn't happen.

True, that the "whistle isn't going to heal an injury", but it could very well prevent one. And by consciously ignoring an intentional foul situation, this particular official is creating an atmosphere where they're allowing the potential for very bad things to happen.