Column: "Officials Make Calls Differently in Tourney"
 

Here's the link.

Sure they are officiated differently. Because you now have your best officials on the court working together in all the games. You have more thorough pre-games. You have more consistency.

In the regular season you're going to have mediocre and poor officials working your games.

And as the author pointed out, you now have 3-man crews in all the games as opposed to 2-man.

Do the players play the same way during the tourney as they do in the regular season? Do coaches always coach the same way during the tourney? When those questions are found to be an absolute "yes", then it's fair to look at the number of fouls called in a game and attribute that to only the officials.

Wow, what a tool.
1. The guys getting picked for tourny games were likely working in front of big crowds a good portion of the season.
2. Hardly a reason for anything. He could just as easily have used this excuse if statistics showed the reverse; fewer calls in post season games. This actually would go more towards the players actually committing more fouls.
3. No pressure here, either. These guys were getting evaluated all season and this is their reward.
4. Valid
5. Not valid, as has been noted, this just makes for better pregames with higher quality officials.
6. ??? :rolleyes:
7. He really needs to do some homework on this one. 3 officials don't typically result in more foul calls; just more accurate foul calls.

Is this what passes for journalism in Maine?

No. It's a column, an opinion piece.

I read the column. Many of his pieces are very good. This one is not. I have played in a tournament game in the Bangor Auditorium. The nerves are up a few notches. There are probably more turnovers in tournament games. There are probably lower shooting percentages in tournament games. There are probably more missed FTs and layups in tournament games. And there are probably more fanboys at tournament games.

With respect to officials, the top ones are usually chosen and some make the transition from 2 to 3 easily. You are not as apt to see whistles swallowed in these games. I did my first playoff game this year. It went pretty smoothly for the most part as we had worked as a crew a couple of weeks prior and probably had our best game of the season in the words of the R. One kid got 3 PFs & 2 TFs by midway through the 2nd quarter. We didn't call the game differently, but maybe he played differently.

Check out the age discrimination article that is a link near the bottom of this one.

btw Full disclosure: the author was one of my instructors before the gap in the Officiating class I took.

There's another doozy linked from that same page.

Numerous traveling calls spoil tourney — Maine Sports — Bangor Daily News

:eek:

That wasn't his column, though.

Know what? I don't have to read those articles (and I didn't) to know it's the exact same crap that gets printed every year in a whole bunch of different states.

Same old, same old....:rolleyes:

Teams tend to play different in Post Season, therefore we adjust our calling to fit the game. More offense, lower foul count, better ball and less calls!!!!