Is there such an animal as a False Multiple Technical?

[M&M Guy]

Originally Posted by just another ref

I've been thinking about this one some more. (I think about things. It's what I do)

dis·cov·er (d-skvr) tr.v. dis·cov·ered, dis·cov·er·ing, dis·cov·ers

1. To notice or learn,

What defines discovery in this case? The officials learned about six on the floor from the coach, then went on to verify the information after a spontaneous (poorly timed) whistle. Ideally, one should make his own count first, but, in this case, I don't think this mistake kills the possibility of the T. JMO

I anticipate hearty disagreement on this opinion.

What about the following: A1 misses the 1st of a 1-and-1, B1 rebounds, looks for the outlet pass, and travels. You kinda hear A's coach saying something as your partner puts the ball in play, and A completes the throw-in. While A2 is dribbling the ball, you finally hear what A's coach is saying, "We should've had 2 shots on that last foul!". You blow the whistle, check with the table, and find out that, sure enough, A1 should've had a second FT.

Let's review - you've discovered, or learned, from the coach some information that something wrong happened. You sounded your (poorly-timed) whistle, and discovered that it was, in fact, true. Ideally, the officials should've known that A1 should've had 2 FT's, not just a 1-and-1. So, does your mistake that you didn't hear the coach right away mean you can go back and correct the error?

Of course not, it's beyond the correctable error limits. Too bad. As much as we would like to think it's only "fair" that we go back and correct the error, we can't. Same here - we can only penalize while participating, not (close enough) right after the fact. It might've been an official's error that allowed their partner to put the ball in play before finding out the coach was asking about the correctable error and missing FT, but, it's still too late. The same as 6 participating - the official might've made the error to blow the whistle first instead of counting while the ball was live, but again, too bad, it's too late.