Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Calling a referee blind is a classic case of sports talk drifting into the realm of hyperbole — usually. But every once in a while, a call is made that is so unbelievable, so atrocious, that you can’t help but wonder: Is it possible that he is actually blind?
Joey Crawford’s latest controversial whistle invites such a question.
The Phoenix Suns were attempting to finish off the Portland Trail Blazers at home on Thursday, and had a 65-58 lead with just under five and half minutes to go in the third quarter. Steve Nash dribbled the ball casually, then proceeded to flip a one handed pass to Amare Stoudemire.
Then, to the surprise of everyone in the building, a whistle sounded. At first, it appeared as if Blazers star, Brandon Roy, was the guilty party. He had actually been near a Suns player, after all. But no, Roy was innocent.
Marcus Camby committed the foul, Joey Crawford proclaimed — Camby’s fourth. Now Camby may have actually come in contact with Grant Hill, the man who set the screen to free up Stoudemire. Maybe. The contact, if it occurred at all, was as innocent as could be, but at least it may have occurred. Had Crawford thus sent Hill to the line, this call could be filed away as merely awful.
But “awful” doesn’t even begin to do this call justice, because Crawford didn’t anoint Hill the foul shooter. Instead, he pointed to Nash, and declared that he had been fouled. Clearly, this surprised Nash as much as anyone. Not only had Camby not fouled Nash, he hadn’t even touched him. Lanky as Camby is, even he couldn’t manage to foul a player from more than ten feet away.
Nash, consistently one of the NBA’s best foul shooters, knocked down both free throws. And never before has the word “free” been more appropriate a term. Nash has never had to do less to — ahem, excuse me — “earn” a trip to the stripe.
So we, the viewing public, are left with several options as to why Crawford made the call. Maybe he simply mixed up Hill and Nash. But there’s about a five inch difference in the two men’s height, and they happen to be of different ethnicities — so that’s probably out. Perhaps Camby possesses latent telekinetic abilities, enabling him to foul Nash with his mind. I think we can write that explanation off too.
That leaves us with two possibilities: A) Crawford whistled Camby for a foul out of malice or some personal grudge; or B) Crawford is in fact blind, and just makes calls at random.
Given Crawford’s history of questionable technical fouls — most notably involving Tim Duncan, during the Spurs vs. Mavericks game on April 15 — option A appears sadly viable. But there is hope still, hope that Crawford’s mistake was just that — whether he’s actually blind or just occasionally clueless.
— Edited by Kristen Liszewski
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