It's been a banner season for missed calls throughout the league. But when it comes to the Lakers it almost feels personal the way they've cheated them in (at least) four games this season during the last play of the game by not making calls on obvious fouls.
Yesterday's game with Boston (in Bean Town) is just the latest example of a blatantly bad no call.
It cost the Lakers the game. Full stop. Re-runs of the play when LeBron was hacked on the arm while going in for a layup have gone viral on the internet today. It's also happened twice before with LeBron being hacked (or grabbed) during a crucial last second shot with the same result.
One of my favorite YouTube channels Laker Nation, hosted by Trevor Lane, covered the game. Trevor asked, at one point, what LeBron had done to piss off the refs? Did he go around in the off season to their houses and call their mothers bad names? he wondered.
For good reason. No other team in the entire league has faced so many games on the line bad calls this season.
The league is looking into what happened.
Wink! Wink!
The last three times {games} a similar Laker play was re-examined proved they were robbed. League officials said, sorry about that it was wrong, but there's nothing we can do.
Wrong.
There is something the league could do to avoid letting refs screw up in a game-on-the-line situation.
Simply put in a mandatory end of the game replay system during the last two minutes where any controversial play that comes up can be overturned by officials upon review.
With the new two-minute rule the refs can be challenged for not making a call when an obvious foul unfolds in front of them.
The way things are right now each team gets one challenge per game if they think the refs blew a call. If they use that challenge - even successfully - they don't get another one. They just get to keep their time out.
Full disclosure: I've been a Laker fan since they moved to Los Angeles. So, if this post sounds a bit biased...it probably is.
As it stands, if not for lousy refs the Lakers would be an over .500 team right now making them the 6th seed in the West... instead they're the 13th seed.
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