Eastern Conference | Round 2 | (2) Boston Celtics VS. (3) Milwaukee Bucks (TIED 3-3)

[ITYSL]

Uh where is the push off?? His arm is literally next to his body the entire time. You're allowed to initiate contact with your should if you're not extending it. What you're NOT allowed to do is stick your forearm/elbow into someone's back pushing them off the court.

I'm not going to go back and forth with screencaps with you. A few steps before your screencap, Giannis initiated contact with his right arm to push off Horford. As I said, wanting a call either way on that play is just hilarious. A member of a fanbase that talks about how physical Giannis is also wants the slightest of touch fouls called against him. Please. He has one of the highest FTr in the league this season, both RS and playoffs.

If Horford got a technical for inadvertently hitting Giannis in the head, then Giannis should have several flagrant or technical fouls this series from hitting Celtics players in the face. Your superstar player gets superstar calls, big surprise. It's how it's always been. But trying to cry that he should be at the line even more is embarrassing.

Lmao. He "initiated contact" because he in fact has an arm, which happened to brush against Horford's jersey.

OTOH, Horford making contact with Giannis while he's shooting or in the air to reroute his trajectory has always been a foul. Another example that was called correctly was the Holiday to Giannis alley oop:

Watch on YouTube

Giannis' initial contact on that play was about as physical as Horford's defense following that initial contact. Which is to say, it was minimal, and a call either way there would be extremely ticky-tack. Wooderson posting a gif of it and saying Giannis should have gone to the line for that is a joke.

This is the thing with some Bucks fans - out one side of their mouth they boast about how physical Giannis is and opposing fans should stop complaining about it, while out the other they post a gif like this and claim Giannis should have shot FTs there. It's laughable.

All that said, I'm going to shut up now about the refs and fouls. I was trying to follow Pachinko's example and not talk about the officiating any more, but I got sucked in. My bad.

[Tatumfor2]

My friends are going to the game tonight, 9 rows up from center court.

C's winning the chip this year.

I can't wrap my head around your selection of favorite teams!

[mademan]

why cant both fans just accept that the C's are allowed to foul Giannis and Giannis is allowed to push off/charge into people. Im not entirely sure who actually wins that trade off, but its hard to complain when youre getting the benefit on one end of it.

That said, i just cant believe in the Bucks this series. It seems like theyve given up a crapton of open looks. Sooner or later, the C's will start hitting those shots

[Slax]

I replied to you on this already, you cut off literally the next sentence which says that this only applies outside the lower defensive box. This is either the funniest accidental coincidence and you need to be more careful when reading and copy-pasting, or you need to engage in better faith.

Missed that part. Regardless Horford is pushing him on a rim attempt. The momentum from that takes him off the court. The initial bump I don't think is a foul, but he continues to lean into him throughout the attempt to finish affecting. Using a forearm in the lower box is only to "maintain defensive position", that's not what Horford is doing by continuing to lean into Giannis on the finish and he gets pushed off the court.

We're talking about the second video, not the first one where Giannis ends up out of bounds (although I don't see Horford pushed him off the court - I think he impeded his ability to move and take the shot which is illegal, but there's no shove there to push Giannis out of bounds, the momentum is from Giannis driving to the basket). The second video is pretty brief contact with the forearm to Giannis's body, takes place in the lower box, does not appear to dislodge or redirect Giannis while he makes progress toward the basket, and peels away before Giannis is able to create body contact or initiate the shooting motion to draw the foul. And as a result, Giannis had no problem getting deep into the paint clean and getting the shot off, he just missed it because it was well contested (and maybe deflected?) by Rob Williams. That isn't supposed to get called as a foul in the NBA, just good legal defense.

But on the other hand ultimately who really cares, even if it was against the rules we would still be debating minutiae of the most ticky-tack of fouls getting called.

[megarover]

Defenses are playing physical with each other. I dont see the problem with it. I thought thats what we all wanted all year. But i guess it only matters if it effects your team.


Giannis,Tatum and Brown seem to average a ton of offensive fouls per game though. All 3 of them would foul out if they called everything.

[AussieCeltic]

If Giannis was really as protected as many Celtics fans seem to think, the majority of these would be called fouls. Horford is the king of getting away with elbows and pushes - often times they're subtle but clear fouls, other times they're blatant. Refs are letting Boston be super aggressive, so of course he's going to be allowed to dish it back.

Horford elbowing Giannis in the ribs, also looks like Williams gets him from behind

Theis riding Giannis side/jumping into him

Horford riding Giannis back with an elbow

Horford grabbing Giannis shoulder

Grant Williams jumping into Giannis on a turnaround jumper

Horford left hand on Giannis back

Pritchard sitcking his knee into Giannis

Horford again sticks his elbow in Giannis

Williams hugs Giannis

Grant Williams runs horizontally under Giannis

Horford small shove on Giannis hip

Horford left arm push on Giannis back as he's attempting the shot

Grant kicks Giannis

Horford pushes Giannis hip on the drive

Spoiler:

[url=

Read on Twitter

?t=duQWRfvUyc-zRMFBtivY8Q&s=19]Williams elbows Giannis in ribs on putback[/url]

Brown cuts off his path, Theis jumps forward into Giannis

White catches Giannis in the face

I appreciate the effort but it’s embarrassing if you think these are fouls. You do know what an arm bar is? You do know you can put an arm on people? Majority of these there isn’t even contact haha.

Go look down the other end and the exact same contact is being made. Matthew’s is all over Tatum. Jrue is all over Brown. It’s just good physical defence being played by both teams.

Foul count for the series is in favour of the Bucks and Giannis easily has the most free throws.

I think the refs have done a good job aside from the offensive contact Giannis is allowed to get away with at times including elbows. He’s hit how many of our guys in the head? At least 2 a game.

At the end of the day I don’t think it’s had an effect on the outcome though and 2-2 is where this series should be.

[Pumpkin17]

I wonder how you guys can go on this long bragging about refs, both sides should just enjoy this hard fought series, seriously take a break

[Slax]

I wonder how you guys can go on this long bragging about refs, both sides should just enjoy this hard fought series, seriously take a break

I can talk about the minutiae of which parts of the court a defender is allowed to initiate forearm contact for DAYS my friend. Do not test me. I actually love that stuff.

[Dick Tate]

Riveting discussion on officiating, fellas. Way to get hyped for the game!

[soxfan2003]

Defenses are playing physical with each other. I dont see the problem with it. I thought thats what we all wanted all year. But i guess it only matters if it effects your team.


Giannis,Tatum and Brown seem to average a ton of offensive fouls per game though. All 3 of them would foul out if they called everything.

Tatum/Brown are rarely getting the postseason calls on the egregious stuff. They do push off for sure at times and I'd like to make that illegal and enforced. Giannis could adjust easily if forced to never foul on defense. Could still do a good job defending the post but on offense, his game in not transition especially is really hurt if he was constantly called for charges.

Tatum and Brown to a lesser extent are good enough shooters that it would be relatively easy for them to adjust to an NBA that enforced the rules. Both may need more picks to set them up but they could adjust without their games being impacted too much. No doubt their games would be hurt, however.

Giannis may develop that sort of game better since he doesn't have that far to go -- he isn't Ben Simmons -- but he is setback more by enforcement of rules and even more if the NBA called traveling like they used to.

Back to the basket bigs helped more in general by this and maybe Giannis becomes more of that sort of player.

NBA knows what it is doing by a series of changes over the last 40+ years that are biasing the game towards ballhandlers and perimeter based players. They are catering to a fan base that doesn't really want to watch big 7 ft or even smaller 6"9 guys score in the post. I would not be surprised at all if Bill Russell grew up in today's environment if he was playing a lot like Giannis. Russell much stronger than he looked according to reports and was fast and could certainly jump. Dribbling is easier when you can palm the ball.

While I do not want to go back to the Chamerlain Russell days, I do think they have gone overboard in other direction and destroyed too much diversity in the game and they have been losing more fans than they would have if they had kept with a happy medium.

[Pumpkin17]

I wonder how you guys can go on this long bragging about refs, both sides should just enjoy this hard fought series, seriously take a break

I can talk about the minutiae of which parts of the court a defender is allowed to initiate forearm contact for DAYS my friend. Do not test me. I actually love that stuff.

Well to each his own I guess...

[Triple M]

Timelord out again for game 5

[Statlanta]

Celtics in 7. Thunder Horford gonna take out the defending champs

[Slax]

I wonder how you guys can go on this long bragging about refs, both sides should just enjoy this hard fought series, seriously take a break

I can talk about the minutiae of which parts of the court a defender is allowed to initiate forearm contact for DAYS my friend. Do not test me. I actually love that stuff.

Well to each his own I guess...

I think of "Is this a foul?" as fun technical discussion about the game of basketball ancillary to the game itself, similar to team building stuff like cap space and trade rules, comparisons of statistical impact by different players, etc. Arguing over which team is getting a more favorable whistle / whether or not the reffing is fair, on the other hand, is less fun and more irritating and I generally avoid that.

[soxfan2003]

Defenses are playing physical with each other. I dont see the problem with it. I thought thats what we all wanted all year. But i guess it only matters if it effects your team.


Giannis,Tatum and Brown seem to average a ton of offensive fouls per game though. All 3 of them would foul out if they called everything.

I'd like to see less physicality and for the players to adjust to that so their wasn't necessarily more fouls called in the long run but less.

If they called offensive fouls against perimeter players, the game would probably become more balanced with a little more post up play returning to the game. The more a player can shoot in general from 3 and midrange, the less they would be impacted by the rules actually being enforced.

[AussieCeltic]

Betting wise. Horfords point total is at 13.5. It seems Vegas think Bud will make an adjustment. I’m assuming that means switching the pick and roll rather than dropping Lopez back.

That will open up driving lanes for Tatum and Brown.

[cl2117]

No Timelord is a big problem for the C's. Definitely at risk of losing another to the Bucks at home.

Theis does an admirable job but he's the kind of player who is great for eating regular season minutes but you don't want to count on in the playoffs. And I feel like I've got to learn to stop doubting Al Horford, but despite his recent stellar play I am constantly worried about age catching up to him.

It'll be really interesting to see what Ime does with the frontcourt minutes tonight. Wouldn't be surprised if he goes with a 7 man rotation and try to steal minutes for Theis when and where he can.

[vinnymate]

Bucks better not come out with the same game plan as game 4. If they want to win.

Stop dropping on Al Horford.

No more/limit Jrue isos.

[ArksNetsSince99]

Ladies and Gentlemen just get ready , being floated with Boston fans complaining about officiating is about to begin !!!

[ArksNetsSince99]

The game didn’t even started and i believe Giannis just bulldozer to the hoop committing offensive foul