Let’s clear up Mavs Warriors ref stuff

[CIN-C-STAR]

It was a mandatory timeout, automatically charged to the home team (apparently that's a thing in the NBA, lol)

Ah i see. Pretty obscure rule.

I'm surprised more people don't know it. I've heard them called TV timeouts and more commonly Officials Timeouts my whole life. They happen a lot and you tend to hear the commentators call them Officials Timeouts and then they go to commercial breaks. It isn't every game, but I would guess that it happens about once per day or more that there is a fair amount of games on. It just is mentioned casually and never seemingly explained on the air.

I was aware of officials timeouts and tv timeouts, but this was the first I learned that they are charged to the home team.
Have watched hundreds of games easily and never heard the broadcast team explain that, like you said.
Of course it usually doesn't really matter so no explanation necessary.

[Invictus88]

I wonder if Kevon Looney's misunderstanding of the call tipped everyone off the wrong way. I.e. folks saw him complaining and took that to believe it was called Mavericks ball.


If so I really want to believe that Kevon Looney just jedi-mind-tricked everyone on purpose; which would be epic.

Note that I don't really think any of that happened but it's fun to think about

I'm not ready to give Looney that much credit

I suspect he saw the timeout point and said "Wait, what?" and then the ref said, "no I was just saying it is their timeout, it is still Warriors ball" and that chilled Looney out.

Isn't it the case though that the Mavs didn't call a timeout, and the pointing to the Mavs was reflecting that they were getting charged with a TV timeout? I think you can see why there was some confusion there. If the Mavs had actually called a timeout the hand gestures would've been less confusing, I think.

Do the refs still need to signal which team is assessed the TV timeout? I actually don't know this and am asking for clarification.

[jokeboy86]

I know they just signed a new deal but I would imagine that the NBRA is going to request a meeting with Silver right away because I'm sure they don't like the public beating that refs have been taking recently. So basically another thing added to Silver's plate.

[MoneyTalks41890]

Ah i see. Pretty obscure rule.

I'm surprised more people don't know it. I've heard them called TV timeouts and more commonly Officials Timeouts my whole life. They happen a lot and you tend to hear the commentators call them Officials Timeouts and then they go to commercial breaks. It isn't every game, but I would guess that it happens about once per day or more that there is a fair amount of games on. It just is mentioned casually and never seemingly explained on the air.

I was aware of officials timeouts and tv timeouts, but this was the first I learned that they are charged to the home team.
Have watched hundreds of games easily and never heard the broadcast team explain that, like you said.
Of course it usually doesn't really matter so no explanation necessary.

This is my experience as well.

Seems like a really strange series of unfortunate events.

[CS707]

Refs may be in the right, but it's bad officiating. Youre making calls, you have to be clear. If an entire team thinks you made a different call than you did, you clear that up. Even the announcers thought it was Mavs ball

The referees job is to be clear, which they were. It's not their job to make sure a group of professional basketball players are paying attention. That's on the coaching staff.

[GregOden]

So the refs were crystal clear that it was Warriors' ball the entire time but still somehow the Mavs players, entire coaching staff, team owner, and even some of the Warriors' players based on how they set up for the inbound, were confused.
Yeah, ok, sure

The real question is if the Mavericks thought it was their ball, why weren't they lined up for an inbounds pass? They were just standing in the middle of the court.

[mademan]

Refs may be in the right, but it's bad officiating. Youre making calls, you have to be clear. If an entire team thinks you made a different call than you did, you clear that up. Even the announcers thought it was Mavs ball

The referees job is to be clear, which they were. It's not their job to make sure a group of professional basketball players are paying attention. That's on the coaching staff.

lmao, they were very far from clear. Pointing in both directions in quick succession is confusing, as you can see even Kevon Looney is pizzed about the call until the ref explains to him it's actually Warriors ball

[Myth]

Ah i see. Pretty obscure rule.

I'm surprised more people don't know it. I've heard them called TV timeouts and more commonly Officials Timeouts my whole life. They happen a lot and you tend to hear the commentators call them Officials Timeouts and then they go to commercial breaks. It isn't every game, but I would guess that it happens about once per day or more that there is a fair amount of games on. It just is mentioned casually and never seemingly explained on the air.

I was aware of officials timeouts and tv timeouts, but this was the first I learned that they are charged to the home team.
Have watched hundreds of games easily and never heard the broadcast team explain that, like you said.
Of course it usually doesn't really matter so no explanation necessary.

I believe there is an auto-time out at the first stoppage of play after the 6 minute mark and one after the 3 minute mark if the teams had not already used them voluntarily. One is to the home team and one is to the away team. I'm not sure on whether the refs gesture to the team it is being assessed to on the auto-timeouts.

[Myth]

So the refs were crystal clear that it was Warriors' ball the entire time but still somehow the Mavs players, entire coaching staff, team owner, and even some of the Warriors' players based on how they set up for the inbound, were confused.
Yeah, ok, sure

The real question is if the Mavericks thought it was their ball, why weren't they lined up for an inbounds pass? They were just standing in the middle of the court.

If the NBA were to overrule this and make them play it again (they won't btw), the Mavs should be assessed a delay of game for not going to the refs for the ball.

[Wagonband]

One thing nobody is talking about is that Looney! was confused as well.

You can see him going over to the referee to ask "How is it not our ball?", and the referee tells him by pointing his finger slightly "it's your ball, it's just a timeout", after which Looney goes to the bench.

The ref signal looked similar to when a ref makes a mistake when it goes out of bounds and then reverses the call. People claiming it's purely the Mavs mistake are deluding themselves, as it is clearly shown that Looney was confused as well.

[og15]

Do teams call TO when they don't have possession? Seems like a waste.

It was a mandatory timeout, automatically charged to the home team (apparently that's a thing in the NBA, lol)

Ah i see. Pretty obscure rule.

I'm actually surprised that you guys have never once noticed a mandatory TV timeout because even the commentators will mention it at times. That's wild to me, but yes, it is a rule.


Oh, I see there was some confusion about it being charged to the home team.

[og15]

So the refs were crystal clear that it was Warriors' ball the entire time but still somehow the Mavs players, entire coaching staff, team owner, and even some of the Warriors' players based on how they set up for the inbound, were confused.
Yeah, ok, sure

The real question is if the Mavericks thought it was their ball, why weren't they lined up for an inbounds pass? They were just standing in the middle of the court.

Probably wondering why the ball was on the other side and why the Warriors were lined up to inbound.

They were obviously confused about the whole situation, it doesn't make much sense what they were doing when one thinks about it.

Yes, if they thought it was their ball, they still shouldn't have been in that spot. Were they simply late getting to the inbound spot then? Kinda lagging around? Odd situation altogether.

[Nate505]

I'm not even sure what's to debate. They made a dumb mistake. Hopefully for their sake as professionals they learn from it. But hey, we'll probably see more Luka crying non-stop and doing a finger motion like the game is rigged, so I kinda doubt they will.

[Billl]

Dallas screwed up, but the refs screwed up worse. How many times has a team been slow coming out of a time out? What do the refs do? Inbound the ball? No. They blow their whistle a couple times and motion for team to get back onto the court.

Also, they were all standing there when the arena announced dallas ball, but they didn't correct it. They had the whole time out to go over to the desk and clarify that is was GS ball.

[rtiff68]

Honestly, I think the Mavs' protest here is Cuban simply throwing a wild a** Hail Mary because the Mavs just lost the most important game of their season thus far.

With the current standings and the tiebreaker on the line because they've played three times, last night's game was basically as important as a playoff game.

[DonaldSanders]

Refs may be in the right, but it's bad officiating. Youre making calls, you have to be clear. If an entire team thinks you made a different call than you did, you clear that up. Even the announcers thought it was Mavs ball

The referees job is to be clear, which they were. It's not their job to make sure a group of professional basketball players are paying attention. That's on the coaching staff.

lmao, they were very far from clear. Pointing in both directions in quick succession is confusing, as you can see even Kevon Looney is pizzed about the call until the ref explains to him it's actually Warriors ball

I agree it was confusing and poorly executed. But Christian Wood also gets the same explanation Looney got, while the ref is pointing Warrior ball with his thumb.

Where I think the refs screwed up is if the PA announcer gets it wrong, the refs should ask for a correction if there is a timeout. At some level this is entertainment and there's no reason not to clarify for everyone -- TV, the fans, and the players. I'm not replaying this game but the refs should be setting the proper expectation for everyone.

[Nuntius]

Then the second hand motion was pointing toward Mavs bench for the timeout call by Jason Kidd.

Kidd didn't call a timeout, though. It was a mandatory timeout that the ref issued to the Mavs (per the rules), not one that the Mavs called themselves.

If you watch the clip, you see that Looney was confused and thought that the ref had overturned the call as well. That's why he started complaining to the ref who then clarified to him that he didn't point towards the Mavs to indicate possession, he was pointing towards them to issue the mandatory timeout to them.

The problem is that this was never communicated properly to the Mavs. Christian Wood approaches Looney and the ref before the timeout but if you take a closer look at the 0:10 mark of the tweet posted by zshawn10 on post #6, it looks like Wood is clapping. That leads me to believe that Wood thought that the ref overturned the call (exactly what Looney thought before the ref explained it to him).

[Nuntius]

https://official.nba.com/rule-no-5-scoring-and-timing/

NBA Rule No. 5 - Section VI - Timeouts Mandatory/Team

If neither team has taken a timeout prior to 6:59 of the period, it shall be mandatory for the Official Scorer to take it at the first dead ball and charge it to the home team. If no subsequent timeouts are taken prior to 2:59, it shall be mandatory for the Official Scorer to take it and charge it to the team not previously charged.

This is a very strange rule that I can only guess exists solely for the benefit of airing more commercials.

Yes, clearly. This rule is all about the ad revenue.

And I think this also explains what happened: The refs called a Mavs timeout, but since no one on the Mavs actually called for a timeout, everyone interpreted the ref pointing to the Mavs bench as correcting the out of bounds ruling and probably just assumed the stoppage was an official timeout.
Personally it did look like the ball was off Looney at a glance, so I can understand the confusion by the team especially since the announcer apparently called it wrong too.

Precisely.

[Nate505]

Then the second hand motion was pointing toward Mavs bench for the timeout call by Jason Kidd.

Kidd didn't call a timeout, though. It was a mandatory timeout that the ref issued to the Mavs (per the rules), not one that the Mavs called themselves.

If you watch the clip, you see that Looney was confused and thought that the ref had overturned the call as well. That's why he started complaining to the ref who then clarified to him that he didn't point towards the Mavs to indicate possession, he was pointing towards them to issue the mandatory timeout to them.

The problem is that this was never communicated properly to the Mavs. Christian Wood approaches Looney and the ref before the timeout but if you take a closer look at the 0:10 mark of the tweet posted by zshawn10 on post #6, it looks like Wood is clapping. That leads me to believe that Wood thought that the ref overturned the call (exactly what Looney thought before the ref explained it to him).

Let's say the Mavs really thought it was their ball...why wasn't a single player over there to inbound it, and not a single player there to receive the inbound on that half of the court? Granted I don't want Mavs games a ton, so perhaps they go four out a lot on random inbounds plays in the 3rd quarter (I'd be shocked if that were really the case, but hey). But at least one guy should be inbounding it.

And if they didn't think it was their ball...why aren't they over there playing defense?

[Nuntius]

Then the second hand motion was pointing toward Mavs bench for the timeout call by Jason Kidd.

Kidd didn't call a timeout, though. It was a mandatory timeout that the ref issued to the Mavs (per the rules), not one that the Mavs called themselves.

If you watch the clip, you see that Looney was confused and thought that the ref had overturned the call as well. That's why he started complaining to the ref who then clarified to him that he didn't point towards the Mavs to indicate possession, he was pointing towards them to issue the mandatory timeout to them.

The problem is that this was never communicated properly to the Mavs. Christian Wood approaches Looney and the ref before the timeout but if you take a closer look at the 0:10 mark of the tweet posted by zshawn10 on post #6, it looks like Wood is clapping. That leads me to believe that Wood thought that the ref overturned the call (exactly what Looney thought before the ref explained it to him).

Let's say the Mavs really thought it was their ball...why wasn't a single player over there to inbound it, and not a single player there to receive the inbound on that half of the court? Granted I don't want Mavs games a ton, so perhaps they go four out a lot on random inbounds plays in the 3rd quarter (I'd be shocked if that were really the case, but hey). But at least one guy should be inbounding it.

And if they didn't think it was their ball...why aren't they over there playing defense?

Someone theorized about it on the other thread. Their theory was that the Mavs thought that there was a delay in the game. When there's a delay of game, the two teams are supposed to stay on their side of the court. The Warriors were on their side of their court so the Mavs did the same. They only started realizing that something was up when the ref gave the ball to the Warriors but by then it was too late.

For what is worth, Looney also started sprinting towards the other side of the court at first despite already knowing what the ref had called. So, it is pretty clear to me that the level of communication between that ref and the teams was sorely lacking.