NC State wasn’t very happy about the way Ted Valentine and his crew called the game against GT and they let the league know about it.
They will send a few videos. Some of which are likely the same ones that we posted last night.
Good on you, NC State and good on you Debbie Yow. She understands what is going on and isn’t ready to lie down and accept it.
What she did is about all she can do, and that is where the problem lies.
This is no conspiracy. This is fact. The ACC has an ego problem at officiating position. You have a certain few who have let fame and power go to their head.
There is a major problem when fans know the names of referees. No one is there to see the referees perform. They are there to make sure rules are followed and the game has a consistent flow to it. So why are a few of the ‘old-guard’ refs so well known?
Well, it’s because they dictate outcomes. Sure, refs never, by definition, lose or win a game. But sports, especially basketball is a game of momentum and mental chess. So a shift in consistency on how a game is called, or run of questionable whistles against one side doesn’t just change those specific plays, they change style of play, pace of play, focus and aggressiveness.
Understanding this goes a long way in realizing why this is such a concern for fan bases and athletic departments. There are millions and millions of dollars riding on these games. From coaches salaries to attendance numbers, to donor giving, and on and on. This is a huge industry, but an industry that is, in the end, driven by wins and losses.
Now sure, the teams and coaches are responsible for winning or losing, but when you are talking about one or two possession games dictating the difference between finishing 3rd or 8th in the conference, you’re talking about a major shift in money riding on those possessions.
So the argument the refs or opposing fans will make is, well your team should have made a few more plays. Yeah, you’re right. That was one option. To make a few more plays IN SPITE of a few possessions being taken away on bad calls. But that isn’t exactly fair. You can’t hold the team solely accountable when they do not hold 100% of the responsibility.
The point is, refs must be questioned. Why did you make that call? Was that call consistent with calls you’ve made prior to that play? Was it consistent with the way you’ve refereed throughout the season? If not, then why not?
The answer to those questions will never be answered because the ruling body over the referees is the company that employs them. To investigate or question their employees would, in turn, work directly against them. They’d be questioned about hiring, or standards, or consistency. They’d be questioned about bias at a much higher level. And maybe there is none, but a deep dive into finding that out will never happen.
There is no transparency or accountability in this industry. Why? When so much is at stake, why not have a more open set of policies and standards. In a time where data is king, why not have a public database that shows consistency or outliers.
They won’t do it. They don’t want to open that door.
So until the masses stand up and use technology and data to create and crowdsource that database, we’ll continue to live in the situation we are in. Where you talk to the conference, voice your concern, and they file it away, likely never to be seen again.