Actually it does make a difference going forward.
There has been a widespread belief that the Suns are doomed because it seems like the Spurs could simply physically dominate the Suns. But if the Spurs had lost Game 3 and still lost Game 4; then things might have been very different even if the Horry smash had not happened since there would have been a game 7 in Phoenix.
Winning the championship would have made a huge difference in how this team is evaluated now.
I wonder how long it will be before a San Antonio Spurs fan puts up a video of the calls that went against the Spurs and for the Phoenix Suns at the end of game 4. I didn't feel bad about it at all because of the way the officials had hosed the Phoenix Suns in the first 3 games and much of the way through game 4. However it definitely looked like somebody out there didn't want to see the songs go down 1-3 in that series. It look like there was an obvious swing in the officials' favor in the last few minutes including at least a couple phantom calls that went Phoenix's way.
Game 3 looks especially bad, but let's not forget that the San Antonio Spurs were essentially allowed to treat Steve Nash the same way all the way through that series. My hope is not that we'll all of a sudden see better officials in the NBA. That would be great, but it's unlikely.
No, my hope is that this will force the league to finally do a complete overhaul of the way games are officiated. A few years ago the league told the officials to stop allowing off the contact on the perimeter. That helped, but they need to remind the officials that those rules exist as the season goes on and especially at the beginning of the playoffs. That's when you want to put the best, most enjoyable basketball out there, and instead that's when the league decides to suddenly allow the ugly play again. It makes absolutely no sense.
The other thing the officials need to do is stop protecting the superstars. It's been going on far too long. The fear, of course, is that we'll have the league's most popular players sitting on the bench all the time. That might happen at first, but I believe, like the other rules, those star players will adjust. Most fans don't appreciate good defense anyhow, and that's really where the superstars will have to adjust their games.
They did not show the play I remember where Duncan hacked Nash like Horry did in this film. It was close to the basket and Eddie Rush was looking right at it just like the Horry call.
If Rush is not in on this, I will be very surprised with the calls he made in this game.
That's right. If Donaghy did fix Game 3, Eddie Rush was either in on it as well, or he was so bad he should have been disciplined. He was right there in perfect position time after time, yet he continuously made the wrong call/no call.
Joe
