Bias Among NBA Refs

[skatingtripods]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070502/ap_on_sp_bk_ne/bkn_referee_bias;_ylt=AgIS0ThPEhritt4jlRX.gIYE9rQF

This is ridiculous.

An academic study of NBA officiating found that white referees called fouls at a greater rate against black players than against white players, The New York Times reported in Wednesday's editions.

The study by a University of Pennsylvania assistant professor and Cornell graduate student also found that black officials called fouls more frequently against white players than black, but noted that that tendency was not as pronounced

Oh come on.

[Wolfy]

I just saw on Cold Pizza, they didnt even account for which ref on the three man squad, called the foul...How can you come to that conclusion with 80% of the league being black and not nowing if the one black ref on the squad called the fowl? What a joke!

[pup]

There is a lot of problems with the report.

Least of which is the possibility that the black players foul more often. Not saying they do or don't, but to put something out like this makes it seem like it is a racism thing, when in fact they have no data that says white refs call fouls against black players that are not fouls. Show me that study and you have some noteworthy information. Until then, you wasted your time.

[Mr. MacPhisto]

Goodness. Another "study" that's worthless. Why does anyone waste their time on this stuff?

It's just a reach to try and insinuate that there's a subconscious racial divide.

No proper controls in this study. No examination of every foul to find out if they were legit. No examination of methodology for all officiating crews.

Nothing but a big pile of poo.

[Dozen]

Do the same study in hockey

[sandlot33]

how about the fact that the whole league is pretty much black and of course they are gonna commit more fouls...this might be the dumbest study i have ever heard of....just stupid

[Guest]

Charles Barkley said it was stupid also and he's the biggest racist around.

[HoodooMan]

No proper controls in this study.

I thought the same thing until I heard someone talking about it on the radio this afternoon. The guy claimed that the study approached the numbers from every possible angle and that the only statistically significant factors were the color of the refs & players' skin.

He said they even looked at it on an individual player basis, where Player X after Player X whether he's white or black a PG or a big, whatever, had his game called differently based on the color of the officiating crew. That's kind of a clincher for me. Rules out factors like different styles of play for players of different races, etc.

[furls]

Officiating in the NBA has never been fair. Stars get all the calls, regardless of skin tone.

[pup]

Hoodoo - That is true. However the problem is that no part of the study looked into if the calls were correct or not. If they can show white refs call fouls on black players that in fact were not fouls, then it would be interesting.

[HoodooMan]

However the problem is that no part of the study looked into if the calls were correct or not.

With a sample size that's large enough, I don't see how that matters. We're not talking about them pointing out one game in which White Guy was only called for 3 fouls while Black guy was called for 4, but all 4 were justified; we're talking about 10 years worth of foul calls here. If White guy over the course of 1,000ish games has his game called differently by white refs & black refs--to a statistically significant degree--do you really think the results would be any different if you broke down the film of those 1,000 games to see how many of them should have been called?

[pup]

do you really think the results would be any different if you broke down the film of those 1,000 games to see how many of them should have been called?

The way the article reads, it basically says that white refs, when only relying on the sub-concious because they don't have time to think about who they are calling the foul on, will tend to call more fouls on black players. Is that true? I don't know. What I want to know, to give this article any validity, is if the correct calls were made. If they were, then how can you draw any possible "race influence" conclusions from that.

White ref "A" calls a foul on Black player "B". Is it the right call? If it is, then how can you say it is a black/white thing.

I just think they are taking half the required data and trying to make an awfully broad conclusion from it. The fact that they used 1000 games means nothing to me, because they only used half of the significant factors from those 1,000 games.

[leadpipe]

Stories like these will do wonders for the overall racial bias situation in the country, I'm sure.

[BruceK]

It would appear that the authors of the study used box scores as their data source.

If this is true, then the data is incomplete, because box scores don't identify which ref called which call. That means they can only completely identify the racial mix when the referee team is either all white or all African-American. Any game in which there ref crews are racially mixed would have to be excluded.

[jb]

Charles Barkley said it was stupid also and he's the biggest racist around.

Doc, you think Sir Chas is racist? I read his co-authored book & I found his refreshing. I don't always agree but I think he just calls it as he sees it with as little bias as anyone I've seen.

BTW - If Barrack Obama fouled someone, which category would he fit into?

And no one has broken out a single "defensive fundamentals" take to cause trouble yet? I am diasppointed....
LOL.