What’s the best way to improve NBA officiating? Introducing some AI into it, of course. What could possibly go wrong?
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver went on ESPN’s Pat McAfee show to prop up his anti-tanking, dramatic lottery reform “3-2-1” proposal expected to be approved by NBA owners on Thursday. However, as part of that, he got drawn into the annual conversation around officiating in the NBA playoffs, which this year has focused on “flopping” and players who draw contact and a lot of fouls. Specifically on the Thunder’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
“It’s been a conversation. I would only say that there’s a difference between selling a call, exaggeration, and a true flop which is where you’re actually fooling the referees. I think sometimes, even as I sit in the stands at games, players may be falling down, players may be reacting to a call. But then to me, if they’re not fooling the referees, it’s like, ‘Okay. That’s like, the players are taught to sell calls these days.’ I mean, can officiating get better? Of course, we’re always working on that. Can officials get fooled occasionally? We’re always looking that as well. But the officiating is incredible.”
That becomes the line that’s increasingly hard to draw for officials and the league. Gilgeous-Alexander drives the lane as well as anyone, absorbs the contact and gets his shot off as he sells a call, often by falling. Where the line between selling a legit call by exaggerating contact is versus flopping is an eye-of-the-beholder thing — SGA walks that line as well as anyone. But there are plenty of players across the other 29 teams who do it to varying degrees, and fans of those teams don’t see it the same way when their guy does it.
Silver then talked about trying to speed up the replay process and game flow by, at some point, using Hawkeye technology (not unlike tennis) with AI to handle in-bounds and out-of-bounds calls.
“Those calls will be done by an AI automated system with cameras lined around the court and it’ll take all those so-called objective calls out of the hands of the referees. It’ll be instantaneous, it’ll be automatic. Just, ‘Play on. Let’s go, Spurs inbound.’ And you’ll move on, you won’t have to deal with challenges on those calls.”
It’s a little more complex in the NBA. For example, the ball can go out of bounds off a thicket of players’ hands under the basket, all going for a rebound. Having AI quickly determine whose hand from which team is not as straightforward a process as “in or out.” That said, we’re seeing things headed in that direction.
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