Five Seconds of Fail

Okay, I have seen some bad refereeing in my days of watching NBA basketball, but the last five seconds of the Los Angeles Clippers and Atlanta Hawks game was just about as atrocious as it gets. The Clippers trailed the Hawks on the road 99-98 before Blake Griffin hit a short shot to give the Clippers the lead.

After a timeout, Joe Johnson pulled up for a mid range jumper and was blocked by the much shorter Randy Foye. The ball clearly bounced off of Johnson's left thigh, did not make contact with Foye, and rolled out of bounds. In an unusual move, the officials did not even make a call on the court and instead went straight to the video screen.

After a few minutes of mulling over the various replay angles, they inexplicably could not draw any conclusions. To this point, they called a jump ball. Johnson easily won the tip over the smaller Foye and Baron Davis was called for a loose ball foul.

The subsequent inbound pass went to Al Horford who faked a pass back to the inbounder and took his defender off the dribble for what looked like an easy go ahead dunk.

Then, Griffin swooped in and made what seemed like an honest contest on Horford's dunk attempt. Griffin jumped straight up into the air with his arms extended skyward but caught Horford on the arm. Horford took a nasty fall, and both he and Griffin remained down on the court for several minutes.

When the two got up, it was announced that a flagrant foul was given to Griffin. This meant two shots for Horford and the ball to the Hawks.

Now, I am all for player safety and reducing cheap shots at all costs, but Blake Griffin clearly made a play on the ball with no malicious intent. This flagrant foul will most certainly be rescinded by the league office, but this officiating crew's gaffes potentially cost the Clippers a huge, well-deserved road win.