Thunder forward Paul George launched into a critical attack of NBA referees following Oklahoma City’s loss to the Clippers on Friday.
George, Russell Westbrook, and Steven Adams all fouled out in the fourth quarter of the 118-110 loss. The 2018 All-Star, who finished the game with 15 points and six rebounds, urged the league to look into the situation, ESPN’s Ohm Youngmisuk writes.
“It’s just bad officiating. I’m sorry, just bad officiating,” George said. “We don’t get a fair whistle. We haven’t gotten a fair whistle all year. … Somebody’s got to look into this. It’s getting out of hand, where we somehow just walk teams to the line. And there’s nobody that gets more contact. If I don’t speak for myself, I speak for Russ. There’s nobody that gets more contact than Russ going to the basket. And it’s just crazy.
“I don’t understand it. It’s a piece of s–t being on that floor. We giving everything we got. We’re playing hard. We’re getting grabbed. We’re getting scratched, clawed, held, shoved. And there’s nothing for it. The officials just get to walk out, and there’s nothing that penalizes them for not officiating the game the right way.”
It’s ironic that George made the comments just a day after OKC’s first game of a back-t0-back, a 129-121 overtime thriller win over Portland. George told reporters, including Brett Dawson of The Athletic, he “planned on losing money” after the win to criticize referees. He changed his tune after realizing he had 20 free throw attempts in the win.
However, Friday was a different tune as George acknowledged he will be lighter in the pockets given the NBA’s strict fines for public criticism of officials.
“It’s nothing we can do,” George said. “I’m going to lose money on this. We speak up, we lose money. There’s nothing I can do to change that. It is what it is. There’s gotta be a change, but there’s nothing that I can do.”
the whole NBA has become a joke
Coming from a guy that elbowed another player in the head the other night. As good as he is defensively, he is soft. OKC might not make it out of the first round if they dont get a top 4 seed.
Elbowed him in the head? Is that really what you saw?
If Paul George is talented enough to split two defenders in the lane and intentionally elbow one – who was already behind him- in the mouth as he makes the layup, he really should be the MVP.
He missed the layup so….
But he definitely elbowed him in the head.
Refs were beyond hot garbage last night and gave the clippers the W. I’m guessing someone had $ on the game. No team should shoot 20 more fts than the other team that isn’t purposely fouling.
PG will be fined, but he was spot on with what he said.
The Clippers are the biggest floppers in the league so that didn’t help. I think PGs offensive foul on Beverley was a tough call and could’ve been a non call but wasn’t. Russ’s offensive foul on Gallo was a bad call though. There’s no way his feet were planted and it should have been called a blocking foul.
Paul George acts like the refs shot his dog.