The Los Angeles Clippers Need To Stop Complaining

The Los Angeles Clippers have found themselves getting shafted by referees and they’re partially to blame.

A superstar 6’10” and 250-pound power forward flailing around aimlessly. One of the best point guards in NBA history tripping opponents, baiting for fouls and barking at referees on any given play. A coach with an NBA championship on his resume who seemingly does more referee critiquing than actual coaching, resulting in him losing his voice on a nightly basis.

These events don’t just happen every game with the Los Angeles Clippers, but there’s a good chance that any of these given things can happen at least once a quarter. We’re in season five of the Lob City Clippers and that means we’ve witnessed five years worth of crying and complaining from this talented group of stars.

It’s one of the main reasons why this Clippers team that has been one of the most aesthetically pleasing teams to watch since Chris Paul came gift-wrapped in the summer of 2011 has been so hated by peers and fans alike since their inception.

The alley-oop dunks from an all-time great like Paul to members of the most athletic pair of big men to ever play together, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan, held our attention for a year or two on entertainment value alone, but we now expect more substance with their style.

More from LA Clippers

The crying and complaining happens as frequently as the dunks nowadays. The old adage is that fans pay to see the players control the game, not the referees. While that’s absolutely true, fans sure as hell aren’t paying to see millionaire athletes cry and complain about every call or no-call that leaves them feeling slighted.

Sometimes, the Clippers have every right to feel slighted and their opinions are validated.

That was the case specifically in the Clippers’ recent 100-99 loss in a key game against the Oklahoma City Thunder, in which the NBA acknowledged that referees had missed three calls in the final 1:03 that played a huge role in the loss. Sadly, this injustice towards the Clippers will likely only increase the frequency and volume of the complaints from the team.

Monday night was not the first time the Clippers can say that they were shafted by the referees in a close game.

After last night, the tally is now 13 mistakes AGAINST the Clippers and just 2 IN FAVOR of the Clippers this season. https://t.co/5UQVHKFjtC
— Justin Russo (@FlyByKnite) December 22, 2015

The NBA reviews the officiating for the final two minutes of close games. The tweet above from Justin Russo of ClipsNation shows that there have been 15 acknowledged mistakes by referees in the last two minutes of close games involving the Clippers, and 13 of them have ended with the Clippers getting a raw deal.

However, Monday night’s loss to the Thunder is not a part of a league-wide conspiracy to stop the Los Angeles Clippers. Doc Rivers, Chris Paul and Blake Griffin might feel like that’s the case, but that wouldn’t be correct.

Live Feed

4 Trae Young trades the Hawks should consider /

FanSided

These NBA stars might switch teams sooner rather than laterAll U Can Heat

3 of the most overpaid players on the LA Clippers' rosterClipperholics

LA Clippers are healthy and should be back on NBA Championship watchSir Charles In Charge

1 advantage the Warriors have over each Pacific Division teamFanSided

Trading for this player covers the Clippers' biggest weaknessClipperholics

If the referees are a little biased against the Clippers, can you blame them? They’re human being with emotions just like the rest of us. If you’re a referee and officiating a play where a foul could go either way, are you going to give benefit of the doubt to the team that has been criticizing and yelling at you all game? Probably not. Are you going to give benefit of the doubt to the team that has been flopping almost all game? No, why would you?

That is the dilemma that the Clippers have created for themselves with their constant complaining. There are so many 50/50 calls in the flow of a game and getting those are crucial, but they’ve complained so often that they’ve completely lost any credibility in their complaints.

They are the Little Boy Who Cried Wolf, complaining so often that their words and actions have to be ignored even when their cries are validated.

What compounds their problems is that the Clippers are one of the hardest teams in the NBA to officiate. Blake Griffin plays as hard as anyone in the league and that style of play leads to constant contact. His relentlessness when chasing loose balls, attacking for rebounds and driving the paint leads to sometimes awkward plays that are hard to officiate.

Chris Paul is equally difficult to officiate, if not more difficult.

One of Paul’s signature ref-baiting moves can be seen below, when he runs into Anthony Davis.

This play drew a foul on Anthony Davis and criticism from people on Twitter for injuring the NBA’s brightest young star in the process. Paul has gained a reputation as the NBA’s version of Ric Flair, the dirtiest player in the game. Paul may be only 6’0″ and 175 lbs, but he knows every trick in the book to draw fouls.

Like Reggie Miller and Vlade Divac before him, Paul has mastered the art of flopping. He’s so good it and so known for his flops that referees no longer know what is or isn’t a foul with him anymore.

When it comes to calling close plays, the NBA adheres by a bit of an honor system and the Clippers are the biggest violators of the trust of the referees.

This is why it’s time to stop the flop.

Make it a hashtag, chant it at games, the Clippers need to be transparent in their attempt to get back in the good graces of the NBA and those who officiate it. They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. For the Clippers, constant flopping and complaining and expecting the calls to change or for referees to start giving them the benefit of the doubt would then, by definition, be insane.

The Clippers also hold the distinction of leading the league in technical fouls. Whether the team’s lack of calls is caused by constant technical fouls or the bad calls cause the players to complain is a bit of a chicken-and-egg scenario, as they are directly correlated but hard to prove which came first.

Whatever the problem is, something needs to change and it all starts with Doc Rivers.

Rivers needs to provide some sort of leadership and strategy as to his team’s issues with referees. There are a few ways Rivers could help his team in the long run with dealing with officials.

When Phoenix Suns head coach Jeff Hornacek felt like his players were putting themselves and the team at a disadvantage by complaining to referees last year, he responded by benching the players any time they received a technical foul. Whether it was Goran Dragic, either of the Morris twins or P.J. Tucker, Hornacek benched any player who received a technical for the remainder of the game.

When asked about his policy on his players and their interactions with the referees, Hornacek told Doug and Wolf of Arizona Sports 98.7 FM, “(Suns GM) Ryan McDonough was hired and when he hired me, we talked about winning a championship and I don’t believe you can get to that level constantly arguing with the ref.”

The message was clear in Phoenix in that if players want to rack up technical fouls and cost their team points by losing their composure, they would get a spot on the bench for the rest of the game.

While benching players for technical fouls may seem like an elementary thing to do, something must be done to curb the complaining in Los Angeles. If it means benching Blake Griffin (tied for first in the league in technical fouls with seven) or DeAndre Jordan (third with six), then that’s the price of learning a lesson that will help the team in the long run.

If Rivers displays leadership in benching a player of Griffin’s stature, the rest of the team will fall in line. Griffin, Paul and Jordan have never shown any sign of being uncoachable or too sensitive for constructive criticism, so there’s no reason to think that benching any of the team’s core for complaining would cause a long-term problem.

Sure, it might cost the Clippers a game or two by benching a key member of the team, but the Clippers are on a mission to make their impact felt in the postseason for once. The regular season for the Clippers should be about preparing for the playoffs and one way to do that is stop the complaining now before it rears its ugly head in another postseason meltdown.

More from Hoops Habit

Another way of going about it is for Rivers to become the sole mouthpiece for his team. Rivers can make it clear that he leads by a “do as I say, not as I do” standpoint where he makes himself the one who can be vocal to the referees. Keep the players focused and let them know that if the team is being put at a disadvantage, then Rivers will take care of it. If Rivers doesn’t feel worried about a call or no-call, then neither should the players.

The other way it could be dealt with is that Rivers leads by example and shows he is serious about his team ceasing the complaints by stopping being a culprit himself. Rivers is the most vocal coach in the league in regards to expressing his gripes with officials. If he were to make it clear that the franchise wanted to shed its reputation for whining, the silence of Rivers would speak volumes to his team in establishing a new way of dealing with the officials.

The Clippers have other things blocking their road to winning a championship (team defense, the Spurs and Warriors and injuries, to name a few), but the easiest way to make one change in developing a championship culture and fixing their relationship with the referees is to cut out the complaints. Every team complains about the referees, but no team does it as frequently as the Clippers.

More hoops habit: NBA Christmas: A Gift For Every Team's Wish List

For their own sake, the Clippers must place an emphasis on keeping their composure on the court or else their recent history will only continue to repeat itself.

Home/LA Clippers