nba officials are racist

[jimotis4heisman]

cant find a link yet but its been all over sports talk radio today. an ivy league academic study shows a statistical variation of 4.5percent based on 1 official vs 3 officials being of the same race against the opposing race.

ill try and find a link...

 

[jimotis4heisman]

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/basketball/nba/2007-05-02-nytimes-study-refs_N.htm

NEW YORK (AP) — 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 on its website Tuesday night.
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.
Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of business and public policy at Penn's Wharton School, and Joseph Price, a Cornell graduate student in economics, said the difference in calls "is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew."



continued

 

[jwinslow]

Cowherd said today there is also a study proving that refs call more penalties (NFL, NHL) on black uniforms. Sounds more like a color thing than a race thing.

 

[PlanetFrnd]

NYT-NBA Refs

May 2, 2007

Study of N.B.A. Sees Racial Bias in Calling Fouls

By ALAN SCHWARZ

An academic study of the National Basketball Association, whose playoffs continue tonight, suggests that a racial bias found in other parts of American society has existed on the basketball court as well.

A coming paper by a University of Pennsylvania professor and a Cornell University graduate student says that, during the 13 seasons from 1991 through 2004, white referees called fouls at a greater rate against black players than against white players.

Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of business and public policy at the Wharton School, and Joseph Price, a Cornell graduate student in economics, found a corresponding bias in which black officials called fouls more frequently against white players, though that tendency was not as strong. They went on to claim that the different rates at which fouls are called ?is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew assigned to the game...

 

[jimotis4heisman]

i think speils said today that it equals to .2 fouls a game...

 

[OH10]

Cowherd said today there is also a study proving that refs call more penalties (NFL, NHL) on black uniforms. Sounds more like a color thing than a race thing.

Or it could have something to do with the Raiders committing a lot of penalities.

 

[PlanetFrnd]

i think speils said today that it equals to .2 fouls a game...

from the NYT article:

?Across all of these specifications,? they write, ?we find that black players receive around 0.12-0.20 more fouls per 48 minutes played (an increase of 2 ?-4 ? percent) when the number of white referees officiating a game increases from zero to three.?

Mr. Wolfers and Mr. Price also report a statistically significant correlation with decreases in points, rebounds and assists, and a rise in turnovers, when players performed before primarily opposite-race officials.

?Player-performance appears to deteriorate at every margin when officiated by a larger fraction of opposite-race referees,? they write. The paper later notes no change in free-throw percentage. ?We emphasize this result because this is the one on-court behavior that we expect to be unaffected by referee behavior.?

Mr. Wolfers and Mr. Price claim that these changes are enough to affect game outcomes. Their results suggested that for each additional black starter a team had, relative to its opponent, a team?s chance of winning would decline from a theoretical 50 percent to 49 percent and so on, a concept mirrored by the game evidence: the team with the greater share of playing time by black players during those 13 years won 48.6 percent of games ? a difference of about two victories in an 82-game season.

 

[cincibuck]

How does any NBA official (or NCAA anymore, for that matter) know what to call these days? Once hand checking was allowed, along with palming, the high dribble, take-as-many-steps-as-you-need,back in till you hit a brick wall, the game turned into street ball.

I don't think the games are rigged, but the rest of it reminds me of studio wrestling, a funny show, but hardly the real thing.

 

[JohnnyCockfight]

A couple critiques that crossed my mind after reading the article:

• the study was based off of box scores (to gather the number of fouls called on the particular players) and cross-referenced against teams of officials. So, if the 3 refs could either be all white, 2/3 white, 1/3 white, or no whites, and a value was used for the team of refs as a whole, and a percentage attributed to the white portion of that team. In other words, this study does not claim to know which individual ref called which particular foul on a player of a certain race. David Stern would not release that data to them.
• the predominance of players who were black and the refs who were white is significant--does that give them a proper basis to study various outcomes?
• what if the players who happened to be black actually fouled more than the players who happened to be white? That is, why is racial bias the automatic answer to everything where a white person might happen to have had a statistical advantage?
• One of the 3 independent experts consulted by the authors of the study is a specialist in finding subtle racial bias in society--of course he was going to agree with their findings.

 

[jimotis4heisman]

How does any NBA official (or NCAA anymore, for that matter) know what to call these days? Once hand checking was allowed, along with palming, the high dribble, take-as-many-steps-as-you-need,back in till you hit a brick wall, the game turned into street ball.

I don't think the games are rigged, but the rest of it reminds me of studio wrestling, a funny show, but hardly the real thing.

a call for bill bradley?

 

[jwinslow]

What if black refs don't call as many fouls on their black brethren? How do you determine which way, if either, the bias exists?

 

[JohnnyCockfight]

What if black refs don't call as many fouls on their black brethren? How do you determine which way, if either, the bias exists?

The authors of the study addressed that issue, and found that black refs indeed called more fouls on white players--but not to the same extent as the white refs calling more fouls on black players. They used that finding to say that racial bias exists both ways, but that the white refs were more racially biased than the black refs.

 

[PlanetFrnd]

What if black refs don't call as many fouls on their black brethren? How do you determine which way, if either, the bias exists?

Statistically, I think its saying that as well - of course, the certain perspective is drawn from the fact that majority of players are black and the majority of refs are white. If it were the opposite were true, the title would probably read the opposite as well.

 

[jimotis4heisman]

The authors of the study addressed that issue, and found that black refs indeed called more fouls on white players--but not to the same extent as the white refs calling more fouls on black players. They used that finding to say that racial bias exists both ways, but that the white refs were more racially biased than the black refs.

they dont address refs, they address crews in their entirety

 

[JohnnyCockfight]

they dont address refs, they address crews in their entirety

Yes, and then they make conclusions about racial bias by assigning a value to the racial composition of the crews. Look at my first post above and you will see that my primary critique of their study is exactly what you suggest.