National Basketball Association

Complaining about fouls is a time-honored NBA playoff tradition for a reason

Updated Jul. 14, 2021 2:23 p.m. ET

By Yaron Weitzman
FOX Sports NBA Writer

MILWAUKEE — Monty Williams was frustrated. You can understand why.

It wasn’t just that the Milwaukee Bucks had run his Suns off the floor in Game 3 of the NBA Finals (final score: 120-100, but the margin felt even greater). It was that one reason they were able to do so was because Suns' starting center Deandre Ayton had spent much of the game in foul trouble.

Ayton racked up 16 points in 20 first-half minutes. But he also picked up three early fouls. He was whistled for another in the third quarter, which further limited his minutes. He played just 24 in total, and the Suns were eight points worse with him off the floor. His absence opened a freeway for Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo — who finished with 41 points and 17 free-throw attempts — to attack the rim and allowed Milwaukee to capture its first victory of the Finals.

After the game, Williams was asked by a reporter about Ayton’s foul woes. "I'm not going to get into the complaining publicly about fouls, just not going to do that," he said.

He then did exactly what he said he wasn’t going to do. "But you can look — we had 16 free throws tonight. One person had 17. So DA is — we got to learn from that."

Williams’ comments came less than a week after Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer had used a postgame press conference to express his own displeasure with some of Game 1’s calls. The Suns had attempted 26 free throws, 10 more than the Bucks that night, and nearly 10 more than the league-low 17.4 the Bucks had held opponents to during the regular season.

After the loss Budenholzer was asked about that imbalance. He smiled.

"You trying to bait me?" he replied. "No, I mean, it's a huge part of the game. They had 25 points from the free-throw line. We're a team that prides ourselves in defending and being able to be good defensively without fouling. I can't remember the last time a team got 25 free throws in a game against the Bucks. And then conversely, the way Giannis attacks, the way Khris [Middleton] attacks, as many opportunities as Khris has with the ball... it's frustrating, but it's part of the sport. It's part of the game."

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You’ve heard the tired cliché about a playoff series not starting until the home team loses? Well, let’s replace that with something new: A playoff series hasn’t started until both team’s head coaches have complained about the calls. And with that, we can now say that three games into the 2021 NBA Finals the series has officially begun.

Coaches have used their mandated media sessions to poke at officials for decades. Scan a list of championship teams and you’ll see a list of this ritual’s most ardent practitioners. Pat Riley. Gregg Popovich. Phil Jackson, who was hit with numerous fines for his many complaints about officiating during the Los Angeles Lakers’ many playoff runs.

"It's like the age-old ritual of the playoffs," Budenholzer said following the Bucks’ Tuesday practice.

But does it make a difference? Can this sort of podium politicking actually influence the way officials call games, or is it just another way for coaches to redirect blame and frustration?

"I think it influences players and maybe fans more than anyone else," said Don Vaden, a former NBA Finals referee who served as the NBA’s director of officials from 2011 to 2016 and as the WNBA’s director from 2016 to 2017. "The players and teams create the actions, referees respond to what they notice happening throughout the game."

Vaden said he and Shelley Russi, a former WNBA colleague who runs the consulting firm Third Side Coaching, where Vaden now works, deal with these sorts of questions from their clients. To Russi, a big underlying issue is the way free-throw numbers are thrown around as measurements of fairness.

"That’s not how officials look at it," she said. "Their job is to call fouls and violations in the game they are reffing and each one starts out zero-zero."

Coaches, Vaden said, know all this. They understand that reciting free-throw numbers during a press conference is unlikely to affect the way a rotating crew of referees approaches their jobs.

So why do it? Vaden has two theories: One is that these sorts of comments can be a way for coaches to alert their players they need to play more aggressively. The other is they can reach the ears of the opposing players and alter their approach.

As an example, he told a story about once working a game and hearing a head coach repeatedly call out for a defensive three-seconds call. Vaden said the coach told him that his goal was not to get a whistle; it was for that opposing player to hear the complaint, panic and vacate his position.

"If you see a change in free-throw numbers, it’s more likely because of changes made by the teams as opposed to anything the next referee crew does in response to comments made," Vaden said. "There is no guarantee the referees are even aware of the comments made unless the game had some sort of controversy."

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During his media sessions Tuesday, Budenholzer acknowledged that his lobbying was likely futile.

"I actually think the referees just call the game. They call the game and coaches go and talk about the game, and we'll do the same thing after tomorrow night's game," he said. "We have the best referees in the league and we're always still frustrated with them. They're still the best in the world. It seems like it's always the same, and I don't think it has any impact on the game."

Williams agreed — "I'm not quite sure if it helps as much as people would think," he said — and added the only reason he mentioned the free-throw numbers was because, "Somebody asked me the question. Like: How can I help DA? So I answered it. And then the free-throw disparity is what it is. So that's what I did. They had one player with 17 free throws; we had 16 [total]. That's not complaining; that's stating facts."

He then later insisted there was no intent behind his comments.

"I don't want to play the game that way," he said. "It's just not who I am. Maybe I'm wrong in that. I've seen coaches implement that. I just know I'm not that good at it."

Maybe, but it depends on what he’s trying to accomplish. If he was trying to influence the results, then he’s unlikely to be successful.

But if Williams just wants to bridge the gap between how many times the Bucks and Suns go to the foul line, well, he might find that he’s more skilled than he thinks.

Yaron Weitzman is an NBA writer for FOX Sports and the author of Tanking to the Top: The Philadelphia 76ers and the Most Audacious Process in the History of Professional Sports. Follow him on Twitter @YaronWeitzman.