Kings protest loss to Grizzlies, NBA to re-review buzzer-beater
After the Memphis Grizzlies completed a 26-point comeback and shocked the Sacramento Kings on a “miracle” of a buzzer-beating layup by Courtney Lee last Thursday, many Kings fans believed their squad got robbed by an officiating crew and replay-review process that concluded Lee successfully caught a lob from Vince Carter and scooped it up off the backboard in the space of three-tenths of a second. Apparently, the fans weren’t the only ones — check out how Kings general manager Pete D’Alessandro’s body reacted to the loss:
Well, now D’Alessandro and the Kings brass have decided to do something about it beyond just bursting blood vessels. As Sacramento radio host Carmichael Dave reported they would, the Kings have officially protested the Nov. 13 loss, according to a league statement issued Monday:
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The basis for the Kings’ protest is that Courtney Lee’s game-winning shot should have been disqualified as having been made after time expired. Under the protest procedures in the NBA Constitution, Memphis and Sacramento each will have an opportunity to submit evidence in support of its position and the protest will be decided by December 2.
Here’s how the league’s constitution, which the NBA made public this past spring as part of Commissioner Adam Silver’s push toward increased transparency, lays out the protest process:
(a) In order for a Member to protest against or appeal from the result of a game, notice thereof must be given to the Commissioner within forty-eight (48) hours after the conclusion of said game, by a Writing, stating therein the grounds for such protest. No protest may be filed in connection with any game played during the Regular Season after midnight of the day of the last game of the Regular Season. A protest in connection with a Playoff Game must be filed not later than midnight of the day of the game protested. A game may be protested only by a Governor, Alternate Governor, General Manager, or Head Coach. The right of protest shall inure not only to the allegedly aggrieved contestants, but to any other Member who can show an interest in the grounds of protest and the results that might be attained if the protest were allowed. No protest shall be valid unless the Written Notice to the Commissioner thereof is accompanied by a check in the sum of $10,000 (the “Protest Fee”) payable to the order of the Association. If the Member filing the protest prevails, the Protest Fee is to be refunded. If the Member does not prevail, the Protest Fee is to be forfeited and retained in the Association treasury.
(b) Upon receipt of a protest, the Commissioner shall at once notify the Member operating the opposing Team in the game protested and require both of said Members within five (5) days to file with him such evidence as he may desire bearing upon the issue. The Commissioner shall decide the question raised within five (5) days after receipt of such evidence.
According to James Ham of Kings blog Cowbell Kingdom, Sacramento’s submitting evidence that Lee’s layup took .377 seconds to complete, and that backup center Ryan Hollins definitely made contact with Vince Carter’s inbounds pass, meaning the game clock should have started well before the ball ever got to Lee. “Definitive” evidence of that would seem to need to be something stronger than what we saw in the aftermath of the call:
The Kings apparently feel “very confident” that their protest will be upheld. If they’re right, as Brett Pollakoff of ProBasketballTalk notes, it’d mark the first time that the league has granted a game protest since January 2008, when the Miami Heat raised a red flag over a critical error late in a game against the Atlanta Hawks:
The Heat protested the game because, with 51.9 seconds remaining in overtime, the Hawks’ scoring table personnel incorrectly disqualified the Heat’s Shaquille O’Neal – asserting that a foul committed by O’Neal was his sixth foul of the game, when in fact it was only his fifth. The error occurred because the Hawks’ Official Scorer mistakenly attributed to O’Neal a foul at 3:24 remaining in the fourth period that was actually called against the Heat’s Udonis Haslem.
NBA Commissioner David Stern found that the Hawks were grossly negligent in committing this scoring error, since they failed to follow league-mandated scoring procedures and failed to respond effectively when the members of the statisticians’ crew noticed the mistake. Because of this conduct by Atlanta’s personnel, Miami suffered a clear competitive disadvantage, as O’Neal – the Heat’s second leading scorer and rebounder that night – was removed from a one-point game with only 51.9 seconds remaining. Under this unprecedented set of circumstances, the Commissioner granted the Heat’s protest, and fined the Hawks $50,000 for their violation of league rules.
In that case, the league ruled that the Heat and Hawks would replay the final 51.9 seconds of overtime before their next meeting, which came on March 8, 2008 … after Shaq had been traded to the Phoenix Suns for Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks. The Hawks held on for a 114-111 win.
While that case involved replaying a portion of the game, though, this would require flat-out stripping a win from the West-leading 9-1 Grizzlies and adding one to the ledger for the now 6-4 Kings. That, combined with an apparent lack of “gross negligence” — a referee being seven hundredths of a second slow on starting the game clock and a handful of refs and review officials not seeing conclusive evidence that Hollins made contact with the ball wouldn’t seem to quality — makes you think the league might not be likely to uphold this particular protest. Then again, if the Kings really do have indisputable evidence that Hollins tipped Carter’s pass, changing the outcome of the game after the fact would not only be warranted, but the right thing to do.
With the Grizzlies riding their meat-grinder defense to the top of the conference and the Kings ranking among the league’s biggest surprises in the early going, flipping one win and one loss could wind up having major implications in the Western playoff race. It’ll be fascinating to learn whether Silver and the league office saw enough merit in Sacramento’s evidence to justify such a drastic measure.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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