The Los Angeles Lakers now trail the Oklahoma City Thunder two games to none in the Western Conference semifinals after their 125-107 loss in Game 2 on Thursday. At times, Thursday’s game got physical, and it left the Lakers complaining about the officiating.
In particular, LeBron James was seen arguing with the referees multiple times in this game. During the first quarter, he appeared to get hip-checked by Jaylin Williams while making a layup, but no foul was called. Later on in the fourth quarter, he was fouled while making a mid-range shot, but the shot didn’t count, as it was ruled that the foul occurred before the shot attempt. Right after the final horn, several members of the Lakers gathered together and had a discussion with the referees.
Advertisement
James scored 23 points but got a modest four free throw attempts, and after the game, Lakers coach JJ Redick defended the superstar by saying that James doesn’t get calls that he perhaps should get in his favor.
“LeBron has the worst whistle of any star player I’ve ever seen,” Redick said. “I’ve been with him two years now. There’s the smaller guys because they can be theatric, they typically draw more fouls, and the bigger players that are built like LeBron, it’s hard for them.
“He gets clobbered, and he clobbered again tonight a bunch. That’s not a new thing. That’s not specific to this crew or this series.”
When James was asked how the officiating affected the key runs Oklahoma City made in this game, he simply responded, “We’re down 2-0.” When asked about Redick’s comment about him not getting calls and why he thinks he doesn’t get more calls, he gave a non-answer.
There was a time when James definitely got the benefit of the doubt from the referees on both ends of the floor, but those days are long gone. His free throw rate dropped precipitously during the 2019-20 season, which was his second with the Lakers, and although his free throw rate somewhat recovered this regular season to 34.4%, that’s still considerably lower than it was during his first 10 to 12 years in the league.
Advertisement
Perhaps the officiating will be a little more tilted in favor of Los Angeles when the series shifts to Crypto.com Arena for Game 3 and Game 4. But the Lakers will need to look past that facet of the game and find a way to generate more offense, limit their turnovers and do a better job on the boards and in terms of getting easy transition scores if they are to get into this series.
This article originally appeared on LeBron Wire: JJ Redick: ‘LeBron has the worst whistle of any star player’
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
