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Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

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"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

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B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

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Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

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When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

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If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

http://www.linktothearticlegoeshere.com/article
Title of the Article
Author's Name
Indianapolis Star

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The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

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However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

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We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

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FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

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  • #1

    FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

    Alright folks,

    First of all, I am opening a new thread because I figured people might avoid last night's postgame thread in the wake of what happened. There was quite a bit of "lively discussion" between myself, and other posters about the final shot of regulation by Amir Johnson. Myself, and another poster firmly stated that we believed it was LATE and should have been disallowed. Others felt differently, and wanted some photographic proof. This thread is my attempt at providing that proof.

    Now let me say first of all, I was watching the game on FSIndiana, and they had several much better and crisper angles during the lengthy replay timeout. Unfortunately, stupid NBA League Pass Broadband (which I had to use to take these screenshots on my computer) was playing the Raptors feed... However, I was still able to get a few shots of some good angles, and hopefully you guys will see where I am going with this. But if anyone has the FSIndiana feed on your DVR, you will be able to see what I mean.

    Secondly, I am NOT interested in debating whether or not the Pacers "Deserved" to lose this game because of mistakes we made, or things we SHOULD have done. This is simply a presentation and discussion of the ruling of this particular field goal.

    Without further ado, I present to you the evidence of (another) game taken from the Pacers by the officials on a final play.


    ANGLE 1: Opposite Baseline




    Ok, so these first two screenshots are from the opposite baseline camera. Of the several angles shown, these are the least conclusive in my opinion, yet they were the ones that the announcers for the Raptors were pointing to as their concrete evidence of a good field goal. As you can see in both of these shots, which are just several frames apart, Amir Johnson appears to have his LEFT hand clear of the ball, but his right thumb and possible the "pad" of his palm still appears to be touching the ball. Again, this is the LEAST conclusive of the three angles. We cannot make a 100% definitive ruling based on this angle alone. Fortunately, we have...



    ANGLE 2: Near Side Baseline

    I am going to break these images down one by one.



    In this first image we see Johnson with BOTH hands clearly still touching the ball. His shooting hand is clearly still supporting the ball from underneath. There are 0.1 seconds on the clock with which he has to get the ball out of his hands.



    As you can see from the shot clock, the time is currently ticking down from 0.1 to 0.0. The game, at this exact moment in time, is OVER. We can see that Johnson has gotten his non-shooting hand clear of the ball, but his right hand, which had to "flick" forward to propel the shot towards the rim, is still in the middle of that motion. His thumb, several fingers and possibly a portion of the pad of his palm are still in contact with the ball as time expires.



    To further drive home the evidence from the second photo, here is a shot from several frames later. His right wrist has now mostly completed its forward "flicking" motion to propel the ball to the rim. Even now, in this shot, it appears as though his index finger at the very least may still be in contact with the ball, several milliseconds AFTER his thumb and several fingers were clearly in contact with the ball.

    This angle definitely shows evidence to support the shot being late. But if you still aren't convinced, here's the magic bullet.



    ANGLE 3: Sideline

    Once again, I'll break these down one at a time.


    Alright, here is the first photo from this angle. Notice first and foremost that ALL the photos from this angle are already showing the basket "shot clock light" already bright red and illuminated. The game is over at this point. In this first picture, we can perhaps assume that Johnson's LEFT hand is still touching the ball, but we've already disproved that in the previous two series of photos. However, we know definitively based on those same first two angles that Johnson's RIGHT hand was at this very moment in time desperately trying to quickly finish its "flicking" shot motion. So here you see the clock EXPIRED and Johnson's "flick" has not yet occurred.



    Several frames have elapsed, and we now see Johnson's RIGHT hand clearly behind his LEFT hand. He is mid-way through his already explained "flick" motion. His LEFT hand is clearly off the ball, while his right fingers are still in the process of giving the ball its final tiny bit of propulsion towards the rim. With his fingers still touching the ball, the game is now at this point most certainly over.



    Alright, now we're getting somewhere. Several frames later we can see Johnson's LEFT hand now fully off the ball. His RIGHT index and middle finger have given the ball their last push towards the rim, but the argument could STILL be made that his ring finger and pinkie finger are still dangerously close to being in contact with the ball, having already established that he was touching it a couple milliseconds ago. Further evidence that this game is REALLY over at this point, 90-88 Pacers.



    FINALLY! A couple frames later and we can at last declare with certainty that Amir Johnson has released the shot. At this point, the game clock has been at 0.0 with red lights on for slightly longer than 0.1, closer to 0.15 or 0.175 in all actuality.



    SO there you have it folks. Is this overkill? Yes. Is it beating a dead horse? Yep. Do I expect for the NBA to come look at this and suddenly reward us with our deserved 'W'. Fat chance!

    However, I do hope that instead of everyone doing nothing but complain about our teams mistakes and things we SHOULD have done, that we may perhaps actually give some validity to the point that sometimes you really DO get a game stolen from you by a blown call. Remember the Denver game? The NBA had to come out and admit fault that time. This should be no different, although I would frankly be shocked if they did.

    We made some mentally and physically tired plays down the stretch of both regulation and overtime. We let this game get away from us when we should have won it going away by double figures. I do not dispute this point. However, despite all of that, when it came down to the end of regulation, the Pacers were winning the game 90-88. Unfortunately, the referees made the cowardly decision that the call was just TOO close, and "aw heck, just let them play 5 more minutes." Some people agree that perhaps that was the "right" way to officiate in that situation. I disagree completely. The NBA rulebook says that if time expires and a player has not fully released the ball at that precise moment, the shot is disallowed. In this situation, NOT enforcing that rule directly lead to the Pacers not instantly claiming a win, and instead the events of overtime took place and we lost.

    Had that rule been enforced by the officials last night, things would have ended OFFICIALLY the way that they should have.

    Pacers 90
    Raptors 88
    Last edited by TMJ31; 02-09-2013, 04:34 AM.
    Tags: None
  • #2
    Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

    The ball is out of his hand in the first two photos. It's close, but you can clearly see the white backboard padding between his fingers, and that would be impossible with the ball still in the pad of his hand. The best angle would have been from the Pacers bench but the top pic is also sufficient.

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    • #3
      Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

      I think the first pic in angle 3 was the best indication that the shot didn't get off in time. I remember seeing that angle on FSI last night with the red backboard light on and was convinced it the shot was gonna count. Great analysis.
      Larry Bird and Ryan Grigson- wasting the talents of Paul George and Andrew Luck

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      • #4
        Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

        I agree with you TMJ, I feel now just like I felt last night that the shot was no good. The basic issue here was that the refs called the shot good on the floor. In order to overturn that they need conclusive evidence to do so. And with the replays as close as they were, not conclusive enough to overturn the call. That's all it boils down to. I think it was late, and in my head we should have won the game on that basis. We still made some boneheaded plays. I was fuming last night, but time to move on to the next one.

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        • #5
          Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

          Originally posted by Pacertron View Post
          I agree with you TMJ, I feel now just like I felt last night that the shot was no good. The basic issue here was that the refs called the shot good on the floor. In order to overturn that they need conclusive evidence to do so. And with the replays as close as they were, not conclusive enough to overturn the call. That's all it boils down to. I think it was late, and in my head we should have won the game on that basis. We still made some boneheaded plays. I was fuming last night, but time to move on to the next one.
          One wonders if a "no good" call would have stood up upon review; likely yes - again, due to insufficient evidence to overturn. I suspect that refs are inclined (even trained?) not to make a "no good" call in end-of-game shots just as they are inclined not to call end-of-game fouls. (Except in Denver. )


          "He’s no shrinking violet when it comes to that kind of stuff."

          - Rick Carlisle on how Kevin Pritchard responds to needed roster changes.

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          • #6
            Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

            not trying to be a dick, but you need a bigger TV to see the space. The Pacers played the officials replay on the overhead scoreboard and you could clearly see the space between the hand and the ball at the moment the light went off. It was the first set of views. Now the screen at the Fieldhouse is, what, 50 ft long? So the space is easier to see. The other views are not clear, but the first view on a big enough screen clearly shows that he got the ball off.

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            • #7
              Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

              I will not be surprised if The League decides the call was missed, just like Denver, but will not result in a W for the Pacers, just like Denver. Apologies cost nothing!

              Comment

              • #8
                Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                Its amazing how close our losses are. Jazz Game, Denver Game, and now this game come to mind. All int he hands of the officials and each time we get the shaft. As Ron Washington said I guess that's just the way basketball goes..

                Comment

                • #9
                  Serious question - is the rule that the shooting motion portion of the hand must have released or is it that no portion of the hand may be touching? I ask because it is almost always stated in terms of whether or not the ball was released, and this analysis seems to turn on a couple of fingers still touching after the motion was completed but the light had not come on - and that last is important, it is the light and not the clock digits that matters.

                  Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
                  BillS

                  A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
                  Or throw in a first-round pick and flip it for a max-level point guard...

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                  • #10
                    Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                    I cant tell with the shot, but I turned this game on with 5 minutes to go and saw at 3 atrocious calls go against the Pacers and about 2 no calls that should have been called. I was furious. I think they took David West out of the game mentally. I think that's why he made such a boneheaded pass at the end there.

                    Comment

                    • #11
                      Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                      I would like to see a reply of Toronto's steal of David west's inbounds pass. From the one or two times I've seen it in real time it looked like it was very very close to being a back court violation on Toronto.

                      Comment

                      • #12
                        Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                        Originally posted by BillS View Post
                        Serious question - is the rule that the shooting motion portion of the hand must have released or is it that no portion of the hand may be touching? I ask because it is almost always stated in terms of whether or not the ball was released, and this analysis seems to turn on a couple of fingers still touching after the motion was completed but the light had not come on - and that last is important, it is the light and not the clock digits that matters.

                        Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
                        The rule, as I understand it, is hand touching the ball. If the hand touches the ball after the light goes on, then the game is over. The motion of the hand off the ball doesn't matter as long as the ball is not touched.

                        Comment

                        • #13
                          Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                          I'm not mad about this call. To me, it came down to what they called at the time of the play because the replays were not 100% convincing. In this kind of situation, I think it's better for the refs to assume the play was good and then to challenge that ruling. Benefit of the doubt should go to the offense.

                          Give them credit, they made tough plays at the end while the Pacers just had a couple slip ups. It was a really fun game to watch, and though I'm bummed about not getting the W, I was thoroughly entertained. I wish I could have been at the Fieldhouse. Frankly, if we had to lose one of these games, I'm glad it was the Toronto game.

                          Comment

                          • #14
                            Butt post sorry
                            Last edited by Dgreenwell3; 02-09-2013, 11:49 AM.

                            Comment

                            • #15
                              Re: FINAL SCORE: Pacers 90 - Raptors 88 Screenshot Analysis Inside

                              Originally posted by imawhat View Post
                              The ball is out of his hand in the first two photos. It's close, but you can clearly see the white backboard padding between his fingers, and that would be impossible with the ball still in the pad of his hand. The best angle would have been from the Pacers bench but the top pic is also sufficient.
                              Yep. The first two photos are the angle I saw on a 650" screen in front of me at the Fieldhouse (I sit almost center court, row 1 in balcony). It was barely, and I mean BARELY, out of his hand. The best argument left is that maybe it was touching his thumb, but considering how one shoots a basketball, I find that unlikely (typically your thumb is as far back as any other part of the hand, if not even a little further back than the fingers). If I want to be super devil's advocate in favor of the Pacers, I would say that it's too close to overturn the ruling (which would mean there's some wiggle room to the interpretation of the replay), but I think they ultimately got it right.

                              I don't like it, but that's what I see.

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