[iimblack]

Basketball is also the problem, refereeing specifically. Refs are humans and make mistakes but it’s hard to watch and not feel like there’s blatant favoritism to star players or certain teams.

There are the L2M reports that detail all the mistakes they make in the end of the game and way too often they’re game altering.

Then there’s the inconsistent approach to the rules. They’ll suddenly decide they want to push a rule, call every tiny infraction on it, then 10 games later it’s like the refs collectively forgot the rule exists at all.

It all makes for an extremely frustrating experience for the players and the fans.

[walr000s]

The Lakers have a statistically impossible +/- in free throws shot. There is favoritism and the league isn't even remotely trying to disguise it...is that really different than any other arena though?

[itsdrewmiller]

Statistically impossible is wild hyperbole. No two teams have the same players and many have drastically different strategies.

[jghn]

> there’s blatant favoritism to star players

This has always bugged me across all sports. For instance in baseball, while it's gotten a lot better over the years, the inequality of how strike zones were applied was annoying.