Once Upon a Time, Referees Defended Their Calls With Their Fists

As my colleague Brett Edwards pointed out, Steve Javie is so notorious for making calls against the home team that he gets booed during pregame introductions. But as bad as that gets, he should just be thank he's not officiating 30 years ago ... That's a clip of the 1975 NBA Finals above, and at the 48-second mark referee Richie Powers actually begins brawling with a fan at center court who was apparently angry that Powers (correctly) ruled that time had not expired. Can you imagine if that happened now? It'd lead SportsCenter for a week, and yet back then announcers Rick Barry and Brent Musburger talk about it for barely a minute before getting back to the game.

Also worth pointing out: in the final seconds of regulation, Powers blatantly ignored Boston's Paul Silas' request for a timeout, ostensibly because he knew the Celtics were out of timeouts. Had he granted Silas' request, the Suns would have had a chance to avoid overtime by hitting a technical foul free throw. Needless to say, the Suns were incensed. Don't gloss over the good ol' days: really bad officiating has existed for a long, long time.

Big tip of the hat to Neil Best for pointing this one out.