Must Have Experience: Most NBA Refs Get Better With Age

Of all the stuff out there regarding negotiations between NBA officials and the league, one thing should be of particular concern to any fan who takes his basketball seriously.

It's that the league, through some of its proposals, is said to be trying to push out more senior officials. If that's the case, and such a plan was implemented, it would be a really bad move.

The first thing we need to do: define old.

There seems to be a perception out there that officials in their 50s, let alone in their 60s and beyond, are too long in the tooth, or close to getting there, to be a good NBA ref.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The reality of the situation is that, in general, most NBA officials don't reach their primes till they hit 50. Sure, there are exceptions, but for the most part the best refs in the league are in their 50s, with plenty of them in their mid- to late-50s.

Danny Crawford, Joey Crawford, Bob Delaney, Ron Garretson, Steve Javie, Greg Willard, Bill Spooner, Joe DeRosa, Derek Stafford and Ken Mauer ... you'd take them officiating your team's game any day of the week.

They're among the most veteran of NBA officials and all of them are beyond competent. And there's a reason officials peak around this time: it's usually when experience meets temperament, and it happens when the ref is still physically fit and mentally sharp enough to keep up with the game.

Just like it's tough for a rookie player to come into the league and make an immediate positive impact, so too is it difficult for an official to do that. For an official to be good, he's got to gain a certain comfort level, and that only comes with years of experience dealing with coaches and players.

Zach Zarba, Ed Malloy, Mark Guthrie and Eli Roe are all young and have a chance to be excellent officials. But each of them is still improving and each is going to need more time to truly excel at his craft. It's just the nature of the beast; the more games you work, the better you get.

Until you can't do it anymore. Let's be clear: we're not talking about weeding out an official or two who might have overstayed his welcome and can no longer get it done. We know you might have issues with Dick Bavetta and Bennett Salvatore, and that's OK. They're getting up there. But let's not perpetuate a mistaken notion that 55 is too old to ref an NBA game.

That's B.S. We don't subscribe to that. In fact, the reality is that usually to become a great official you need a certain amount of maturity -- that often only comes with age -- to deal with the fast pace and high emotion of the NBA game.

Instead of looking to eliminate older NBA officials, commissioner David Stern and the league might want to think about going in the other direction, like he did with the players in the last collective bargaining agreement.

Maybe it's time to have a minimum age requirement for NBA officials. How does 40 sound?

More Steinmetz on Twitter: @matt_steinmetz