NBA officals are the worst? (Casey)

So on a recent post on Facebook I asked if there was anything that people wanted us to write about that concerned sports in one way or another, and the first response was, Why do officials suck so bad, specifically NBA officials. So I waited till the NBA season officially ended which was last night in a game 7 where the Miami Heat beat the San Antonio Spurs and claimed the trophy before i wrote this entry. For many years I have thought that the NBA and the NBA officials to be more specific were some of the worst at calling a game right down the middle. For instance, if you have followed the NBA for any period of time you have I'm sure heard of a little something called "Star Treatment". Star Treatment? There is no such thing as Star Treatment in any other sport that I'm aware of. Why is it a league that is so popular needs to have specialized treatment for "Stars" and the game is not called right. I had a conversation this morning with some co-workers and one of the things brought up was the fact that a Star like Lebron James can take the ball in the regular season and if someone so much as looks at him wrong he is called for a foul. Why is that? For the life of me I have never seen a "Star" NFL player get a special call because of who he is. Why does the NBA feel like it needs to protect its Stars, they are the best on the planet at what they do. They could win a game single handedly and yet the NBA officials protect them. Maybe its a marketing thing. I know I have heard that the NBA needs to protect its brand by keeping these big name players in the game. But in my eyes it hurts the product especially with the fringe fans who see officials dictate the game and protect only the few. I can only imagine how hard it would be to officiate a Pro athletic event, but these guys get paid big for what they do. 
Game 6 of the NBA finals was officiated by a man named Joey Crawford, if you don't recognize the name here are a few things that I found out about this "Well Respected official" courtesy of Wikipedia.

 

This is a playoff game between Suns and Trailblazers!

• Airline ticket income investigation: In 1998 Joey and 8 other officials were charged with filing false income tax returns and pled guilt and resigned from the NBA only to have David Stern reinstate him in 1999.
• Tim Duncan altercation: During a game in 2007 Joey Crawford and Tim Duncan got into a verbal altercation and as Tim Duncan was sitting on the bench staring at Crawford he was ejected for the game. Both sides blamed the other as usual, Joey said Duncan called him a name and Tim said Joey asked him if he wanted to fight. They altercation resulted in Joey getting suspended for the remainder of the 2006-07 season and the 2007 playoffs. But then again in September of 2007 good old David Stern reinstated him.
  Why would the NBA continue to reinstate this guy, it seems like bad decision after bad decision but he still is being rewarded with anywhere between $100,000 and $400,000 a year. Its no coincidence either that when he was assigned Game 6 of this years finals that after the game there were a lot of questions about the officiating.
  
  Lets not forget the most damning thing that has happened to the NBA in the last 10 years. Tim Donaghy! Tim was an NBA official for 13 years, he had officiated over 700 games and 20 playoff games. Good Old Tim was involved in his fair share of incidents. He was one of the officials during the Pacers/Pistons brawl. But the worst was his involvement the scandal where he was charged with betting on games and betting on games that he officiated! In 2007 it was found out that Donaghy was linked with a Sports betting duo that had limited affiliation with the mob and that was using Donaghy to bet on games. The sad part of the story is it took an FBI investigation to find a crooked ref when David Stern has told us that he polices his officials very stringently! The Most Damning part was a statement made by Donaghys attorney where he stated that there were other officials that were fixing games, one in particular was the 2002 Western Conference finals between the Lakers and the Kings where Donaghy claimed he heard officials talking about making sure it went to a game 7 so the NBA could make more money on ticket sales and advertising which it did. Now take that information for what its worth i mean he is a known criminal.
  
  The reason I bring up these stories is to show the character of some of the Officials in the NBA. I am sure there are other leagues that have officials with character problems as well but if you sit back and think about it, with a simple no call here, or a random stoppage there, the officials can have a huge impact on an NBA game. I think Officiating has to be one of the hardest things to do. They are spit second decisions that are made, but in the NBA it feels like there are so many outlying things that come into play that alter the way it is called (Star Treatment) that sometimes truthfully makes its hard to watch. And the reason I think I have more questions about the NBA is because I hear more about officials from the NBA than I do any other sport!