Add an Additional Referee
Having three officials today makes for a lot of running up and down the court. While not so laborious as to prevent Dick Bavetta from lapping Charles Barkley, it is a challenge when you task each official with a ton of potential calls that they have to account for while literally on the run.
Giving officials more stationary time to focus and less potential calls to focus on should improve the overall accuracy of the calls.
More from Valley of the Suns
- Ranking the Phoenix Suns’ 5 holiday games in 2023-24
- Zion Williamson gets compared to Phoenix Suns legend
- Suns player preview: Bol Bol can be the perfect role player
- Former Suns’ guard shows he is officially done with Phoenix
- NBA insider guarantees Suns’ rival won’t make blockbuster trade
Instead of running a triangle coverage, the officials could run a box. That way the running consists just of move from baseline to the trailing position and back again. That cuts the court into quarters and cuts down on the movement and re-positioning. It means the lead official doesn’t have to cover an entire baseline that they currently can’t see.
Think of it too from a football perspective Consider that there is also a lot less movement on certain parts of a play in which officials aren’t having to run around in order to keep an eye on (specifically on the line).
Sure, they too can miss a lot of calls, I am not discounting the fact that they are all human. But the NBA has constant movement, and with so much of the game now predicated on fastbreaks, officials are always moving.
If the league added a foot of room on the court they could also take all four officials off the actual playing surface which would help eliminate a lot of the goofy plays where a ref becomes an inadvertent obstacle course.