During last night’s win over the Denver Nuggets, Lakers forward Matt Barnes picked up a technical foul after an apparent elbow to the chin of Denver forward Rudy Fernandez.
However, a closer look showed that Barnes didn’t actually make contact with Fernandez. But, as was explained following the game, it seems that even though Barnes didn’t hit Fernandez he would have been given a technical foul anyways.
Here’s the play from the game. Fernandez clearly flops, which becomes even more evident once the tape is slowed down.
httpvhd://youtu.be/F3dUJZy9yI0
During the game, after the replay was shown, it was obvious that Fernandez flopped and that Barnes didn’t actually make contact with him. This caused fans on Twitter to get extremely upset, feeling that the incorrect call was made based on the flop. However, since the call was indeed correct that isn’t really the problem.
As Brett Pollakoff of NBC Pro Basketball Talk points out, flopping is the issue.
“There’s no way to make this any clearer: Flopping is the scourge of professional sports. Saying that’s it’s somehow part of the game and that it’s up to the referees to determine what’s real and what isn’t is completely insane.”
I’m sure most of you will agree.