Mar 13, 2025 4 min read

The Grift Won't Last

As Worm found out, eventually you have to play the game straight up. (Image Credit: "Rounders")

I had the pleasure and privilege of attending tonight's game between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Boston Celtics. It was a marvelous game, filled with big shots, interesting strategy, and unsung players stepping up big. I was particularly impressed with Cason Wallace's defense on Jaylen Brown. But the game was marred by several ridiculous calls from Tyler Ford and his officiating crew. This has been a theme with the Thunder all season, particularly with presumptive league MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and I'm certainly not the only one who has noticed. I can assure you, a lot more people are going to take notice after tonight's game.

I want to start with some facts, because I can already feel you dismissing this as an overly green-tinted edition of Green Tint. And you aren't wrong, necessarily. Classy as always, even JB wouldn't blame the refs in his postgame comments. But a lot of outlier stuff happened in this one that should not have happened, and probably won't happen again any time soon. To wit:

Between the regular season and the playoffs, tonight was the 553rd game of Derrick White's career. It was the very first time he's fouled out.
Between the regular season and the playoffs, tonight was the 719th game of Jaylen Brown's career. It was only the 11th time he's fouled out, and just the third time since the start of the 2020-2021 season. He fouled out once last season, and once in the 2022 playoffs, in Game 6 vs. Miami.
The Celtics were whistled for 25 fouls tonight, which was a season high.
The Thunder attempted 35 free throws tonight, which was the most this season by a Celtics opponent (previous high was 31).
The Celtics' -23 free throw disparity was the widest margin this season by a country mile. The prior largest gulf came Jan. 2 in Minnesota, when the C's took just six free throws compared to 22 for the Timberwolves. Notably, the C's were the road team in this game.
The -23 free throw disparity was even wider in context when you consider just home games. It's generally presumed that the home team will get more calls, or at least not be dogged in their own building. The prior biggest gap for the C's this season was -12, back on Oct. 28 vs. Milwaukee. In that game, the Bucks took 31 free throws (18 by Damian Lillard) to Boston's 19. Tonight's gap was essentially double.

I really don't know how to research "the last time two Celtics players fouled out in the same game" without spending a lot of time I don't have combing through individual box scores, but suffice to say I can't remember the last time that happened. To be honest, it's very hard to remember the last time one of the Celtics' players fouled out in a game, nevermind two. The Celtics are very disciplined, and have a wide body of games to prove it. They entered tonight second in the NBA in terms of fewest personal fouls committed. They also ranked second last season. The season before they ranked sixth, and the season before that fifth. This excellent on-ball discipline has been a hallmark of this team ever since Ime Udoka took over as head coach for Brad Stevens. Tonight, Tyler Ford and his officiating crew saw things quite differently.

In a way, the grifting that the Thunder did tonight was a gift. I can't think of anyone who wants to watch games marred like this, and now there is clear videotape of them mucking up a high-level game with this unethical crap. SGA does this stuff relentlessly, and is usually rewarded for it. He doesn't mind looking like an idiot the few times it isn't whistled in his favor, such as this play halfway through the fourth quarter. Watch the replay. He didn't complain. He knew there was no foul. He got up and ran back down the court. This is regular-season stuff. It won't work in the playoffs.

SGA is not the first player to do stuff like this, and if the league doesn't change the rules, he certainly won't be the last. But the beauty of a seven-game series is that even the best grifters don't get the benefit of the doubt for all seven games. The best grifters of this century – James Harden, Joel Embiid, Jalen Brunson, and Trae Young – have never reached the NBA Finals. At a certain point, you have to stop trying to bait the refs and start playing straight up. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is absolutely talented enough to get there without trying to bait the refs into calls (as are Harden, Embiid, Brunson, and Young). And when he plays straight up, he is one of the most entertaining players in the NBA to watch. He landed a few vicious step backs in tonight's game. But after a certain point, he was landing them because Boston defenders knew if they got too close he was going to jump into them and they were going to be whistled for a foul. So they gave him a little cushion, and he took advantage.

And to be fair to SGA, it wasn't just him. For just one instance so as to not repeatedly beat a dead horse (what a weird idiom that is), Isaiah Joe was rewarded with three free throws for flopping to the ground at the end of the first quarter. All of this is a shame, but in the long run, the Celtics are still the better team.

The C's shot 5-for-27 (Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown combined were 0-for-9) from three-point land in the second half, and OKC took 14 more free throws than Boston in the second half, and the game was in the balance right up until the very end. With those kinds of numbers, it should have been a blowout. It wasn't, because the C's are that good, and they kept hanging around. Right up until the refs whistled Brown for his sixth and final foul with 3:36 remaining. I'm confident that won't happen again, because as I showed above, this game was an outlier in a myriad of ways.