OT: Instant Replay is Of The Devil

Submitted by momo on

As the title suggests, Instant Replay is Of The Devil.

 

In the average person's imagination, Instant Replay serves a single purpose: to make games more fair. In fact it does no such thing. At the expense of human enjoyment (by prolonging games, often seemingly interminably) it simply offers a placebo effect: because we have instant replay, things must be better than if we did not have it.

 

This is not, in fact, the case.

 

Human ingenuity has brought us incredibly accurate slow-motion replay. Thanks to technological genius, most people with functioning vision clearly saw the Duke player's finger deviate from its natural position in a splayed hand configuration due to its contact with the ball. And yet, in utterly predictable fashion* the refs stuck with their original decision: Duke ball.

 

The "tell" of slow-motion replay and its status as opium for the barely-sentient mainstream sports-consuming masses is the fact that it only applies (for out-of-bounds decisions) in certain time periods. As we all know, two points scored at 13:40 count the same as two points scored at 1:32. And yet, for some reason, out-of-bounds decisions become critical in the last two minutes of the game. So critical, in fact, that refs must review them (and then ignore the slow motion evidence).

 

Instant replay is a crude tool, selectively applied for no good reason, which has no significant positive effect on the accuracy of rule application in sporting events, or at least not enough to counterbalance its annoyance effect as an interruption to the flow of the game. It is, when all is said and done, Of The Devil.

 

* Not at all meant to be an anti-Duke comment: refs get it wrong all the time and probably not, in the long term, in Duke's favor. The point of this rant is that instant replay doesn't really improve things enough to justify the boredom of waiting for the final verdict.

ShruteBeetFarms

April 7th, 2015 at 1:14 AM ^

The deck was already stacked against Wiscy. Wiscy needed to bring their A game, but they didn't. They missed an unusual amount of free throws and Dekker had an off night. They dribbled too much and didn't swing it in the 2nd half. Their offense is better than that.

 

BeantownBlue

April 7th, 2015 at 12:52 AM ^

About a minute left (or maybe a little more).  Wisconsin down by 5 but the ball would've been theirs, right under their own net.  Instead, Duke gets the ball and hits a 3 and is up by 8.  

MichiganMAN47

April 7th, 2015 at 12:56 AM ^

Who gives a shit about the fans!!!! It's not about YOU! It's about the PLAYERS!



The players and coaches want the right call made, it is about what is fair to them.  It's very important to the players- the losers are almost always crying after games like these.They worked hard all year, they deserve a review, even if it takes 10 minutes to get it right.  

 

The argument for instant replay is that they get it right more often than not. They don't always make the right call, but the review increases the odds. Even though it is only in the last two minutes, it is still better than missing it. Instead of 3 blown calls in a game, you now have just 2.  It makes sense, although it's implementation often is less than perfect.



Give it a rest. If you don't like watching an extra 60 seconds of commercials for the sake of being fair to players who have put thousands of hours into the game, then don't watch. 

JamieH

April 7th, 2015 at 1:03 AM ^

The problem is INCOMPETENT OFFICIALS.

 

We were told for years that the reason officials sucked is that games were "too fast".  Officials couldn't possibly be expected to see what really happened in real time.   it just wasn't possible.  And we believed them.

 

Then we got instant replay, and we learned the truth--the average ref is a f'ing incomptent blind moron.   You can slow the game down to frame-by-frame advance and they STILL can't get it right.  Everyone in the country can see what the correct call is, yet the refs on the floor will still be entirely clueless as to what they are seeing on the replay monitor. 



We have seen this over and over and over again in Big Ten football games.  OBVIOUS replay calls that the replay officials utterly botch because they either

A)  Don't know the rules

B)  Have no idea what they are looking at

C)  Are just completely incompetent



There is no point to replay if you don't have officials watching it who know what they are doing.  If you have shitty refs, and then you put that shitty ref in front of a reply, you just get the same shitty calls.  Slowing down the game doesn't make the terrible ref better--he still sucks. 



The answer is to take replay away from the refs entirely and pipe it to a command center somewhere, where a group of replay experts analyze the play from as many angles as possible and call back with the correct call.  I believe they do this in MLB and NHL.  As long as you leave the call with the crappy refs who botched the call to begin with, you'll never get it right. 

What I would love to know in this case is, did they get to see the angle that clearly showed the ball going off the Duke player?  If they did, then WTF?  And if not, WHY NOT???



BTW, I don't think the refs were hosing Wisconsin all night.  I actually thought the Badgers got quite a few calls in the first half and early in the 2nd half, especially on some foul calls.

dmac24

April 7th, 2015 at 10:15 AM ^

As someone who has officiated for 8 years at the high school and college level along with having an older brother officiating D1, watching the tournament this year was rough. So many calls made by officials that were not in their primary coverage area as well as making calls when they are not in a good position to see what actually happened. Not to mention how inconsistent they are.

Officiating is as much a politics game as everything else is. Officials are sometimes concerned about making sure the number of fouls are close to the same so they look consistent, not taking into account one team may be more aggressive than the other. It drives me nuts.

JamieH

April 7th, 2015 at 12:48 PM ^

I'm not saying that all refs suck, but clearly too many that aren't good are getting promoted to the upper levels of DIv 1.  in both basketball and football.  Like you said, it is more political than skill-based. 

CompleteLunacy

April 7th, 2015 at 10:49 AM ^

It doesn't even have to be a "command center". Just use a flipping replay booth. Give them a bigger monitor to actally, you know, SEE the play (part of that call was likely due to the refs staring at a tiny screen). Let the replay officials deal with the minutae of the rules and how to examine/scrutinize crucial close clals via replay. If the refs are as incompetent as we say (I mean, if we really DO accept that the game is too fast for them), then why teh fuck would giving them MORE responsibility be a smart thing to do? It's just another opportunity to screw things up, but this time in a situation where screwing up is unacceptable.

JamieH

April 7th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^

It doesn't work.  The leagues put the crappy refs who suck and and are retiring in the replay booth and then they continue to f*** things up for another decade, instead of hiring people whose PRIMARY responsibility is to be a replay official.

 

We need people who are DEDICATED replay EXPERTS, and we probably need TEAMS of them, preferrably in an odd number so that they can vote if there is a disagreement, looking at this stuff.  That's why I prefer some sort of command center approach.  Have teams of 3 crack replay guys who work together looking at this stuff.  With 3 experts looking at a replay, you should be able to get it right 99%+ of the time and do it quickly.   

MaizeAndBlueWahoo

April 7th, 2015 at 6:47 AM ^

As we all know, two points scored at 13:40 count the same as two points scored at 1:32.

Wrong.  Only in hindsight is that true.  In the moment, when actual decisions have to be made, the earlier the event, the more time there is for that event to become lost in the shuffle.

What would you rather do?  Hit a three-pointer to go up four with 14 minutes left, or hit a three-pointer to go up four with 1 second left?

If you could pick a time where the referees would screw up in your favor and give you possession and a one-point lead, when would you rather have it?  At 14 minutes, or at five seconds?

You've just scored a basket and you're now down by two points.  There are 14 minutes left.  What do you do?

You've just scored a basket and you're now down by two points.  There are 14 seconds left.  What do you do?

The closer you get to the end of the game, the fewer chances you have to change the outcome.  Every decision means more.  Getting it right at 1:32 is far more crucial because there are far fewer possessions left.  The two-minute mark for automatic replays is trying to strike a balance between not disrupting the flow of the game and trying to get it right at the most important moments.  And it's a fallacy to say that if an undeserved basket is scored at 30 seconds, it's the same as if an undeserved basket is scored at 13 minutes, because taking away the undeserved basket at 13 minutes doesn't just mean the game would have proceeded exactly the same as it did only with two fewer points.  Lots of different decisions might have been made and there is plenty of time to wipe out the effects of the mistake.  There is no time to wipe out the effects of a mistake at the end of a game.

MGoBender

April 7th, 2015 at 7:50 AM ^

Was going to post this exact same thing. Time is not equal in importance during any game.

In fact, I was at a basketball officials event about 5 years ago. ACC officials have a standard of 90% correctness in their games (calls and no calls). And they are expected to be perfect in the final four minutes. Those are the two main standards that the officials coordinator uses to determine game assignments.

MaizeAndBlueWahoo

April 7th, 2015 at 10:56 AM ^

Of course it holds up.  Answer any of the questions I posed in the post and you'll see why.  It's not possible for a bad call's effects to be exacerbated over 15 minutes of play unless you think there's some kind of psychological effect to it that causes the screwed-over team to give up.

More plays means more chances to do something that covers up the effect of the call.  Fewer plays means fewer chances to do something.  That's such common sense it's practically a tautology.  Any play that happens afterward helps to erase the call's effects. 

HollywoodHokeHogan

April 7th, 2015 at 11:15 AM ^

Really. So a bad call, or series of bad calls, that fouls out a player with 10 minutes left has a lesser effect in your view than a bad call that fouls him out with 1 second left? There is a difference between the effect of an event being actually diminished and its effect becoming harder to discern. One is causal, the other epistemic. Everybody wants the three pointer at the end because they are certain it will win you the game. But it's effect is still just three points. If you assume that ref error is random, then the more time left gives the expectation that error will balance out. I thought you might be making that sort of argument, but I guess not. Errors at the end of the game are such that we are more confident about their effects, and perhaps that means we ought to try especially hard to avoid them. But that doesn't just follow as tautology. Especially since we can, in some cases, be confident that a bad call earlier in the game had a large negative effect, such as when your star gets his 3rd foul five minutes into the game.




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MaizeAndBlueWahoo

April 7th, 2015 at 11:58 AM ^

You're making the mistake of viewing the game through the lens of hindsight.  But decisions that affect the outcome of the game can only be made during the game.  Hence, that's the only proper way to view things like instant replay.  It's not a matter of confidence, it's a matter of probabilities.  A three-pointer has a completely different effect on the game and the probability of winning, depending on when it's scored.

Besides, your argument is contradicting itself.  Does it have an effect on the game if a star player gets into foul trouble early?  Of course it does.  And why is this?  Because not all minutes of the game are created equal.  If they were, there would be no such thing as foul trouble.  Coaches would only substitute based on matchups and rest and just let their players foul out when they fouled out.  But they don't do this because it's more important to have them playing with a minute left than with 15 minutes left.

Here's further evidence that a point is not just a point and they really don't all count the same.  Picture the situation of a player at the free throw line with two seconds left and his team down two.  If the effect of making a free throw were "just one point" then you'd expect that if you studied every situation where this ever happened, there'd be a random distribution between making none, making only the first, making only the second, and making both.  It would be nothing more than a weighted coin flip.  But that's not the case.  You'd find that it's very rare a player misses the first and makes the second, because he needed to make the first in order for the second to matter.  Missing the first causes him to purposely miss the second, in order to try for a rebound rather than give the ball up.  One point is worth the same as zero points.  This situation would be skewed toward three of the four possible outcomes.  That alone is proof that the effect of a miss on the first shot is not just one point.

To say that the effect of a three-pointer is just three points regardless of when it happens is to assume basketball is equivalent to a weighted random number generator much like a lotto drawing.  But since it's infinitely more preferable to win than to lose, that's the wrong way to look at it.  It only makes sense to view it that way if a basketball season were ultimately determined by your point margin at the end of it, and not wins and losses.  And even then, an "ending" implies changing your strategy at some point and accepting more risk.  So it's probably more accurate to say it makes sense only if the outcome of a basketball season were determined by point margin over a randomly-chosen stretch of the season.

HollywoodHokeHogan

April 7th, 2015 at 2:33 PM ^

I'm not sure I follow you. When you talk about effects, you have to be talking about past events, so I would think hindsight is the only sight that matters. I don't know what you mean by confidence verse probabilities, other than to say I am a Bayesian so I don't see the difference.

I'm fairly sure I'm not committed to a contradiction because I'm not committed to accepting or rejecting the idea the coaches act rationally in benching players for foul trouble. But we can ignore that by focusing on the first example. Suppose your player fouls out in the first six minutes due to bad calls. Was the effect of those calls lessened because they occurred earlier? No, it was increased, and precisely because they occurred early. But not because they occurred earlier and caused the player to miss the allegedly more important moments later one. But because they occurred earlier and kept the player from playing as long as he would have otherwise. Please note that we are in agreement that timing matters. My only point was that it can matter in both directions, sometimes earlier events are more important in virtue of their occurring early. Sometimes later events are less important in virtue of being later, like a three pointer when you are up 30 with 10 seconds left vs a 3 pointer when you are up 30 in the first half.

You are right and was wrong to say that the three pointer was only worth three points, because maximizing point margin is not the goal of basketball. It's value depends on context and that includes time of occurrence. You are right that a three at the buzzer shifts win probability more than one at the end of the half. But a foul out that occurs at the start of a game will shift the wp, all things being equal, more than one at the end of the game. Whether you want to talk about probability or confidence, the effect of an event in a game does not seem to necessarily increase with time. That's my point. Put quaintly, the first brush stroke may be just as important as the last though the result of the last is more certain.




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Achilles

April 7th, 2015 at 6:50 AM ^

I cannot stand how basketball refs go to the replay so often. I think it is far overused and does kill the flow/momentum. They also go to the replay too much to make sure a three-point basket was indeed a three-point basket.

TyTrain32

April 7th, 2015 at 7:11 AM ^

Bread and Circus theory guys, its all rigged to a certain extent. Video replay is just one more tool they use to slowly manipulate the game towards the outcome they would like. Its all very deliberate.




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WMU81

April 7th, 2015 at 7:22 AM ^

Dont get how Kentucky and Duke can drive and slam into players and everytime its a charge, along with Winslow stepping out of bounds on baseline and Winslow touching ball that was REVIEWED.

jcouz

April 7th, 2015 at 7:35 AM ^

It is not worth it in basketball or football since the officials, after spending several minutes reviewing all angles, seem to still fuck up the call more times than not. I have a much easier time dealing with real-time human error on missed calls than I do fucking up obvious slowed down replay missed calls. The disruption of the flow of the game is not worth the selective implementation of its use IMO. Perhaps it would be better to just concede that there are going to be several missed calls and they will generally even themselves out over the course of an entire game (unless Duke is involved) and just accept the results.

Yo_Blue

April 7th, 2015 at 7:30 AM ^

After the game, Ryan went on a lenghty rant about how the refs allowed Duke to bump, grab and swat at his players and that this is not fair to his kids.  Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't Wisconsin known for their "getting away" with bumping, grabbing, and swatting opponents?  Not to mention sliding underneath jump shooters.  Ryan's class (or lack thereof) was really evident after the game.

LJ

April 7th, 2015 at 8:19 AM ^

Your rant provides no evidence to support anything you're saying.  It's absolutely true that replay makes the game more fair, unless you honestly think that reply more often switches the call from the correct one to the wrong one than the other way around, which is patently ridiculous.  Have you ever heard of any player or coach suggest of getting rid of instant reply altogether?  Nope, because calls are more often right with it than without it.

Icehole Woody

April 7th, 2015 at 9:09 AM ^

I liked instant replay the first year when the Big Ten implemented it.  They were really paranoid about it impacting the flow of the game that first year and so it was used it minimally.  Now it's morphed into a monster that can completely control the flow of the game.  Time to wack it back.