Doris Burke took cheap shot at Thunder star to defend Anthony Edwards’ push-off

· Yahoo Sports

NBA referees' frequent double standards in officiating have been a major talking point for years.

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But the way the reigning league champion, the Oklahoma City Thunder, has pushed those boundaries since their rise to prominence has brought about new talking points. And ESPN NBA analyst Doris Burke is clearly all too happy to shoehorn in any reference to what the Thunder and reigning MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are allowed to get away with compared to almost everyone else.

In the third quarter of a Minnesota Timberwolves win over the Denver Nuggets on Sunday, Anthony Edwards got called for a blatant push-off offensive foul on Jamal Murray. Truly, when watching the replay, it was a no-doubt-about-it call to make for the referees on hand. Full extension to make space for himself, which isn't a legal basketball play. Anyone with a similar position who understood the rules would make the same call on Edwards.

But Burke questioned the logic behind actually calling the offensive foul. Why? According to Burke, because someone like Gilgeous-Alexander gets away with pushing off all the time, other stars like Edwards should be able to get away with it, too. Huh?

In a vacuum, I see Burke's point, even if it was delivered in an inelegant way. A push-off foul is a push-off, after all. It's the "if everyone else jumped off a bridge" axiom, but on a lower scale, limited to professional basketball. I don't understand trying to defend a push-off by saying someone else who isn't even playing in that game is allowed to do it on a regular basis.

But again, I understand what Burke was trying to say at the core of her idea.

The Thunder play a physical, relentless brand of defense that emphasizes forcing referees to make foul calls. Oklahoma City has gamed the system by realizing that NBA officials do not want to call fouls if a fall occurs on almost every sequence because it would disrupt the flow of the game to a nauseating degree. By direct contrast, on offense, Gilgeous-Alexander, by virtue of being one of the faces of the league, has a reputation of being a "foul-baiter" who gets a lot of leeway from the referees. As a result, for example, he is often able to get away with pushing off when creating space for himself on a jumper.

This double standard understandably infuriates many opponents of the Thunder. And judging by Burke's assessment here, I can't imagine it sits well with a lot of prominent ESPN analysts, either.

It is this discrepancy that Burke calls out when noting that she thought Edwards shouldn't be called for an offensive foul. Her point adds up. Her logic makes sense. I still don't know that I would've brought it up in a game that Gilgeous-Alexander wasn't even playing, but alas.

It kind of sounded like Burke has an axe to grind about the Thunder. In that case, I wish she would do it even more, rather than these random, one-off occurrences.

This article originally appeared on For The Win: Doris Burke referenced Shai Gilgeous-Alexander on Anthony Edwards foul

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