Report: Study suggests racial bias in calls by NBA referees

[mqywaaah]

May 2, 2007

NEW YORK (AP) -- An academic study of NBA officiating found that white referees called fouls at a greater rate against black players than against white players, The New York Times reported in Wednesday's editions.

The study by a University of Pennsylvania assistant professor and Cornell graduate student also found that black officials called fouls more frequently against white players than black, but noted that that tendency was not as pronounced.

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Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of business and public policy at Penn's Wharton School, and Joseph Price, a Cornell graduate student in economics, said the difference in calls "is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew."

The study, conducted over a 13-season span through 2004, found that the racial makeup of a three-man officiating crew affected calls by up to 4 1/2 percent.

The NBA strongly criticized the study, which was based on information from publicly available box scores, which show only the referees' names and contain no information about which official made a call.

"The study that is cited in the New York Times article is wrong," president of league and basketball operations Joel Litvin told The Associated Press on Tuesday night. "The fact is there is no evidence of racial bias in foul calls made by NBA officials and that is based on a study conducted by our experts who looked at data that was far more robust and current than the data relied upon by Professor Wolfers.

"The short of it is Wolfers and Price only looked at calls made by three-man crews. Our experts were able to analyze calls made by individual referees."

Litvin said the NBA's study, using data from November 2004 to January 2007, included some 148,000 calls and included which official made each call. The Times said the NBA denied a request by Wolfers and Price to obtain that information, citing its confidentiality agreement with the officials.

The study also found differences in everything from a decrease in scoring to a rise in turnovers depending on the officials' race.

"Player-performance appears to deteriorate at every margin when officiated by a larger fraction of opposite-race referees," Wolfers and Price wrote.

But the key finding was in regard to foul calls, saying "black players receive around 0.12-0.20 more fouls per 48 minutes played (an increase of 2 1/2 -4 1/2 percent) when the number of white referees officiating a game increases from zero to three."

The NBA has an observer at each game and closely monitors its officials, who are required to file reports after each game they work and are expected to be able to explain each potentially controversial call they have made.

Litvin said in an original version of the paper, dated March 2006, Wolfers and Price came to the conclusion that there was no bias. He added that the NBA's research "all prove beyond any doubt in our minds that these guys are just flat wrong."

"They reached conclusions in their own papers that are unsupported by their own calculations," Litvin said.

Wolfers and Price are set to present the paper at meetings of the Society of Labor Economists on Friday and the American Law and Economics Association on Sunday. The Times said they will then submit it to the National Bureau of Economic Research and for formal peer review before consideration by an economic journal.

[mqywaaah]

Ooooooooooohh.....

[come_on_now]

Well, black guys also the ones that go to the line all the time. Sometimes there's a German guy that can't get there to save his life, and really it might save his life the way they beat on him under the rim.

[The Crippler]

I could have told you this without doing a study...

unfortunately, I have many GDT posts claiming the same, especially against Crawford, Smith, Derek Stafford, and Earl Rush.

[MFFL]

I'd have to see the study parameters.

Most of the NBA is black so the study would have to be fouls on a per-minute basis. Plus since many of the white players are end of the bench fodder, you would have to throw out minutes played during a blowout. After all, refs don't call many fouls in the last few minutes of a blowout.

And position on the court has to be factored in. I have seen fewer big white stiffs lately so it would seem to indicate a higher percentage of the white players would be wing players who tend to draw less fouls.

[alexamenos]

Originally Posted by MFFL

....Plus since many of the white players are end of the bench fodder, you would have to throw out minutes played during a blowout. After all, refs don't call many fouls in the last few minutes of a blowout......

lol....damm good point.

makes me wonder....JJB is puerto rican. Does he count as white?

[FINtastic]

It would be impossible to do a fair study on this. You would have to assume that black players and white players have identical playing styles. But as you know, there are a lot of "soft" white boys. Having dudes like Steve Kerr picking up a foul once every four games or whatever is going to skew things. I would wager that on average black players, due to better athleticism and whatnot are probably a little more physical. So how on earth does a higher amount of fouls called represent anything noteworthy?

[MFFL]

Originally Posted by FINtastic

So how on earth does a higher amount of fouls called represent anything noteworthy?

But a study on an individual player might give you some information. It would need to be a mid-range star player. Focus on Rasheed Wallace (for example) for a season and count the fouls called on him by white officials vs black officials. Do the same for a white player of the same caliber. Then look at the percentages afterwards.

[MFFL]

NEW YORK -- The NBA responded strongly and angrily Wednesday to a front-page story in The New York Times alleging a racial bias in officiating, saying the study the report was based upon was wrong and contained flawed statistical methodology.

"The story is based upon a paper that is flat-out wrong in its conclusions, and we're disappointed that they ran the story this way," NBA president of basketball operations Joel Litvin told ESPN.com, saying The Times ignored data the league provided to the newspaper to support its argument.

The report in Wednesday's Times said an academic study of NBA officiating by a University of Pennsylvania assistant professor and Cornell graduate student found that white referees called fouls at a greater rate against black players than against white players. The study also found that black officials called fouls more frequently against white players than black, but noted that that tendency was not as pronounced.

Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of business and public policy at Penn's Wharton School, and Joseph Price, a Cornell graduate student in economics, said the difference in calls "is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew."

The study, conducted by reviewing box scores over a 13-season span through 2004, found that the racial makeup of a three-man officiating crew affected calls by up to 4½ percent. But the box scores only show the referees' names and contain no information about which official made a particular call -- an information gap that the league seized upon in attacking the report.

"We conducted our own study with experts in mathematics and statistical analysis, and those experts, looking at far superior data that included 148,000 calls, concluded unequivocally that there was no racial bias in officiating," Litvin said. "You cannot use box scores to do a definitive analysis of whether race affects an individual action. We have the information on specific referees and the specific calls they made, and they don't."

Litvin further said that a previous version of the same study, published in March 2006, came to the exact opposite conclusion. "I'm quoting from that report here, Litvin said, "and it says it found 'no own-race bias on the part of referees.' "

Litvin also said it was curious that The Times saw fit to publish the article, which was an exclusive, even though the Wolfers-Price report has not yet been the subject of peer review. He also said The Times was inaccurate when it said the league withheld data, and he took particular issue with a quote from Wolfers that "if you spray-painted one of your starters white, you'd win a few more games."

"We gave them underlying data on every single one of the 148,000 calls we looked at," Litvin said. "We gave them data, computations, answered questions, and at the end of the day they chose to ignore a significant amount of what we gave them. Why? I don't know."

The NBA has an observer at each game and closely monitors its officials, who are required to file reports after each game they work and are expected to be able to explain each potentially controversial call they have made.

Chris Sheridan covers the NBA for ESPN Insider.

[birdsanctuary]

Flawed study... talk to those boys over at 82 gamez dot com...

[come_on_now]

This is the stupidest story ever created. What, do these guys hate the opposite race so bad they want to express their racism by training for years and years to become an NBA ref just to call some fouls against them? Aren't there easier ways to express a racist position?

People will write anything and take a set of numbers and spin anything just to stir up some shit. I wish we the people were smart enough to quit dignifying it. Oh well, though.

Gotta go. I've got American Idol on TiVo. I think there was a racist issue there too. Fun!

[Murphy3]

I don't think Dirk is screwed up the ass because of his race... well, maybe he is.

ACTUALLY, it's because he isn't a high flying acrobat and becaue he's a 7 footer that does many of the same things that guards do... but, they continue to allow contact as if he's a 7 footer that's just posting up.

It's odd, on a drive, he doesn't get the same calls that the normal shorter player gets on the drive. I believe it's because of his size... I guess they believe that he should be able to absorb more abuse because of his size, but that's not how the game is supposed to be called.

[MFFL]

Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of business and public policy at Penn's Wharton School, and Joseph Price, a Cornell graduate student in economics, said the difference in calls "is large enough that the probability of a team winning is noticeably affected by the racial composition of the refereeing crew."

I think someone with a basis in statistics would be better than these two.

The study, conducted by reviewing box scores over a 13-season span through 2004, found that the racial makeup of a three-man officiating crew affected calls by up to 4½ percent. But the box scores only show the referees' names and contain no information about which official made a particular call -- an information gap that the league seized upon in attacking the report.

OMG - it's worse than I thought. You can't look at boxscores. A close game might have 6 or more intentional free throws.

Litvin also said it was curious that The Times saw fit to publish the article, which was an exclusive, even though the Wolfers-Price report has not yet been the subject of peer review. He also said The Times was inaccurate when it said the league withheld data, and he took particular issue with a quote from Wolfers that "if you spray-painted one of your starters white, you'd win a few more games."

"We gave them underlying data on every single one of the 148,000 calls we looked at," Litvin said. "We gave them data, computations, answered questions, and at the end of the day they chose to ignore a significant amount of what we gave them. Why? I don't know."

And the study ignores data they don't like?

Useless study

[Dtownsfinest]

I imagine in Hockey the refs are racists against the white players as well lol. Maybe i'm not understanding the study but how in earth could some guys who've never seen basketball a day in there life come up such a study? For instance, when a team is losing by 4 with let's say 10 seconds left what does the other team have to do? Foul the worst foul shooter possible. Ben Wallace and Shaq are the two worst foul shooters in the league. I can't deny whether there's a racial bias or not by refs but I just don't see how you can determine there is one by a box score.

[SeattleMavsFan]

this is a crap story. and these are supposed to be smart people that did this study?! it would be impossible to figure this out based on the percentage of players, players playing, players minutes, playing styles, time of game, etc. i really don't think the refs are racist at all. I think they are biased towards giving superstars better calls but it has nothing to do with the color of their skin...

[come_on_now]

Originally Posted by SeattleMavsFan

this is a crap story. and these are supposed to be smart people that did this study?! it would be impossible to figure this out based on the percentage of players, players playing, players minutes, playing styles, time of game, etc. i really don't think the refs are racist at all. I think they are biased towards giving superstars better calls but it has nothing to do with the color of their skin...

Yes, the officials are definatley starist, unless that star is from Germany.

[Dtownsfinest]

Dirk gets plenty of fouls. He just doesn't get them when he's not being aggressive which can be said about most players in the league.

[Lor20]

3% more fouls are gonna make you win "a couple more games"?
Aside from the fact that no exact numbers are displayed with the conditions and everything, lets just assume its 3%. an average team gets called for fouls maybe 20 times a game. thats not even a foul more. even if we up it to 5% it'd be 1 foul, but not every foul is equal with 2 free throws- i'd guess an additional foul gets you a free throw in about 80% of the case. if the foul hadnt be called you prolly had 10% of a chance to still score 2 points.
Say people make 80% of their free throws then we get a whole
2points*3/5*0.8*0.8-2*0.1=0.568 points.
thats not gonna make anyone change their lineup....

[twelli]

Even if it was true, it wouldn't matter that much.

It's human nature to treat different people differently even if you, as a referee, try to be as un-biased as possible. It's just part of life and as long as it is not too obvious it will level itself out anyway. Why only looking at black and white? There are players from Europe and South America, even China. There are those with and without tattoos there are those with education and those from the ghetto, there are model citizens and those with a criminal past. There are those from your hometown university, those who could be your best friends, those whose style of play you like, and those you always suspect to play dirty. There are even GAY players...

Just play ball.

[SeattleMavsFan]

Originally Posted by twelli

Even if it was true, it wouldn't matter that much.

It's human nature to treat different people differently even if you, as a referee, try to be as un-biased as possible. It's just part of life and as long as it is not too obvious it will level itself out anyway. Why only looking at black and white? There are players from Europe and South America, even China. There are those with and without tattoos there are those with education and those from the ghetto, there are model citizens and those with a criminal past. There are those from your hometown university, those who could be your best friends, those whose style of play you like, and those you always suspect to play dirty. There are even GAY players...

Just play ball.

very good points and a good post.

[AxdemxO]

No shit.. i cant stand how people try to tie everything with race. Look at all the black players. I mean shit like this is ridiculous