Report: NBA Adjusts Officiating Policy

On Thursday, a memo from the NBA to all 30 teams was leaked and subsequently reported on by Chris Sheridan of ESPN and tweeted about by Chris Mannix of SI. The purpose of the memo was to reiterate a "no-tipping" policy regarding officials and arena or locker room personnel.

Long story short, backstage personnel have long done favors and personal errands for officials before and after games, and in the latest CBA negotiations, a policy was put in place to end it. The memo clearly states that the league does not feel the pre-existing actions have tampered with games, but a conclusion was reached to eliminate it regardless.

"This is an important change to the CBA," the memo states, as reported by ESPN. "While we do not believe that the pre-existing practice of tipping locker room attendants has affected the integrity of the officiating in any way, it could be perceived in a negative light, and it is therefore best to eliminate this practice."

Any other week, this would appear as an act of due diligence and a progressive move by the league to remove negative perceptions about the officials and get in front of any concerns. Unfortunately, this week it looks a little odd.

Earlier this week, Tim Donaghy's expose book on the alleged shady life and times of NBA officials was leaked to Deadspin. The book was pulled from planned publication by Random House following pressure from the league, although Donaghy is trying to find another publisher.

Many have dismissed the excerpts as the inflammatory, exaggerated ramblings of a dirty official trying to generate enough income to scrape a life back together after his stint in prison. The league has done very little to even acknowledge the book, and it is well on its way to fading into obscurity in the annals of league conspiracy theories.

One of the traditions mentioned in the excerpts was that the refs would play a game where the first official to give a technical to one of the league's "bad boys" wouldn't have to tip the ball boys that night. Since the refs use the ball boys as their personal runners prior to games -- fetching snacks and drinks, running errands -- the refs would usually tip the ball boys. That makes sense. Making bets during games with that tip being the payoff does not make sense. Anything that creates what legal code usually refers to as "consideration" in how they officiate would cross that line into where the simple bets influence the games.

The memo clearly states that this decision was reached during the CBA negotiations, which was before the book excerpts were leaked to Deadspin. So this isn't a direct response to those allegations, as we previously reported. However, in the harsh light of PR, this doesn't come across great.

The fact that this policy touches an issue directly that Donaghy mentions gives the impression that the two are directly related, even though the timeline shows that the policy was established before the book publicly leaked. Unfortunately, the appearance is that the league is adjusting a policy in light of the attempted rabble-rousing by their disgraced former employee. By all accounts this was less of a poorly executed cover-up and simply a case of poor timing. And that's if you believe Donaghy's claims at all.

You're going to have a hard time finding NBA league insiders who think that Donaghy's claims have any real sense of truth to them. They may be able to paint a certain image using strategically manipulated context, but they don't actually reveal any smoking guns. But if the league is planning on sending out any more memos on officiating behavior, they might want to wait a while until Donaghy has slipped back into the darkness of irrelevance, which should be in about, oh, 10 minutes or so.

Note: this post was edited to reflect the inclusion of the tipping policy in the referees' CBA with the league.