Kyrie Irving is a preternaturally gifted dribbler. There are few basketball players in the world with his ball-handling ability. Irving is such a good ball-handler that when he botched a routine crossover and lost the ball into his own backcourt in Game 4 of the NBA Finals, the game’s refereeing crew didn’t call him for a violation.
Kyrie Irving is such a good ball-handler that referees missed a backcourt violation call
That’s an understandable error on the referees’ part.
I can understand the impulse here on the officials’ part. Klay Thompson is a great perimeter defender, exactly the sort of guy who’d be able to poke a ball loose from an elite guard like Irving. And Irving’s so good that there should be no way he could lose a crossover like you did in your post-work pickup game at the community center that one day. The refs were so incredulous that they just assumed Thompson knocked the ball away, thus negating a backcourt violation. As it turns out, he definitely did not.
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