A month ago, the Dallas Mavericks narrowly beat the Toronto Raptors in a 111-110 thriller, but the talk after the game was mostly about referee Tony Brothers after Spencer Dinwiddie addressed the media and said Brothers called him a “b*tch ass motherf*cker” while talking to Reggie Bullock about a technical foul Brothers had hit Dinwiddie with.
While that led to jokes and some discourse about ref-player relations, we didn’t hear much more about it in an official capacity from the league and Brothers has continued to officiate games. On Tuesday, Marc Stein brought word of how the league handled the situation, noting that Brothers was taken off his next assignment but wasn’t given an official suspension without pay.
Veteran referee Tony Brothers was forced to miss one game assignment after Dallas’ Spencer Dinwiddie said Brothers referred to him as a “bitch-ass motherf—–r” Nov. 4, sources say.
It’s believed no discipline was formally announced because it was not a suspension without pay. https://t.co/WtLXE8r55h
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) November 29, 2022
That seems like he was just given a night off, which isn’t exactly punishment, and the league just let the news cycle move forward with Brothers staying out of the spotlight for long enough for this situation to blow over. It’s an odd situation because we’re fairly used to seeing players call refs names, and that can get them a fine from the league, so there will certainly be some wonder if the NBA let Brothers off too easily by simply removing one of his assignments and not hitting him with a sturdier penalty, even if not a suspension.