‘Lakers manipulate the refs’: Jamal Murray calls out LeBron James and co. for using unfair influence on referees

Jamal Murray says the Lakers try to manipulate referees after every call. He says he expects his team to play through it and not complain about it.

After getting off to a hot start on offense in Game 1, the Nuggets were brought grinding to a halt in the second quarter. Two really marginal offensive foul calls against Jokic put him into foul trouble with 3 fouls.

He had to be benched, despite being the team’s highest scorer through that point. Murray himself ended up in foul trouble shortly after.

Jamal Murray blames Lakers for manipulating refs

LeBron James can be seen complaining after every foul call against his team. In fact, James has questions even about out-of-bounds calls, waving his wrist.

Every time James gets the ball slapped out of his hands, you can expect to see him demanding a foul call for being hit on the hand.

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Murray specifically called out the officiating in game and blamed the Lakers of manipulating the referees all game long. He emphasised on how the Nuggets were the younger team, and did not really have a lot of rapport with the refs, something that the experienced Lakers have at their disposal.

“Just try to play through it, it’s tough. [The Lakers] want to talk about every call and have full conversations and try to manipulate what happens, but you can’t worry about it.. We know we’re the younger team” Murray said.

Talking about adjusting to the whistles, Murray pointed out how the Nuggets need to take it on the chin and keep battling out there.

“The calls aren’t always going to go your way, and you can’t complain about it, I tried to learn that as a young player, and you just got to play through it. [The referees are] not trying to make the wrong call.” Jamal Murray added.

The Nuggets were docked an ungodly 25 free throw attempts during just the 2nd quarter of Game 1. The two offensive foul calls on Jokic and a couple of ticky-tacky fouls early in the period meant that they were in the penalty for a long time.

The Lakers put them in the penalty in the third quarter as well, although there is no concrete evidence of bad officiating against them.