The Sacramento Kings fell in a highly competitive against the Milwaukee Bucks on Sunday night thanks to a buzzer-beater three-pointer from Bucks star Damian Lillard. Instead of speaking about the final play after the game, Kings head coach Mike Brown used his post-game press conference to rant about the officiating in the game, aided by a laptop where he outright showed mistakes from the officials.
It should come as no surprise to hear that Brown ranted about the officiating in this game.
In the fourth quarter, he completely lost his cool after a no-call from the refs on a Kings shot, leading to him needing to be held back by numerous Kings players.
Sacramento kings coach Mike Brown doing his BEST Isaiah Stewart impression: pic.twitter.com/mPVrKqd87x
— 🤍’ (@HeavenlyBuckets) January 15, 2024
In his postgame press conference, Brown had no interest in talking about anything except how the game was officiated. He used a laptop given to him by a Kings staff member to break down several fouls that the Bucks received, as well as a number of no-calls against the Kings.
“Let me see that man,” said Brown pointing to the laptop loaded up with game film. “I just want to show you guys why I got kicked out of the game. Right here, this is in the third quarter. You can go back and watch. (De’Aaron) Fox barely puts his hand on Dame’s hip. Incidental contact, and they give him three free throws. At half, we were down 19 to 5 in the free throws. I know that happens sometimes. But that is very frustrating.”
Brown then went on to call out the officials for not calling this game how they have been all season, particularly on a play near the end of the second quarter where no call was made on a shot attempt from Malik Monk.
“That’s a five-point swing. They take away the two free throws and Milwaukee goes down and hits a three. And to end the half at 19-5, that is tough to deal with. Especially when you are getting told different interpretations of a rule.”
He then went on to break down another play with help from the laptop where it appeared that De’Aaron Fox was fouled without any call from the refs.
“Watch this, right. Fox comes off a pick-and-roll. The kid, Cam Payne hooks his arm. No incidental contact. He hooks his arm and almost falls and there is no foul. To me, as a coach, I am okay with mistakes from a referee. They are human. But you hope as a coach there is some sort of consistency and there is some sort of communication. Tonight, the refs communicated with me all night. But in terms of consistency, you see it right here.”
The entire rant, which was shared by Anthony Slater of The Athletic on Twitter/X, lasted for over five minutes, with the laptop featuring heavily to help those tuning into his rant understand his frustration.
Mike Brown lights into the refereeing tonight in the Kings loss in Milwaukee. Brings out a laptop in his press conference to show film of the non-foul and foul that has him ticked off. Here is the five minute soundbite. pic.twitter.com/Q8InpkFh8B
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) January 15, 2024
As you can see, Brown isn’t complaining about one call in general here. He is more complaining about the culmination of calls that went against the Kings, which he admitted made him reach his “boiling point.”
“It for sure was tonight,” said Brown on reaching his boiling point. It was tonight. 19 to 5 from the free throw line? In my opinion, the consistency wasn’t here. Again, they are human. They’re good people. They are gonna make mistakes. But we can’t interpret a rule two different ways. As you can tell, I’m beside myself.”
Brown will almost certainly receive some sort of fine from the NBA for blatantly calling out the officiating publicly like this. But he certainly did so in style with the laptop breaking down every mistake he saw on Sunday night from the refs.
