Trouble is in "every" passage of play, there are probably 5 or so frees ( over the shoulder and arm chops are classic examples) , but they let 4 go, and then pick the fifth . And of course the TV can back up their decision. Its the other 4 that are let go that are the problem. The whole thing is a joke.
I have been making this point for years. To my mind, it is what leads to the umpires becoming too big a part of the game.
Carry the logic through. If the umpires pluck 20 free kicks out of 100, then they have let 80% of the frees go. Could have called them, should have called them, might have called them but didn't. They are making all sorts of judgments that have no relationship to the play at all. They are just "plucking out" the occasional free.
The thinking goes like this. Let that one go because it is too early in the passage to pay a free, let the next one go because I would be late with the call, let the next one go because my view is slightly obscured by players running past me, let the next one go because it is not a rule we are hot on at the moment, better pluck one soon this is getting ridiculous and it heading for a stoppage. There it is, free kick! Its a bit soft but I cant afford to let it go any longer.
This is all well and good, nobody wants to see every contest decided by a free kick. The problem is when they pluck out 20 frees and give 15 to one team. Or when they pluck out 10 in a quarter and give 9 of them to one team. Goals tend to flow one way when these things happen.
Basketball is a game which is over-adjudicated. Every foul, regardless of how soft, is paid. Even if the contact was an imaginary finger tip on the hand during a shot. Ruins the game. Footy is under-adjudicated, too much gets past the umpires, not because they don't see it but because they choose to let the game flow. When this happens, at least keep the calls evenly distributed to both teams. At least that way the umpiring is not a factor in the game.
Worst example last week. I think it was second quarter, center bounce after a goal, a free kick is paid for a hold to a Lions player and they get a goal from it. Next bounce, Martin is held before he grabs the ball, the call is play on and Lions kick a goal.
Second worst example. One umpire gives a free against Castagna for a throw ( it clearly wasn't), another umpire reverses it because it was a dangerous tackle. The third umpire probably thought it was play on.
How is anyone supposed to make sense of this stuff?