There are too many instances of egregiously bad calls in the playoffs for this to go away: Bennett Salvatore non-call on Walton, Hue Hollins call on Scottie Pippen, Lakers/Kings 6th game, etc....

However, talk is cheap.. Here are some suggestions for Dave to get himself out of this jam.

a) When Donaghy talks, shut the frak up. When you protest too much, and start disparaging people, people start to think you might actually be guilty.

b) Investigate badly called games/specific bad calls immediately.  Hire an ex-gambler/bookie to be your special investigator of games. Nothing better in this sitch than a true pro.

c) Don't blame the refs for this. If you want to fix the problem, you'll need their co-operation.

d) separate the regular season from the playoffs. when playoff time comes around, allow the refs to select the best among themselves. Allow teams to "veto" troublesome refs (you could make it that a ref needs 3 vetos from the playoff teams to actually be disqualified from running games)

e) add a 4th TV ref for playoff games, with the right to call for a review (only allow on-court refs to make actual binding calls).

f) implement Mark Cuban's quality assurance suggestions

g) be more open about any investigations. My feeling is that any investigations done by central office have more than a whiff of cover-up about them.