In my opinion, the problem is not the officials, but the way the game is played today. It has become impossible to officiate. Like anything in life, if you let someone get away with breaking the rules, they will continue to push the envelope to see how many more rules they can get away with breaking. That is what has happened with the game of basketball today. The players have gotten away with breaking so many rules for so long that it is impossible for three officials to maintain any semblance of control on the court. That is why it is easy to find so many plays where calls are missed. If the referees called every travel and every foul, the first half would take 4 hours to play...and would not get finished because neither team would have five players left who had not fouled out. I would say that players travel on at least 80% of possessions....and on 100% of drives to the basket. The referees only occasionally call a travel...which pisses off fans wen it is called on their team. The players know that travelling is going to be called so seldom during the flow of the game that they have no respect at all for the rule. Players are constantly shuffling their feet before and after dribbling and take 2 or even 3 extra steps on drives to the basket. If the referees called all of that, the game would be stopped all the time.
I would also say that....according to the rules....each player probably commits an average of 25 to 30 fouls in a game....maybe more. The game of basketball was designed for only incidental contact, but it has become so physical that it more resembles a wrestling match at many times. As the players have gotten bigger, stronger & faster...and are allowed to get away with almost unlimited illegal contact, the job of 3 referees has become impossible. Illegal contact fouls are being commited constantly all over the court. Defensive players inside are illegally pushing offensive players away from the basket and wrapping their arms around them to prevent them from getting the ball. At the same time, when that offensive player gets the ball, he is illegally backing into the defensive player while dribbling to try to push him closer to the basket. And offensive players' movement is being illegally impeded by defensive players' arms all over the court.
With players committing 30 fouls per game (not called fouls, of course, but true fouls according to the rules), it's like the same 3 referees are trying to officiate a game with 60 players, rather than 10 players....not to mention the non-stop travelling and carrying the ball.
This is the game today. Maybe throwing the rulebook out the window and just letting players do whatever the hell they want to do makes it more entertaining. That seems to be what many fans want to see. Personally, I think a game that has become out of control and impossible to officiate because the rules of the game are no longer relevant sucks. However, if you like a game with no rules and ridiculous amounts of illegal contact where physicality is all-important and skill & finesse can be overpowered by brute strength because the rules of the game are ignorred, that is your right. Just don't complain when that Frankenstein that you have created can no longer be controlled....because it is impossible for the referees to call even a tiny fraction of the illegal activity that is going on during a game today.