As his first order of business, should Adam Silver eliminate the Hack-A-(Insert Poor FT Shooter's Name)?

[Scraptor]

I fail to see how intentionally fouling bad free throw shooters is abuse of the rules.

If a guy is going in for a layup or a dunk, a hard foul that prevents the easy bucket is also to the advantage of the fouling team.

Is that abusing the rules? If so, and if you outlaw all intentional fouling, you create a whole new grey area between intentional and non-intentional fouls.

I love the hack-a-shaq strategy and I wish it was even more punitive! Like if you get intentionally fouled, the first time you miss both free throws your team loses an extra point. The second time you miss both, you lose two points. The third time, you lose 20 points and your entire team gets sent to the d-league and you have to ride around in an RV with Royce White while the the music of Lady Gaga plays on endless loop. If you ever make it back to the NBA and it happens again you are sentenced to spending the rest of your life watching Leo Rautins break down Andrea Bargnani highlights (That's a seven footer out there!") while eating frozen Pizza Pizza in an igloo in the Yukon.

That'll teach you to make your damn free throws.

[Letter N]

Didn't read all replies but the simplest way to change this is the to apply the 2-minute rule (fouling player without the ball will result in any player on the floor taking free-throws, not necessarily the player that was fouled) and extend it out to apply to the entire game.

You can still Hack-a-*insert name* but only if they have the ball in their hand, otherwise you will put a 90% shooter on the line.

This would backfire for things like bigmen battling down low and fouling each other off the ball, but that wouldn't come into play that much because your team would have to be in the penalty at the time for it to put another shooter on the line.

[ezz_bee]

For me the hack-a-player, and the intentional foul to stop the clock, and calling a timeout immediately after another team has called a time out are all very annoying. And while they do not violate the rules of the game, to me they make the game less enjoyable, and are NOT in line with what's great about the NBA (fast-paced, athletic showcase). Even grind-it-out half court teams are a joy to watch when they are executing properly.

The fact that Pop hates it, but employs it, probably means it is NOT the most ideal outcome. Also, I agree with whitemencan'tjump that every rule change has side-effects, and that the NBA's rules are complex. That said, just because there are side-effects doesn't mean you can't or shouldn't make any changes. Adding the 3-pt line has had drastic implications on the game (just as moving it back a few feet has also changed strategy). Imagine we still had to watch basketball games without a shot clock?

I for one support the NBA making rule changes that limit the amount of time the game is stopped. I would support a rule change like giving the team the option of just taking the ball out of bounds as opposed to shooting free throws. Any of the statistical evidence I've seen has demonstrated that you are better off just trying to go for a steal then fouling (although that doesn't stop teams from doing it), at the end of games when you are behind. Both are virtually impossible to use to win, although a steal is slightly more likely (as the Brooklyn came can attest). By letting teams choose to take the ball out of bounds, you reduce the odds that the hack-a-player or the foul to stop the clock makes sense. (Although, maybe it is easier to generate a steal off an in-bounds play than during real time? Although that should only incentivize the team to shoot free throws).

While I don't think the hack-a-player strategy should be addressed because it's against the logic of gaining an advantage from rule breaking (I think you take advantage of any rule you can), I do think it's worth addressing because it slows the game down, and makes for a BAD PRODUCT for the fans, that isn't really part of what the NBA is about. Sure it's an interesting strategy, because you are exploiting the rules to take advantage of a weakness in an opposing player, but it just results in a super boring game to watch. Once or twice in 82 games is fine but when you are watching it once every 3-5 games it makes you want to blind yourself.

To continue with my analogy with the 24 second shot clock. Before it was instituted teams would just not shoot. They would use the opposing team's inability to generate a steal to run the clock down. Sure it wasn't against the rules, AND it was exploiting the weakness of the other team, and was a TOTALLY legit strategy, but it made for SLOW, BORING basketball.

Although they are not exactly the same they do seem like parallels to me.

[JimiCliff]

And this is a whole new problem. Rivers can choose inbounds for his poor shooters and shots for his good shooters. Welcome to an all new abuse of rules

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

There's no abuse possible here. 5 fouls till the bonus still applies. Any foul after this gets free throws for the player fouled, or you inbound the ball. The only change to the existing rule is that you can choose to inbound the ball.

[white men can't jump]

There's no abuse possible here. 5 fouls till the bonus still applies. Any foul after this gets free throws for the player fouled, or you inbound the ball. The only change to the existing rule is that you can choose to inbound the ball.

Yes, and that destroys the integrity of the game. Instead of a poor shooter facing the same rule as everyone else, he is allowed to always escape that responsibility and the coach is allowed to take advantage of that. That is an inherently flawed rule. Every time a good shooter is fouled his coach chooses shots, and any time a bad one is, he avoids that by inbounding the ball. That is ridiculous. It's so much ridiculousness. There should never be a rule like that that allows certain players to escape a responsibility just because they are lacking in a certain area of skill. Just...so wrong.

I don't understand how you think a coach choosing to foul is abusive, but creating a rule where a coach can choose that their bad shooter almost never has to shoot free throws is not abusive.

[JimiCliff]

Yes, and that destroys the integrity of the game. Instead of a poor shooter facing the same rule as everyone else, he is allowed to always escape that responsibility and the coach is allowed to take advantage of that. That is an inherently flawed rule. Every time a good shooter is fouled his coach chooses shots, and any time a bad one is, he avoids that by inbounding the ball. That is ridiculous. It's so much ridiculousness. There should never be a rule like that that allows certain players to escape a responsibility just because they are lacking in a certain area of skill. Just...so wrong.

I don't understand how you think a coach choosing to foul is abusive, but creating a rule where a coach can choose that their bad shooter almost never has to shoot free throws is not abusive.

Heheh, I find this all pretty hilarious, because we tend to agree on most things, yet on this we're so completely opposed, with neither, it seems, willing to budge.

Again, for me, it's simply the order of events.

1. Intentional foul.

Followed by:

2. Free-throws.

When the existing rules were written, no one ever dreamed that teams would foul on purpose. The act of intentionally fouling is hijacking the rules in a way that was not supposed to happen, and hasn't yet been corrected. Any abuse to the integrity of the game that follows is moot, because it stems from this initial act which shouldn't be allowed in the first place.

[white men can't jump]

Heheh, I find this all pretty hilarious, because we tend to agree on most things, yet on this we're so completely opposed, with neither, it seems, willing to budge.

Again, for me, it's simply the order of events.

1. Intentional foul.

Followed by:

2. Free-throws.

When the existing rules were written, no one ever dreamed that teams would foul on purpose. The act of intentionally fouling is hijacking the rules in a way that was not supposed to happen, and hasn't yet been corrected. Any abuse to the integrity of the game that follows is moot, because it stems from this initial act which shouldn't be allowed in the first place.

The simplest solution, is as I said in a post far back, to simply increase the general penalty for fouls that are intentional AND off the ball. You can never have variability in the penalty for a call (such as the inbounds vs. FTs choice). And even increasing the penalty will not totally eliminate the hacking strategies, nor make things clearer. You risk adding a new area where poor officiating impacts the game...unless you have reviews of every such foul...in which case the logic behind your wanting to change the rule (to speed up the game and make it more fluid) gets lost a bit.

There is no suggestion I've heard that totally eliminates the "hacking" strategy that isn't also very flawed.

[JimiCliff]

The simplest solution, is as I said in a post far back, to simply increase the general penalty for fouls that are intentional AND off the ball. You can never have variability in the penalty for a call (such as the inbounds vs. FTs choice). And even increasing the penalty will not totally eliminate the hacking strategies, nor make things clearer. You risk adding a new area where poor officiating impacts the game...unless you have reviews of every such foul...in which case the logic behind your wanting to change the rule (to speed up the game and make it more fluid) gets lost a bit.

There is no suggestion I've heard that totally eliminates the "hacking" strategy that isn't also very flawed.

What would your increase be?

[white men can't jump]

What would your increase be?

Make it a tech or flagrant 1 type penalty (but still a normal foul for the player's foul total). I'm fine with 1 shot and the ball....and you can make it 2 shots with the ball if the team is in the penalty. And I had the caveat that in the last 2 minutes (of quarters? halves? but definitely at least of the game...) it is allowed, because fouling in those instances is also often to stop the clock. Thus it still alows the "hacking" strategy, but for limited time and will only be useful in close games in terms of putting a poor shooter on the line.

This would limit the way the coach can use the hack strategy, as he'd have to focus on actually targeting the guy when he has the ball. But there is risk of over-calling it on things like loose ball fouls, screen-related fouls, etc...anything where it is not an intentional "hack", but where because it's off the ball, we could see bad calls where a ref calls it intentional because of the shitty FT shooter involved.

There's no perfect rule change for this problem IMO.

[planetmars]

I don't really care if they change this rule.. it's not like the Raptors have any poor free throw shooters so I don't see how it gives them the advantage. If it's for the fans at home to help speed up the game.. well you get so used to it anyways with those fouls to stop the clock where the team hopes they have a chance to win the game. At that point you use picture in picture or you change channels and flip back every 1-2 minutes.

If this is Silver's first order of business I'd be pissed.. if he's going to make a rule change I better hope he considers using video review especially for controversial calls.. as that is what really pisses me off the most. Lowry's offensive foul should *never* have been called.

[Shrub]

For me the hack-a-player, and the intentional foul to stop the clock, and calling a timeout immediately after another team has called a time out are all very annoying. And while they do not violate the rules of the game, to me they make the game less enjoyable, and are NOT in line with what's great about the NBA (fast-paced, athletic showcase). Even grind-it-out half court teams are a joy to watch when they are executing properly.

Adding the 3-pt line has had drastic implications on the game (just as moving it back a few feet has also changed strategy). Imagine we still had to watch basketball games without a shot clock?

I for one support the NBA making rule changes that limit the amount of time the game is stopped.

While I don't think the hack-a-player strategy should be addressed because it's against the logic of gaining an advantage from rule breaking (I think you take advantage of any rule you can), I do think it's worth addressing because it slows the game down, and makes for a BAD PRODUCT for the fans, that isn't really part of what the NBA is about.

You said just about everything I couldn't take the time to say.

I'm really amazed how many of you are defending what is easily the worst part of the game of basketball.
Does anyone enjoy watching a player shoot free-throws?
Shit, when I watch league pass I just fast forward them.
I think that anything that can be done to limit the # of free throws in a basketball game should, and will be done.

They have their place, but right now they are far too prevalent.
The "hack-a-shaq" strategy is just one part of a bigger problem.

The NBA will be doing something to address it, because they want a more exciting game, and they should, and we will all be happier and basketball will be more popular for it.

[white men can't jump]

You said just about everything I couldn't take the time to say.

I'm really amazed how many of you are defending what is easily the worst part of the game of basketball.
Does anyone enjoy watching a player shoot free-throws?
Shit, when I watch league pass I just fast forward them.
I think that anything that can be done to limit the # of free throws in a basketball game should, and will be done.

They have their place, but right now they are far too prevalent.
The "hack-a-shaq" strategy is just one part of a bigger problem.

The NBA will be doing something to address it, because they want a more exciting game, and they should, and we will all be happier and basketball will be more popular for it.

It's not about liking the strategy....It's about not wanting a half-thought out change to just cause a whole new bunch of problems. Rule changes have to be very well considered. I'm opposed to any change such as the FTs vs. inbounds choice. Any change has to be a blanket change applicable to all players, and where coaches are not given new choices to make to still exploit anything in the rules.

The NBA of course wants as exciting a product out there, but again, they can't make reckless changes. That's one reason I really like their first attempts at dealing with flopping. It hasn't been totally eliminated, but it's quite a bit rarer than it was even 3-4 years ago with the introduction of warnings and fines. Now obviously this doesn't work for the hack-a-whoever strategy....

But yeah, it has to be something that basically discourages the intentional fouling, while not rewarding a player/team because of a lack of fundamental ability.

[white men can't jump]

I voted yes to no changes because I'm not convinced any proposals, including my own, are necessarily better than current state of things.

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

[Shrub]

It's not about liking the strategy....It's about not wanting a half-thought out change to just cause a whole new bunch of problems.

Fair enough, I'm not suggesting it's an easy fix.
But I am suggesting it is a wise and eventual one.

[OldSkoolCool]

If this is Silver's first order of business I'd be pissed.. if he's going to make a rule change I better hope he considers using video review especially for controversial calls.. as that is what really pisses me off the most. Lowry's offensive foul should *never* have been called.

Same. Leave the rules alone, the only thing that hack-a-player does is show how a multi million dollar athlete can't make a free throw and his punishment should be the embarrassment of being teams calling him out as being a weak link.

There are 4 things that I would like to see, and think the league could benefit from the most:
1) Challenge rule for controversial calls, with the loss of a time out if the challenge is wrong. Like football.
2) Flopping foul. The flopper gets charged a regular foul, the other team is given 2 free throws and possession back. Like the clear path foul.
3) 1-and-1 bonus free throw shooting (like college). This could make some interesting comebacks late game with bad free throw shooters. IMO bad FT shooters should be penalized at this level, not coddled.
4) Less time outs late game. Currently each team can have 3 time outs stockpiled for the end of game situation. I think it should be made that in the last 3 minutes of the game, each team can only have 1 full time out. This would massively speed up the late game, as well as open up comebacks and make for some really clutch players as the players will have to be better prepped for these end of game situations.**


**Nearly all non-NBA fans I have talked too all hate that the last couple of minutes of the game take soooo long to play and really is boring to watch all those commercials and I tend to agree. I want to watch the superstars in the league take over Reggie Miller style late game, but with all these time outs it is improbable, and if it does happed, it's just not as fun to watch