A Basketball Curmudgeon Speaks

The NCAA basketball tournament is one of the highlights of the year in sports.  No other event has so many win-or-go-home games:  63 to be exact, once the play-in games have concluded and the 64-team tournament begins.

As much as I enjoy the tournament, I’m not as keen on basketball as I used to be.  The game has changed so much since I learned to watch and play it that I often feel like I’m watching a different game from the one I grew up with.  Everyone over 40 knows what I am talking about.

What happened to traveling?  Well, unfortunately, the rule changed.  Now, a player gets two steps after he stops dribbling; it used to be one and a half.  That’s a huge difference.  Of course, many plays involve more than two steps.  The rule that prohibits traveling is more in the nature of a suggestion these days than mandatory.

Today’s players appear to run with the ball.  And sometimes they do, watch here for ten of the worst walking “violations” that weren’t called.  The video quality isn’t great, but the traveling is.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSZGCfKvlTI#t=196.3300  For one truly egregious offense, watch Kirk Hinrich practically waltz with the ball in his hands.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qExFbDuOdyE  But probably the worst example of traveling that wasn’t called was perpetrated by superstar Dwyane Wade.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNdDsriVwmU This one was so bad that even his teammate (at the time) LeBron James made fun of him.

Carrying the basketball used to be an offense as well.  We were taught to dribble with our hands on top of the ball.  That is so passe that on some possessions there isn’t a single dribble that would have passed muster in the 70s.  If I had been able to travel and carry like today’s players, well – I still wouldn’t have been any good, but I would have been called for fewer violations.

At times I watch a game and think these guys would never have scored in the old days because the refs would have blown the whistle on every possession.  That wouldn’t be much fun.  I’m not sure when and where the tipping point occurred.  I’m not even sure whether it started in the NBA and trickled down or started with younger players getting away with what had hitherto been violations and migrated upstream.

Some of the changes in basketball are for the better.  I’m happy the players no longer wear short shorts.  The following link shows highlights from the 1982 championship series between Larry Bird’s Celtics and Magic Johnson’s Lakers.  These guys were practically wearing underwear.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_WU1WNl-jI   I believe the long shorts trend started with Michigan’s Fab Five.  Here’s a picture of them just nine years later.  https://www.google.com/search?q=fab+five&rlz=1C1EODB_enUS512US556&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwicu9a0rYPTAhVEWSYKHU7JD8UQ_AUICCgB&biw=1024&bih=589#imgrc=—v0ORiWALpXM:  Sadly the movement to covering the legs progressed to the wearing of tights.  So a good trend went too far.

An “innovation” I could live without is the obligatory hand slap after every single first foul shot.  Hit or miss, the shooter’s teammates are compelled to approach him and slap hands.  I can’t remember the last time a guy shot a foul shot and didn’t get the hand slap.  What a collective waste of time for players and viewers alike.

Let’s ride with the negativity.  Most of the announcers drive me crazy (it’s not a long trip).  I realize that talking for two hours straight about anything is a difficult job.  And I admit that I would be horrible:  tongue-tied, muttering all kinds of ridiculous things.  Still, I feel compelled to point out a few foibles among the talking heads.

Gross generalization number one – former players are brutal in the booth.  They tend to be more akin to cheerleaders than thoughtful analysts.  They provide insight into how players think, sort of, but without an assessment of the big picture.  Among their worst “crimes” is speaking in cliches, one after another after the other.

Gross generalization number two – the talking heads ask too many questions.  What is the point of a commentator saying “how big is that” after a shot is made?  Or how good a play was that?  Why don’t you tell me.  You are the expert, analyze the player, describe the play, do something other than ask me rhetorical questions.

Gross generalization number three – announcers turn too many plays into melodrama or a theme.  During the tournament, an announcer, upon watching a player drive and get fouled, said:  he knows how to create contact and get fouled.  Sure – maybe.  And maybe he just got fouled.  That something happened doesn’t mean it was intentional or indicative of some singular ability to make that thing (getting fouled) happen.  And not every shot made late in a game is the result of guts or experience or anything really.  These guys are good.  They take a lot of shots, some go in and some don’t.  Stop turning every play on the court into a test of character.  Usually the play depends on talent, often on luck, and, every once in a while, solely on character.

Gross generalization number four – the talking heads love to praise coaches.  After a player makes a quick move into traffic, spots a cutting teammate, threads a pass through defenders, and the teammate grabs the pass with one hand and makes a contested shot, the announcer is more likely to praise the coach than either player.  Especially if the play occurred after a time out.  Anything good that happens after a time out is 100% attributed to the coach.

Gross generalization number five – the talking heads all received the same memos.  For instance, they love talking about “length.”  The players are big.  They are tall.  And starting a few years ago, they are long.  It doesn’t even make sense.  Lions are long, particularly if you add in the tail.  Players are perpendicular to the ground and athletic, some are wide; none are long.

I realize that they mean “long” in a different sense than it is typically used.  The average arm span for a person approximates that person’s height.  The announcers feel obliged to comment on any player whose arm span is greater than his height, calling that player “long.”  According to Dr. Katrina Parker, an average adult male’s arm span is approximately 5cm greater than his height.      https://www.utmb.edu/pedi_ed/core/endocrine/page_09.htm  So the excessive chatter about height is unnecessary, not helpful, and downright wrong in the sense that the players aren’t any “longer” than we might expect.

Announcers and analysts are also required, as a reasonably close game winds down, to remind us that two minutes (or 90 seconds or 45 seconds or some similar not very long period of time) is an “eternity.”  They used different words, like “boatloads of time” or “forever” or some such.

I’m going to mention a couple of comments I found especially enjoyable.  I’m aware that this isn’t fair — because misspeaking is inevitable given how much chatter occurs – so I won’t mention names.

While suggesting that the refs were calling more fouls that they might have called in a regular season game, the commentator noted that players would have to adjust “regardless of how officials let them play in their respectable conferences.”  I’m sure that both conferences represented are respectable.  I’m not sure whether the commentator was (unsuccessfully) trying out a new word or simply misspoke.

“When you’re a shooter and when you get a layup on your first shot, threes are going to be easy.”  Huh?  As far as I know, there is no statistical support for this proposition.  If there were any basis for this statement, teams would try much harder to make sure their three-point shooters take more layups early in the game.  Furthermore, I’m pretty sure that a three-point shot is never “easy.”

“I love to see guys who aren’t good free throw shooters shoot through their percentages.”  Huh?  He almost certainly meant better than their percentages.  But he was basing that comment on two foul shots, which proves nothing.  Percentages indicate how many shots a player would make out of one hundred shots (per cent).  That a player who shoots as poorly as 50% makes two shots in a row ought not surprise a thoughtful person any more than that a tossed penny would be heads two times in a row.

“Oh, what a put back.  Almost.”  A player rebounded a shot and shot another.  He missed.  What drama.  Wasn’t there time for the announcer to wait an extra nano-second to see whether the shot would go through the basket, not just in its vicinity?  Rats, now I’m asking rhetorical questions.

I will be watching the games tonight.  The traveling and the carrying and the excessive praise of the coaches will annoy me, even as the athleticism, effort, and talent of the players beguiles me.  I hope the games are close, but I’ll be watching even if they aren’t.