League won't Change "Hack A Shaq" rule

[da_suns_fan]

Sucks for us

As Stern promised earlier this month, changes were considered by the committee to the league's rules regarding intentional fouling away from the ball, which is more commonly known as the Hack-A-Shaq strategy.

Yet it appears that Hack-A-Shaq will be back next season, too.

Stern himself has said he doesn't like "the idea that [players can say], 'Hey, look at me, I'm going to hit this guy as soon as the ball goes into play, even though he's standing under the other basket.' "

San Antonio made extensive use of the Hack-A-Shaq tactic in its first-round series with Phoenix after Spurs coach Gregg Popovich had shunned the strategy for years. The Suns later conceded that the strategy not only took advantage of Shaquille O'Neal's poor foul shooting -- he missed half of his 64 free-throw attempts in the series -- but also frequently interrupted their offensive flow.

Such intentional fouling is legal until the final two minutes of regulation or any overtime, when intentional fouls result in one free throw and the team whose player was fouled retaining possession.

"We had a pretty spirited discussion on the subject and we talked prospectively about how we might change it," Jackson said, declining to elaborate on the potential alterations.

"But in the end, there wasn't enough support to change it. ... There was a feeling that by changing the rule you would be essentially rewarding a player for a lack of skill by allowing him to stay in the game."

 

[dreamcastrocks]

very disappointed.

 

[Mulli]

I have to go with the NBA on this one. Chance you take for having a guy who can't shoot FT's.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

I have to go with the NBA on this one. Chance you take for having a guy who can't shoot FT's.

Rule should be the same throughout the entire game. Why make it not ok to intentionally foul in the last 2 minutes of a half?

 

[BigJit]

Best call the league could have made. Just leave it alone. Shaq will be gone in a couple of years anyway.

Moving on.

 

[JS22]

Good. You don't change a rule simply because one player can't hit a damn free throw.

Honestly, what the Suns should have done - and possibly do in the future, is foul the other team's worst FT shooter repeatedly. Drag the game on for an extra 30 min or so. THEN the league will have a legit reason to tweak the rule.

 

[CardNots]

Good. You don't change a rule simply because one player can't hit a damn free throw.

Honestly, what the Suns should have done - and possibly do in the future, is foul the other team's worst FT shooter repeatedly. Drag the game on for an extra 30 min or so. THEN the league will have a legit reason to tweak the rule.

Maybe the only way we would use our bench...

 

[Andrew]

Boooooooo.

 

[Ouchie-Z-Clown]

why wouldn't any team locate any player who shoots ft's at a clip of below 60% and just foul every single play? i mean, it'd take a toll on fouls, but that's why you should now have a bench. it means your players can be primarily offensively oriented b/c they no longer have to play defense. that's what i'd do when i went to my second string. just make 'em offensively skilled and have 'em locate the worst FT shooter and hack him every time. sure, the game will be extended an hour as we watch a FT shooting exhibition, but we'll win more often than lose with that philosophy.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

Good. You don't change a rule simply because one player can't hit a damn free throw.

You don't change the rule because one person likes to back down his opponent for 18 seconds of the 24 second shot clock. Oh wait, yeah they did. (Barkley)

You don't change the rule because one person likes to stay camped in the lane (Wilt) or institute offensive goaltending (Wilt) or leaping for the foul line to shoot a free throw (Wilt)... but wait, they did.

The league changes rules because of one player all the time. The logic is flawed.

 

[Maligzar]

Good. You don't change a rule simply because one player can't hit a damn free throw.

Honestly, what the Suns should have done - and possibly do in the future, is foul the other team's worst FT shooter repeatedly. Drag the game on for an extra 30 min or so. THEN the league will have a legit reason to tweak the rule.

But you do change the rule when one player can jump from the free throw line and dunk it? That's what the league did with Wilt Chamberlin.

Anyways I don't think that's the point that most fans that are against the "hack a shaq" have. I hate it not because it "hurts" us, but because it slows the game down into an incredibly boring craptastic product that I don't want to watch.

 

[Mulli]

You don't change the rule because one person likes to back down his opponent for 18 seconds of the 24 second shot clock. Oh wait, yeah they did. (Barkley)

You don't change the rule because one person likes to stay camped in the lane (Wilt) or institute offensive goaltending (Wilt) or leaping for the foul line to shoot a free throw (Wilt)... but wait, they did.

The league changes rules because of one player all the time. The logic is flawed.

You seem to really care a lot about this. You should write a sharp letter.

 

[Maligzar]

haha dream you beat me too it, and I forgot about the Barkley rule!

 

[dreamcastrocks]

But you do change the rule when one player can jump from the free throw line and dunk it? That's what the league did with Wilt Chamberlin.

Anyways I don't think that's the point that most fans that are against the "hack a shaq" have. I hate it not because it "hurts" us, but because it slows the game down into an incredibly boring craptastic product that I don't want to watch.

Great minds...

I have a problem that the rule is enforced differently during crunch time, than throughout the game. If the league doesn't want to change the rule, it shouldn't have the 2 minute rule at the end of the half either. It's stupid.

 

[nashman]

They should just have Shaq foul the players that foul him, foul them very very hard and make them think about doing it more than once. If they want to let teams play BS ball like fouling a guy on the other side of the court then we should counter with the same thing if not worse, I mean flagrant a few guys and see if they still want to play cheap.

 

[nashman]

Agree DCR either have it all game or not at all!!

 

[BigJit]

HACK-A-XXX happens so rarely in the league anyway. There is absolutely NO point to make a rule change to "rescue" the foul shooter who can't make a simple, uncontested 15 foot shot. LAME.

I applaud the NBA in actually not wussifying the sport anymore. Sorry Shaq fans. Wait, why am I sorry. Shaq won't even get hacked until the postseason anyway. All he has to do is make a simple shot. Issue solved.

 

[Ninjafish]

I have to go with the NBA on this one. Chance you take for having a guy who can't shoot FT's.

Let's pretend we had a decent coach this year and he was able to come up with a counter to the hack-a-shaq. Let's say either by doing hack-a-duncan or hack-a-bowen every time they fouled Shaq. If they kept doing this on each posession over and over, would that change your mind any? If there was nothing but hacks and free throws for 20 minutes straight. Just the fact that it could happen like this is wrong. It's not the way basketball should be. Any fan who was watching that sequence would laugh and think the NBA was an absolute joke.

One of the reasons I was hoping D'antoni would try hacking someone in retaliation is to send a strong message to the NBA office by ruining the game completely.

HACK-A-XXX happens so rarely in the league anyway. There is absolutely NO point to make a rule change to "rescue" the foul shooter who can't make a simple, uncontested 15 foot shot. LAME.

I applaud the NBA in actually not wussifying the sport anymore. Sorry Shaq fans. Wait, why am I sorry. Shaq won't even get hacked until the postseason anyway. All he has to do is make a simple shot. Issue solved.

I think the rule should be changed more because it looks ridiculous than to protect Shaq. Shaq would still have to make free throws anyway if they waited until he had the ball to foul him.

 

[Mainstreet]

You don't change the rule because one person likes to back down his opponent for 18 seconds of the 24 second shot clock. Oh wait, yeah they did. (Barkley)

You don't change the rule because one person likes to stay camped in the lane (Wilt) or institute offensive goaltending (Wilt) or leaping for the foul line to shoot a free throw (Wilt)... but wait, they did.

The league changes rules because of one player all the time. The logic is flawed.

I also think that off the ball fouls should be treated differently because it slows the game down. It should almost be treated as a technical or at least give the team offended the option of possession back and/or FT's.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

I also think that off the ball fouls should be treated differently because it slows the game down. It should almost be treated as a technical or at least give the team offended the option of possession back and/or FT's.

Hell, it could almost be consider flagrant.

A flagrant foul is a serious contact foul involving unnecessary and/or excessive and/or intentional contact

 

[Mainstreet]

Hell, it could almost be consider flagrant.

A flagrant foul is a serious contact foul involving unnecessary and/or excessive and/or intentional contact

Exactly.

 

[MigratingOsprey]

that's a great bit of hyperbole Ouchie

The average NBA team gets 92.01 possessions per game

The average NBA team scores 98.49 points per game

That works out to 1.07 points per possession

Given this rate and 2 FTs per possession that would equate to 184.02 FTs attempted per game

Let's take a bad FT shooter - Shaq for example - who for his career shoots 52.4% from the FT line

If he stays with his career average over those 184.02 FT Attempts he will score 96.42 ppg. This is about 2 ppg less than the average ppg of "playing normal"

There would be some players out of a job with that strategy - of players averaging more than 6 ppg during this past regular season the worst FT shooter was Josh Boone @ 45.6% - the next is Shaq @ 50.3% - then you have Antoine Walker @ 53%

The next guy with an offensive impact would be Emeka Okafor at 57% - but even at that low of a percentage, if you give him 184.02 FTs he will on average score 104.89 points - which would be an increase in scoring

Emeka ranked 380 out of 436 guys who attempted a FT last year - Ben Wallace would be out of a job, but most guys we know and love would be unaffected

most teams would be able to shape a roster and actually score more

also keep in mind the logistics of how many possessions you could actually do this - if you foul out your entire bench that is 42 possessions (7*6). That leaves your starting 5 with 5 fouls each for another 25 possessions.

So after you go through you 67 possessions, then what? You are still a solid 25 possessions less than what the average game is now and the remainder would have to be played perfect

i'm glad the NBA stood firm on this one

 

[MigratingOsprey]

so that leaves us with the pace of game - at this time I see no impact to the pace of game - it was done so rarely on a league wide level over the course of the entire season that it really has minimal impact

this is something that happened maybe 10 times in close to 1500 games

i do not see any real impact to outcome or pace to make there be a rule change

 

[Mulli]

Let's pretend we had a decent coach this year and he was able to come up with a counter to the hack-a-shaq. Let's say either by doing hack-a-duncan or hack-a-bowen every time they fouled Shaq. If they kept doing this on each posession over and over, would that change your mind any? If there was nothing but hacks and free throws for 20 minutes straight. Just the fact that it could happen like this is wrong. It's not the way basketball should be. Any fan who was watching that sequence would laugh and think the NBA was an absolute joke.

One of the reasons I was hoping D'antoni would try hacking someone in retaliation is to send a strong message to the NBA office by ruining the game completely.



I think the rule should be changed more because it looks ridiculous than to protect Shaq. Shaq would still have to make free throws anyway if they waited until he had the ball to foul him.

probably

 

[dreamcastrocks]

so that leaves us with the pace of game - at this time I see no impact to the pace of game - it was done so rarely on a league wide level over the course of the entire season that it really has minimal impact

this is something that happened maybe 10 times in close to 1500 games

i do not see any real impact to outcome or pace to make there be a rule change

You dont?

What game are you watching?