NBA Competition Committee looking at how can parity be achieved between offense & defense in today's game

[MalagaBulls]

It will never happen, not even after that boring snoozefest of chucking with 0 effort or D.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39606079/from-embiid-70-luka-73-nba-offenses-become-too-good

James isn't the first star to join that conversation. The question of whether offenses have become too overpowering has been driving years of discussion.

Now, the NBA's leadership is having those discussions too.

Joe Dumars, the league's executive vice president and head of basketball operations who was a pillar of the defensively elite "Bad Boys" Detroit Pistons of the 1980s, told ESPN the league's competition committee has officially begun reviewing whether the game has tilted too far toward offense and whether changes need to be implemented to achieve better balance.

"It is a topic that we're monitoring," Dumars told ESPN earlier this month. "We're diving in right now to make sure that we're on the right side of this."

And while the NBA takes a closer look into the generational shift in defensive and offensive parity, finding a solution -- if one is necessary -- is going to be a challenging proposition.

"The rules really favor offense, in general, right now," Rudy Gobert, Minnesota Timberwolves center and front-runner for his fourth Defensive Player of the Year award, told ESPN.

"Keeping a team under a hundred is way more rare than it was a few years back."

I'm not advocating rules changes to keep teams under 100 points as that is a thing of the past but I'd like to see way more effort on D.
But that doesn't fill seats or sell merch.

[DuckIII]

Not holding my breath, but hopeful.

[HomoSapien]

I hope they actually do something. I’m getting close to the point of quitting as a fan.

[sco]

I think, like football, they know there are $ associated with keeping the stars on the floor and healthy. Allowing defense to play tougher works against that. Maybe they can move to the international rules for basket interference.

[jnrjr79]

I think, like football, they know there are $ associated with keeping the stars on the floor and healthy. Allowing defense to play tougher works against that. Maybe they can move to the international rules for basket interference.

Does it? I'm not sure a lot of guys miss time due to hand=checking, and players seemed to be a lot more durable back in the 90s when a more physical brand of basketball was played.

[SalmonsSuperfan]

I really think a major rule change needs to be made, I just wonder what it could be. I don't think it's as simple as allowing for more physical defense, I think it needs to be something radical like moving the three point line back or, call me crazy, rethinking the way points are scored entirely. The expected value of a three-point shot is out of wack with the most types of two-point shots. playing to draw fouls is an issue too because free throws' point values are higher than they ought to be relative to a two-point field goal. I think fundamentally a 3-point shot probably shouldn't be worth 150% of a mid range shot, so maybe there become 2, 3 and 4 point shots. or whatever configuration produces expected values that are reasonable across all the sections of the half court because a "4-point shot" probably isn't twice as valuable as whatever a 2-point shot entails. maybe the end result is players averaging 55ppg and teams routinely scoring above 200.
I don't really care about how this changes records or makes it hard to compare players across eras, I think NBA basketball is going to die out unless they do something drastic. At its core the game of basketball is fun and timeless, kids are never going to stop bouncing balls and throwing them at targets, but the professional game is frankly not as fun to watch as it used to be and maybe the NBA will just be a flash in the pan.

[GoBlue72391]

- Enforce the rules equally regardless of the player in question

- Punish flopping instead of rewarding it

- Eliminate the stupid rule that results in a shooting foul if the defender lands anywhere near a shooter (it's called contesting a shot)

- Call offensive fouls when players lower their shoulder into a defender

- Call more traveling and carrying, it's out of hand

- Maybe test eliminating the defensive 3-second rule in the G League and see how that goes. I believe the NBA is the only level that has defensive 3 seconds, which contributes to why zone D is more common in college

This is just off the top of my head. It wouldn't fix things, but it would help.

[jc23]

less calls and allow more physicality. Offenses today get to do whatever they want unimpeded. Nobody wants to watch millionaire athletes shoot free throws. Less calls allow for a better flow to the game.

[MalagaBulls]

I hope they actually do something. I’m getting close to the point of quitting as a fan.

What is driving your apathy Homo? The Bulls or just the state of the NBA?

[HomoSapien]

I hope they actually do something. I’m getting close to the point of quitting as a fan.

What is driving your apathy Homo? The Bulls or just the state of the NBA?

Both. But Bulls aside, the game is quickly becoming unrecognizable from the one I fell in love with. It’s like I’m watching a different sport. People talk about how advanced offensive skill has gotten, but the heart of the game was always the push and pull between great offensive talent against great defensive talent. Now defense isn’t allowed to compete. Comparing this era to past eras is like comparing a Michael Bay Transformers movie to Citizen Kane. Sure, Transformers is loaded with hundreds of millions of special effects but it isn’t close to being the better movie.

[League Circles]

Maybe they should consider not allowing players to take 8 steps carrying the ball without being called for traveling.

[Flopper]

Relaxing hand-checking restrictions by extending the hand-check zone to inside the 3pt line would probably do the trick. It solves the problem on multiple fronts by limiting dribble penetration, the effectiveness of slow big on fast perimeter player switches (i.e. the big can stay close enough to contest 3s instead of dropping back), and limits wide open 3s generated by collapsing a defense. Enforcing carry rules is also another option, but I can see that having catastrophic effects on game watchability.

[Ice Man]

less calls and allow more physicality. Offenses today get to do whatever they want unimpeded. Nobody wants to watch millionaire athletes shoot free throws. Less calls allow for a better flow to the game.

Hmmm. Average free throws per game are 22.5 this year, 26.6 back in the day. I think you are forgetting how bogged down the game was back then. Throw the ball into the middle, lots of hacking, lots of calls. David Robinson in '94 got 11.6 FTs per game, Shaq got 10.5 FTs. In contrast, Jokic only gets 5.9 per game this season. (When Steve Kerr complained that Jokic gets all the calls that nobody is allowed to defend him, he was deeply deeply full of ****.)

I think Flopper's suggestion has the best chance. If you let defenders hand check, aggressively, inside the 3 point line then you can crowd the 3 point shooters more easily with less fear of being beaten off the dribble or through ball movement to players who have found space. At any rate, the key is slowing the 3 point shooting. That genie is out of the bottle ... guys shoot WAY better from distance, on the move, than they did 30 years ago. If offense is to be slowed, those 3 point shooters somehow have to be denied space.

[_txchilibowl_]

It's not the amount of points that's the problem. It's the way in which they're scored. Dull, boring brand of basketball.

[jc23]

less calls and allow more physicality. Offenses today get to do whatever they want unimpeded. Nobody wants to watch millionaire athletes shoot free throws. Less calls allow for a better flow to the game.

Hmmm. Average free throws per game are 22.5 this year, 26.6 back in the day. I think you are forgetting how bogged down the game was back then. Throw the ball into the middle, lots of hacking, lots of calls. David Robinson in '94 got 11.6 FTs per game, Shaq got 10.5 FTs. In contrast, Jokic only gets 5.9 per game this season. (When Steve Kerr complained that Jokic gets all the calls that nobody is allowed to defend him, he was deeply deeply full of ****.)

I think Flopper's suggestion has the best chance. If you let defenders hand check, aggressively, inside the 3 point line then you can crowd the 3 point shooters more easily with less fear of being beaten off the dribble or through ball movement to players who have found space. At any rate, the key is slowing the 3 point shooting. That genie is out of the bottle ... guys shoot WAY better from distance, on the move, than they did 30 years ago. If offense is to be slowed, those 3 point shooters somehow have to be denied space.

im an eye test guy. im sure you are right but it doesnt feel like less. Maybe other factors like the foul review make it seem like more.

if you allowed for more physicality that would make it more difficult to get open looks. Either from disrupting the ease to get into sets or slowing the offensive player before they can get to their max speed. Right now i see a hesitation to be too aggressive on D and guys rather hang back then be called for a foul or scored on because they can only play safe D.

Few years back the NBA experimented with this philosophy and it worked. Soon after it went away due to players crying bloody murder.

[HomoSapien]

It's not the amount of points that's the problem. It's the way in which they're scored. Dull, boring brand of basketball.

Ehh, I don't know. We are 25th in points per game and are averaging 112 ppg! Five teams are averaging over a 120 points per game. That doesn't scream quality to me.

[_txchilibowl_]

It's not the amount of points that's the problem. It's the way in which they're scored. Dull, boring brand of basketball.

Ehh, I don't know. We are 25th in points per game and are averaging 112 ppg! Five teams are averaging over a 120 points per game. That doesn't scream quality to me.

Understood. My point was that if those points were coming from a variety of places such as post ups, mid-range, 3's, fastbreaks, etc. the game would be entertaining and much less prone to criticism.

But you're preaching to the choir, brother. It's almost like people don't want to acknowledge that defense is a skill and should be celebrated.

[HomoSapien]

It's not the amount of points that's the problem. It's the way in which they're scored. Dull, boring brand of basketball.

Ehh, I don't know. We are 25th in points per game and are averaging 112 ppg! Five teams are averaging over a 120 points per game. That doesn't scream quality to me.

Understood. My point was that if those points were coming from a variety of places such as post ups, mid-range, 3's, fastbreaks, etc. the game would be entertaining and much less prone to criticism.

But you're preaching to the choir, brother. It's almost like people don't want to acknowledge that defense is a skill and should be celebrated.

I do agree with you there for sure. I miss how back in the day, each team had their own style. Utah, NY, Chicago, Indiana, Rockets, Sonics, etc... all had extremely different schemes.

[othawhitemeat]

Quit rigging games and start playing 90's style and I will go back to watching.

[MGB8]

Shrink the rim diameter by 1 cm?

My theory is that would disproportionately impact range shooting vs. scoring inside, encouraging more balanced play and reducing reliance on the 3.