We have officially entered the peak sports viewing experience for the fall. The MLB Postseason is in its final stages, the NFL is in midseason form, and now the NHL and NBA have returned, giving us something to watch/bet on every single day.
Yesterday, Jack covered the NHL and its new RedZone like program dubbed “Frozen Frenzy”, so for today I thought I’d cover the start of the NBA season, and more specifically the new flopping rule they implemented over the summer.
To give some background on my stance on fouls in the NBA, I am one of four boys who grew up playing contact sports, so I have a deep rooted opinion that physicality is a necessity in men’s team sports. Now, you may be thinking to yourself that some sports warrant more contact than others, like football compared to baseball, and you are definitely right, but what would baseball be without charging the mound or dugout clearing brawls? Less entertaining. That’s what it’d be.
Basketball has always been in this weird gray area when it comes to physical play, and I think that is especially true for fans around my age (22) or younger. You see, we grew up hearing stories from our fathers about how rough the league was back in the day, and old-school highlights back up those claims, but nowadays the league has grown to be incredibly soft.
This may be a little bit of a tangent, but I truly believe that the soft playstyle we see nowadays can be credited to LeBron James. Not only did the physical era end shortly after he entered the league, but he single handedly trailblazed a path for players to think it’s okay to throw tantrums like children and dive on contact like the court is a swimming pool instead of parquet. I mean, the guy has the greatest build and some of the best talent the league has ever seen, yet he still feels the need to whine for calls any chance he gets. I’ll never understand how he can act so tough and then go out and do stuff like this:
Okay, you get the point now, so let’s get back to the new rule.
According to nba.com, “Under the new rule, when a game official calls a flop – or a physical act that reasonably appears to be intended to cause the officials to call a foul on another player – the offending player will be charged with a non-unsportsmanlike technical foul and the opposing team will be awarded one free throw attempt, which could be attempted by any player who is in the game when the technical foul is assessed. A player will not be ejected from a game based on flopping violations”.
What’s also important to note is that the calls can be held off until the next deadball. This means that if a player flops mid play, the refs have the choice of whether to call the play dead or let it go on until the next stoppage. I love this part of the rule, and we even got to see it in action a few times in the Celtics game tonight:
Hopefully this new rule will bring some contact back into the sport and steer it away from the theatrical antics we see in soccer. The game is just better when blood gets boiling and elbows start flying. I can’t wait to see how physical this season ends up being compared to others, but if you feel a different way, let me know in the comments or on Twitter/X @A2ZSportsTakes! See you Friday for my final article of the week!