Adam Silver is ‘on the fence’ about changes to international fouling rules

Adam Silver discusses his stance on international fouling rules

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Thursday, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver weighed in with his thoughts about changing to international fouling rules, which has been a hot topic for awhile now.

In international basketball, if you foul in manner not indicative of a basketball play, than the player gets two free throws and possession. This would essentially put an end to Hack-A-Shaq/Dwight/Jordan. Sterling was quoted in a meeting with Associated Press as saying:

"“I’ve gone back and forth”“I’ve sat in meetings with some of the greatest players like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird who said that players should learn to make their free throws and it’s part of the game. At the same time, it doesn’t make for great television, so I’m on the fence right now.”"

Silver later goes on to explain how when he sees these strategies being used he can “feel the viewers changing the channel.”

Another option presented to solve the issue of this simply not being entertaining would be to give the teams an option to decline the foul, like football, and just inbound with possession.

"“I’ve listened to owners change their point of view on it both ways. General managers and coaches as well,” Silver said. “Sometimes the issue with coaches and general managers, of course, it depends on who’s on their roster at any given time as well, understandably. So it’s our job to take a longer-term view of it, but I think that’s one of those issues that we’re going to be very engaged in over the next few months.”"

Silver goes on to say that this will be discussed by general managers during their meeting in May, as well as the Competition Committee in June.

It will be a tricky issue to confront, as the solution, if there is one, will have to be a rule that doesn’t allow for too much advantage for the fouled team or something that could exploited to deviate from its purpose. It is my belief that changing to international rules would take away the lull in the game and will lead to more actual basketball play.

It is cool that people implemented this strategy and it’s interesting, but you can admire Gregg Popovich for thinking of it, and you can support the fact that everyone should make free throws, but it isn’t basketball. It really isn’t all that hard to fix, and if we do, it is not to shame or discredit the strategy implemented. It was a smart way to exploit a system, but as strategy and technology evolve, the game must evolve to maintain its original purpose.

This is part of genre of focus for Adam Silver that he calls “competitive issues,” which he will be trying to undertake reform on after the first part of his tenure was marked with the handling the Donald Sterling issue.

via NBA.com

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