Video Request: Block/Charge
 

12/30/15: Syracuse @ Pitt, ESPN2, call at 5.6 remaining first half.

I don't usually ask for B/C videos (there are no shortage of requests each season), but this one had me perplexed. Defender was outside the RA, so that's not the issue.

Saving my thoughts for later. Want to see how the discussion goes once the video is up.

Side discussions could include whether C got too excited about the secondary defender coming over and therefore missed an illegal screen on the primary defender as the drive began.

Here you are sir...

https://youtu.be/91B_2CupZ4o

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I think L had defender still moving forward ad the offensive player left the ground.

IMHO, this is a block at all levels.

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C has a very late whistle so I doubt he is getting super excited about the secondary defender coming over. Plus the screen is legal at that level and every level below that too IMO.

About as close as you can get. I'd have had a block too.

Don't think I see an illegal screen and a block looks like the right call.

Block....still moving in after the shooter left the floor.

1) I would have expected my first year students to get this call correct: CHARGE!!

2) I do not use the term "secondary defender" because there is no such thing as a "secondary defender" contrary to it being in the NCAA Men's and Women's Rules Books. The members of these two rules committees, may be very good basketball coaches but the addition of the term "secondary defender" and the "restricted area" to the rules show that they are completely lacking in the basic concepts of the Guarding Rule as it was conceived over fifty years ago.

The Guarding Rule was written based upon the following three concepts:

(1) An Offensive Player without the Ball has a reasonable expectation of not being defended because he/she does not have the Ball.

(2) An Offensive Player who does not have control of the should be expected to be guarded the instant he/she gains control of the Ball; meaning that the Offensive Player should expect to be guarded as long as he/she has Player Control if the Ball.

(3) An Offensive Player in control of the ball cannot drive the lane and go airborne indiscriminately. An Offensive Player in control of the Ball must make a decision before he goes airborne: "Can I return to the floor before making contact with a Defensive Player who has taken a legal position on the floor before I go airborne?" The "restricted area" allows the Offensive Player with the Ball to drive the lane and go airborne indiscriminately.

One can see how these Concepts are applied in the countless Casebook Plays and Approved Rulings that have been written over the last five decades.

It is late and past my bed time and I do not want to get riled up thinking of the clueless members of the NCAA Basketball Rules Committees.

Good night all.

MTD, Sr.

Are you sure? Looks like he stops with both feet on the ground and then braces for impact. The bracing looks kinda goofy but I'm not calling it a block for just that aspect of the call.

I'd say block as well. The very last view shows the defender moving forward and to his left which causes him to chuck Gbinije with side and not take contact straight on.


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Gold star, sir! When I first watched it from the standard camera angle, I thought for sure it was a charge. Seeing it from the L's angle (after watching it ten times), I finally convinced myself that it was a block based on that left shoulder injection. Subtle, but not a recoil action, especially at that level. Great call by the L. I think the defender got LGP before both of the shooter's feet left the floor, but then he gave it up by moving that shoulder forward outside of his vertical plane where contact occurred.

As for the C, agree it was a late whistle, but I'm just critiquing that I thought he was a little too quick to abandon the two high post defenders at the beginning of the drive. You could tell from his slide down and his eyes. Illegal screen or not up high, my point is that I don't think he even had an opinion.


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The Initial Sometimes Leads to the Inevitable
 

I'm working this season on a principle that might well apply here. Your feedback on this is invited. I'm still in the middle of studying it.
And I'm not assessing the call made in this clip. I'm only bringing up for discussion the mechanic which, for many, can explain why so many officials seem always to default to a block on plays that are actually charges.
Note what the first, immediate, impulsive motion for the lead was on this call.
He starts immediately, with no pause or hesitation, going straight up with both arms. That locks him into one call and one call only, a block. His initial, impulsive motion is a precursor to this inevitable result.
Whereas, if the first impulse is, as is approved, a single fist in the air, then the signal, either block or charge, that gives the official just that little bit of a fraction of a second to digest what just happened so that a charge is at least given a chance to be called if warraned.
I'm not saying this is a universal thing for all, but it seems to be a valid observation as I've been studying video of block/charge calls on the high school and college level more this year.
Again, I'm not debating the call in the clip. Only the initial, seemingly impulsive start of the signal that might often lead to a default call which isn't always correct.
Am I on the right track with this? Or am I all wet?

How is this relevant to the actual words printed in the 2015-16 Rule and Case books and what the officials working NCAA games are supposed to do?

So you are going to tell a college official to ignore the RA when they are working a college game? :rolleyes:

I summarized your post.

In NCAA mechanics does C or L get first crack on a drive from C to the hoop?

That left elbow being extended outside his vertical space is the contact that I believe is the root of why the L calls this a block.

The C is absolutely great on this play. He puts his eyes on the screen and then switches his coverage to the ball-handler. Then he comes up a with a fist since the play is in his primary, but holds since it is a secondary defender play.

I don't think you're too far off here at all. It seems to have elevated to that especially at the collegiate level, but I think based more on the rules and officials adapting to them. The NCAA changes in recent years regarding block/charge has made it extremely difficult for defenders to take charges which in turn makes it easy for officials to default right to the block call. I'm not arguing against rule changes or adoptions, just merely an observation.
Personally, I think at the NFHS level (for now), it's a little easier to determine the call. Referee the defense and think like the offense. And as you stated Freddy, getting that arm up for the correct mechanic gives you more time to digest that play.

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Since it was a secondary defender (despite what MTD says), L.

My usual disclaimer: I ref soccer, not hoops . . .

I disagree with where you go with this. There are three possible calls on the play, not two. Block, charge, or nothing. Your process seems to encourage the referee to blow the whistle and raise the arm before deciding which of the three. I think that's a bad idea -- and will result in more anticipation calls where the referee expects something that doesn't actually happen. (And from the comfort of my seat in the stands, I think that is something that differentiates experienced, quality officials from newbie/sloppy officials: the ability to actually wait rather than anticipate and call fouls that never happen.) IMHO, the referee should know what the call is before blowing the whistle.

You're like a broken record on these plays. Have you ever come on the forum and said a close play was a block?

I'm all for shipping 50/50 calls, but this is a block.

I should have stopped reading at this incorrect statement. This play is a block, and correctly ruled a block by the official.

Further, the concept of a secondary defender is in the NCAA rulebook. See Rule 4, Section 35.

If you don't like the evolution of the game, that's fine, but your opinion isn't pertinent to a discussion of today's rules.

Absolutely...once I saw the view from the endline and above.

The defender's shoulder was still moving into the path all the way to the point of contact. If the defender's body was frozen at the time of the shooter elevating, there may have been no contact at all.

While the defender's feet may have been down, his body wasn't yet in the path...thus LGP was not yet obtained. Getting the feet into the path isn't adequate.

This.

Well said, thanks for the reply.

No, I don't encourage the referee to blow the whistle and raise the arm before deciding which of the three... That goes against the principle of slow whistles from L, of which I'm an advocate. In fact, many of the times when the two arms begin to go up simultaneously, they're on quick whistles. This impulsive raising of both fists on a quick whistle is what locks officials into the default block on some plays that should have gone charge.
I'm advocating a slower whistle, in fact.
Your last sentence I also agree with. What I'm identifying is a habit that mitigates against that.

That makes no sense to me. What is "impulsive" about it if the referee has already decided it is a block? I don't think your proposed habit mitigates against anything -- it encourages decision making after the first signal, which is more likely to encourage an early whistle while still thinking than to encourage a slow whistle.

There's no such thing as the RA or a secondary defender....even if it's defined in the rule book....right....Or maybe things change after 50 years....

This line of thinking helps no one working the college ranks.

One thing that might be worth discussing, his whether L should have rotated to the drive side.

It's one thing I've been focusing on myself this season, on plays like that, when I can tell where the screen is coming from....to get ball side.

In this play, he had a solid look because the defender tried to take a charge...but if there is a contested shot, I imagine the ideal look would be on the other side of the lane.

I'm someone who rotates more than most and there's just not enough time to get there.

I'd probably pinch the paint....the L in the video didn't and he seemed to have the look he wanted.

OK. I asked for feedback and that's what I got, so I thank you for that. I will consider your responses as seriously as I have considered others' as I continue to study this issue. It's a "work in progress" study.

Added thing I might not have mentioned: this idea I'm testing is based on studying plays that were obvious charges that were called blocks instead, which prompt me to ask, "Why?" And one commonality with many of them is that starting with two fists at the hips going upward. I'm not conclusively set yet to claim cause-and-effect, but I'm still led to wonder...

Thanx again for your input.

Absolutely not. The play started in the middle of the court. He probably should have closed down, but you do not rotate on immediate drives.

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