Designated spot after timeout / made basket?

[Back In The Saddle]

Originally Posted by Cobra

Saying baseline doesn't really hurt anything but there is still no reason to do it. If you are going to change this term because a bunch of ignorant people don't know the proper term then where do you draw the line on how many fan terms to use?

Lots of people call basket interference goaltending. It really isn't a big deal. Either way the ball is dead and points are awarded if committed at the opponents basket. So then some new official comes along and calls a technical foul for basket interference during a free throw. Using the proper terms would have avoided all the confusion. It is best to just use the right terms instead of trying to decide which ones being changed would cause confusion.

Human language is an endlessly evolving animal, and it evolves most often because of common usage among a very big "bunch of ignorant people". As my father used to say, "If everybody called a horse a cow, it would be a cow."

And before the pitchfork and torch crew begin massing, I'm not condemning anybody for using end line. I've even started using it myself on the forum just to avoid the mindless pissing contest. But really, where is the compelling argument on this? Unlike goaltending v. basket interference and request/grant v. calling a time out, base line v. end line is a distinction without a difference.

There are only two arguments I can find being made for insisting on this "proper usage". The first is that the rule book uses end line. Yet I fail to find such dogmatic insistence on the usage of "try" or "false double foul" or "illegal use of hands" either here or in the real world. So it must be the other argument, which is nothing more than "the cool kids are doing it."