Intentional or not?

[BigDave]

Intramural men's league. NCAA rules. Decent level of ball.

A1 on a fast break drives to the basket. B1 coming from the opposite angle. I assume there will be some contact on the block attempt. A1 takes off and B1 meets him in mid air and BOOM. Good hard contact, but B1 was definitely going for the ball. I'm lead and in perfect position. I call a common foul and feel good about it. A1 loses it so I have to T him.

I think a lot of players/coaches think that hard contact is automatically intentional. I disagree. A good, hard foul is basketball. There was nothing dirty about B1's actions.

Thoughts?

[Blackhawk357]

My thought is that you probably got it right.

Hard to say without seeing it, but hard contact dosen't dictate wether or not you call an intentional foul.

[ChuckElias]

Originally posted by BigDave
A good, hard foul is basketball

I disagree. That notion is a result of the Riley/Fratello/Hubey Brown mentality. "Giving the hard foul" was a common NBA phrase for a while. Even the NBA has tried hard to reduce the incidents of "hard fouls" by issuing flagrant fouls much more frequently.

Originally posted by Blackhawk357
hard contact dosen't dictate wether or not you call an intentional foul.

Maybe not, but excessive contact does dictate an intentional foul.

I can't comment on the original play, b/c I didn't see it. But the "hard foul" is specifically addressed as an intentional foul. Excessive contact, even while playing the ball, is considered an intentional foul. Just my two cents.

Chuck

[RookieDude]

I'm glad this discussion of intentional fouls has come up.

I had a tough call, regarding this, in a Boys Varsity game the other night. (It's still bothering me)
Team A was up by 5pts with 23 seconds left in regulation. A1 had just got a rebound under Team B's basket after a failed 3pt shot by B1. A1 was standing facing the endline and holding the ball right in front of his body and hanging over the endline somewhat. B2 came running up hard behind A1 to obvioulsy foul him so as to stop the clock. Well the contact by B2 from behind on A1 was pretty hard...B2 might have been reaching around A1 "going for the ball" somewhat, but the contact was hard on A1's back.
There had been a couple of "not friendly fouls" (radio guy's statement) just a minute earlier in which I had told the players to "make sure they are going for the ball" when trying to "stop the clock".

Well, as the foul happened I felt my arms raising and crossing above my head...I don't know, I couldn't help it...it just happened...it felt like it was intentional.
The Coach of the team behind, Team B, and a guy that hadn't howled any all night said, "Aw C'mon Dan, that's not an intentional foul!" As I was going to report the foul I walked by the Coach and said "Coach, he hit him hard from behind". The Coach then said "that dosen't make it intentional".
I went on to report the foul without anymore conversation.

The team ahead, Team A, went on to win by 10pts...the intentional foul call certainly didn't get any complaints from them. The radio guy said the call was "questionable".

You know what...I think he was right. In this game situation I probably should have just called it a common foul...even though we all know the player was fouling his opponent to stop the clock.
This was not good game "awarness" on my part.

There I'm done beating myself up....comments?

Dude

[BigJoe]

A foul should be ruled intentional if while playing the ball a player causes excessive contact with an opponant. Obviously, in your mind the foul was excessive thus your arms crossed over your head. Our first instincts are usually correct. Don't beat yourself up over this call. We as officials are usually lax in calling int. fouls according to the rules.
At least you didn't "cost the team the game" like I did the other night. That was the first time a coach accused me of that. Of course the one call that fouled out his post player with a minute left cost him the game. He must have forgotten about the 30 turnovers, 25 missed shots, etc.

[Dan_ref]

Rookie,

Sounds like you got this right. Fouling to stop the clock at the end of the game is by definition intentional, it's been a POE in both NCAA & NFHS. This goes double if the team behind is fouling hard instead of going for "the touch fouls". But more often than not the level of contact goes up because they are not getting the quick touch fouls. Were you guys slow on the whistle?

[BigDave]

Originally posted by Dan_ref
Fouling to stop the clock at the end of the game is by definition intentional, it's been a POE in both NCAA & NFHS.

If I called the game according to this, I wouldn't be working very much. Fouls to stop the clock are a part of most games we work. We know those fouls are intended to stop the clock, but calling all of them intentional is not the answer. POE or not. I do believe there is some judgment involved.

[RookieDude]

Originally posted by Dan_ref
Rookie,

Sounds like you got this right. Fouling to stop the clock at the end of the game is by definition intentional, it's been a POE in both NCAA & NFHS. This goes double if the team behind is fouling hard instead of going for "the touch fouls". But more often than not the level of contact goes up because they are not getting the quick touch fouls. Were you guys slow on the whistle?

Dan,

No, I don't think we were slow on the whistles...just maybe some frustration on their part from them being behind. (Even though their opponent is the second place team and they are the sixth place team in the league.) Great game otherwise.

The game was on a Tuesday night, so we had a lot of other Coaches and Officials there that night. Also, my assigning secretary was there. He came in the locker room after the game and never said a word about the intentional foul. Of course I mumbled something about it being one I could have passed on...I asked my partner and he said he probably wouldn't have called it.

Dude

[Blackhawk357]

Rokie,
I'm with Dan on this one. Obviously I didn't see the play, but:

Originally posted by RookieDude
A1 was standing facing the endline and holding the ball right in front of his body and hanging over the endline somewhat. B2 came running up hard behind A1 to obvioulsy foul him so as to stop the clock. Well the contact by B2 from behind on A1 was pretty hard...

Sounds like the definition of intentional foul.

And I too believe that generally speaking, at least in the area I work, that officials are a bit lax on calling it right.

Blackhawk

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by BigDave

If I called the game according to this, I wouldn't be working very much. Fouls to stop the clock are a part of most games we work. We know those fouls are intended to stop the clock, but calling all of them intentional is not the answer. POE or not. I do believe there is some judgment involved.

I agree with you but if you don't call the hard fouls to stop the clock intentional then you'll soon have a brawl on your hands.

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally posted by BigDave

If I called the game according to this, I wouldn't be working very much. Fouls to stop the clock are a part of most games we work. We know those fouls are intended to stop the clock, but calling all of them intentional is not the answer. POE or not. I do believe there is some judgment involved.

I believe that you are misinterpreting what Dan is trying to say.He's not recommending that you call all contact "intentional".He's just wondering if the officials were calling "touch" fouls quick enough when they are being used to stop the clock,instead of maybe ignoring them and making the defenders commit a harder foul to get the whistle.Dan's point,I believe,was that you have to be ready in these end-of-the-game situations to recognize that the defense will want the quick foul,and you should be just as quick to give it to them-even if it's contact that you might have passed on earlier in the game. JMHO,'cause I can't really speak for Dan.

[mick]

Originally posted by RookieDude
[QUOTE
Of course I mumbled something about it being one I could have passed on...I asked my partner and he said he probably wouldn't have called it.

Dude,
You were obviously aware the defenders would try to foul.
Likewise, you were obviously aware of the line between intentional and purposeful.
You obviously sensed the "tone" of unfriendly fouls.
You knew the score and the time.
You had all the information and made your call in a blink.
You were there.
You reacted.
Finis.
mick

[BigDave]

Originally posted by Jurassic Referee

I believe that you are misinterpreting what Dan is trying to say.He's not recommending that you call all contact "intentional".He's just wondering if the officials were calling "touch" fouls quick enough when they are being used to stop the clock,instead of maybe ignoring them and making the defenders commit a harder foul to get the whistle.Dan's point,I believe,was that you have to be ready in these end-of-the-game situations to recognize that the defense will want the quick foul,and you should be just as quick to give it to them-even if it's contact that you might have passed on earlier in the game. JMHO,'cause I can't really speak for Dan.

I'm with ya, JR.

[rainmaker]

In my opinion, the problem with the intentional foul rule is the word "intentional". People interpret it to mean that the one kid was trying to hurt the other one. I wish we had a different word for when someone is not trying to stop the clock but just gets carried away. I agree with the penalty and the set-up, but the word makes it awkward. Also, we should always use the word "excessive" when describing these fouls and not "hard".

I had to call a common foul a couple of weeks ago, where the shooter ended up in a heap on the floor and took about 10 minutes to get up. The coach couldn't understand why the foul wasn't intnetional. But the contact was not even remotely excessive, just placed in an unfortunate part of the body. The defender was quite a bit taller than the shooter and defender was behind. She reached forward to block the shot and did indeed stop the ball. But as the shooter kept moving up, defender's arm was in the way, and shooter got her head snapped backwards by contact with the defender's elbow. It was a hard foul, but not excessive at all. Coach kept saying, "That was a hard foul! How is that not intentional?!" Well, the contact wasn't excessive, it just wasn't. If we wouldn't use the phrase "hard foul" it would be easier to explain.

I felt justified in calling it common at the end of the game, since coach called a TO, fouled player hit both her free throws and player played the rest of the game (about 5 minutes). Obviously, not too bad an injury!

[Edited by rainmaker on Feb 13th, 2003 at 10:25 AM]

[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Two posters in this thread have talked about how they called common fouls when the shooter was fouled. These are not common fouls. A common foul is a personal foul that is neither intentional nor flagrant nor committed against a player in the act of shooting.