The Call Most Often, or Most Egregiously, Missed

[Camron Rust]

Originally posted by Jurassic Referee

The only place it talks about players with regards to position and jumping is:

Rule 4-23. GUARDING
Art. 1...Guarding is the act of legally placing the body in the path of an offensive opponent.
Art. 4...Guarding an opponent with the ball or a stationary opponent without the ball:
b. If the opponent with the ball is airborne, the guard must have obtained legal position before the opponent left the floor.
[/B]

NFHS rule 10-6-3NOTE states the general principle to be used:-"The guard may not cause contact by moving under OR IN FRONT OF a passer or thrower after he or she is in the air with both feet off the floor. The key phrase is "in front of ....."! The same principle applies to a shooter or passer,also.They similarly can't cause contact by moving under or IN FRONT OF a defensive player after he or she is in the air with both feet off the floor.

That's what JeffRef is trying to say,I think.If it is,I agree with him,and this language backs him up. [/B][/QUOTE]

Does the same principle apply? I'm not so sure it does.

Consider this play: A1 is driving from the top of the key...straight down the lane. B4 rotates from the corner to help. B4, anticipating a shot, jumps while running towards the lane. A1 continues down the lane and pulls up for a 3 foot jumper about the time that B4 lands on him.

By the analogy you made: "The same principle applies to a shooter or passer,also.They similarly can't cause contact by moving under or IN FRONT OF a defensive player after he or she is in the air with both feet off the floor."

the foul would be on the shooter for moving under the defender after the defender jumped. I assert that this foul should be on the defender.

What would this mean if your analogy were true? If the two players are on convergent paths, the first (perhaps only) one off the ground could not foul. Example: If I, as a defender, saw an opponent driving, I could cut towards a point along his intended path, jump towards it before he got there and before he jumped, crash onto the dribbler/shooter and draw a foul on the him.

Of course this is not the case. This foul is on the defender. Therefore, a defender does NOT always get a guaranteed place to land even if path was clear when they jumped. The fouls the defender can draw while jumping must conform to the requirements of legal guarding position and/or verticality. The clauses granting a landing spot specifically talk about the offensive player. If it were to apply to both, it would not single out the offensive player in both locations.

(I've only consider body contact fouls...a shove by a hand can always be a foul regardless of who jumps when or where).


[Edited by Camron Rust on Jun 13th, 2003 at 05:54 PM]

[Love2ref4Ever]

The defender has leapt high and slighty foward, towards the shooter. It never said any where that the defender had established "legal guarding position." This sounds like the move that Walt "Clyde" Frazier had mastered. We are taught to referee the defense and by doing so on this play, the defense caused the contact. Soley because, once the shooter goes up he/she is allowed space to return down to the floor. The "fake" is what played this defender! Now if this was Reggie Miller who likes to kick that foot out to initiate the contact on his jumpshot, we can reward the defense.

[Joe]

"Now if this was Reggie Miller who likes to kick that foot out to initiate the contact on his jumpshot, we can reward the defense."

Have you EVER seen Reggie called for a PC foul when
doing this?

Originally posted by Love2ref4Ever
The defender has leapt high and slighty foward, towards the shooter. It never said any where that the defender had established "legal guarding position." This sounds like the move that Walt "Clyde" Frazier had mastered. We are taught to referee the defense and by doing so on this play, the defense caused the contact. Soley because, once the shooter goes up he/she is allowed space to return down to the floor. The "fake" is what played this defender! Now if this was Reggie Miller who likes to kick that foot out to initiate the contact on his jumpshot, we can reward the defense.

[Love2ref4Ever]

What I have saw was Reggie look for the foul call on this famous shot of his, and not get it!

[ChuckElias]

Originally posted by Camron Rust
What would this mean if your analogy were true? If the two players are on convergent paths, the first (perhaps only) one off the ground could not foul. Example: If I, as a defender, saw an opponent driving, I could cut towards a point along his intended path, jump towards it before he got there and before he jumped, crash onto the dribbler/shooter and draw a foul on the him.

Of course this is not the case.

Camron, you're now the third person to make this same point. Maybe the third time's the charm?

[Joe]

Originally posted by Love2ref4Ever
What I have saw was Reggie look for the foul call on this famous shot of his, and not get it!

Wow! He didn't get it *once*!!!

Has anyone *ever* seen him called for tripping
the defender? Seriously, he would get 15 yards
for this in the NFL.

[Joe]

FWIW, I agree with you re. convergent paths, however,
the play I visualized in the original post was a
stationary, or near stationary shooter who "fakes"
his shot, causing the defender to jump, then jumps or
lunges into or under the defender. Usually "faking"
a shot requires two hands on the ball (MJ and Dr. J
aside) so I assume the shooter already picked up his dribble.

Originally posted by ChuckElias

Camron, you're now the third person to make this same point. Maybe the third time's the charm?

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally posted by Joe
FWIW, I agree with you re. convergent paths, however,
the play I visualized in the original post was a
stationary, or near stationary shooter who "fakes"
his shot, causing the defender to jump, then jumps or
lunges into or under the defender.

Exactly!
A1 has the ball and pump-fakes. B1,who is loosely defending A1,jumps forward with the fake,but if A1 doesn't move,B1 will return to the floor without making any kind of contact.However A1,after B1 has jumped,now takes a dribble forward and goes up for a jumper.B1 runs into A1 now.There is nowayinhell that the foul is on B1 in this case.That's the play that JeffRef basically described.Even if B1 jumped sideways,A1 still can't move under him after B1 has jumped.

Gotta go watch Clemens whine again now.He's one dickhead that shoulda stayed a BoSox!

[BktBallRef]

You guys are talking about 2 different things here.

1- The original post would seem to be a paly where the shooter has both feet planted on the floor, pump fakes, gets the defender into the air, and jumps into him.

2- The latter play has the shooter "driving" to the basket.

Does the same rule application apply to both scenarios? Personally, I haven't been able to find anything that the defender is entitled to a spot on the floor to land after becoming airborne. The only application I find is for the shooter/thrower. But I did find this. "If he/she (the defender) jumps into position, both feet must return to the floor after the jump before he/she has obtained a guarding position." So, even if the defender had LGP before jumping, if he jumps toward the offensive player, doesn't he have to re-establish his LGP. by returning to the floor with both feet?

And yes, I have seen Reggie Miller called for an offensive foul in the situation described, both for kicking the defender and for jumping into him.

PS - After writing this, I looked back at some of the posts and I believe Camron and I have written almost the same thing.

I'm with Cam and Chuckie.

[JeffTheRef]

There are a number of other references that make the point. I'll dig them out when I get a chance. The matter of a dribbler is somewhat more complicated, subject to some special rules, although, certainly, once guarding position has been obtained, the defender can jump to stay in front of the dribbler and need not have even one foot on the floor to have the 'right to land'. In all other cases, a player cannot move INTO somebody's landing spot - the player can sure as hell stay in place and, if the official is seeing far enough ahead of the action, get the call. The example I gave of what happens on an inbounds pass going from the baseline out beyond the arc is very common.

[JeffTheRef]

outright flummery. I alter my rhythm - it would be illegal were I a foul shooter - to try to catch the jumpers off guard. They're dedicated to stealing it, and I'm dedicated to getting off a fair jump. What a way to start the game!

[JeffTheRef]

CASEBOOK 10.6.1 Situation A asks: "Is it correct to say that guarding takes place only when an opponent is playing against a player who has the ball?" The answer is no, and that exactly the same principles apply to situations without the ball as to those with . . .

Even more specifically, CASEBOOK 10.6.1 Situation B says: B1 takes a certain spot on the floor before A1 jumps from the floor to catch a pass: (a) A1 lands on B1; or (b) B1 moves to a new spot while A1 is airborne. A1 comes to the floor on one foot and then charges into B1. RULING: In (a) and (b), the foul is on A1.

Taken together, these two Casebook examples make the point. The principle that 'a player is entitled to land on a spot that was unoccupied when s/he took off' is inherent in the first example and is commonly illustrated in the literature referencing the airborne shooter. In the second example, the foul is on A1 because A1 came down on the floor before the contact happened. Otherwise, the foul would have, indeed, been on B1.

[Hawks Coach]

I have to weigh in with Chuck and company. Jefftheref, the more you p[ost, the more you dri9ft from the facts at hand. In the two cases you cite, the principle is that B has a position on THE FLOOR and A is in the air, and in both cases A gets the foul. Neither establishes an inherent right to land anywhere that was open when you left the ground. The second case only points out that your right to land as an offensive player (A!) ends when your foot touches the floor and you have no right to further space in that same line that you jumped.

As many others have pointed out, airborne shooters have a right to land in space that was vacant when they jumped. No rule yet cited extends this right to the defense, and a jumping defender does not have legal guarding position. Defenders do own the right to their vertical plane, so defenders can jump staight up and draw an offensive foul by rule if the player steps into their landing area. The book is silent on the defender that jumps toward a spot that an offensive player occupies while the defender is airborne. But the book is clear that defenders don't have legal guarding position until they return to the floor, so it seems that they do not have a right to land in any unoccupied space. Rules for offense and defense clearly differ in this situation.

It seems that most refs, and this coach, think that the defender can be charged with the foul once they leave their vertical plane while jumping, with the obvious caveat that you have to see it to call it.

[Edited by Hawks Coach on Jun 14th, 2003 at 09:20 AM]

[BktBallRef]

Originally posted by JeffTheRef
... need not have even one foot on the floor to have the 'right to land'.

Would someone, ANYONE, please reference the rule that says a defender is entitled to a "right to land" on a space if it was unoccupied before he left the floor.

If a defender is running at a player with the ball, doesn't he if to stop prior to making contact and establish position? Why is it any different if he's running, and then jumps? Answer: It isn't. The only rule, that I can find, that protects and airborne player applies to a shooter or a thrower. It says absolutely nothing about a player without the ball having a "right to land." Now, if you know where such a reference can be found, please post it. Because damned if I can find it.

[JeffTheRef]

apply to the situation of guarding a dribbler, which is special case. It is implicit in the rules and casebook examples bearing on the rights of players - importantly, both offensive and defensive players - in the context of physical contact.

I think you're over-thinking it. One guy leaps to get the ball, straight up or at an angle, it doesn't matter. A player on the other team runs under him, moves to occupy the spot the leaping player would have landed on, a spot that was unoccupied at the moment he took off. The 'rules' can't expect a player to change direction in mid-air and they don't.