The question remains. What does it take to become a primary defender. What if they get position outside, back up a step or two and get one foot in the RA? Does the fact that they back up a step or two during the drive make them a primary defender. What if they back up 10 steps after getting in front of the driver? 20? When does a defender shift from being secondary to primary?

The goal of defense is to prevent the other team from shooting the ball. Obtaining any position between the ball and the basket is, by definition, good defense. It is preventing the offensive player from having access to a desirable path to the basket. It may not be as exciting as a dunk or a blocked shot, but it is still good defense to take away the avenue desired by the opponent.

People can thump their chests all day long about it not being "good" defense, but those claims just don't make sense. They may be common but it doesn't make them add up when you consider what the purpose of defense is.

You can also use hyperbole about defending the ball coming through the net but in 99% of the cases, the contact occurs before the ball is released.

The REAL reason for the RA is to encourage scoring. Nothing more. The safety claim is just a canard. They had to use that to justify the change as they didn't want to appear to be manipulating the basics of the game for something like scoring. The saftey issue was easily resolved with the old rules if the plays were called as the rules were written.

People do realize there is a difference between "their opinion" and "facts"? :eek:

back up 10-20 steps, now you are being nonsensical. and btw it doesnt really matter when of if the defender can ever switch from being secondary to primary because the rule states the seconday defender cannot ESTABLISH INITIAL LEGAL GUARDING POSITION so if you want to take your argument to the most absurd extreme and assume the secondary defender establishes position 94 feet from the basket and backs up all the way into the RA they can do that legally.

It is not nonsense. It is just exaggerating the elements to expose the main point that you don't seem to see.

Again, how does a player become a primary defender? How long must they be on the player and at what distance must they be in order to be a primary defender. If players switch out top on a screen, the secondary defender does at some point become a primary. The question is where and when? If a secondary defender slides in and backs there way down the lane for 1 step, two steps, 5 steps, 10 steps, all right with the dribbler, when do they become the primary?

camron you are the one missing the point. the RA only matters for establishing initial position. if the situation with screen out top you describe occurs, it doesnt matter what you want to call the defender (primary, secondary, tertiary) who picks the offensive player up off the screen if that defender establishes legal guarding position outside the RA, then they are allowed to maintain that legal guarding position all the way into the RA. the key point and the only thing that matters is where this defender establishes guarding postion, inside or outside of the RA after that the same rules for maintaining legal position are in effect.

Why then is it being called a block when simple because the defender has a heel on the line even if it wasn't there to being with.

Maybe it should be as you suggest, but that is not how it is being called.

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