I confess I'm not at all likely to approach a partner and suggest we not shoot free throws. In fact, I don't recall ever doing it. For me, the slower my whistle, the more likely I am to grant free throws to a player whom I deemed to be shooting before getting fouled. A slower whistle means the player may have thought he wasn't getting the call so he needed to adjust, imo.

My question to the OP, how loudly did you offer this extra information?

Funny that you should ask. Being tableside, we met just off the baseline outside the lane. I went to his side and asked in a low voice if he knew the player was passing. He ignored me, and continued walking to report. When he confronted me after the game he also mentioned that "the coach heard that!" which makes both of us look bad. I said that I knew the coach did not hear me (the coach was at least 15 feet away and I was speaking so no one else could hear me), but he said "you can't know that!" Simply put, I spoke in a fashion (low voice and unobtrusive) so spectators would not think I was showing him up. He took offense anyway.

you might think he is in the act of shooting right up to the point he decides to pass the ball and when he does, he isnt getting free throws. the contact didnt prevent him from releasing the ball, in which case i will make a judgement as to whether or not he was attempting to shoot, so he chose to pass the ball, which means he isnt shooting!

I was taught the same way. Then, I read some interp from the NFHS (might be in the "annual interps thread"; I don't think it's in the case book) and changed how I called the plays to follow the interp.

Is it very wrong because you disagree with it?

Look, if a player wants me to think they are shooting, then shoot the ball. If a player wants me to think they are passing, then pass the ball. Not all players that gather and jump in the air are shooting. Otherwise if a player gathers and gets the ball knocked out his hands or knocked the the floor whether they release the ball to shoot or pass, they are getting shots from me. After all this is all about judgment anyway. There is ultimately nothing right or wrong either way. I am just not rewarding a player that is not smart enough to know to not pass the ball if you want the total benefit of the foul.

Peace

I've always been taught, and judged these plays similar to how JRut has spelled it out. The only exception is if a player puts up a shot as a clear afterthought.

The definition of a try tells us it is still a try even if a foul prevents the release of the ball. The fact that the player releases the ball on a pass after all this doesn't change that. In my example, I took judgment out of the equation.

"If a player is shooting a layup......."

He gets clobbered and is unable to complete the layup, so he does what he can, just in case he doesn't get the foul call. You and johnny d say, because of this late pass, which in fact occurs after the ball is dead, he shouldn't get free throws.

This is very wrong.

And that is exactly what I get paid to do and that is what matters at the time of the foul. Defaulting to a pass if they don't actually finish the shot is, IMO, the lazy way out.

If you're going to follow the philosophy you've laid out, you must also award shots when a player who had no intention of shooting gets fouled and then flings the ball towards the basket after realizing they were fouled.

problem is you dont really know he is shooting the ball, even on a layup, until he acutally releases the ball on a shot. he could very well be in a motion we all assume and associate with shooting a layup but that doesnt mean he is going to shoot the layup, foul or not. and none of us have ever seen a player go up for an apparent easy shot/layup and decide while airborne that their teammate has a better shot and try to pass it off to them only to have the ball go out of bounds because everybody assumed he was shooting the ball when he really wasnt. so if the play looks like a shot, acts like a shot it can be considered a shot right up the the moment it becomes a pass.

We will just have to agree to disagree on this one. Because part of this is judgment and when a player does one thing, I am not going to assume he wanted to do something totally different. He better continue as if he was shooting if he wants a shooting foul opportunity. If he passes because he thinks that is the better play, then he told me what he wanted to do. Again, this is not a reading minds situation where I know for sure. Again, I give the benefit of the doubt to shooting anytime a player gathers the ball. But when they could hear the whistle and do something else, that tells me they were not shooting. That is the way I have done it for years and that is the way I will continue forward. You can say I am wrong, but no one but you in my career has ever argued the point you are in this discussion.

Peace

We've all seen enough basketball to make this call. And I'd rather err on the side of giving a set * of free throws that maybe weren't deserved than taking away three or four sets * of shots because a player adjusted after he was fouled because he didn't know if he'd get the call. We tell them to keep playing to the whistle.

* per season

The definition of a try tells us it is still a try even if a foul prevents the release of the ball.

Apparently you don't sometimes. The guy in my play had gathered the ball. What he does after contact doesn't change that.

The ball was released. It was passed to a teammate.