Shooting Foul after a Blocked Shot
 

Greetings, I just joined in order to ask this question.

I was watching the Thunder-Knicks game last night and there was a call that I did not agree with at all. Kevin Durant drove to the hoop and attempted to either dunk or lay it in. Kenyon Martin ran to him to defend him, and knocked the ball away from Durant before they made any contact at all. The ref's whistled play dead and called a Flagrant-1 on Martin, which was later downgraded to a Shooting Foul.

Was this the right call? Martin's block was clean, and at the very worst, I feel it should've been a non-shooting foul, as the "foul" had no effect on the shot at all. It appeared to simply be 2 bodies colliding in midair, neither of which had control of the ball.

http://i.minus.com/idokrZ32nbhLc.gif

Once the offensive player started his shooting motion - which Durant clearly did here - then it becam a "shooting foul". The fact that the ball was knocked away does not give Martin freedom to lay Durant out like that.

There are plays all the time where the defender fouls the player in the act of shooting and never even touch the ball and foul shots still get awarded.

1) can we change this from a .gif file that repeats constantly? (In fact, can we not allow this type of file to be posted at all?)

2) Clearly a "HS foul". ;)

3) Some contact is allowed (by practice) after a block, but that much needs to be penalized, imo.

Yes, this is a correct call. In the NBA, he's considered to be in the act of shooting once he started his shooting motion and would be considered in the act until he returns to a normal floor position. A foul committed on an offensive player during this interval is a shooting foul.

True in all codes.

Well not exactly. Under NCAA/NFHS rules, you aren't going to have a shooting foul on a player that has returned to the floor with a foot to the floor (well technically speaking). In the NBA, he has to land and return to a normal position. The interval in which it would be considered a shooting foul is longer in the NBA.

Only if you disallow all .gifs. The site can't know the type of content in the .gif that is being embedded.

I do think, however, that many browsers provide a way to not render the animation gif. A quick google search for your preferred browser will probably give you the necessary instructions.

I am not so sure there was a foul (or one I would call).

Looks to me like the defender got the ball and the force of the block made both players fall off balance.

Contact can be severe and not a foul. This is just a philosophy situation more than a rules situation IMO.

Peace