The rise of dunking and the three-point shot | Hacker News Reader

The rise of dunking and the three-point shot

99percentinvisible.org

41 pointssamsolomon33 comments

Anyone watch the game last night? The Cavs attempted 45 three pointers (http://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=400954513). For reference, the most 3s ever attempted in an NBA game is 61 (http://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/let-it-fly-rockets-set-nba...). Both were set this season. We are living in an absolutely insane time for basketball. Expect both records will be eclipsed next year.

yes, it was an amazing game! the cavs finally showed up. the warriors are so good (at 3's and dunks and everything else) that it took that level of super-human effort by the cavs to win. they had over 80 points by half and 100 halfway through the 3rd quarter. the warriors had an average game (for them), scoring 116 (!).

To be clear, this is what happens when your commissioner lets one of the league's top 3 superstars join an already 73 win historic team, even after that superstar took the 73 win team to 7 games in the conference finals right before. It's the most "piled on" team in NBA history, not even by a little.

Last year had 2 of the best series I've ever seen in the NBA (the WCF and the finals), this year there's nothing particularly exciting watching the Warriors play, it was all inevitable, and it just feels a little dirty.

It also feels even more dirty that the commissioner pretends like there is parity in the league, and even the officiating last night where they re-assigned technical fouls to prevent having to throw out a Golden State star (never, ever seen something like that, and as Jeff Van Gundy said right in the broadcast, "This is an absolutely terrible look for the NBA").

Just voicing another sentiment.

i hear you. the playoffs weren't very exciting this year. but on the other hand, look at how the cavs (finally) rose to the challenge last night, and in the process raised the bar for every other team. these are the best people on earth at throwing orange balls through orange rings and they're only getting better! =)

> the playoffs weren't very exciting this year.

You do understand why, right?

Your solution is "The other teams will improve!" and you're citing the Cav's improbable record setting game as evidence?

Sorry, but it takes a certain willful ignorance, or looking the other way, to defend the state of the NBA.

i'm not defending the nba, nor being ignorant. but it's just not that upsetting to me. for me, it's still fun to watch harden and westbrook face off, or to see if deandre jordan will ever make a free throw, or to see if the spurs can find their motion offense groove again, or watch what the best player on earth will do against a stacked team. you certainly have a different perspective, and that's fine too.

Or maybe you just enjoy seeing historic excellence at an athletic event. It's not clear to me what heinous crime the Warriors or the league have committed by allowing a team to exist that is really good. I'm not a big sports fan, but I thought the point was to be as good as you can at that sport. It would be one thing if there were behind the scenes inequalities unrelated to the athletic event itself, like one team spending way more money that everyone else, but as far as I can tell that's not the case here.

Go watch the Olympic Men's basketball team or the All-Star Game if you want "historic excellence"..

Having a team like this in the regular season is a joke and only serves the most base basketball fans.

I definitely don't understand that. I would consider Olympic Men's basketball more of a joke, since everyone knows that professional basketball in the USA is far and away a bigger deal than in other countries. It's completely stacked from a financial perspective, whereas (AFAIK) that's not the case with the Warriors.

So teams can only be stacked financially and not talent-wise?

It's only in the past 10 years or so that teams have really started utilizing the 3. Arguably the most sought-after NBA player these days is the 3-and-D (i.e. a player that can shoot accurate 3-poitners and also play defense).

Previous to that, the main school of thought was that driving to the basket was better, as there was a much higher chance of a favorable outcome (draw a foul, or make a basket). The school of thought now is that the expected value of attempting a 3 is higher (even though the odds of scoring are lower).

I have to bring hand-check up here again as a routine for this type of conversation. Now offensive players with the ball have more chances to face the basket and launching the shot just a more efficient option. Even the best guards in NBA were forced to protect the ball with their back outside 3-point line. GP was very fast and had top tier quickness (there are plenty of his clips on youtube). His back faced the basket a lot. If a player had to turn around first to face the basket, 3-pointers are less the best options.

Just try to provide another opinion on this. And I know there are endless conversations regarding this under many youtube clips.

It's all about what are allowed for the defenders to best contain the offensive space and what offensive players' best option is in this case.

it's not that driving is no longer valued, but that the elite players are so capable of driving and scoring that the dunk and 3 strategies work. watch any team incapable of penetrating a defense and they just won't have the room to score easily inside or far out.

but yah, 3-and-D is like the mantra of the warriors. curry got a whole lot better penetrating on the dribble this season and durant has always been a scoring machine going to the basket. that's on top of both being able to shoot and play good D. and they have 3-4 more who fit the 3-and-D mold.

its not even that. Its that teams score the 2 point shot, average around 80-110 points a game. a team comprised of 3 point shooters can max out at 120-130. The spread is much larger. So even though you have a more consistent team hitting 2's that could win games, they won't beat a 3 point shooting team unless they shoot cold.

This is my point; a 60% chance of making a 2 is equal in value to a 40% chance of making a 3, averaged over the 80+ shots you will take in a game. The top teams in the NBA are closer to 40% from beyond the arc then they are to 60% within it.

It's more of a show biz now. Its own ability of having one master player for a certain type can both benefit and cause damage to its business. Because master players of a certain type is not easy to find and once there comes one, the expectation for the same type would be pushed higher after the player left. Or customers would leave. So if there is a master player now, do business around him/her. After that, change the game and expect another master player in another type. More fans pay to see their hero in his/her prime.

It's not that new. There was a team in the 1980s called Showtime with some very masterful players. Free agency rules in the 90s actually made it easier for dominant players to switch teams. See Shaq.

What has happened is that players are basically bred from youth basketball leagues and they're healthier for longer, so you've got a number of skilled and freak athletes that can swing games. But those athletes have voluntarily chosen to form these superteams which are also a reflection of youth basketball culture.

The master player in one type I was talking about is someone like MJ. He pushed the expectation so high in both quantity (from data's point of view) and quality (all those master level moves only rooted from unreal fundamentals). There is basically zero chance to have someone better than him in the short and mid run. And the league had to change how the game is played to create space to expect another master player in another type. In this process, before the true master player emerges and matures, there is also some time for the fans to speculate who will be the master in each generation of players till that final one arrives. In short, better versions of a certain type of heroes keep coming and attracting more fans and pushing the expectation higher. It somewhat resets the product and let the new dynamics evolve so that it keeps the cashflow flow in strongly and can last for quite some time.

Of course, just my observation.

edit: added the product and dynamics analogy and corrected grammar.

Good points. My dad is a Bulls fan. I remember watching MJ but don't remember appreciating just how dominant he was.

It seems like today we've got a number of players who while not as well-rounded are dominant in the same ways. You've obviously got Lebron, Curry is a better shooter, Westbrook is a triple double machine, KD has size + offense, etc. The ceiling for skill seems very high now.

I wonder if we're gonna see some insanely athletic 7 footer which brings the game back towards the basket any time soon.

The three-point shot is nice, but they need to introduce the 4-point-shot that's made from behind the 1/2 court line.

Or the 5-point shot that goes in after bouncing off an opposing player.

Also, more replay reviews to catch flagrant floppers.

I originally thought of this as one could imagine "let's add a 64-point shot: for off the floor, off the scoreboard, off the bankboard... no rim", but then I found the remake and there was something more relevant and possibly interesting at play.

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McDonald's Commercial, Original, 1993: Michael Jordan & Larry Bird

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oACRt-Qp-s

"No dunking!" – Larry Bird @ 0m14s

The premise of the commercial is "nothing but net".

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McDonald's Commercial, Remake, 2010: LeBron James & Dwight Howard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmrTDZy3f2M

"No jump shots." – Dwight Howard @ 0m22s

The entire commercial became "nothing but dunking".

I remember playing in a local league and one of the opponents was a flopper extraordinairre. Every two minutes, almost like clockwork, he'd be on his arse sliding backwards. In the second half of the game I was puzzled because it'd been a few minutes since there'd been a flop... I looked around, and he was resting on the bench! Came back on at the next sub, and resumed flopping...

Besides computers, basketball was the other pillar of my young life. At 12yo I was 6'3" and was playing basketball approx 7 hours a day at the local recreation center mostly to get away from my verbally abusive parents.

By 14yo, I was playing, as a freshmen in high school, on the varsity team with the second highest scoring and rebounding averages on the team. My basketball career ended suddenly with a ACL knee injury the first practice of my senior year.

My quite tenuous claim-to-fame is I once scored, in high school, 32 points against 6'11" Will Perdue, whom eventually won a world title with the Chicago Bulls.[0]

Modern basketball analytics have discovered that there are only 2 good shots...a 3-pointer and a dunk. If you do the math, the added extra point for a "three" and the very high-percentage outcome of 2 points for a dunk make them the ideal scoring mechanisms.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Perdue

The biggest problem with the NBA these days is that so few players come into the league with solid fundamentals and skills. The rookie age limit that has spawned the whole era of one-and-done college players who bail after March for the draft is in some ways worse than when high schoolers could get drafted. Most of those guys are poorly served by the current system. Either they are ready at 18 (like LeBron or Kevin Garnet were), or they really need two or three or four years in a good college system to hone their game, get experience, and work in the weight room. Just look at how sad rookie of the year awards have been in the last few years.

> "And now the game is more inclusive than it ever has been."

This is a laughable claim. The average NBA player is at the 99.9th percentile in height. You can count using your fingers the number of NBA players who are 5'9 or shorter. Such extreme height disparities do not exist in other popular sports such as soccer. Perhaps the 3-pointer rule helped in some way, but it's ridiculous to pretend that professional basketball today is "inclusive".

The reason for this is of course defence. A short person can elevate quickly to block a shot but then they have to wait while gravity brings them back down. In the mean time they're helpless.

The NBA needs a longer, wider court. Players aren't just bigger than they were 30-50 years ago, they are also longer. Bigger courts would provide more open space for passing and fast breaks.

I wouldn't be surprised to see them add a 4 point shot.

tldr; dunking became a thing, the three point shot eventually balanced it out.

Color me disappointed.

All the way through that article I was waiting for the point of it and then it ended. What it's doing on the front page mystifies me.

I skimmed through it three times to try to understand what it tries to say and find the answer for the title. But I still feel lost. I was thinking my English reading was too poor (not my native language).

I think the unique article title is getting it more attention. Anyways good read for me.

We'll use that to make the title more modest above.

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