In basketball, players need to be good in most departments. Regardless if it is the NBA or some other league, there will be poor and good free throw shooters.
Hack-a-Shaq, a tactic made famous on retired NBA player Shaquille O' Neal due to his poor free throw shooting, is something that teams turn to when they want to somehow frustrate opposing teams who have players who are poor free throw shooters.
To date, players like Dwight Howard of the Houston Rockets and DeAndre Jordan of the Los Angeles Clippers have fallen prey since they don't necessarily have the high percentage when sent to the charity stripe. The immediate solution is to of course get them to practice more but if this move by NBA Commissioner Adam Silver prospers, poor free throw shooters and their teams could get a big lift.
This is in reference to the rumored plan to ban the Hack-a-Shaq technique which according to Silver takes out the quality of the game, particularly during crunch time.
Filed to ESPN: Adam Silver told me pregame that NBA will have "full-throated conversations" this summer regarding rules to ban Hack-a-Shaq.
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) April 24, 2015 " data-caption="null" data-credit="null">The idea does seem sound since it does take out that dirty angle when you talk about teams trying to build leads or overhaul them at certain points of the game. However one has to think, would the move help out players who really need to improve on their free throw shooting? More so, how does this impact young and aspiring players who are poor in this department?
From the NBA perspective, the move would benefit the NBA in terms of game quality. But the thing is, the problem surrounding poor free throw shooting should be left at the hands of the teams with players who are poor free throw shooters and not the league.
Banning the move may not necessarily be wisest of solutions although the NBA could probably work around it. Fines would be an idea but that would somehow carry a money-making side to it which may draw criticism.
There are a lot of alternatives to discourage teams from resorting to the tactic and banning it directly may not necessarily be the right route when it comes to committing an intentional foul on poor free throw shooters.
Understandably, the NBA wants to make the game better. But touching a topic which should be the problem of NBA teams seem to be a bit overdoing it.
Free throw shooting can be improved and is a task NBA teams should be doing, not the NBA itself.
