lefty
11-08-2008, 02:11 AM
For shooters, home is where the bounce is
By Rick Schwartz, Yahoo! Sports
Nov 6, 2:16 pm EST
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Two hundred fifty-one NBA games were decided by four points or less last season, lending some credence to the league’s long-held cliché: One or two good or bad bounces of the ball can make a huge difference in who wins and loses – and even who makes the playoffs.
The NBA takes great pains to ensure its official basketballs carom off its official rims in similar fashion, whether a shot is taken in Los Angeles or Boston, Oklahoma City or Orlando. But do all NBA rims, which have been manufactured by Gared Sports for the past 25 years, react exactly alike?
Depends on who’s answering the question. Ask the league and you’ll hear a resounding yes. Ask some players and…not so much.
“I think it’s hard for two rims to be alike everywhere,” said Utah Jazz point guard Deron Williams. “Some are dunked on more than others, some have more jump shots than others.
“They’re just like cars. All models don’t break down at the exact same time even though it’s the same parts in each car.”
That’s not the impression the NBA wants its players and fans to have. Former Jazz forward Scott Padgett once said the team purposely overinflated its game balls to make it more difficult to hit jump shots. While Utah’s offense was predicated on backdoor cuts and layups, Padgett claimed opponents typically had to rely on perimeter shots. Jazz officials, noting that Jeff Hornacek and John Stockton had become accomplished long-range shooters using the same balls, laughed off the accusation.
While true that visitors and hosts compete on the same baskets, all 18 inches in diameter, the prevailing wisdom remains – the home team is accustomed to its own bounce. So if the feel differs from city to city, it’s a perceived disadvantage to the visitors.
Christopher Arena, the NBA’s vice president of apparel and sporting goods, said every rim is thoroughly tested and measured. A contractor named Drew Sorensen travels to all 30 NBA arenas in the preseason to set each rim. Sorensen uses something called the ERTG Rim Tester, which measures the “rim flex,” a computation based on energy absorption. A weight is dropped from each rim and a tiny microprocessor calculates the flex. The higher the rim-flex number, the softer the bounce, and the more likely your shot will roll in when maybe it shouldn’t have.
Each NBA team is required to buy new rims at the outset of every season – new backboards must be purchased every five seasons – and the league mandates a rim-flex reading of 20 to 35. Once Sorensen signs off on the measurements, he theoretically locks that number in place for the season by placing pieces of tape over the brackets that connect the rim to the backboard brace. Those pieces of tape each have a seal with holographic imagery. If a visiting team were to complain about the flex, the NBA can “go to the tape” to discover whether the rim has been illegally altered.
Sorensen returns to each arena once during the regular season, once during each playoff round and then resets the rims for every NBA Finals game.
Sounds fairly foolproof, but it doesn’t explain why our small sampling of NBA players believes rims feel different in different arenas.
Raja Bell, resident marksman of the Phoenix Suns, said today’s NBA rims are “the same (in) that they are the same dimensions. But act the same and give the same? No.”
“They’re supposed to be the same,” Jazz guard Kyle Korver added, “but they’re not.”
NBA rims are set at 200 pounds of pressure. That means the rim will snap back to its original position with 200 pounds hanging on it. Whether repeated beatings from guys like Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard affect the bolts and how tightly they’re attached is anyone’s guess.
Just by virtue of the fact that Sorensen returns to check them out, one could surmise that at some point, the rim-flex numbers change naturally. Or that teams would have an interest in manipulating the numbers.
It’s not exactly Notre Dame growing its football turf high enough for Knute Rockne to smell in the heavens, but the NBA knows it really can be a competitive advantage.
Rim-flex issues can occasionally, but rarely, work against the home team. Last January, Tracy McGrady of the Houston Rockets complained that the rims in his home arena, the Toyota Center, were too tight. McGrady shot 43 percent on the road but only 40 percent at home. His 3-point percentage was not great on the road (32.7 percent), but he was a much-worse 25.7 percent at home. Free throws? Also better on the road (71.4 percent) than at home (63.4 percent).
The Rockets’ overall stats, however, didn’t entirely support McGrady’s claim. Only the team’s free-throw percentage was worse at home than on the road.
Interestingly, college basketball is a completely different game when it comes to standardized rims. Schools buy from different suppliers. Each institution functions within conference rules, and most conferences set the rim-flex range between 35 and 50.
That means that, depending on the school, college players could be shooting on rims up to 150 percent softer than what they’ll see in the NBA. Ever wonder why some shooters don’t transition well? Better defenders are obviously the biggest factor, but some players also could need time to adjust to tighter rims. That’s one reason for teams to bring in college prospects for a home workout before the draft.
Los Angeles Lakers big man Pau Gasol doesn’t see the inconsistencies in the rims which some other players see. The biggest difference in arenas, Gasol said, is the court. The league allows teams to use multiple suppliers for its hardwood floors, and the batches can feel very different.
“At the end of the day, there are little things in arenas that favor the home teams because of their familiarity with them,” Gasol said. “But, in general, usually the better team wins.”
A favorable bounce or two also doesn’t hurt.
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By Rick Schwartz, Yahoo! Sports
Nov 6, 2:16 pm EST
Buzz Up
Related Video
NBA award predictions
NBA award predictions
East predictions
West predictions
NBA Finals predictions
More NBA Videos
Two hundred fifty-one NBA games were decided by four points or less last season, lending some credence to the league’s long-held cliché: One or two good or bad bounces of the ball can make a huge difference in who wins and loses – and even who makes the playoffs.
The NBA takes great pains to ensure its official basketballs carom off its official rims in similar fashion, whether a shot is taken in Los Angeles or Boston, Oklahoma City or Orlando. But do all NBA rims, which have been manufactured by Gared Sports for the past 25 years, react exactly alike?
Depends on who’s answering the question. Ask the league and you’ll hear a resounding yes. Ask some players and…not so much.
“I think it’s hard for two rims to be alike everywhere,” said Utah Jazz point guard Deron Williams. “Some are dunked on more than others, some have more jump shots than others.
“They’re just like cars. All models don’t break down at the exact same time even though it’s the same parts in each car.”
That’s not the impression the NBA wants its players and fans to have. Former Jazz forward Scott Padgett once said the team purposely overinflated its game balls to make it more difficult to hit jump shots. While Utah’s offense was predicated on backdoor cuts and layups, Padgett claimed opponents typically had to rely on perimeter shots. Jazz officials, noting that Jeff Hornacek and John Stockton had become accomplished long-range shooters using the same balls, laughed off the accusation.
While true that visitors and hosts compete on the same baskets, all 18 inches in diameter, the prevailing wisdom remains – the home team is accustomed to its own bounce. So if the feel differs from city to city, it’s a perceived disadvantage to the visitors.
Christopher Arena, the NBA’s vice president of apparel and sporting goods, said every rim is thoroughly tested and measured. A contractor named Drew Sorensen travels to all 30 NBA arenas in the preseason to set each rim. Sorensen uses something called the ERTG Rim Tester, which measures the “rim flex,” a computation based on energy absorption. A weight is dropped from each rim and a tiny microprocessor calculates the flex. The higher the rim-flex number, the softer the bounce, and the more likely your shot will roll in when maybe it shouldn’t have.
Each NBA team is required to buy new rims at the outset of every season – new backboards must be purchased every five seasons – and the league mandates a rim-flex reading of 20 to 35. Once Sorensen signs off on the measurements, he theoretically locks that number in place for the season by placing pieces of tape over the brackets that connect the rim to the backboard brace. Those pieces of tape each have a seal with holographic imagery. If a visiting team were to complain about the flex, the NBA can “go to the tape” to discover whether the rim has been illegally altered.
Sorensen returns to each arena once during the regular season, once during each playoff round and then resets the rims for every NBA Finals game.
Sounds fairly foolproof, but it doesn’t explain why our small sampling of NBA players believes rims feel different in different arenas.
Raja Bell, resident marksman of the Phoenix Suns, said today’s NBA rims are “the same (in) that they are the same dimensions. But act the same and give the same? No.”
“They’re supposed to be the same,” Jazz guard Kyle Korver added, “but they’re not.”
NBA rims are set at 200 pounds of pressure. That means the rim will snap back to its original position with 200 pounds hanging on it. Whether repeated beatings from guys like Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard affect the bolts and how tightly they’re attached is anyone’s guess.
Just by virtue of the fact that Sorensen returns to check them out, one could surmise that at some point, the rim-flex numbers change naturally. Or that teams would have an interest in manipulating the numbers.
It’s not exactly Notre Dame growing its football turf high enough for Knute Rockne to smell in the heavens, but the NBA knows it really can be a competitive advantage.
Rim-flex issues can occasionally, but rarely, work against the home team. Last January, Tracy McGrady of the Houston Rockets complained that the rims in his home arena, the Toyota Center, were too tight. McGrady shot 43 percent on the road but only 40 percent at home. His 3-point percentage was not great on the road (32.7 percent), but he was a much-worse 25.7 percent at home. Free throws? Also better on the road (71.4 percent) than at home (63.4 percent).
The Rockets’ overall stats, however, didn’t entirely support McGrady’s claim. Only the team’s free-throw percentage was worse at home than on the road.
Interestingly, college basketball is a completely different game when it comes to standardized rims. Schools buy from different suppliers. Each institution functions within conference rules, and most conferences set the rim-flex range between 35 and 50.
That means that, depending on the school, college players could be shooting on rims up to 150 percent softer than what they’ll see in the NBA. Ever wonder why some shooters don’t transition well? Better defenders are obviously the biggest factor, but some players also could need time to adjust to tighter rims. That’s one reason for teams to bring in college prospects for a home workout before the draft.
Los Angeles Lakers big man Pau Gasol doesn’t see the inconsistencies in the rims which some other players see. The biggest difference in arenas, Gasol said, is the court. The league allows teams to use multiple suppliers for its hardwood floors, and the batches can feel very different.
“At the end of the day, there are little things in arenas that favor the home teams because of their familiarity with them,” Gasol said. “But, in general, usually the better team wins.”
A favorable bounce or two also doesn’t hurt.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=ys-nbarims110608&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/us/sp/ed/nav08/yahoo_logo_ca.gif