How new NBA rule changes help the Warriors and offensive flow
Kevin Pelton ESPN PLUS ($ MATERIAL)
Having won three of the past four NBA championships and lost the other NBA Finals in Game 7, the Golden State Warriors didn't need much help as they go for a third title in a row. But the NBA's emphasis this season on cracking down on off-ball contact could benefit the Warriors anyway.
When the league rolled out its points of education video in September, the most notable change to how referees will be instructed to call games came in terms of what the NBA calls "freedom of movement," specifically away from the ball.
As officials during the preseason whistled fouls for grabbing and holding that previously went unpenalized, the potential impact of the change has come into view. If players and teams adjust to a less physical style, the emphasis on freedom of movement could have an effect similar to how a crackdown on perimeter hand-checking helped set the table for the faster-paced, pick-and-roll-heavy style of play that has dominated the NBA over the past decade and a half -- except this time favoring teams such as Golden State that don't rely on the pick-and-roll.
How should we expect players and teams to react? Who besides the Warriors might benefit from or be hurt by that change? Let's analyze the importance of freedom of movement. Referees "letting too much go"
When Monty McCutchen retired from working games and moved into the league office in December, the NBA's new vice president and head of referee development and training found the league's competition committee -- made up of representatives from ownership, GMs and coaches, as well as non-voting referee members -- already engaged in discussions about the level of grabbing and holding being allowed away from the ball.
"We were letting too much go," McCutchen said. "There's no doubt about that."
The Utah Jazz in particular had taken up the cause of freedom of movement. In April 2017, Jazz GM Dennis Lindsey went on the Woj Pod with ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowskiand lamented the degree to which that contact impeded Utah's motion-based offense, which ranked second in passes per possession during the 2016-17 season, according to Second Spectrum tracking.
The NBA solicits feedback on refereeing in a variety of manners, including a program through which coaches can text their thoughts the day after a game.
"Through those various points of contact," McCutchen said, "we realized that there was a consensus, if you will, that this is an area of our game that has slipped. It's funny that we get all this feedback from a wide range of people, and it's all saying similar things: that the game has gotten too physical, that there's too much clutching and grabbing, there's too much wrapping.
"Then we go and look at games from the late '90s, in which some of the most physical players of our history of our game are playing with their feet, and they're doing the things that we see that are in our rulebook. And we realized that good, strong, physical players of previous generations weren't doing this holding, clutching and grabbing to the level that we see now. That's a pretty good indicator that we need to tighten up." Preseason adjustment period
After rolling out freedom of movement as a point of education to referees at their annual preseason training camp, the NBA began the process of enforcing the rulebook during preseason. The result has been a surge in the number of whistles.
Through Monday, exhibition games were averaging 25.1 fouls per 100 possessions, up from 21.2 during the 2017-18 preseason. It's clear from the numbers that off-ball fouls explain that increase. So far, 64 percent of called fouls have been of the non-shooting variety, compared to 54 percent during the 2017-18 NBA regular season, according to Second Spectrum tracking.
The foul rate so far is the highest since the lockout-shortened 2011-12 preseason, in which teams were called for 25.9 fouls per 100 possessions. Since then, foul rates have been dropping in both exhibition play and the regular season. Although the rate of whistles for fouls tends to decline from preseason to the subsequent regular season, preseason foul rates generally predict those in the regular season -- a trend that would suggest fouls will stay up once the regular season begins.
McCutchen hopes to avoid that as players and teams adjust to the freedom of movement initiative, creating better flow to the game.
"I think the idea is, if we're consistent and the players adjust, the flow will return, but not only will it return, it will return to a better, more free-flowing game," he said. "Flow is to be interpreted two ways. One, right now, I think it's being interpreted as an interruption by our whistle. But the second definition of flow is, are people running with a flow to the game that is aesthetically pleasing and actually adheres to our rulebooks?
"We think that we're going to get two definitions of flow in the process once the players make this adjustment. Not only will we have fewer whistles because the players have adjusted, but the game itself will have a better flow from the lack of the clutching and grabbing and holding and physicality in the post that we've seen creep in."
Coaches expect something similar.
"I think anytime you have a major shift in points of emphasis, it starts in the preseason, and players adjust, coaches adjust, and eventually I think it turns out for the best," Portland Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts said. "I come back to the early- to mid-'90s, when they were trying to clean up hand checks. The whistles were ridiculous in the preseason, and the players adjusted."
"I think the players are going to adjust," the Jazz's Quin Snyder said. "All of us are going to have a little angst at certain times as you get used to it. There will probably be something really reasonable that gets adjudicated over time as we figure it out."
As McCutchen pointed out, that adjustment already seems to be happening. In the first week of preseason play, there was an average of 37.1 non-shooting fouls per game, including an incredible 57 during the Knicks-Wizards game on Oct. 1 that featured three technical fouls and the ejection of Washington forward Markieff Morris. Since then, the average has dropped to 32.1 non-shooting fouls per game, more in line with past seasons.
The cynical perspective might be that referees will go back to their usual lax treatment of off-ball contact when the regular season begins or by the playoffs, when the game typically becomes more physical. McCutchen sees it as his department's responsibility to prevent that from happening. In a first, the league plans monthly updates on its points of education -- which include "respect for the game" between players and officials, as well as traveling -- highlighting correct calls and pointing out where referees need to step up their enforcement.
"If the same acts occur in March, April, May, June, we want them called," McCutchen said. "This is how the game should look, and this is how it should be adjudicated. Our role in that is to enforce it with the will of the rulebook."
Impact of freedom of movement
If referees continue calling the game as instructed, it should benefit teams that already have offenses heavy on player movement away from the ball. When ESPN analyst Jeff Van Gundy was asked which teams that means, he didn't hesitate.
"It's all about the Warriors," Van Gundy said. "Any team like that, that tries to play like that and has the skill, obviously, is going to be rewarded. The NBA doesn't necessarily favor a team, I don't think, but they favor a style. They're almost forcing your hand roster-wise."
Under Steve Kerr, Golden State has featured relatively little of the pick-and-roll basketball that dominates most NBA offenses. Per Second Spectrum tracking, the Warriors averaged less than half an on-ball screen per possession during the 2017-18 regular season (45.1 per 100 possessions). Only the Philadelphia 76ers (41.5) set fewer on-ball screens per possession. Instead, the Warriors prefer to keep players moving around off-ball screens. They set more than twice as many of those last season (93.4 per 100 possessions), a rate that ranked fifth in the league.
It's no coincidence that Golden State's Klay Thompson and Philadelphia's J.J. Redick were among the top five individual players in off-ball screens received, according to Second Spectrum. It's interesting to note that both have excelled in the preseason. Thompson is scoring more than a point per minute (23.5 ppg in 21.6 mpg), while Redick is averaging 27.1 points per 36 minutes.
Although both players have benefited from unsustainably hot 3-point shooting (64 percent for Thompson and 57 percent for Redick, who went 7-of-7 from 3 against the Dallas Mavericks last week in China), the other leaders in 2017-18 off-ball screens have succeeded without the same kind of small-sample shooting. Paul George is leading the league in scoring in the preseason (just ahead of Thompson), Bradley Beal is averaging 25.0 points per 36 minutes, and CJ McCollum is making 75 percent of his 2-point attempts.
The freedom of movement emphasis extends to post play, in which the NBA wants to eliminate players wrapping their arms around opponents or dislodging them from position. That could have an important impact on switching defenses, which often ask their guards to defend far bigger opponents in the post by any means necessary.
"It will be good for the game because it just opens up so many more options for attacking switching," Boston Celtics coach Brad Stevens told Jared Weiss of The Athletic Boston. "Because at the end of the day, you're going to see a lot of that."
At best, more freedom of movement should incentivize teams to eschew the isolation-heavy offense we saw against switches during the 2018 conference finals in favor of a more free-flowing style that involves all five players.
"I think players will figure out what they can and can't do," Stotts said. "Once they figure that out, then they'll figure out other ways to be effective defensively. Offensively, I think hopefully you'll see more movement, and I think that's good for the game."
That's all well & good, but we all know once the playoffs arrive it will be holding & grabbing as always.
I have no patience with NBA refs. They readily admit that there's no consistency from one game to the next ...that the players have to adjust to how it's being called. That even mid-game the way the game is called can change just because it gets a bit heated. Really! Got to be the only sport where the rules change in-play.
What they allow Dray Green to get away with also is disgusting.
oh here we go, losing bets already because of some rub against a player who doesn't even have the ball and isn't being passed to.
from what this describes there can be bumps and flops 25 ft away from the ball and they call a foul that changes the score.
think I'll skip straight to NCAA this year.
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How New NBA Rule Changes Help The Warriors
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