Where was Marion? I watched pretty much the whole game and I did not see him once. Was he hurt or something? just wondering.
Okay, let's agree that the "purpose" of a pick is to impede the defender in some way. That still does not give the defender the right to slam into the picker as hard as they can. Lowered shoulder or not, it is a serious risk of injury to both players, and something must be called. Even if the defender doesn't purposefully lower their shoulder, it is very possible that the picker gets knocked over by the defender. If that happens, it is suddenly the offense that is at a disadvantage, all because the defender was allowed to hit the picker as hard as possible whenever they didn't know it was there. If you let things like that go, it is exactly the kind of thing teams like the Jazz would exploit. This is not football. (And incidentally, I have been hit by my fair share of picks that I didn't know was there, and they do hurt. But I have also been the picker in that same situation, and unless you are MUCH bigger than the other guy, it usually hurts just as much) You didn't fully read my first post (or else missed the edit). I thought that the case in the US game should have been a no call. There really wasn't that much contact, but if there was any, it should have been Divac shooting FTs. My argument is the general case of the defender blowing through a pick because he didn't know it was there.
There's a grey area here, but for all sakes and purposes, this should have been a no call, and YES it absolutely makes a difference if the player running into the pick lowers their shoulder, elbows, or puts his hands on the picker. THAT would be a foul. Divac took very little contact, and Miller DID NOT slam into him, their legs got intertwined and Miller tripped. I did not happen to review it much, but the reason I said it could have been a foul on Divac, was because it looked to me like Divac stuck his left knee out as Miller glanced off of him. Merely running into a pick is not a foul on the defensive player. Guys run into hard picks all the time with no call. But when either the picker or the pickee make some sort of noticeable contact such as a forearm, a shove, put their hands on the other player, stick legs out, or anything like that...then a foul should be called. Miller was moving to his left, sliding his feet in a defensive stance and hit it blindly. I don't care how hard he hit it, that was NOT a foul on Andre Miller.
So if a defender literally runs through a pick, that is to say, if Miller had managed to knock Divac down, but made no noticeable contact, ie putting arms out, elbowing, lowering shoulder, then the play just continues? Does no one else think that this is just wee bit unfair for the picker? If they get knocked down, or injured, there is no punishment for the defending team, whose fault it is that it happened?! Does anyone have any quotes from an NBA rulebook to back up this assertion?
RUNNING THROUGH a pick and flattening the picker is quite a bit more blatant than sliding sideways to defend your man and glancing off of one. It would also assume either the pickee SAW the pick, or was running with his eyes closed. Could a guy Miller's size flatten a guy Divac's size (this is of course assuming Divac does not flop, as he is so accustomed to doing) by sliding sideways and defending his man? Doubtful. To run through a pick, as you say, would require some force. Plus, he didn't run through Divac at all. Shoulda been a no call.
When you guard someone one-on-one, and the offensive player moves with the ball, you don't run full speed one way. You stay in front of him by moving laterally. Because of this, it is pretty impossible to run train-like through a pick. As a defender, if you are not aware of the pick, you will slide laterally into the pick. The collision, while it may be significant, isn't like a trainwreck. If it is, then you know some intent was there to run full speed into a pick. Now off the ball is a different story, because you are running with the offensive player, not sliding. So that is when you usually see the bigger collisions. Again, if there is no lowering of the shoulder nor any intent on both parts, it should be a no call. The pick is serving its purpose. I've seen many hard clean picks set in the NBA where the defender was jarred rather severely, but were rightfully no calls. The injury risk is just part of the game I guess.
Once again, I am not talking about the call on in the US game. I have said several times that I thought it should have been a no call. But I do think it is a forseeable possibility that a person runs through a pick without knowing it was there. If they are running fast to keep up with their man, and no one calls out the pick, they could conceivably run into the picker pretty damn hard. I agree that sliding along a pick should not be a foul. I am talking about the extreme case (and again, this wouldn't really happen very often) of a defender plowing through a picker that he simply did not know was there.
