In N.B.A., All-Star Acting Is Part of Game

TheDreamShake · Nov 19, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/sports/basketball/19shout.html?_r=1&ref=sports

To the crack of the bat, the cadence of the quarterback and the thwack of a tennis racket, add a new element to America’s sports soundtrack — the shrieks, cries and shouts of N.B.A. players as they try to put the ball in the basket.

In part, the emoting is designed to deceive, with players trying to persuade referees they were fouled in the act of shooting, even if they were not. It is hardly a new tactic, but it has become a more popular one and is now as much a sound of the game as the squeaking of sneakers.

“Anytime anybody goes to a hoop, they yell or scream,” said Bernie Fryer, who has seen it all, and now heard it all, as a former N.B.A. player and referee who now oversees league officiating. “You hear it all the time. It’s kind of like a tennis player who grunts every time he hits the ball.”

Players will sometimes cry out when they are taking jump shots far from the basket, but the sound effects are more prevalent when they drive to the rim. Many of the game’s biggest stars — including LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade — shout as they near the basket, even if the little bit of physical contact they draw from an opponent hardly merits such a response.

“I guess once word got out that more often than not, you make a noise going to the basket, you’ll get a foul call, it just became second nature for a lot of guys,” said the Knicks’ Malik Rose, a veteran forward in his 13th year, who cited Bryant, Vince Carter and Allen Iverson as trendsetters.

“Ever since I’ve been in the league, I’ve seen guys trying to bring attention to the fouls they’re getting,” said Jamal Crawford, who is the Knicks’ town crier and remembers his skepticism when he first encountered Iverson’s dramatizing.

“I was like, You’re not getting fouled like that,” Crawford said. “But he’s so little, he really is getting pushed around.”

To some extent, the cries of anguish are akin to the over-the-top acting in international soccer, where players writhe on the ground in agony, hoping to draw a foul on the other team, only to pop up and start running at full speed once the referee delivers his verdict.

Although the cries in the N.B.A. might not have been as frequent when Atlanta Hawks Coach Mike Woodson played in the league from 1980 to 1991, he said they definitely existed.

“It’s just a part of the game to try and get the call,” he said. “You are trying to sell what you’re doing. When you go to the hole and you think you’re getting hit, the first thing you do is flail or yell. And sometimes they get the call and sometimes they don’t.”

Mike Brown, the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers, said: “It’s what I like to call acting. There is a lot of acting going on.”

He suggested, somewhat tongue in cheek, that players might simply be emulating one of their own, guard Ray Allen of the Boston Celtics, who had a starring role in the Spike Lee movie “He Got Game.”

Allan Houston, a former Knicks guard who now works as a team executive, said he had witnessed more than just an uptick in the noise volume in recent years. Not that he thinks much of the trend.

“My thing is, if you go in there strong and you’re going to get hit, the ref is going to see it,” said Houston, who as a player made his mark as an outside shooter rather than someone who drove to the basket.

“I think a lot of times guys are just trying to draw a little bit more of an awareness to the contact,” Houston said. “But the bottom line is, if you’re going to get hit, most of the time, it’s going to get called. The referees are human, but they’re good. They’re going to see if you get hit. I don’t think that yell is going to make that much of a difference.”

Fryer said he agreed.

“You pay no attention to it,” Fryer said, speaking on behalf of his referees. “So many players are doing it now.”

“It’s almost like a flop,” he added, in reference to an old tactic in which players fall flat on their backs in a bid to get a foul called on the player they were guarding. “The officials have gotten so used to it that it has no effect on what they’re going to call.”

But plenty of players seem to believe that the screams work. For them, it is an N.B.A. axiom: yelling is the result of contact, and contact results in a foul call.

“It definitely does,” said Hawks guard Joe Johnson when asked whether it was worth it to scream on the way to the basket. “If you yell, they may give you a call.”

When asked about the tactic, Carter said with a smile: “For me, it’s good, but if the guy I’m guarding does it, it’s bad. That’s just the way it is. It makes it tough for the referees to decipher what is what, if a guy got hit hard because he’s yelling or not.”

“It sells,” Carter said.

One of Carter’s teammates, point guard Keyon Dooling, is in the group that says that the success of the ploy depends on the player’s pedigree.

“It used to be to show that you were being aggressive,” Dooling said. “Now, it’s more so that you can get a foul. If you’re a good player and you yell, that’ll get you a whistle. But if you’re an average player, you need to pick your body up and get back on defense.”
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MayoRocket · Nov 19, 2008

I'm glad we don't have any players like that.

rocketman1979 · Nov 19, 2008

LOL

slowmustang · Nov 19, 2008

TMac and Rafer do that every single time they are in the lane. TMac gives the long painful "argh" while Rafer does a "eh!" when they drive in.

roslolian · Nov 19, 2008

slowmustang said:

TMac and Rafer do that every single time they are in the lane. TMac gives the long painful "argh" while Rafer does a "eh!" when they drive in.
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Rafer drives in?

MisterPink · Nov 19, 2008

I do notice Mac yelling on every single drive. He makes it sound so painful, too.

JuanValdez · Nov 20, 2008

McGrady's yelling because his knee and back are giving out on him, not because anyone has hit him.

It's funny, as soon as I saw N.B.A. in the thread title, I knew it was an article in the NY Times. Are they the only publication that writes NBA like that?

rn_xw · Nov 20, 2008

MisterPink said:

I do notice Mac yelling on every single drive. He makes it sound so painful, too.
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probably picked that up from Oakley..

EssTooKayTD · Nov 20, 2008

I think it was someone here saying it sounds like a sheep everytime Tracy goes to the basket. That made me laugh.

ima_drummer2k · Nov 20, 2008

JuanValdez said:

McGrady's yelling because his knee and back are giving out on him, not because anyone has hit him.
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Well, in his defense, you can hear him doing it more at home games because it's usually the only noise coming from the arena...

Shaud · Nov 20, 2008

When T-mac does it he probably really is hurting.

Christopher · Nov 20, 2008

Shaud said:

When T-mac does it he probably really is hurting.
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You'd yell too if you were match of biscuits!

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In N.B.A., All-Star Acting Is Part of Game

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