FanPost

moving screens

This is something that has been on my mind for a while that I was reminded about during last night's game. While it seems many of you think Okafor's screen was perfectly clean you can clearly see him turn his right shoulder into Wallace, the shoulder that hit Gerald's face.

This brings up a huge gray area in the way screens are called in the NBA. If that pick had happened in a high school game it probably would have been a foul, but the NBA lets people get away with movement on screens. It seems like every screen in the NBA allows their teammate to go by and then slides a step or two up to block the defender and contact is often made with the person setting the pick moving sideways (if I was a more accomplished blazersedge-er this is where I would add the video links to prove my point). This is not a dangerous play and I can see why the officials don't call it a moving screen, but the problem is it sets up a gray area and changes the rule from if the offensive player is moving it is a foul, to if the offensive player is moving too much it is a foul. This makes it much harder to call the more violent moving screens fouls because the refs must remain consistent in their calls. The problem is it doesn't take a lot of movement to lay a hard blow on someone, especially when we are talking about professional athletes, as evidenced last night.

I think it would be nice to see the NBA crack down on moving screens, not because taking a step to the side to add a little length to your screen is dangerous and a total disregard to not only basketball but all that is good in the world, but because it would make it easier to call harder more violent moving screens. As I said, this isn't just a reaction to last night, but something I've noticed for a while. What do you all think?

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