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What is the main goal of the game to you?

What is the main goal of the game of basketball for you?


  • Total voters
    16

addictionary

Well-Known Member
What is the main goal of the game of basketball for your point of view?

Is it trying to stop the opposition from scoring?

Or is it scoring more than the opposition whatever they do.

No "both"s in this one. Make up your loving minds.
 
Well, as much as I love and appreciate defense, you can never hold your opponent to ZERO so if you can only have one you need to be able to score in order to win.
 
?The first choice involves both offense and defense ("score more"), the second only defense. Obviously the first is better.
 
The goal of the game, and most any sport in which a 0-0 tie is not allowed, is to outscore your opponent. Pretty straight-forward. It seems to me you are really asking what people think is the better strategy to use to outscore their opponent, and that is the age-old debate. Is strong defense better than strong offense or vice versa? What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?
 
The goal of the game, and most any sport in which a 0-0 tie is not allowed, is to outscore your opponent. Pretty straight-forward. It seems to me you are really asking what people think is the better strategy to use to outscore their opponent, and that is the age-old debate. Is strong defense better than strong offense or vice versa? What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?

Great comprehension Log thanks for ripping this one's spine out. I'd be happier if you guys stepped one little foot further about the age-old issue and choose which option defines the game for you.
 
Great comprehension Log thanks for ripping this one's spine out. I'd be happier if you guys stepped one little foot further about the age-old issue and choose which option defines the game for you.

Neither. Offense-only teams (such as the All-Star game) would be boring affairs on a regular basis, and defense-only teams are equally dull. The game is defined in the conflict between offense and defense; the soul of the game is conflict.
 
Great comprehension Log thanks for ripping this one's spine out. I'd be happier if you guys stepped one little foot further about the age-old issue and choose which option defines the game for you.

It has to be a combination. We have seen it all over the place in the history of the NBA. Why is there a shot clock, or rules about the "time line", or "over and back" once in the half court set? These came about due to one team's attempt to dominate "time with the ball" to minimize their opponent's ability to score. This was an effective way to stop the opponent from scoring and so was used a lot, therefore they made rules to stop this practice, in order to make the game more enjoyable. We have seen "high-octane" offenses, with little defense played, and these systems have seen moderate success. I am sure someone somewhere has done a statistical analysis of this exact topic, as it would lend itself to such statistical analysis very well.

I think, though, that in the end you would find that most teams or systems that win consistently would have a combination of highly efficient offensive AND defensive schemes. Think of the Jazz and Bulls teams of the 90's. Both were consistently ranked as among the top half of the league in both offensive and defensive efficiency. I think that a tactic of all of one or all of the other may yield results on a short-term basis, but for lasting success it would have to be a combination. Sure, a team may be much stronger offensively than defensively, or vice versa, but I would highly doubt you are going to find many championship teams that ranked among the top 5 in offense, and at the same time the bottom 5 in defense, or vice versa. I think in recent memory the team that fit this mold more than others was Billup's Pistons, who iirc were consistently in the top 3 teams in defensive efficiency, but usually middle of the pack offensively, yet still far from an offensive bottom-dweller, so to speak.


Most rule changes, incidentally, have been geared toward fans more than players, if you think about it. If the game is deemed "too slow", we institute a shot-clock to speed it up. If it is deemed to be too "rough" or too low-scoring, we institute new rules about hand-checking and make it harder to defend to increase scoring or fluidity since defense tends to stifle the flow of the game. But who is doing the "deeming"? It is the fans, or at least the NBA's interpretation of what they think the fans want the "product" of their business to be. If the game were kept in its purest form, without meddling by fickle fans, we would still have teams that spend upwards of a minute for any given possession and games that ended with scores regularly in the mid-70's for both teams.
 
The goal of the game is always to score. I too appreciate a tight defense, but that's what a good wing man and Booze are for. I never minded being the one bouncing only to set up a an assist either, since that way your bros don't hate when you steal one away from them.

Also, what Log was getting at, loose spreads are a blast to play in, but tight spreads are always the most appreciated victories.
 
Even though I appreciate D more, I think scoring more is more discriminative for winning. But practically no offense can survive without decent D.

I post therefore I am...
 
I voted for the bad option

The attendance to this poll was insane! I remember the site crashing down for a whole week and losing a lot of Heaven Harris franchise money.

I screwed myself by commenting towards the opposite of the choice I've voted for. Well, thoughts evolve.
 
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