Last week, we shared the story of the Houston Rockets fouling Detroit Pistons center Andre Drummond 12 straight times to start the second half.
Well, on Wednesday night against the Spurs in San Antonio, the Rockets found themselves on the receiving end of the “Hack-A-_” strategy, in another ridiculous way.
Watch the Spurs foul the Rockets’ Clint Capela WHILE HE IS STANDING OUT OF BOUNDS in preparation of an inbounds pass:
That’s correct, Jeff Van Gundy. Intentionally fouling someone out of bounds because he sucks at shooting free-throws is not basketball.
— Rich Eisen (@richeisen) January 28, 2016
I’m with JVG. In 42 years of playing and coaching, I have never seen the inbounder being fouled. — david b. thorpe (@coachthorpe) January 28, 2016
Don’t want to comment specifically on the Capela foul since I wasn’t watching but in general fouling an inbounder should be delay of game.
— Kevin Pelton (@kpelton) January 28, 2016
Count me in as someone that watches a ton of NBA basketball and has never seen this before… and don’t think this is supposed to be allowed (it certainly shouldn’t be allowed, at least). Like Kevin Pelton, I assumed this was delay of game/a technical foul.
Either way, this is really taking the “Hack-A_” strategy to another level, and the whole thing is a flat-out circus now. Perhaps Gregg Popovich just wanted to expose how big of a joke it all is — and how the NBA needs to make some rule changes preventing the intentional fouling — with the game on national television. Let’s hope the NBA decides to make changes here as the strategy is becoming way too common and the implementation of it much more brash.
