BuzzerBeater Forums

Hello you all !
I hope you enjoy the game and wish you all the best for the beginning season.

Let's make myself clear, I'm not complaining (I know... This must be like the 200th time you read this :p). I'm just trying to help. I came across some bizarre situation, no major bug but some people might find it a bit annoying. Or is it that someone can come up with a well put explanation ?

My first season league game : (8581346)

4th Q - 1'19 to go. We are 3 pts behind. They have possession.
1'17 - My C, a very bright man, fouls. This my 2nd team foul.
My coach decides it is my back up PF glorious moment. And my back up PF is up to it ang gets into court.
1'13 - Job done ! My sub PF recorded two consecutive fouls, making it my 3rd and 4th team foul. He now walks towards the bench with a straight head.

Let's pause a second. I'm not arguing with or about my coach. I trust him. It is a tough decision to make and you have to do it on a rush. It is foul time ! Ok, fair enough ! So, let's go and kick that bunch of evil... opponents.

1'13 to go. We are still 3 pts behind. They still have possession.
I'm expecting my team to foul and send them to the line. Clock runs. Seconds pass. Seconds pass. Tick tick...

00'52 to go. They have a clear shot. They score.
TIME OUT !
My coach is cool-tempered. He carries on with the sweet talk.
"Hey boys, look at your PF buddy ! He has just made an embarrass... He has just made us proud for his fouling skills. You know why, the sacrifice and everything ? So that YOU can stay out of foul trouble AND send them to the line to regain possession quickly. So foul them ! Do this ! And win this game ! For your PF buddy ! (See the story in disguise :p)

00'52 to go. We are 5 pts behind. We have possession.
00'47 Somehow, the opponent team manages to steal us the ball. Bah...
00'45 My 5th team foul. It takes my experience-strong 33 yo player to get it right.
They score 1 out of 2 FTs.
00'45 to go. We are 6 pts behind. We have possession.
00'36 to go. We score from the 3pt line. We sc... Did we ? We scored from the... COME ON ! GO YOU !
At this point, we are 3 pts behind, they have possession.
I'm expecting my team to foul and send them to the line. Clock runs. Seconds pass. Seconds pass. Tick tick... Didnt' I write this already ?
00'28 to go. They have a clear shot. They miss.
TIME OUT !
My coach is cool-tempered or maybe not so... No more sweet talk. I won't transcribe it again. The players had what they deserved. They received a hell of a b*ll*cking ! Eventually it ended by foul them for the life of me or something...

We managed to get our way to OT and lost. But this is not the point, I expected it to be a close game, I made some mistakes that I acknowledge and that might have cost me the game. I am happy with that. It was a terrific game. I jumped and screamed all along. Well almost :)

Now coming back to the point. What was this ? Obviously, by committing 3 personal fouls in 4 seconds space time and pushing our team foul from 1 to 4, the clear plan was to continue the fouling. I feel like it needs some tuning. Or I will gracefully read a kind explanation. Is it a feature ? I mean, is the GE so refined that in front of an especially quick and agile team, it makes the fouling difficult ? Like we can't catch up with them, hide and seek style :) ? Is there something that could refrain my players from fouling in fear of committing a flagrant foul ? I can't come up with a satisfying explanation myself. From my experience, in real basket-ball, failing to record a foul is a very rare occurence, I might be wrong.
Please share your thoughts.
(Sorry for the capitals, I felt like the story needed it.)

Many thanks to the devs for this great game !





Last edited by Manouche at 11/22/2008 6:14:28 PM

Pretty simple: when you're in a 1-possession game with 50 seconds on the clock, you don't need to foul immediately -- you just have to concentrate on making a stop. The foul strategy is just fine in this example.

Last edited by GM-kozlodoev at 11/22/2008 7:40:19 PM

All right. So why the 3 consecutive PF in the first place ?

All right. So why the 3 consecutive PF in the first place ?

So that if you need to foul (which happens when you're down 4 or more points with less than 24 seconds on the clock, roughly speaking) your first foul will send them directly to the line, rather than having to waste valuable time off the clock to give 3 fouls first.

I need to get to watch more basket-ball then. Is that so really ? Giving away 3 PF in advanced planning in this situation ? I thought that with 70 seconds left, one more foul could have gain us double possession. It's only me I guess. Anyway, thank you for your answer.
Do leading teams ever enter the foul game ? I got back because I was allowed to shoot 3-pointers. Forcing me to double FTs could arguably have been a safer path for the other team.

I need to get to watch more basket-ball then. Is that so really ? Giving away 3 PF in advanced planning in this situation ? I thought that with 70 seconds left, one more foul could have gain us double possession. It's only me I guess. Anyway, thank you for your answer.
Do leading teams ever enter the foul game ? I got back because I was allowed to shoot 3-pointers. Forcing me to double FTs could arguably have been a safer path for the other team.

Тhere is the situation: when you foul, you're supposedly giving the opposition 2 easy points (you're sure hoping they will miss at least one, but it is way more likely to miss from play than from the line). Therefore, when you don't _have_ to foul, you don't -- you try to play defense as well as you could.

Moreover, you don't have to take full 24 seconds on a possession, and likewise you don't have to let the other team take 24 seconds before you foul them, so this point is kind of moot.

In the particular example you quoted: with 50 secs on the clock you let them play. If they score, you can still try to get a quick basket, then give a quick foul and hope that they miss -- 35 seconds is an eternity in the NBA.

If they miss -- great, you're down 3 with the ball and 30 or so seconds on the clock. The usual strategy there is to look for a quick 2-pointer, give a quick foul and hope that they miss. This way you can avoid the risk of having to shoot a three-pointer.

Of course, sometimes teams will go for the three-ball rather than a quick basket -- it all depends on what type of players you have, and what looks at the basket the opposition gives you. One thing is certain though: if you can't get stops and can't score baskets, you ain't going to win -- fouls or no fouls.

Thank you for trying to give me the full picture :)

By 50 seconds on the clock, we were 5 then 6 pts down and we fouled them quickly.
By 35 seconds on the clock, we were 3 pts down and didn't. Actually, I can understand why although it's highly debattable, please concede.
By 75 seconds with only 3 pts down, the foul thingy routine is triggered, we commit 3 PF putting us in position to give unwanted FTs in case we get even or else but we don't take full advantage of this by cutting down their possession to earn one extra theorically. I sense it was triggered to soon or not to full effect. It does not make sense to me but I admit I might be wrong.
If you say this is the usual "real life" tactics, I assume it is. It's fine.

Actually, I'm impressed that your coach thought in advance about the foul situation, and appears to have brought on a backup to commit the fouls needed to bring your team fouls to 4 - before the game situation demanded it - and then returned to the more stable tactic of actually trying to defend the basket rather than offer free throws, for as long as you were only one shot behind. I'd be very happy with the game tactics you've outlined, they look spot on to me.

The 'foul, shoot, foul, shoot' end-game tactic doesn't actually work very well, but when you're more than one shot behind and running out of time it's better than letting the opponent run down the clock. Assuming their FT percentage is better than their FG percentage (and remembering you can't TO while taking free throws), I'd always rather my guys play defence than commit fouls, unless the situation is really desperate.

Indeed, this is quite impressive. I really didn't think the GE was that sophisticated and wrongly deduced that something buggy had occured. This is not about the choice to foul or not but more about the drastic "preemptive action" taken.

Now, out of curiosity, I know that nobody has any direct inside view of the GE but still, do you think that in this situation the trailing team is instructed to full court press to force TO ? Since the coach is smart enough to plan ahead on a double bonus, he should at the same time adopt a more considered approach to defense.

Again, I didn't want to start a discussion about fouling or not fouling. Actually, this is interesting. I would not advocate fouling in most cases except when it earns you an extra ball possession. When you're trailing, ball possession time is critical. Leading teams main objective is not to score but to kill time. When they have possession, you're left with not so much options. With 70s to go, a 3 pt lead and ball in hands, a leading team is in position to get two full 24 seconds possession in order to kill time, it leaves the trailing team with little time to bounce back. If the trailing team purposely gives FT by 70s, it might face a larger points difference (it will certainly) but saves valuable time and most importantly gets the opportunity to boss how time should be split according to score evolution and in order to have the crucial last ball possession. It's no perfect plan, so many things can happen, in terms of reasoning, you try to stick to what is more probable. If you do not foul by 70s, the leading team will only shot at the clock, whether they score or not is almost irrelevant, the trailing team will be 3 pts or more down, with only 45 to 50 sec left in a 1vs1 possession context. So very probably, they will have to foul anyway. But because we are inside a minute, it will stay a 1vs1 possession whatever you do. If you foul by 70s, you prevent this, you gain one extra ball possession. If you do not, your only hope for not having to foul later is an early TO. Possible but not very likely.

Of course this is merely theorical. You're behind, you look bad already, anything is a desperate attempt to overcome things, you did badly in the first place.