Flak Magazine: Kick Out the Sports! 04.12.04

Real basketball players who get paid real salaries to play on real teams with real uniforms get derided if their style is borrowed from the most real basketball around: playground ball.

The beauty of playground ball, or "pickup ball" if you're not on a playground, is that you don't have some coach barking stupid rules like "four passes before you shoot," or some cowed referee giving preferred players the benefit of every call. It's freestyle, no-holds-barred and alternately beautiful and brutal. But that makes pickup ball a lot of fun, even for real basketball players. However, whether your playground ball is on West 4th Street in Manhattan or the tile-floor gym of a suburban church, every pickup site has its own unwritten rules regarding the basic structure of the game — stuff like who calls fouls, how you enter the game and whether the game can be suspended if someone stops by to sell some hot stereo equipment.

The problem is that these rules change not just from city to city, but from court to court. If you're playing at the same court all the time, no problem. But if you change venues, it can be the equivalent of being dropped into a foreign land with no translator or pocket map. You may have an idea of what's going on around you, but you still feel like a dumb tourist.

That is why we need a universal set of pickup rules.

By implementing these guidelines everywhere, we can keep freestyling within the context of the play, rather than the rules, of the game. Based on my extensive pickup experience — from the hard courts of Brooklyn to the fertile hoops fields of Indiana; from the hot gyms of Chicago to the frigid outdoor courts of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan — I propose the following rules:

ORGANIZING PLAY

1. First five players (or whatever number splits the teams evenly) to make a free throw (or shot from the top of the key, depending on ability) make up the first team. Remaining players make up the second team. If there are more than 10 willing players, the next five to hit the agreed-upon shot make up second team. Remaining players wait on the sideline. They may shoot at a hoop while teams are at the opposite side, but if they're in the way when the teams come back, they may be pistol-whipped.

2. Player from the first team shoots from anywhere outside the high school/college 3-point line (or estimated distance if no line is available) to determine who gets the ball first. If the shot is made, first team gets the ball and gets to choose which direction it will go on offense. If the shot is missed, the second team gets the choice, plus the right to trash-talk whomever missed that wide-open, easy shot.

3. After the first game, the winning team stays on the court; the losing team exits. No team can stay on the court for more than two straight games — no court hogging! Except if it's one of those college or premier urban courts where something like 60 people are waiting for a game. It's one thing to give up your streak knowing you'll be back soon; it's another to give up the court to scrubs when you won't be back for hours. Keep winning, burnish your rep and let those hackers find another court.

4. Players on the sideline come in for a new game in the order they arrived. If they don't have enough players, the losing team (or team due to sit out) shoots free throws to fill spots. If someone thinks they're the defending Rucker League champs and insists on playing with the same five, they must wait to play until there are five spots available. If they are the defending Rucker League champs, they can come in anytime they want because everyone else should probably find another court.

HALF-COURT GAMES

1. After any defensive rebound, the rebounding team must take the ball back behind the 3-point line (or distance equivalent) before shooting. None of this I-can-shoot-it-because-it-didn't-hit-the-rim jazz. You can always pass to the immobile guy on your team who regards the 3-point line as some sort of impenetrable force field.

2. A team that gives up a basket must inbound the ball after all baskets — no make-it-take-it. If you have the energy to cut through three guys and do a hop-step-jump, double-scoop, 360-degree turnaround finger-roll, you have the energy to play defense after your shot.

SCORING

1. Games are played to 15 by ones if no one is waiting, or to 12 by ones if someone is. If there is a 3-point line, those shots count as two. Yes, in organized ball it's only a 33% difference between 2 and 3-point shots, but we're not going to be put into the position of determining whether a shot counted as 1 or 1.5.

2. Gotta win by two, otherwise known as The Great Santini Rule.

VIOLATIONS

1. Unless a player sprints up the floor with the ball like Terrell Owens or it's otherwise plainly obvious in an open-court setting, there's no traveling. And there's no double-dribbling, unless it's plainly obvious in an open-court setting. Then again, if you're double-dribbling in a pickup game, you should probably take up another sport.

2. Fouls are called by the offensive player with the ball, not by some defensive player trying to be nice or a lazy defensive player trying to bail himself out by calling a phantom slap to stop an open layup. The offensive player must call the foul at the time of the occurrence. Any offensive player who waits to see if his or her shot goes in before deciding whether to call a foul is a dillweed who may be pistol-whipped. And if you want to call the most ticky-tack of fouls, go ahead. But realize that everyone will hate you.

E-mail Bob Cook at bobc@flakmag.com.