[Starman]

Why has basketball been arbitrarily limited to the taller men? This is like limiting boxing to heavyweights. Why not make this sport available on a professional level to all heights and adjust the height of the basket accordingly. Nothing is lost in the drama of the game.

[Abro83]

Its all about strength and agility.. when I was younger I was challenged in the height department. Although I had a problem getting rebounds before other tall players, I had the advantage of ducking and weaving under their arms.

Its all relative. It would be impractical to lower the height of the basket... is everyone on a team the same height.. or does it move up and down according to who takes a shot?

[Jahiem28]

Hello there there are small guys in the nba. They just have to work harder to prove they can play with bigger guys. They have to have a lot of heart to go in there with the tall guys. I'm a tall guy and I have play against a lot of smaller guys who can play against anyone. Take care

[oldcoach]

Starman,


Let me break down your question so that we can address all of it.

Part A of your Question-
Why has basketball been arbitrarily limited to the taller men?

Answer-
Basketball is not limited to taller players. There are players of all heights playing the game at all levels. I will concede that there is a tendency towards taller players, but the cause is not that taller players are better than shorter players. Divisions 2 and 3 at the college level has more of the shorter players than Division 1. Much of the blame for the predominance of taller players comes from coaches that lack the confidence to select players that are shorter. Why? Some coaches would rather deal with improving a taller player's ball handling and game knowledge than training a shorter player to play bigger. Bigger players simply fair better with less talent, because the goal is above the players, height affords better vision of the court, and height usually means better reach. Reach translates to blocking shots, stealing passes, and rebounding.

However, all those abilities are affected by many other skills, such as, court vision is greatly influenced by anticipation, game knowledge, and court sense. Blocking shots is also affected by positioning, anticipation, hand-eye coordination, and jumping ability. Pass stealing is influenced by anticipation, sense of player positions, play knowledge, speed, quickness, and hand-eye coordination. Rebounding is affected by a sense of where the ball will go after a missed goal, blockout skills, jumping ability, timing, and hand-eye coordination.

Some of the elimination occurrs because shorter players lack the confidence to try for a team at younger ages. Such as, junior high and high school. Even parents and peers can be counterproductive. They make fun and offer scoffing instead of support.

Part A1 of your question-
This is like limiting boxing to heavyweights.

Answer-
The high school and college levels are somewhat divided for shorter players by divisions and many schools have recreational leagues. Dividing the pros into divisions is simply economically impossible. The pros exist for profit alone. Even if you could force divisions on the NBA and owners, the supply of money from fans to support the required profits for so many teams would threaten the existence of all NBA teams.

If these "new pros" would play for less or nothing how would they live? Fans will not come out to see mediocre professional games. Therefore, the "new pros" would still need to practice every day for hours. A person may be able to work a job (9.5 hours/day), practice (3 hours/day), and play one game per week (3.5 hours), but not for long.

If these "new pro" divisions did not make any money and did not practice enough to draw an audience you would, in effect, have a recreational league.

Part B of Question-
Why not make this sport available on a professional level to all heights and adjust the height of the basket accordingly. Nothing is lost in the drama of the game.

Answer-
Again, I could make an argument against divisionalizing due to the economics and the problems caused by the shear numbers of teams. A televised recreational league with a cash prize would be as close as we could get to the pros, but there would still be a natural tendency to have taller teams once a cash prize was offered for winning.

In short, basketball has arrived at its present state by natural evolution since its inception. Whether we like it or not is irrelevant. We should not force NASA to accept scientists because they are tall any more than we should force the NBA to accept players because they are short.

That being said, basketball offers many many leagues. Opportunities for fun play or serious play are numerous and widespread across the country. Statistically speaking, most of us lack the skills, knowledge, and conditioning to play basketball for money. That should not deter us from playing for pleasure.

Sincerely,
Oldcoach

[magicrain09]

If you are getting a herd time being small and getting stick for it just don't listen to them they only want to put you down because they know you're a threat to their egos
I just take it as a challenge to beat them and then mock them hehehe

[bballer454545]

Its not limited for tall people. There are short people who make it to the NBA and NCAA. Its about your skill level and how well conditioned you are.