Play the advantage

I'm an avid soccer fan. I watch a lot of Premier League and La Liga, a bit of MLS and most major international tournaments I can get my eyes on. There are many aspects of professional soccer I wish were applied (or could be applied, in certain cases) to professional basketball. Many of them are about how the game is consumed by a viewer on TV/Internet. For this purpose, however, I'm going to focus on rules or, to be more exact, how rules can be enforced in a way that is beneficial to the sport.

In soccer, when a player is fouled by an opponent - by being, pushed, tackled or anything of the kind - different outcomes might happen. If the foul has caused the player to lose control of the ball in the following seconds or has effectively killed an opportunity for an attack, the referee will blow his whistle and bring back the play where the foul occurred for a free kick. If, however, the contact, illegal though as it may be, has not "stopped" the player and his team manages to keep the control of the ball, the referee might decide the team has not been disadvantaged by the "foul". In other words, the team still has the "advantage" even if the player was indeed fouled. You see that happen often when a player is hit by a defender while gearing up for an attack, but manages to keep control of the ball and pursue the attack either by scoring or create a good opportunity to score. In those cases, the referee might actually create a disadvantage for the attacking team if he blows the whistle too early (in case you wondered, a player can evidently be punished later for committing a foul by the referee, usually via a yellow or red card, if the contact was severe enough). This helps preserve the flow of a soccer game, and I, as a fan, appreciate it quite a lot when the referees use it wisely. 

While applying exactly the same logic to basketball would be close to impossible, due to the speed of the game and the size of the court. Everything happens faster. However, and this might surprise some, even if you have played, coached or watched basketball, there is indeed a similar concept in our sport. Here's the key part of the FIBA rulebook on the matter : Article 47 - Officials : Duties and Powers.

Article 47.3

When deciding on a personal contact or violation, the officials shall, in each instance, have regard to and weigh up the following fundamental principles :

• Consistency in application of the concept of 'advantage/disadvantage'. The officials should not seek to interrupt the flow of the game unnecessarily in order to penalise incidental personal contact which does not give the player responsible an advantage nor place his opponent at a disadvantage. 

You can understand how that power of interpretation plays a major role in those decisions. When applied correctly, it can make the game a more fluid, and therefore more enjoyable, affair. Smaller inconsequential contacts are ignored, fewer "and one" actions are called, fewer ejections and basically fewer whistles overall. Here are a few examples that happen quite a lot in normal basketball games :

• A dribbler manages to beat his defender 1-on-1, the path to the basket is basically free behind the defender. The defender moves a bit late and nudges the attacker, but the latter keeps his balance and dribble and has a free lane to the hoop. Say you call that foul, you effectively robbed the attacker of an easy scoring opportunity. The contact, while itself illegal, did not create a disadvantage, therefore no call necessary.
• A player rises up to score a layup. On his way up, he is touched slightly on the arm by the defender, but the touch itself didn't alter his shooting motion and he manages to score as if he were never touched. Now if the contact altered the shooting motion, you should absolutely call it even if the attacker still scored. The contact created a disadvantage.
• Player A sees an open teammate on a breakaway. He flings the ball towards him so he can have an easy opportunity to score. While he passes the ball, the defender hits him on the arm but the pass still goes unimpeded to the lone player. If you whistle there, you take away two points from the team. If the contact is hard enough that the ball trajectory is heavily modified, then of course you call it.

Of course, there are possible negative points if you don't use your judgment properly. Some contacts are too heavy to not whistle, and a lax attitude towards those kinds of contact can lead to frustration from the players and even more physical, and therefore more dangerous, play. You also have to know your partner(s)' tolerance for playing the advantage. If your partner calls everything, even actions you wouldn't even dream of whistling, then you adapt or you talk to him/her about it.

Here, I don't think anything but experience (both in actually playing basketball and reffing) helps. And it's not a perfect science either. But overall, refereeing with that specific rule in mind helps create a better experience for everyone. Fewer stoppages, foul shots and better flow.