What can the zone do?

Professional basketball leagues all over the world are suffering a power shortage. Scoring has been going down the past few years, despite the constantly improving athletic ability and enhanced nutrition and training of players. Although it can be partly attributed to poorer free throw shooting, the bottom line is that pro league like the NBA, PBA and MBA feel the need to jack up the wattage. And some of them are turning to an old enemy.

The zone.

The zone defense was incorporated in basketball in 1914, when officials American Athletic Union (AAU) met with their counterparts from the YMCA and International Athletic Association (ancestor of the NCAA) to standardize rules of play for amateurs all over the United States. Standing zone defense are introduced to counteract a particularly effective offensive pattern introduced by Walter "Doc" Meanwell at Wisconsin.

Meanwell had pioneered a precise offensive set which emphasized crisp, short passes. His Badgers won 44 out of 45 games in his first three years, and the sport’s authorities feared that this would become embarrassing.

Enter the zone. This allowed defensive players to stand around while offensive players tried to find a way to the basket. In the 1950’s, the zone become immensely more effective when the three-second area (then resembling a keyhole) is widened to twice its previous size in order to diminish the impact of giants like George Mikan, who was later named the most important player of basketball’s first half-century. Now, there was a wider gulf between the offensive players and the goal. The bespectacled, Mikan, a towering 6-10, simply stood under the basket and waited for the ball to come his way.

But today’s game has changed in very dramatic fashion. In the early 1980’s when China first sent its national team to train with NBA franchises, Mike Fratello, then coach of the Atlanta Hawks, was shocked to find that Asian centers were still taking jump shots two feet away from the basket. Now, they spin, weave and slam dunk just like their American rivals, and have penetrated the hallowed enclave of the NBA.

So how has basketball changed?

First, the players have gotten bigger. They take up much more space in the paint than they used to. It is not uncommon for NBA teams to have a frontline with three seven-footers nowadays. China could conceivably have 7-6 Yao Ming, 7-0 Menk Bateer and 7-1 Wang on its frontline in the coming ABC Men’s Championship in Shanghai. Driving to the basket is now like trying to drive through a forest, with the trees able to move into your path.

One other improvement in today’s game is the use of the triangle offense. This could conceivably make the zone defense less potent, since the object is to find the best possible shot in the closest possible distance.

Perhaps the motive behind the proposal to use the zone defense in the NBA (and possibly the PBA) is to encourage teams to shoot better from the outside and run more. This would definitely increase scoring, and all but render the zone useless. Then the zone would have served its purpose.

The main concern is that, if jump shooting become the main solution, basketball will become unexciting. Younger players fear being reduced to jump shooters. There will be less slashing drives to the basket, less in-your-face dunking, less banging.

I believe that the answer is multi-faceted. If free throw shooting improves, it will be harder to foul. The game won’t be slowed down. If teams run more, then bigger players will be forced to improve. That’s exactly what’s happening in the MBA pre-season. The introduction of the "Blitz Three" has allowed most of the teams that have won their tune-up games to score over a hundred points. And because the new rule encourages pressure defense, even big men are learning to dribble upcourt.

If pro leagues take a multi-pronged approach, then they may only have to resort to the zone for a little while. But the zone alone won’t solve the problem.