About Basketball

I haven't done anything of cultural interest since the weekend, so I'm going to write a post about basketball. In particular, about my views on the illegal defense rule. No, actually I've been playing basketball with the guys at work on Wednesday nights. My workplace has facilities for pretty much anything that you ever need or want, including a regulation indoor basketball court. In the evenings it gets plenty of use--I've seen at least 3 games of 3-on-3 going on at once (there are additional hoops along the sidelines.) One thing I do have in common with a bunch of the guys here is that we like to play basketball. So I'm very happy to get some exercise, do some networking and have some fun at the same time. It's the highlight of my work week, no doubt about it.

The style of play is pretty different that what I'm used to, unless I think back to games that I would occasionally play with some Korean graduate students at Berkeley. There's not much screening and practically no contact. Most of these guys are shooters and some of them are pretty deadly. I'm not the best player out there but I've been the biggest by far in all of the games I played, so I'm doing most of my damage within 5 feet of the basket.

I have no idea how many points we play to, or even how many points you get for a basket. That's not as dumb a question as it sounds--in pickup basketball some people play 1 point for any basket, some play that 3-pointers are worth 2, and practically nobody plays using the official rules of basketball. I assume that they're calling out the score from time to time, and I know the numbers from 1 to 15 or whatever we play to, but I can't make anything out. Maybe they're speaking Taiwanese instead of Mandarin? Who knows. I just keep playing until they stop, and then I can figure out who won by whoever scored the last basket.

Appendix for basketball players: It's winners-out, pass the ball in, check everything, just like back home. They pretty much switch all screens and generally pick up whoever is in the vicinity after a change of possession. I can't hear them calling out much of anything on defense. I don't think staying organized on defense is much of a priority.