for basketball fans

[Laurence Horn]

At 3:50 PM -0500 12/8/03, Zitin, Abigail wrote:
>I had thought drafting an entry for "point guard" was going to be
>simple (my first quot is December 1970, from proquest, if anyone's
>interested in finding an antedating). To a certain extent, it was;
>what I'm stuck on is the (apparently) subsequent use of "point" in the
>same (or a closely related) sense.
>
>Webster's Sports Dict. (1976) has "a player position in the frontcourt
>in the area roughly between the division line and the free throw
>circle which is occupied by a guard who directs the team's offense."
>My first contextual quot, however, is the following:
>
>1978 N.Y. Times 16 Jan. C12/4 John Moore, a junior guard...played the
>point in the zone defense that forced 19 Razorback turnovers.
>
>Does this quotation indicate that John Moore is playing a position in
>the zone defense referred to as the "point"? or is he defending the
>other team's point guard? The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, to
>complicate matters, has "a frontcourt position, usu. manned by the
>guard who sets up the team's defence."
>
>My sense is that "point" is not used in basketball as a purely spatial
>designation (as it is in hockey), and while it is frequently just
>short for "point guard" (1999, XXL Basketball, Aug: "You shouldn't
>play two-guard, you should play the point"), it has a somewhat looser
>application (as Webster's Sports Dict. implies with "a player
>position") insofar as another player could take over the function of
>the point guard.
>
>So: any thoughts on this? offense vs. defense, spatial vs. personal,
>etc... all musings welcome (including likely contexts in which one
>might hear this: all I've been able to find is "play the point", but
>could you have someone "at point"? shooting "from [the] point"? etc.)
>All antedatings too, as ever.
>
Off the top of my head (where NBA players would likely dribble the ball)...

The usual reference here in pro basketball is to the offense rather
than the defense; "playing the point" usually means bringing the ball
upcourt and ceteris paribus the point guard is the player who is
generally responsible for doing so.  He (or she) controls the ball,
passes well, and almost always leads the team in assists; he is
sometimes compared to the quarterback in football, both for
leadership/responsibility qualities and for adeptness at passing.
The "guard" part, though, may include defensive responsibilities as
well, or so I gather from the fact that occasionally you find NBA
players referred to as "point forward".  The first time I recall this
was when Milwaukee Bucks coach (now Dallas Maverick coach) Don Nelson
appointed one of his players, Paul Presser, "point forward" in the
late 1970s, presumably because even though he was taller than most
guards and didn't defend the other team's guards he was a good
ball-handler.  But when the versatile Magic Johnson came into the
league at 6'9", he was referred to a point guard simpliciter even
though he was eminently capable of rebounding, shooting hooks, and
exhibiting other non-guard-like skills, as well as setting the career
assist record that stood until a more conventional (though excellent)
point guard, John Stockton, broke it a few years ago.  It can be a
detriment for a point guard to be too much of a scorer; the
prototype, like Stockton, is supposed to think about passing and
setting up his teammates for scoring.  I'm not sure I'd call it a
"spatial" category as much as a functional one.

More recently, NBA references by players, coaches, and media, are
often to the positions as designated by numbers:  1= point guard, 2 =
shooting guard, 3 = "small" forward, 4 = power forward, 5 = center.
This allows for evaluations of the form "He's not a true 1 because he
likes to shoot, he's more of a 1 and a half" or "he's a 2.5".

larry