NBA to Test In-Game Flopping Penalty at Summer League
The NBA announced this week that it will test assessing in-game penalties for flopping at the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas. Flopping, the act of embellishing contact to try and draw a foul call by deceiving the referees, has become an increasing problem in the NBA. The league instituted an after-the-fact fine system for flopping offenses a few seasons ago but is now looking to incorporate on-court penalties to further curb the behavior.
At the summer league, referees will issue a warning the first time a player is deemed to have flopped. Any subsequent flopping offense by that player will result in an in-game technical foul. The technical fouls will count toward a player's total for the game and thus could lead to ejection if a player is called for two technicals. The in-game penalties are meant to have more impact and be more of a deterrent than post-game fines.
Some detractors argue that in-game penalties could lead to too many technical fouls and detract from the flow of the game. However, others counter that curbing flopping is important for the integrity of the game and to limit the direct impact of deception on the outcome of games. The summer league experiment will be an important test to see if the in-game penalties achieve the desired result of reducing flopping in a way that does not overly burden the referees or needlessly interrupt play.
The summer league’s fan-friendly and low-stakes environment provides an ideal forum to try out the new policy. The NBA will evaluate how the penalties and warnings impact flopping behavior and whether referees feel comfortable implementing the policy. They can then determine if and how to carry over in-game flopping penalties to the regular season and postseason. Potential tweaks could involve changing the number of warnings before assessing a technical, or even removing warnings altogether and going straight to technical fouls after an initial grace period.
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