NEW YORK — The NBA unveiled 14 new rules Tuesday intended to clarify 11 existing rules that league officials acknowledged had become “a little conceptual.”
“The good news is every confusing rule now has at least one additional confusing rule explaining it,” said a member of the competition committee.
The revisions include new language governing continuation, gather steps, take fouls, landing space, verticality, marginal contact, and the precise legal status of a defender who appears to be standing still but is apparently not.
Teams received a 96-page memo, three diagrams, two instructional videos, and a short quiz whose answer key was immediately disputed by the league office.
Officials said referees would undergo extensive training before opening night, at which point players would begin demonstrating several interpretations nobody had considered.
The league stressed that the changes are designed to improve consistency and will be reviewed after the first week if fans remain capable of predicting any call.
By afternoon, broadcasters had already begun describing the new rules as “pretty simple once you ignore most of the wording.”
