Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2010 January 26

= January 26 =

Origin of double dribbling rule
What's the origin of the prohibition of the double dribble in basketball? Nyttend (talk) 03:05, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, just some background. Dribbling itself was not among Naismith's original 13 rules of basketball.  See Rules of basketball and History of basketball for that list.  According to dribbling, the move originated about 1901 or so by players who developed it as a method of passing the ball to oneself.  The original rules of basketball prohibited running the ball, and anticipated that players would advance the ball by standing still and receiving the pass, then passing and moving to a new location, perhaps to receive another pass.  However, there was no prohibition against dribbling as such, and so when players invented the legal self-pass (the dribble), Naismith was pleasantly surprised by the ingenuity of the players in working within his framework of rules to do things he never anticipated.  That would mean that the concept of "double dribble" likely would not have arisen but for several years after that.  It may have grown out of early rules which prohibited the same player from dribbling and shooting on the same posession, if you dribbled you had to pass to a new player who THEN could take a shot.  That rule was only repealed in 1915.  this site has a really good narrative on the history of the game, much better than the Wikipedia article on the subject, though it does not discuss double dribbling specifically.  It's a shame that there isn't a source for this sort of history like there is for American football.  David M. Nelson's 1994 book The Anatomy of a Game is pretty much canonical with its coverage of football rules changes, and the online publications of the Professional Football Research Association are an invaluable resource for anyone researching football history.  However, I can find no similar sources for Basketball history online.  Maybe someone else has some more insight there.  -- Jayron  32  04:06, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * When I last looked at the History of basketball article, a long time ago, it was a serious mess. I'm afraid to ask if it's improved or gotten worse. There was an excellent writeup in Sports Illustrated some years back about the original typewritten rules which, believe it or not, were still pretty much out in the open. I think someone finally caught on to their value and put the sheet in a museum where it could be protected. The article stated the same thing, that Naismith's rules were general and flexible enough to allow for some innovation, which he embraced. Seems to me there was a brand of girls high-school-level basketball that was still being played clear into the 70s maybe, that was pretty close to the Naismith concept, i.e. that there was no dribbling except maybe under certain circumstances. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:00, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Netball is the version you are referring, and in a few countries is actually a rather popular sport, often televised, and shows up more often than actual "Women's basketball". While netball has also diverged from the original rules in different directions than basketball, some aspects of it remain from Naismith's original 13 rules.  For example, there is no dribbling, so the only way to advance the ball is to pass. There is no backboard.  The ball is restarted from the center circle, not the end line, after each basket.  Stuff like that.  But it is basically derived from Naismith's original 13 rules, but evolved from a result of different rules changes than the main "basketball" line did.  Something like the way that modern American football and the two different Rugby codes all did.  They are recognizably three different sports today, but share a single common ancestor.  -- Jayron  32  14:15, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Excellent. The elimination of the center jump after each basket was a revolutionary step for conventional basketball, in that it prevented a team with an extra-tall player from winning all the tips, and it also sped the game up a great deal. That was many decades ago. It wasn't all that long ago that the center jump was also eliminated in a "jump-ball" situation and they went to alternating possession. I'm not a big follower of basketball, but I think they're down to just one center jump now, at the very start of the game. Regarding Rugby, there was a play in the Minnesota-Dallas NFL playoff game recently in which Adrian Peterson was carrying the ball for the Vikings and dragged several Cowboys with him for like 5 yards. One of the announcers commented that it looked like a Rugby scrum. Yep. Many varieties of football. And then there's Rounders vs. English Baseball vs. American Baseball, softball, kickball, etc. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The NBA still does a "center jump" for all "jump-ball" posessions, whereas college and high school ball uses the "possesion arrow". Actually, HS and College have used the posession arrow for a few decades now, so I don't know what is meant by "recent".  Oh, and American football anouncers always get the term "Scrum" wrong.  What happens when a bunch of players converge on the ball carrier in rugby union is called "Maul" while the gathering that occurs after a tackle is called a "Ruck".  A scrum only occurs as a restart of a play after certain infractions, and is actually much closer to a "scrimmage snap" in American football (in fact, the term "scrimmage" has its roots in the word "scrum").  Functionally, a scrum is more like a "Jump Ball" in basketball in its usage.  Rugby league (a different sport than Rugby union), no longer uses rucks and mauls, and instead has a "six tackle rule" akin to American football's "down and distance" rules.  -- Jayron  32  17:39, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Here's that S.I. article I was talking about. It's from 2002, and it's mostly about the actual rules, which were on 2 typewritten sheets. On the third page it mentions dribbling briefly. The thing is, Naismith needed a game that was deliberately paced and non-contact, contrasting with violent games like football, lacrosse, hockey, etc. He also wanted it to be a team sport, hence all the requirements of passing the ball around instead of hogging it as if you were playing h-o-r-s-e with your neighbor or something. It's like there was no dribbling at all, at first, and once dribbling began they put limits on it, again to prevent one player from being the whole show. I have a book from the 1950s called The Encyclopedia of Sports, whose coverage of basketball is rather sparse compared with baseball, for example. It briefly mentions the formal coding of the rules ca. 1915 and ca. 1936. It says that at one time prior, there were 5 sets of rules, not counting the girls games, and that there were countless variations. No wonder it's hard to write a history. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:23, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * According to James Naismith's book on the history of basketball, the first rule approximating today's double-dribble rule was enacted in 1898, and it said a dribbler could not touch the ball with both hands more than once. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 00:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

What's this Spooks reference?
In an episode of Spooks a.k.a. MI-5 in Series 6, Harry Pearce says at one point: "Anyway, don't idealise the Scots. They were the most brutal and enthusiastic of empire builders.  Some of them are still at it." Is this a reference to Alex Ferguson? If not, what then? TresÁrboles (talk) 04:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Tony Blair, perhaps? Gordon Brown? Adam Bishop (talk) 06:14, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Don't forget Idi Amin who declared himself King of the Scots. If anything, I'd imagine the reference was to him. TomorrowTime (talk) 07:42, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * @TomorrowTime - I very much doubt that it was related to Amin. There is a view sometimes expressed in England that the Scots appear to dominate UK government, so it is more likely to refer to Brown (more than Blair, who was less obviously Scottish and did not sit for a Scottish seat in Parliament).  See also West Lothian question.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:37, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed - we even had a Scottish Home Secretary, (one John Reid) whose remit purely England and Wales, yet he sat in a Scottish seat. Alansplodge (talk) 11:02, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I doubt it was a reference to Idi Amin too. As for Blair or Brown, I got the feeling that the comment was more subtle humor than serious, so even though those two hadn't occurred to me, I'm not quite sure either of those were who the writers intended.  But I'll defer to any British Spooks watchers.  TresÁrboles (talk) 06:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I am only familiar with the first three series of Spooks, but Harry Pearce is incredibly focussed on his job and pretty oblivious to anything outside it. He also spends much of his time defending MI-5 against political opponents within the British political system. His comment is probably directed at a character within the series who is "empire building" in Harry's view. DJ Clayworth (talk) 17:16, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
 * My impression was that it wasn't a serious comment; it was more a humorous offhand comment not really related to plot points. TresÁrboles (talk) 06:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

1956 NFL Draft, First Round
Google "1956 NFL Draft" and you'll find our article is the first link. The next three links   agree with our article and each other, at least as far as draftee name and drafting team. However, the nfl.com site is an entirely different matter! Some names are in different places, other names are not present at all. You would think the NFL would know, so... what's up? TresÁrboles (talk) 05:19, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * The NFL.com site appears to maintain a player database, and generates its "draft lists" from players in its database. That is, each player who has appeared on an NFL roster is given a database log entry, and when you pull up the draft page at NFL.com, it culls its database and generates its list "on the fly" from that database.  It looks like, for players from older years, the draft data in their database is incomplete.  For example, the specific selection order is missing for many players (its not just 1956, its most pre-internet years) so when it calls the list from its database for 1956, it can't order the players by selection order, so it appears to be roughly a random listing of names.  Each player in their database is probably assigned an internal "player number" so my guess is that the draft order has defaulted to that internal number order, which is why it appears "random".  I would trust those other sites, since those appear to be lists built on the actual draft (that is, specifically written lists rather than "database calls"), so barring simple typos, they are likely to be accurate.  You will also notice that the players missing from the NFL.com site don't have bluelinks on the www.pro-football-reference.com site, which would mean that those players never appeared in the NFL, despite being drafted.  So, there's your explanation. -- Jayron  32  14:07, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Ah, that makes sense. I should've thought of that, especially since I had noticed that the nfl.com site suspiciously didn't number the picks they did show.  That's a really crappy way to handle the display of their draft data.  They should at least put a disclaimer or something that not all draft picks are shown, and that they are not displayed in pick order.  Boo nfl.com .  TresÁrboles (talk) 06:33, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

month designations
many months have specific/multiple designations (i.e. Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Black History Month, etc.) is there a source that captures all current monthly designations whether related to health, culture, etc.

if you know of such a source or sources, please advise.

thanks in advance

amanda talbert —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.143.204.198 (talk) 18:34, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The pitifully sourced List of commemorative months may be of some help. I don't know whether I'd believe everything there, though. Deor (talk) 19:49, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * These things are completely arbitrary, so I doubt whether you will find a source. But looking at that list February promises to be a lot more fun than January. (Shouldn't Chocolate Lover's Month come before Get A Colonic Month?)--Shantavira|feed me 09:29, 27 January 2010 (UTC)