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We have a diverse set of HoopIdeas in this week's Five for Friday, including a gem mined from a March 1958 issue of Sports Illustrated. But though the topics vary, all the HoopIdeas featured this week have a common goal: to speed the game up and make it more free-flowing.

Be sure to send us your own HoopIdeas using the ways detailed below!

TWEAK INTENTIONAL FOUL RULES
Intentional off-the-ball bonus fouls are penalized by two free throws to be shot by a player chosen by the shooting team that is on the floor at the time of the foul. Any player with the ball in his hands is at risk to be fouled and sent to the free throw line. But hugging a bad free throw shooter at half court is bush league and should be dealt with by the rulebook. -- Andrew M. Grimsrud

1958 HOOPIDEA: BASKETBALL PENALTY BOX
Seeking to curb what he called "a long parade back and forth between one free-throw line and the other," Colorado State University AD Fritz Brennecke convinced CSU's head coach, John Bunn, to try playing with a penalty box instead. Read the full story at Sports Illustrated (via Ron Bronson)

OVERTIME PERIOD IS FIRST TO 11
Turn off the game clock, but leave on the 24-second shot clock. Each team gets two timeouts. On all non-shooting fouls, the team that is fouled gets the option of shooting free throws or inbounding the ball (to prevent hack-a-thons).

With this format, the object of overtime is to maximize each possession, as either team can win in as little as four trips up the court. Imagine the tension every posession, as a bevy of strategic questions come into play.

Do you go for three early in O.T. to build momentum? With no clock, when does it make sense to use your timeouts? Imagine if you are a point guard bringing the ball up with your team down 10-8. Do you play it safe and go for two or pull up for a game-winning 3? -- Tolu Thomas on Google +

STRICTER DELAY OF GAME RULES
New Rule: after a team scores they can't touch the ball. No throwing it to a ref or kicking it to stop the other teams transition. -- Asad (@AsadVIDEO) via Twitter

NO CHARGES WITHOUT THE BALL
A player can only take a charge if the attacking player has not yet released the ball (on a shot or pass). These tweaks would promote more active defenses rather than mastering a technique that attempts to cheaply take advantage of a rule that is in place for safety. A defender should not be rewarded for placing himself under an attacking player in the air who is pulling up for a floater to avoid contact. The defender does not impact the shot while at the same time creates an unsafe and avoidable scenario. -- Mark Bernard Reis

Check out previous Five for Fridays: May 18 | May 11 | May 4 | April 27 | April 20 | April 13 | April 6 | March 30| March 23 | March 16 | March 9

JOIN THE CONVERSATION

You can give us your ideas and talk with us and other fans in the following places:

• Twitter: Go to @HoopIdea and tweet to us with the hashtag #hoopidea

• Google+: Go to our HoopIdea Google+ page and discuss

• TrueHoop: Read our HoopIdea posts here and contribute on the conversation page

• Email us at hoopidea@gmail.com

And for the truly ambitious: Shoot a short video of yourself explaining your HoopIdea, upload it to YouTube and share the link with us on Twitter or Google+.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Mario Chalmers, who made three of four 3-pointers in Game 6, is becoming the Miami Heat's version of Lakers championship era Derek Fisher. Disruptive defense, spot up shooting ... and, of course, flopping. Chalmers has even mastered Fisher's ability to draw fouls by driving headlong into traffic and tossing the ball toward the basket.

Last night, he drew an offensive foul (video) on a moving screen from Roy Hibbert with Fisher's typical flair for the dramatic.

Working the play-by-play, ESPN's Mike Breen points out that the referee on the scene got the call right, but Jeff Van Gundy was still annoyed by Chalmers' act and suggested a flopping rule similar to the NHL's restriction on "Embellishment":

Breen: Well, Hibbert was clearly moving. You can say that he flopped, but that’s a foul.

Jeff Van Gundy: You see that’s where my flop rule will come into play. If you flop, even if you were fouled -- which he was -- you’re not gettin’ it!

Maybe Chalmers would "get it" in Jeff Van Gundy's world, but his theatrical reaction and the discussion it sparked was enough for him to get our Flop of the Night.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

Early in the second quarter of Game 6 between the Pacers and Heat, Miami's Dwyane Wade drove left, took a little contact, missed a layup and fell to the ground.

Foul.

When Wade stepped to free throw line, the yellow-wearing Pacers faithful in Bankers Life Fieldhouse invented a new cheer. It took them a few tries to get it right, but eventually it was clear, even on YouTube the next day.

"He's a flopper!" Clap clap, clap-clap-clap. "He's a flopper!" Clap clap, clap-clap-clap.

Flopping has been a major topic of this playoff series since before these two teams even took the court, when Indiana Coach Frank Vogel publicly warned the referees that the Heat players have a tendency to embellish or even invent contact.

ESPN's Jeff Van Gundy reacted quickly to the chant on the national TV broadcast:

“This," he declared, "is the first time I’ve ever heard an NBA arena chant 'He’s a flopper.' ... We are making progress, America! Let’s eradicate the flop."

"You really have started a movement," replied Mike Breen.

Van Gundy elaborates on his anti-flop platform in an interview with 98.7 ESPN New York (as transcribed by SportsRadioInterviews.com):

I would like to see a two-pronged attack to the excessive flopping that is overtaking the NBA. One as you said if an official can see the flow of the real game that a flop occurred than the foul that brought about the flop is negated and the flopper is assessed a technical foul.

I think the league office, they have a lot of people working for them, go back through every game and any exaggerated contact that is a flop during a game you start accumulating technical fouls. You accumulate points that will eventually lead to suspensions.

You’re not looking for the ones that are minor. You are looking for the ones where a guy is definitively trying to trick an official because to me tricking an official is not an NBA play and I think it’s gone where teams have one guy who would flop to now where our stars are doing the flopping and that’s not good for basketball.

Van Gundy has been railing against flops for years, and the reaction in Indiana showed that this season fans across the league are catching on in a big way.

The NBA has created a new competition committee to consider rule changes. The first meeting is in June, and there are hints -- from David Stern's public comments, to arena-wide chants in Indianapolis -- that stopping the flop will be on the agenda.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Paul Pierce is one of the most expressive players in the NBA. Whether he's yelling as he yanks down a rebound or making this face on a drive to the hoop, Pierce has a way of making it so even the fans in the nosebleeds can feel his pain.

Sometimes, it seems as though Pierce has built ways to embellish contact into the fabric of his game. Here he draws an and-one foul on a jumpshot over Evan Turner (Video). A close-up replay shows Turner isn't even touching him. But from the wide angle view (and the view of the official), thanks to wiggling extremities, it looks like Pierce is taking a punch to the gut as he releases the shot.

Perhaps that herky-jerky style that so flummoxes defenders can have the same effect on the officials.

Twitter also spotted another potential Flop of the Night from Pierce in Game 6, so we might as well show you that one too.

Watch Pierce's legs (Video) go limp during this blocking foul on Lavoy Allen. The bump is there, but it's almost entirely incidental. Still, Pierce's legs buckle like ancient pillars in an catastrophic earthquake.

Also worth noting: Ryan Hollins and Rajon Rondo's smiles as they pick Pierce back up.

Even without the acting, Pierce would likely have gotten this call, so it doesn't win Flop of the Night. But it does merit recognition and the attention of aspiring thespians everywhere.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

In the mid 1970s, legendary Celtics coach and team president Red Auerbach gathered several NBA stars, and a veteran of refereeing, to make a video. The goal? To end flopping.

That's right, nearly four decades ago, Auerbach was the Pied Piper of what has become the Stop the Flop movement, as you can see on video.

"Coaches today in high school, college and pro, are teaching the players how to fall! This is unreal!"

The Auerbach in this video is not a man who minds jabbing a finger at the camera to make a point.

Auerbach leads players like Wes Unseld and Mike Riordan through flopping scenarios. After Riordan hits the deck, Auerbach quizzes him. "Did Wes Unseld hit that man hard enough to knock him down? What went through your mind, Mike? What was your purpose when making that pick?"

Riordan says that initially he was "trying to free my teammate Elvin Hayes here for a jumpshot or a move to the hoop without the ball. But also, if I could get away with it, to draw a foul on Wes in setting that pick. To fake a foul, in other words. That was the second purpose."

Auerbach brings Hall of Fame referee Mendy Rudolph into the conversation. Rudolph jokes about how "Mike went and did some 'Hollywood acting." Rudolph's advice: Don't call a thing.

Auerbach directs another scenario, with another flop. Rudolph says "it was a great acting job by Clem Haskins. Now the contact between Mike and Clem was totally incidental, and again the officials should ignore it completely to eliminate this kind of acting in our game."

Then Rudolph adds another option for officials: "If they’re smart, again, to stop it, to stop it early in the game: Call a blocking foul on this man right here, and he’ll stop falling on the floor picking up splinters on his backside.”

"Well I happen to agree with you," says Auerbach. "I am very, very much opposed to this kind of basketball.”

"We’ve got to stop this sort of play in the NBA," replies Rudolph.

Auerbach: "Exactly!"

Auerbach closes the video by turning to the camera and addressing viewers:

This segment is not aimed at referees, believe me. It’s aimed at coaches, it’s aimed at players.

What are we going to do about it?

Let’s clean this thing up!

Let’s not hurt the game.

In retrospect, the referees lost control of the game early in the second quarter. Tyler Hansbrough fouled the daylights out of Dwyane Wade. Some would point out he "made a play on the ball," as if first hitting the Spalding mitigated a karate chop to the face of the mid-air guy. In slow motion ... wow. With a menacing scowl, Hansbrough met the Heat star in the sky. The fouling begins not with the right hand but with the left -- a forearm to the base of the neck that would have been a hard foul all by itself. Then the right arm windmilled through the ball, Wade's arms, and -- changing paths now, evidently to ensure maximum effect -- veered directly to Wade's eye and temple. Both, of course, are part of an athlete's head, which scientists are increasingly sure can sustain permanent brain damage from seemingly minor impacts like this.

Wade fell to the court, and stayed face down for a while.

Hansbrough slapped a cool low-five with his teammate Lou Amundson -- mission accomplished.

What mission could that have been? What page were they on together, exactly? A clue came from the post-game comments from the franchise's most respected voice. After that game, physical to the point that the fun plays have almost all been forgotten, Pacers president Larry Bird declared how disgusted he was with how "soft" his team had been. Could it be taken any other way than Bird was ordering up more of the same, and harder, in Game 6 -- just like he once did as a Celtic player, precipitating Kevin McHale's clotheslining of Kurt Rambis?

Game 5 had plenty more in store. In real time, commentator Steve Kerr mused about a Flagrant 2 for Hansbrough, which would have resulted in his ejection. It seemed a bit harsh at the time, but in retrospect, it would have been brilliant. In failing to eject Hansbrough, the referees whiffed on their last chance to control the game, took a pass on fulfilling the NBA's mission to prevent the spread of violence and set a precedent that would encourage one dangerous foul after another, all game long.

Moments later, Hansbrough had the ball and room to roll. The only thing between him and the hoop was ... Udonis Haslem -- Wade's avenging angel since they were rookies together.

Uh-oh.

Hansbrough slowed. Instead of a power dunk, now he was thinking jumper. Haslem swung two arms right through Hansbrough's shooting arm and -- oops! -- caught a whole bunch of face. Hansbrough's head ricocheted. In slow motion he looked like a crash test dummy at the moment of impact. (If you're a mom or a dad or somebody who loves Tyler Hansbrough you'd hate to watch it.)

That hardly ended it. Before the final horn, one had no choice but to wonder if the Heat had held a team meeting about the value of hitting people in the face. David West would be bitter about Shane Battier's knocking him down. West would bash LeBron James on the top of the head with an elbow. Mario Chalmers would snuff out a Paul George drive with a play to the face much like Haslem's, only without Haslem's force. The most violent play of the bunch would come in garbage time, when Heat reserve Dexter Pittman presented his high-speed forearm to the neck of a sprinting Lance Stephenson, which was reminiscent of the ugliest play of last year's playoffs: Andrew Bynum's assault on J.J. Barea.

Despite a rare playoff game filled with beautiful fast-break moments, the story of the NBA would transform, thanks to all those hard playoff fouls, to a story of violence as the league office in New York decides how many players to suspend for Game 6.

And none of it had to happen.

---

The NBA has it exactly right: The game is better when it's not violent.

There are business reasons for that: Although some fans will tell you they're thrilled by the no-extra-charge sprinkling of mixed martial arts, by and large the league operates with the fear of riling a finicky general sports audience that is terrified of the spectacle of these players -- predominantly black -- behaving violently. In baseball and hockey it's "boys will be boys" but in this sport it's treated like the end of civilization as we know it when they start taking swings. Harsh penalties have essentially eliminated not only bench-clearing brawls but also punches and even most blatant elbows. There's a reason the Wests and Haslems have learned to attack using the elbow of a straight arm.

There are also basketball reasons to police rough play more in this sport than others. This sport is at its best when the action is free-flowing. Both of those hard fouls were designed in part to keep the Wades and Hansbroughs of the world from finishing at the rim with power dunks. But, of course, those power dunks are exactly what the league and its fans rightly want. That is the sport at its best. Two guys knocking each other in the noggin -- you can get that from all kinds of dumber, less skilled, less athletic games.

This is the sport where people fly to the hoop, and the vast majority of "hard playoff fouls" are designed to scare players from even trying to take off.

It's like using a jet fighter as a battering ram. Nothing dumber.

Old-timers tell fish tales of a game that was both vastly better and far more violent years ago. But the video reveals the truth: Through the NBA's "glory days" players had almost no muscle, didn't run nearly as fast or jump as high, didn't take defense anywhere near as seriously and endured precious little contact. Not to mention, the scores in those days were through the roof compared to today, precisely because so very many of those offensive players were entirely unmolested by defense. The most famous hard foul of yesteryear, Kevin McHale's clotheslining of Kurt Rambis, was such a big deal because it was such a massive departure from the norm. A few years ago Jason Kidd threw Jannero Pargo the court every bit as hard, and nobody remembers it because players go down that hard all the time.

Nowadays bigger, stronger bodies collide play after play, at elevations off the court few could imagine three decades ago. The forces in play are vastly greater, the knowledge of brain damage that much more acute. The league does far more than ever to prevent the escalation of violence, because it has to and should.

That is why referees are lectured again and again about keeping control of games, and dealing harshly with the kinds of fouls that might lead to escalation. This is why the work of Game 5's referees, Derrick Stafford, Greg Willard and Jason Phillips, is being second-guessed by the league as we speak.

---

Of all the dumb moments of Game 5 -- and there were several, including Danny Granger injuring his own ankle while trying to put a hard foul on James (the second time he twisted his ankle, when he had to leave the game for good) and Mike Miller playing an extended period with a Nike on one foot and a sock on the other -- none was dumber than the referees' huddle moments after Hansbrough's foul.

Everyone at home with or without a DVR, every fan in the seats and the people at league offices in New York all had replay of the video to watch. And they did. Miami fans who reacted mildly in real time saw it on the arena's big screen and were suddenly livid. It was a lot worse in replay, which made Hansbrough's intentions clear as something beyond blocking a shot.

The poor referees were just about the only people in the world who could not see it again, and they were the only people in the world who got to decide Hansbrough's penalty.

In retrospect, a Flagrant 2 would have been the right call, for two reasons. The first is, we now know with the unfair benefit of hindsight, that it would have prevented several more blows to the head. The second, though, is that thanks to the oddities of NBA rules, that call would would have triggered a video review, finally putting the referees on an equal information footing with Joe and Jane Fan in the tenth row.

Some say the league does not want to have everything decided by video. But they are deciding it that way right now, today, in New York, where league officials are watching nothing but video. From the rules:

League will review every flagrant, called or not. The League Office will consider the following factors (as well as any other relevant facts and circumstances) in determining whether to classify a foul as Flagrant “1” or Flagrant “2”, to reclassify a flagrant foul, or to impose a fine and/or suspension on the player involved: how hard the foul was; the outcome of the foul (e.g., whether it led to an altercation); and the level of the injury sustained by the player who was fouled.

It is great that the league is using video to get to the bottom of these things. It's the best available tool for investigating flagrant fouls, flopping, and a hundred other kinds of calls.

But why so slow? Here the NBA is losing a battle with the information age. On these tough-to-get-right-in-real-time calls, the league is fooled nightly, and everybody knows it.

Meanwhile, whole wars are being fought, missiles fired, bombs dropped, combat teams deployed based on real-time decisions, based on video beamed around the world. Barack Obama oversees Navy Seals by television, and gets Osama bin Laden as a result.

The NBA is no war, at least it's not supposed to be, but the same kinds of information can be processed just as fast. Which means where there used to be three options there are now four:

1. Get things blatantly wrong now and again and deal with the fact there will be a certain error rate.
2. Stop games almost constantly to review video, making the game a horrible TV product just as TV replaces tickets as the biggest revenue source.
3. Review video in New York and hand down punishments a day or two after the game.
4. Review video in real time.

No. 4 is, to me, obviously where the league is headed. There can't be blatant mistakes every night -- not the way people consume the game now. They can't make us wait while referees watch. And waiting for the real people to review the tape ... how could that possibly take so long? It's a few seconds of video. It's impossible to watch for more than a minute or two. Make up your mind and move on.

Here's my HoopIdea: The reviews in New York must happen instantly, mid-game, so that a player can be ejected or not while it still matters, and can still prevent a game from getting out of hand. Alternately, and better: Have a fourth, video-enabled referee on the sidelines, reviewing everything all the time. That referee would have started reviewing on video the moment the play was whistled dead, and could have easily had a good, lasting decision in the interim before Wade stepped to the line. That referee could also quickly and permanently solve flopping, traveling, out of bounds and so much more.

It's not how things used to be done, but it didn't used to be that every fan had better information than the referees. It's where this is headed, and it'll make a better game, one where it will make little sense for players to try to fool the referees with hard fouls, flops or anything else.

Some key moments of Game 4 between the Clippers and Spurs were not basketball at all. And with bricklayers like DeAndre Jordan and Reggie Evans parading to the line, it was a decent reason to change the channel.

"I hate it," says Gregg Popovich, the Spurs coach who made the whole thing happen. "It's ugly. But it's something that's available."

What he's talking about is what used to be called "Hack-a-Shaq," where, instead of playing defense, or grabbing a rebound to get the ball back, a team simply fouls a horrible free throw shooter, often with the ball nowhere in the vicinity, and forces them to struggle through the freebies.

It should probably be called "Hack-whoever-Gregg Popovich-says-to-hack," these days, though, as the Spurs dominate this field.

And yet the coach who does it most hates it. Fans hate it. Players, surely, prefer to play, not hack. Surely this is no referee's idea of a game well played. Even David Stern is on record against it. In 2008, Stern railed against hack-a-Shaq tactics to ESPN.com's J.A. Adande, saying he didn’t like "the idea that, 'Hey, look at me, I'm going to hit this guy as soon as the ball goes into play, even though he's standing under the other basket.'"

If everybody hates it ... why would it ever happen?

Because -- as an unintended consequence of the current rules is that in certain situations -- breaking the rules in this precise way can give a team an advantage.

In other words, the rules made Gregg Popovich do it.

Imagine if the penalty for robbing a bank was that you had to give half the money back. The rules, in that situation, would essentially beg people to rob banks.

Change the rulebook, though, and you can say goodbye to this forever. Nobody will miss it.

How to change the rulebook?

We're open to ideas. But here's a basic principle to consider: Breaking the rules should never help your team. If teams are breaking rules to gain an advantage, clearly the penalties are out of whack.

Now in basketball, there's something odd, that most sports don't have. We have a longstanding tradition of fouling intentionally to get the ball back. It happens late in almost every close game. Some of you might be thinking that any rule that eliminates Hack-a-Whoever would need to somehow preserve that.

To which we'd say: You sure about that?

One simple solution: Let fouled teams decide if they'd rather have the free throw, or the ball out of bounds. After any foul, Hack-a-Whoever or otherwise. You'd quickly have no reason to foul to get the ball back, because fouling would not get you the ball back. Then you'd also get a lot more games ending with a lot more basketball being played. And who's against that?

JOIN THE CONVERSATION HERE:

You can give us your ideas and talk with us and other fans in the following places:

• Twitter: Go to @HoopIdea and tweet to us with the hashtag #hoopidea

• Google+: Go to our HoopIdea Google+ page and discuss

• TrueHoop: Read our HoopIdea posts here and contribute on the conversation page

• Email us at hoopidea@gmail.com

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

On this edition of Flop of the Night we go back to Friday and Game 3 of Lakers-Thunder to give James Harden special recognition for this improbable flop of Lakers guard Steve Blake (video).

Here's what flopping expert Shane Battier said about noted Luis Scola: “The more hair you have, the better. My boy Luis Scola, he’s got that long hair and when it gets sweaty and he starts flopping and flailing, it looks like he’s getting murdered out there.”

New theory: James Harden’s enormous beard acts in much the same way.

Harden has a history of playoff flops -- this one against the Dallas Mavericks had Jeff Van Gundy and Mike Breen chuckling -- but the audacity of this acting job is truly admirable.

Midway through the fourth quarter, Blake finds himself trailing Harden around a ball screen. That's where Harden wants to keep Blake, so he blatantly hooks him with his off arm to prevent Blake from getting back in good defensive position.

Then, perhaps sensing that foul is about be called on him, Harden suddenly lurches forward and throws his arms -- and beard -- in the air, while Blake remains absolutely stationary. What's so amazing is that usually a flop comes in reaction to something the other player does, whether or not the contact is genuine. But here, Blake is just a prop in Harden’s performance.

It’s worth noting that the referee who made the call had a terrible angle on what actually happened. He just saw Harden’s reaction and gave him the benefit of the doubt. This is exactly the kind of flop that an instant remote review system could set straight in a matter of moments.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

From HoopIdea to Indiana Pacers coach Frank Vogel to NBA commissioner David Stern, flopping has been a topic of conversation during the NBA playoffs.

So this week, Five for Friday spotlights HoopIdeas from Twitter, ESPN comments, Grantland and Google+ that detail how the league can address flopping, and how anti-flopping rules would be enforced.

DO AWAY WITH THE BLOCK/CHARGE CALL

We need to start thinking about block-charge calls in an entirely different way. We need to realign the incentives for players on the court. We need to discourage any play that forces the referee to make a call. We need to urge players to play the game as if the officials weren't there, and not require such taxing use of their imaginations to do so. We need to do as much as possible to restore basketball to its purer, less whistle-prone, origins. We need to let the game breathe. -- Eamonn Brennan on ESPN’s College Basketball Nation Blog

BUILD A FLOP COMMITTEE

How about the NBA creates the proposed Flop Committee? If you accrue flops during the season, you start the next game with an automatic foul. And that keeps going every two flops after the first six. — Sam, New Orleans

Simmons: I'd go even further — once you get to 10 flops for the season, after every ensuing flop, you start the next game with TWO automatic fouls. -- From the April 20, 2012 Bill Simmons Mailbag on Grantland

PENALTY FOR "EMBELLISHMENT"

Whenever a player exaggerates the contact between he and another player, the referee can call a foul on the player who exaggerated the contact regardless of who committed the actual foul. This would surely discourage excessive flopping. Also, it would have an immediate impact on the game the exaggerated contact occurred, as opposed to a review process which would produce a punishment at a later date. -- Chris Nichols (A similar rule is already in place in the NHL)

ENFORCE FLOPS AS TEAM VIOLATIONS

Treat flops like 3 second violations. Offensive flop -- turnover. Defensive flop -- 1 free throw and the ball. -- Adam Schleman from the TrueHoop Comments

PENALIZE FLOPS LIKE ILLEGAL DEFENSE

They should [penalize flopping] like the illegal defense, except shoot free throws on the first flop. -- Keith Schoultz via Twitter.

Check out previous Five for Fridays: May 11 | May 4 | April 27 | April 20 | April 13 | April 6 | March 30| March 23 | March 16 | March 9

JOIN THE CONVERSATION

You can give us your ideas and talk with us and other fans in the following places:

• Twitter: Go to @HoopIdea and tweet to us with the hashtag #hoopidea

• Google+: Go to our HoopIdea Google+ page and discuss

• TrueHoop: Read our HoopIdea posts here and contribute on the conversation page

• Email us at hoopidea@gmail.com

And for the truly ambitious: Shoot a short video of yourself explaining your HoopIdea, upload it to YouTube and share the link with us on Twitter or Google+.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Today we bring you not one, not two, but three egregious flops from two of the game's finest players.

LeBron James is the most dominant athlete in the NBA, capable of leveling an entire team with an inspired run of unstoppable drives to the rim. So his willingness to exaggerate contact tends to drive fans nuts. Last night James found himself trapped against the sideline with David West and Danny Granger closing in on him. Out of any other options, and unprompted by contact, he essentially fell out of bounds (video) to preserve possession.

It happened right in front of ESPN's Mike Tirico, who called LeBron's performance "an extraordinary swan dive."

Not to be outdone, Tony Parker proved to Chris Paul and Blake Griffin that when it comes to flopping they still have much to learn. Parker's first flop came when a nudge from Chris Paul sent him careening to the floor (video).

The call was a big one -- it put Paul on the bench with three first half fouls.

But his best flopping work (Video) of the night came just 20 seconds later, and at the expense of Blake Griffin.

After chasing down a loose ball in the back court, Parker had only a handful of seconds to recover possession and get off a shot before the shotclock expired. Wary of this fact, Griffin chased him along the sideline to force Parker to use up the clock.

Instead, Parker used Blake's effort to draw a foul and rescue the possession.

With the benefit of replay, ABC play-by-play man Dan Shulman explained that instead of being fouled, "Tony Parker initiated that contact. He grabbed the arm of Blake Griffin, and made it look like he was being grabbed."

But the official who made the call was trailing the play, and only saw Parker's "reaction," not the shenanigans that prompted his wild flailing.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

Sometimes being an NBA official is tough. But this time, referee Michael Smith had a gimme.

About five feet in front of him, the Celtics' Kevin Garnett delivered an offensive foul combination platter to Sixers swingman Andre Iguodala: One part moving pick, another part flying elbow.

Now that's a foul.

Replays only made things clearer. Later, even Charles Oakley -- a high priest of physical play -- would take to Twitter to chastise anyone who'd question the call.

Smith did the obvious thing: He blew his whistle.

And that surprised the hell out of everybody.

---

Broadcasters could scarcely hide their astonishment. It was a matter of seconds before the Boston crowd was apoplectic, chanting in unison a word that begins "bull" and ends unprintable. Even back in the TV studio, where the mood was less partisan, there was little support for Smith's call, which was said to have been to the letter of the law, but not the spirit.

The reason? The game was on the line.

The Celtics were trailing by three with 10 seconds left. With Smith's whistle, the Celtics went from living on the prayer of a tying 3 to doomed.

It was one of the more obviously correct calls imaginable. But it befuddled so many because there's an idea out there that referees ought not decide games.

Even Iguodala was surprised. Garnett hit him so hard the Sixer said his ribcage still hurt a day later. Iguodala said on the NBA Today podcast that when he heard the whistle, in that pressure-packed moment, he assumed it had nothing to do with the blow he had suffered, saying he "actually thought the whistle was for something else."

Which is amazing, if you think about it. Iguodala knows the rules, and he knows Garnett broke them. He also knew Smith was standing right there.

But Iguodala also knows this: "In that situation, they always say you can't have a call determine the game."

The NBA would insist playcalls are the same all game long. And the NBA is a decade into going to some trouble -- inspired, sources say, by a private and public campaign by Mavericks owner Mark Cuban -- to make it that way.

But it's a stretch to say that's what's happening on the court. Players certainly believe they have more leeway late in games, and there's evidence referees swallow whistles. For instance, the 2011 book "Scorecasting" found offensive fouls are 40 percent less likely to be called in overtime, compared to the first 48 minutes -- a trend that would explain the broad surprise at Smith's call.

---

In 2008, the NBA's independent investigator Lawrence Pedowitz published his report on refereeing in the wake of the Tim Donaghy scandal.

He included a section on "old" vs. "new" refereeing styles:

In an effort to improve both actual and perceived referee performance, the NBA, during the past six years, has tried to move toward a clearly articulated refereeing philosophy that adheres strictly to a literal and consistent interpretation of the rules. Previously, referees were inclined to employ an approach that allowed for more discretion. That approach -- which was also aimed at getting calls right -- varied somewhat with the circumstances of the game.

The approach has been described to us as the “art of refereeing” or “game management,” and has aspects of common sense, a desire not to interrupt the flow of the game (thereby showcasing the talent of the players), and rough justice.

Then Pedowitz listed examples gleaned from his interviews with every official, including:

Referees might avoid calling a foul on a play with significant contact at the end of a close game, consistent with the view that players rather than referees should determine a game’s outcome.

We all get what this means -- referees want to tread carefully, to have light impact. But even that is not real. When there's a hard foul late in a close game, referees don't really have an option of not deciding the game. They can essentially call it by the book and decide the game for the fouled team, or call something less and decide it for the other team. (The band Rush knows all about this: "If you choose not to decide you still have made the choice.")

For instance, referees decided for the Sixers and Celtics in getting those teams out of the first round.

---

If any two teams know the power of the old way of refereeing, where referees issue only small punishments late, it's these Sixers and these Celtics. Both teams won their first-round series with some old-fashioned crunch time referee timidity.

On video, Spencer Hawes' foul of Omer Asik at the end of the Sixers' series-clinching Game 6 was inseparable from all kinds of plays that have been whistled flagrant. It took a massive amount of force to keep the massive, open and full-speed Asik from even attempting a shot. Hawes put everything he had into yanking Asik sideways from the base of his neck, throwing him to the ground with no hope of scoring.

But even though referees were there with a great view of everything, only a regular foul was called. The city of Chicago isn't the only place people believe that decision wasn't rooted in the rulebook -- which would support the flagrant -- but in the reality that there were seven seconds left in a game the Bulls led by one. A flagrant would have given the Bulls the lead, free throws and the ball. A flagrant would have "decided the game," or darned close.

Letting players decide the game has a dark counterpart in these situations, too: A less violent foul would not have worked. That close to the hoop, with an offensive player that open, any normal foul would have let Asik win the game by finishing at the rim, putting the Bulls up three with a free throw still to shoot. This oddity of NBA rules, and their enforcement, forced Hawes to make his attack a particularly violent one.

It's odd that breaking the rules by fouling ever helps a team win. It's nuts that there are cases like this where throwing the opponent wildly off balance is the only way to win.

Of course you know what happened. It worked beautifully. Hawes' foul was, arguably, the play of the Sixers' season. Asik couldn't get a decent shot off. He missed both free throws. The Bulls didn't get the ball back, because no flagrant was called. Iguodala got the rebound, drove hard to the hoop, was fouled by Asik and won the game for the Sixers at the line.

But the story doesn't end there.

The Sixers retreated to their locker room to savor the win and gather their belongings for a trip to the second round. On the locker room television, the Hawks and Celtics were fighting for the right to face the Sixers next.

The Celtics were up two points with 3.1 seconds left -- the Hawks were inbounding under their own hoop, praying to tie the game. In Philadelphia, Hawes was watching.

Two things happened. First Celtic Marquis Daniels held Hawk Al Horford, rather blatantly. It's to referee Bill Kennedy's credit that he called anything. But replays show the hold happened before the ball had been inbounded, and the NBA would later admit the call came late. This was a particular point of emphasis from the league to the referees a few years ago. When the foul occurs before the ball is inbounded, as this clearly did, the correct call is one free throw for the Hawks, and then the ball out of bounds again. That would have been a huge help to the Hawks' chances, in a game they really lost by one point (before an intentional foul). Instead it was ruled the foul was after the ball had been inbounded, giving the Hawks no relief at all: Once again they got the ball out of bounds.

Whether Kennedy didn't see the sequence of events, or didn't want to have too big an impact, is unknown.

But what is known is that he had a front-row seat for the next play. The bigger, stronger Horford caught the ball by the hoop, and Daniels was faced with the same no-brainer of a choice Hawes had. He was beat, with no way of winning by following the rulebook, or making a basketball play.

So Daniels grabbed Horford around the shoulders and hurled him earthbound. The Hawes foul looked more like a flagrant than this one, but it was certainly not a play on the ball. Kennedy called a regular foul. Horford missed one of two free throws and the Celtics advanced to meet the Sixers.

Credit both Daniels and Hawes with great, game-saving plays that are in the interest of their teams -- but not their league.

---

There is only one alternative to referees deciding games. Iguodala: "That means anything goes."

That's what Garnett, Hawes and Daniels were all counting on.

Otherwise, why would Garnett -- one of the NBA's most respected veterans, a champion and a professional who knows all the little particulars of winning -- put his team in jeopardy with such a reckless play, right in front of a referee, in such a moment?

It's not like he tripped. He took a calculated risk even though, as he'd later admit, he had been warned in the same game about such plays.

Imagine the outrage if, say, JaVale McGee had done the same thing in the second quarter. A chorus of pundits would sing of his ignorance. But this was Garnett, and it's clear he wasn't being dumb at all. He was being brilliant. He was playing with the assumption Smith simply would not doom the Celtics with his whistle, which gave him a special way to get his teammate Paul Pierce wide open for a game-tying 3.

Garnett is not being called a fool. Instead, the referee is being questioned.

Garnett was playing very well under the old way of refereeing. But the new way is better. Way better, in fact, because it rewards the best basketball plays, as opposed to hardest fouls.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

It was a rough night of flopping for Manu Ginobili. First, he was unable to inspire the referees to tweet -- though Twitter was noisy enough -- when he flailed on a first quarter 3-point attempt (Video).

It was the type of call Ginobili is famous for getting -- which might be why he couldn't sell it this time. As Eric Bledsoe reached in, Ginobili ripped the ball to his shot pocket and struck a distorted pose, like he wanted to shoot the ball but forgot how.

The officials' response: Silence.

Later in the game, Ginobili was even burned by one of his old tricks (Video) when Caron Butler drew a charge by stepping into Manu's path as he released a kickout pass. This sneaky play -- where the defender takes the charge after the driving player has already passed off -- is a pet peeve of many fans and has even shown up in a HoopIdea Five for Friday care of @ShotDrJr.

By the time Manu makes contact with Butler -- who appears to still be moving when he gets the call -- he has almost entirely stopped his forward momentum. But that doesn't stop Butler from flying backward and earning the call instead of flying out to the 3-point line to close out Kawhi Leonard. And that's your Flop of the Night.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

As Dave McMenamim reported on ESPN LA, Kobe Bryant says he is against flopping and does not intentionally take charges.

"We got a couple guys that take charges, but for the most part, the one guy that took a charge is now playing in Oklahoma," Bryant said of his longtime teammate Derek Fisher, who is now with the Thunder. "I don't take charges. Metta [World Peace] don't take charges. Steve [Blake] will take a charge every now and then, but most everybody else just stands up and plays."

Let it be noted that Pau Gasol has been known to take to the court in the name of drawing an offensive foul. But all in all, the Lakers are very much wallflowers in the NBA's flopping party.

"I don't flop," continued Bryant. "We all know what flopping is when we see it. The stuff that you see is where guys aren't really getting hit at all and are just flailing around like a fish out of water. That's kind of like, where are your balls at?"

Although Bryant makes clear charges and flops are not always synonymous, block/charge collisions are a particular hot spot for flopping. Bucks forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute recently estimated that "40 to 50 percent" of NBA charges are flops -- calls made based on the defender staging a theatrical reaction to minimal contact.

In fact, it’s worth questioning whether the entire concept of the block/charge call needs to be rethought: When a strategy leads to lots of collisions, lots of falling down (legitimate and illegitimate), lots of faking, lots of whistles, lots of stoppages of play, lots of arguments and lots of real and potential injuries, and is designed mostly to prevent our most dynamic scorers from making exciting plays, is that something basketball needs?

Hoopdata shows that the Lakers join the Thunder as the two teams taking the least advantage; they are 29th and 30th on the season, respectively, in drawing charges. With charge-taker Fisher in Oklahoma City, it's likely the current incarnation of the Lake Show is dead last. (And true to his word, Bryant takes very few charges -- according to Hoopdata, just two in as many years.)

This is great news for anyone who is eager to see an NBA with less flopping. Here we see that a team that has won lots of titles and a team projected to do the same are showing the game can be played in a fan-pleasing and effective way without manufactured theatrics. That's fantastic and strong support for the argument that curtailing flopping won't hurt basketball.

One concern, however: David Thorpe points out the Lakers are the worst team in the NBA, by a wide margin, when it comes to creating turnovers. Defensive flops are, of course, designed to do just that. It would take some in-depth analysis to make a case that the Lakers would be better if they flopped more, but it could be so -- which would send a disturbing message.

Indeed, despite what the Lakers and Thunder show us, it might be that flopping does pay for some teams, with Miami (fourth in charges drawn this season) near the top of the list, and the Spurs and Clippers undeniably in the mix.

It will take more than resolute players, those willing to "stand up and play," to stop the flop.

It's the NBA's move. The only wrong answer is doing nothing, especially with one of the NBA’s greatest superstars, the commissioner and fans all speaking out against flopping. Only the rulebook, implicitly, is for it.

But that can change.

HoopIdea began with the conviction that NBA basketball was the best game ever, but could be even better. To that end, we opened channels of communications to ESPN.com readers, to hear how they thought the game could be better.

You know what they wanted changed?

Flopping.

That was a radioactive topic in comments, e-mails and tweets. Flopping came up again and again, far too much to ignore.

That was, frankly, a bit of a surprise. None of us saw it as that big of a deal. Not then, at least. But we did some research, watched some video and found ... a hell of a lot.

NBA flopping is one of those things where the more you dig in, the more likely you are to become a zealot. There tends to be a moment of religious conversion, when suddenly it's clear that flopping is a major preoccupation of NBA players, and it's happening right before our eyes and it's ridiculous.

Flop of the Night was born, and during every single NBA game NBA fans are tweeting candidate plays to our @HoopIdea Twitter account.

Pacers coach Frank Vogel cemented the idea that flopping is an issue of the moment by accusing the Heat of leading the league in the dubious art. It was pure playoff gamesmanship, to be certain -- he wanted to get in the heads of referees -- but it resonated for a reason. People are worried about flopping now, and the Heat do it as noticeably as any team.

Following up in an interview on 790 the Ticket, as reported by Tom Haberstroh, Vogel made the case that fans are making: "We've got the greatest athletes in the world. There's nothing more exciting for our fans to see an athletic play made above the rim. When a defender's intent is to fall down and hope for a whistle, I don't think that's good for the game."

Whether or not Vogel's tactic will work in the series remains to be seen, but certainly Vogel succeeding in bringing the issue to a new level. At the Pacers' first game against the Heat on Sunday, NBA Commissioner David Stern got serious about flopping during the ABC TV broadcast:

Some years ago I told the competition committee that we were going to start fining people for flopping, and then suspending. And I think they almost threw me out of the room (saying), 'No, let it be.'

I think it's time to look at (flopping) in a more serious way, because it's only designed to fool the referee. It's not a legitimate play in my judgment. I recognize if there's contact (you) move a little bit, but some of this is acting. We should give out Oscars rather than MVP trophies.

The league was determined to fine players for flopping in 2008, as Marc Stein reported at the time, but nothing really came of it. Perhaps this time people see the issue differently. There is no shortage of voices complaining about the state of things:

• Jeff Van Gundy on ESPN TV: "It just ruins the game. I can’t believe with all the brilliance we have in the NBA office that we can’t find a way to eliminate this part of the game, or at least even start to punish it. ... I’m just sick of it! And I can’t believe the NBA office isn’t sick of it too. They’re obviously condoning this. ... They’re absolutely condoning flopping because they give them the calls and they don’t punish them when they do flop."
• Zach Randolph on "The Doug Gottlieb Show" says it's getting worse and that, for instance, the Clippers have learned well: "It starts with Chris Paul, because Blake didn't really used to flop like that, you know, last year. Reggie (Evans) flops, Reggie always flops. I think it started when Chris got (to the Clippers)."
• Bucks forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute admits on NBA Today that he has flopped, and says everybody does: "You can't touch guys now. The just flop, or they call everything. I think it's part of the game. Flopping. There's definitely a limit where flopping becomes annoying. ... I think, personally, 40 to 50 percent of all charges are flopping. ... Nowadays, you kind of touch a guy and he flops. ... It's just taking advantage of the way the game is called, offensively and defensively."
• Mike Golic on Mike and Mike in the Morning: “It looks horrible. ... Out on the football field I tried to sell things. So there’s a line in all of it: does it make it embarrassing to the sport, the way some of it looks? I guess that’s the questions David Stern is asking. There’s that line you cross over to say, 'All right this is getting out of hand, this is getting embarrassing' ... are we there yet?"
• Shane Battier says he is all for new rules to prevent flopping.

Whether or not you think the NBA has a pressing problem here depends on whether or not you think flopping is very common. If you don't think it's common, I question how hard you're looking.

Not doing anything about it -- and at the moment the league is doing literally nothing whatsoever -- seems to have real potential to harm the game.

Consider the lessons of international soccer. Gary Neville, who was today named a coach of the English national team, is almost synonymous with English soccer. As a longtime regular for Manchester United and the national team, and more recently as a TV analyst, he has a voice that matters. And in a meandering and heartbreaking rant on Sky TV (via @netw3rk), Neville is at his wit's end on the topic of diving. "It isn't creeping into the game," he insists. "This is an epidemic!"

Over nearly 15 minutes of Neville's commentary (well worth watching, by the way) the mood changes. As one superstar after another is shown falling comically to the ground, with games hanging in the balance, it stops feeling like garden variety hand-wringing, and starts to feel more like profound concern about the very definition of the sport. Where is all this headed? Why hasn't somebody fixed this by now?

In soccer one fall can lead to one penalty kick which has an excellent chance of deciding the match, which is why Neville speculates it's a regular part of even amateur soccer. That's also why Neville admits he took a dive or two in his playing days.

Who doesn't? Included in the video clips are some of the biggest names in the sport, including David Beckham, Lionel Messi, Frank Lampard and Stephen Gerrard. "This is every single game of football," Neville laments, "with the greatest players in the world."

What can be done about it? "I don't know what we can actually do," says Neville. But you sure get the feeling he wishes something would be done, because the sport is not, as he sees it, what it once was. "This," Neville says, "is the way of the game."

But of course, it doesn't have to be.

Word is flopping is likely on the agenda for the NBA's competition committee -- comprised of the NBA's 30 general managers or their designees -- expected to meet during the Finals next month. If the committee recommends some method to cope with flopping (and HoopIdea has plenty of suggestions), it will go to the NBA's Board of Governors, made of all 30 owners or their designees.

The owners can do with it as they please. They can vote the recommendations into the rulebook, they can come up with their own solution, they can vote against changes or they can abstain from addressing it at all.

What matters to those intent on stopping the flop, however, is that change could come quickly -- if general managers and owners want it.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Even before the Pacers and Heat took the floor in Game 1 of their second round series, we knew that flopping would be a topic. Indiana head coach Frank Vogel's comments about the Heat's habit of flopping -- and the $15,000 fine that followed -- assured as much.

Right on cue, Mike Miller earned his first Flop of The Night by toppling over on the expectation of contact from David West. Watch the video. Miller actually leans into the bump from West -- his plan here is to draw the charge so he needs to ensure at least some contact is made.

The set up is almost as unbelievable as Miller's actual fall, which lasts just under seven seconds. That's an exaggeration, of course, but it's fair to say Miller tips over in slow-motion, rather than falls. Instead of moving his feet to regain his balance, Miller, obviously intent on drawing a call, lets the kind of contact he would normally shrug off knock him to the ground.

Miller's tumble was met with silent whistles.

As Mike Tirico put it while calling the game on ABC, "You could say Frank Vogel's $15,000 paid off, at least for one play."

Runner up: LeBron James takes a shot to the throat, or so it appears.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com