Schayes: The Franchise Center is an Endangered Species

1. Traditionally, centers take longer to develop than guards. They are bigger people and it takes longer for the athletic skills and physical development to happen. I came out of High School weighing 215 pounds, left college after 4 years at 245 lbs, and after 5 years in the league played most of my career at 280. And I didn’t grow one inch taller. Thirty years ago it was rare for a player to enter the league without four years of college.

Today, it’s almost unheard of for a star player to last more than one year in college. Centers typically miss their entire physical development cycle before they enter the league.

2. Most 7-footers don’t reach their full height until they are between 18-20 years old. So in essence they don’t know they are actually centers until they are entering the league. Thirty years ago they would have received several years of coaching at the position, developing their offensive skills in the low post, learning how to attack double-teams.

Today there is little specific position coaching as players are sent to the league at a much younger age. Players also miss the entire skill development cycle for a center. Plus few players are interested in post play who are not true centers. It is much more common for NBA teams to find an athletic 7-footer with the hopes of teaching him how to play once he is in the league. Remember, you can’t teach height! By the way, this strategy has a horrible track record, see #4 below.

3. The center position is the one position that you can’t play by yourself. Centers typically need to be fed the ball offensively in a set play. Mastery requires years of team structure to learn the intricacies of the position. The center position requires the most precision as things happen in traffic very quickly. Centers don’t have the luxury of isolations with time to dribble the ball 10 times to get off a shot.

Today’s development cycle is so short that this rarely happens. Youth teams don’t know how to use centers, and by high school, players have rarely learned how to play inside offensively.

4. It’s been so long since dinosaurs ruled the Earth (meaning centers ruled the game) that in many instances, the skilled coaching doesn’t really exist on the level that it did 30 years ago. Plainly put, few people really understand how to teach the position. After 1995 or so I had a hard time getting signed to new contracts even though I was still a very effective player. The reason I heard, most of all, was that there just weren’t enough centers to play against to justify signing me.

5. Since so few teams in the last 20 years have had a dominant offensive center, there is no urgency for anyone else to get one (or develop one).

6. As the 3-point line became the weapon of choice, few teams see the need for a center to do anything but block shots. With a shot blocker in place, the smalls can pressure the 3-point line without the worry of getting beat to the basket. Plus there are more 7-footers shooting 3s than dominating the post! Case in point: Chris Bosh attempted 37 3-pointers in the playoffs. Teammate Mike Miller attempted 36.

Thirty years ago when the three ball was new, teams used it as a threat to free up the post game. That is called “inside/out basketball”. Solid post play was used to suck defenders in for kick out 3s. Now the 3-point shot makes up more than half of some teams’ attempts, a strategy unheard of back then. Today, post play only happens when the 3 is covered.

Consider this: In 1979-80, the first year the 3-pointer was introduced to the NBA, the Atlanta Hawks attempted only 75 3-pointers DURING THE ENTIRE SEASON. (They made 13).

For some reason, the idea of pairing a dominant post player with a bunch of shooters is out of fashion unless Howard is your center.

It may be a chicken and egg kind of thing. No one will do it until someone does it well and wins. Currently San Antonio is the only team that has consistently used a dominant post player effectively. If they had won it this year, maybe the tide would start to change. After all nothing succeeds like success!

So what will it take to reverse the trend? For one thing it will take a visionary to understand the value of an inside/out offense and commit to dominant play there. Then it must be taught and bought into. The final factor is this mythical team needs to win. The only thing that will force others to follow is knowing that the road to a championship runs through the post.

I do a lot of private coaching and youth coaching. When I instruct players on every level, I am still amazed how few players understand the most basic elements of center play. Even as I watch many college and NBA games, I miss the days when players understood how to set a pick, or establish deep post position.

As an old school guy, I appreciate the tremendous basketball education that I received from so many Hall of Fame coaches on every level. I continue to pay it back at every chance I get.

I hope someone figures it out and being an inside player becomes fashionable again. Maybe Dwight Howard and Kevin McHale will make it happen in Houston. I hope it does, so we can get the Franchise Center off the Endangered Species list!

MORE FROM DANNY SCHAYES:

WHY THE CHAMPIONSHIP FORMULA ALWAYS WORKS (UNTIL IT DOESN’T)
HOW DO HEAT COMPARE TO GREATEST TEAMS EVER?
ON NBA COACH OF THE YEAR, AND COACHES IN GENERAL

Danny Schayes is a retired 18-year-veteran of the NBA, a professional broadcaster and aspiring author now penning NBA columns for SheridanHoops. Follow him on Twitter.