Thursday, June 18, 2015

How the 3-point shot has changed basketball



Tom Haberstroh writes at ESPN,
LeBron James is one of the greatest athletes the world has ever seen.

The body of an NFL linebacker. The speed of a track star. The vision and precision of a marksman. The basketball mind of a computer. All rolled into one package barreling right at you on his way to the rim.

How do you defeat such a modern-day Goliath?

With a slingshot, of course.

In the NBA, they call it a 3-pointer.

...By 1967, former NBA great George Mikan had become the commissioner of the NBA's upstart rival, the American Basketball Association. Desperate for fans, the ABA implemented the 3-point shot for the 1967-68 season to juice up the action, adopting it from the defunct American Basketball League, where it originated.

"We called it the home run, because the 3-pointer was exactly that," Mikan said in "Loose Balls," Terry Pluto's definitive history of the ABA. "It brought the fans out of their seats."


Stephen Curry and the Warriors used the power of the 3-ball to become a powerhouse in the NBA. AP Photo/Ben Margot

Read more here.

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