Was watching an NBA game as they were coming back from a timeout and couldn’t really understand why:
(a) They had about eight security guys lining the sides/ends of the court, facing out. What do they think is going to happen (in the timeout as opposed to the game)?;
(b) the players and coaches from both benches all huddled up on the court (not the sidelines). Why all pile onto the floor (it’s only 13-14 people)?
Not sure about (b), but I think the answer to (a) is to discourage spectators from going onto the court to hobnob with players during timeouts. Here’s a story from February of last year in which two women walked up to the Trail Blazers’ huddle:
http://www.chicagobreakingsports.com/2010/02/nba-probing-how-fans-got-into-blazers-huddle.html
I’m not sure what you’re referring to here, don’t they usually just huddle in front of the bench? I’m guessing they just move onto the court to have a little more room to stand a comfortable distance apart in a circle and also to put a little distance between them and the fans so they can hear better.
They all move onto the floor for 3 reasons.
Coaches are paranoid people and they fear, especially in opposing arenas, that the plays they diagram and their strategies will be overheard by the opposing teams. They use hand signals and code words to communicate plays mid-game while a PG is walking up the court and keeping those as secret as is possible is a goal. By moving to the middle of the court they eliminate the possibility that a person sitting directly behind the visiting bench, always season ticket holders and potentially team employees, could be scouting them and communicating with the other team.
There’s just more space for the players to huddle around and all see the marker board. On the sidelines its basically impossible for players to stand behind the coaches and by moving the chairs onto the floor more guys can huddle 360 degrees around the coach to see the play. Having everyone sitting/standing in concentric circles brings everyone closer and allows better views than having a lopsided D-shape pinned against the fans.
The coaches can ensure that all the players are attentive this way. There’s no “end of the bench” syndrome when you make everyone huddle up on the court. Players used to often ignore the coaches during time outs and use the time to get water, sit down and talk to trainers and teammates. When the coach moves the huddle to the court everyone has to ignore the distractions and pay attention and it gets the assistants and the water boys out of the way.
The security guys are there to make sure nothing funny is going on in the stands. They do it at baseball games during inning changes too. It’s not that it’s dramatically more dangerous during timeouts than during the game, but it’s more practical to do it during timeouts. If teams could position security there during the game without interfering with play and spectators views they would. It’s just not practical.
Also, during timeouts and intermissions is when everyone gets up and moves around. During the game most people are sitting and paying attention. A fight or some jackass rushing the court/field is going to stand out like a sore thumb when everyone around them is watching the game and sitting. During timeouts when everyone gets up to move around it’s tougher to notice which people are just stretching and leaving/coming to their seats and which ones are doing something wrong and unsafe. The extra eyes on the crowd at that point allows security to better watch these periods when everyone is moving around and people might come too close to the court or start bumping one another.
The guys I saw were huddled at a spot halfway to the key, so more that just a little room.
I’d suspect it’s for the reasons Omni noted, probably mostly reason #1 (discouraging eavesdropping).