Craw's Email Bag/Tribute To You Great Readers

Time to give all you great emailers some credit.

For sure college basketball fans are passionate about the game. I hear from great fans, coaches, referees and even basketball timekeepers. The good and the bad are always accepted.

Sometimes the posts I make, get no response, other times, it takes me three days to read all your emails.

Nothing creates a greater response from the readers of Craw's Corner than my effort to make the game better through rule changes. Four changes I proposed have stirred the pot the most. You can read my entire comments on these changes in past posts, but in a nutshell here are some of my proposals and the responses. (I do not use names for responses, I will always respect people's privacy.)

1. Put back dunking the basketball in the pre-game warm-ups. Responses:

"Dumb idea, there is enough dunking during the game, it is all for show and not part of the game."

"Great idea Craw, not enough is done for the fans as it is, this would be a great move, thanks for bringing it up"

"I am a basketball timekeeper, the last thing the game needs is someone breaking the backboard, causing myself and many others to have to stay longer, games last too long as it is."

2. Dropping the 35 second shot clock down to 29 seconds. Responses:

There was not one negative comment out of 73 emails. Sounds like I hit a home run here. I WILL TAKE A BOW, fully realizing your only as good as your next performance.

3. Eliminate the alternate possession, bring back the jump ball. Responses:

"Bad idea, this was the best rule change ever put in the game."

"I have never seen a referee yet who can throw the ball up straight, no change necessary."

"You have been watching too much Dick Vitale, stupid idea, stupid."

"This will create too many injuries, not a real bright idea, but as you have said, you are making us fans think about making the game better."

4. Eliminate the second overtime if necessary and go to a free throw shoot out. This caused the most passion of any post that I have written in the months I have been doing this. You can read the whole post, which was written on May 15th.

"Love the creativity, but a bad idea. Overtimes are huge part of the game, don't mess with this one."

"On paper this looks dumb, but give me more time to think about it."

"Crawscorner, I love this idea. I want to see how many people really choke on the free throw line."

"They need to put you on the rules committee, about time someone stepped up to change things."

I will continue my quest in future weeks to bring you awesome readers some 40 rule changes which I think will impact the game for many years to come and make it even better than it is.

crawscorner@gmail.com