A breakaway rim is a basketball rim that contains a hinge and a spring at the point where it attaches to the backboard so that it can bend downward when a player dunks a basketball, and then quickly snaps back into a horizontal position when the player releases it. It allows players to dunk the ball without shattering the backboard, and it reduces the possibility of wrist injuries. Breakaway rims were invented in the mid-1970s and are now an essential element of high-level basketball.
In the early days of basketball, dunking was considered ungentlemanly, and was rarely used outside of practice or warm-up drills. A broken backboard or distorted rim could delay a game for hours. During the 1970s, however, players like Julius Erving and David Thompson of the American Basketball Association popularized the dunk with their athletic flights to the basket, increasing the demand for flexible rims. [1] [2]
While several men claim to have created the breakaway rim, Arthur Ehrat is recognized as the inventor by the Smithsonian Institution's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention & Innovation. [1] [3] A resident of Lowder, Illinois, Ehrat worked at a grain elevator for most of his life and barely knew anything about basketball. In 1975, his nephew, an assistant basketball coach at Saint Louis University, asked him to help design a rim that could support slam dunks. Using a spring from a John Deere cultivator, Ehrat designed a rim that could bend and spring back after 125 pounds of force were applied to it. He called his device "The Rebounder". In 1982, the US patent office accepted his 1976 application to patent a "deformation-preventing swingable mount for basketball goals". [4] [5] The breakaway rim was first used by the NCAA during the 1978 Final Four in St. Louis. [5] Although Darryl Dawkins shattered two backboards with his dunks in 1979, [6] the old-style bolted rim structure was not phased out of the NBA until the 1981–82 season, when breakaway rims debuted as a uniform equipment upgrade.
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A slam dunk, also simply known as a dunk, is a type of basketball shot that is performed when a player jumps in the air, controls the ball above the horizontal plane of the rim, and scores by shoving the ball directly through the basket with one or both hands. It is a type of field goal that is worth two points. Such a shot was known as a "dunk shot" until the term "slam dunk" was coined by former Los Angeles Lakers announcer Chick Hearn.
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A backboard is a piece of basketball equipment. It is a raised vertical board with an attached basket consisting of a net suspended from a hoop. It is made of a flat, rigid piece of, often Plexiglas or tempered glass which also has the properties of safety glass when accidentally shattered. It is usually rectangular as used in NBA, NCAA and international basketball. In recreational environments, a backboard may be oval or a fan-shape, particularly in non-professional games.
A backboard shattering is an accident or stunt in basketball. It occurs when a player performs a slam dunk with sufficient force to shatter the tempered glass of the backboard, often causing the hoop to break off as well. The stunt usually causes games to be canceled or delayed, incurring a foul for the offending player, serious injuries to occur and expensive costs of cleanup and replacement. Shattering a backboard can be dangerous, sending various small pieces of the backboard glass flying over the players, sideline press personnel, referees, and spectators. In the National Basketball Association (NBA), shattering a backboard during a game is penalized with a "non-unsportsmanlike" technical foul and a possible fine towards the player. The player may not be ejected, nor shall the foul count towards a player's total towards either ejection or suspension. The referee also has latitude to waive off the foul, if it is determined the shattering was accidental due to a defect in the backboard or its structure, the board was broken during a rebound of the ball from a jump shot, or if the player had no intentions to dunk with force.
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Basketball is a ball game and team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules. Since being developed by James Naismith as a non-contact game that almost anyone can play, basketball has undergone many different rule variations, eventually evolving into the NBA-style game known today. Basketball is one of the most popular and widely viewed sports in the world.
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules. Basketball is one of the most popular and widely viewed sports in the world.
The rim is a piece of basketball equipment, the circular metal ring holding up the net. It hangs from the backboard. The rim had a diameter of 18 inches. A slam dunk requires one to jump high enough to get his hand above or over the rim. Today there are breakaway rims.