The origins of Basketball

Via a mailing list on Game Design, I found a reference to a paper written by James Naismith - the inventor of the game of Basketball. Chapter 3 is very interesting, as it details the process he went through designing the game and formulating it’s first set of rules.

I concluded that the most interesting game at that time was American Rugby. I asked myself why this game could not be used as an indoor sport. The answer to this was easy. It was because tackling was necessary in Rugby. But why was tackling necessary? Again the answer was easy. It was because the men were allowed to run with the ball, and it was necessary to stop them. With these facts in mind, I sat erect at my desk and said aloud:

“If he can’t run with the ball, we don’t have to tackle; and if we don’t have to tackle, the roughness will be eliminated.”

I can still recall how I snapped my fingers and shouted, “I’ve got it!”

What is really interesting, as a European, is that the initial rules, especially rule 3, sound a lot more like Netball (popular in the UK, Australia, NZ, etc…, not really popular at all in the USA), than Basketball.

3. A player cannot run with the ball. The player must throw it from the spot on which he catches it; allowance to be made for a man who catches the ball when running at a, good speed.

It seems to me that Netball is very closely linked to the original design of the game, and that Basketball evolved from that.

Anyhow, this just seemed interesting to me. In the industry there is a large amount of published information about “videogame” design, but this is the first time I’ve seen anything about the design of an actual sport.

Plus, it’s slightly amusing that the inventor of one of the three big US professional sports was a Canadian…