The NBA is considering implementing a target score for games that require an overtime period, which has caused a lot of discussion among fans and pundits. Ice Cube took to Twitter to share his opinion on the timing of the league’s decision.
“Adam Silver is 5 years behind the curve,” the 53-year-old tweeted on Monday (Feb. 27). The Friday actor then boasted about his three-on-three basketball league, BIG3, who instituted that rule years ago. “@thebig3 been on a target score since 2017.”
The N.W.A. legend’s dig was a quote tweet of a report by popular NBA media source NBA Central. They shared a report from Eric Pincus which outlined the thought process behind implementing the target score. “That would prevent overlong broadcasts and overloading player minutes, like Los Angeles Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard’s playing 46 minutes in a double-overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings on Friday.”
The NBA has already explored target scores with the new All-Star Game format in 2020, which added the Elam Ending. In memory of the late Kobe Bryant, who passed away in January 2020, they took the winning team’s score at the end of three quarters and set a goal of scoring 24 more points beyond that. With Team Giannis leading Team Lebron 133-124, the winning team was whoever reached 157 first. Team Lebron successfully did so.
Ice Cube has previously had words for the NBA and their alleged attempts to sabotage the BIG3. “The NBA hasn’t been the nicest to the BIG3,” the Los Angeles rapper told Basketball News. “Of course, publicly, they say all the right words. But we know privately, there’s things done behind the scenes [with] sponsors, broadcasters, blah blah blah… It did tarnish my fandom a bit.”