Hey, coaches: Get off the court!

Some rules are silly, and there are others we all agree to disregard even if they make sense. Players are supposed to get called for delay of game when they make a layup, catch the ball as it comes through the hoop and hand it to the officials. Dwight Howard is supposed take fewer than 10 seconds to shoot a free throw once the referee tosses him the ball.

And coaches are supposed to stay in their designated area along the sidelines.

These are all concrete, objective things, and they are easy to enforce when officials want to enforce them. There is no subjectivity here, as when we discuss what sort of angry gesture should merit a technical foul or whether something is a block or a charge. The problem is that officials do not enforce these rules consistently, so Howard (and others) exceed the 10-second limit and offensive players often take the ball out of the net and coaches get in the way.

In general, we’re OK with this as fans. We don’t need endless whistles mucking up our games. But if I were an Orlando fan, I would not be OK with the out-of-nowhere enforcement of the 10-second rule we saw on Christmas — especially if the potential lost point ended up costing the Magic the game. The rule is either a rule or it’s not, and it shouldn’t become one just because a Boston player is loudly counting out the seconds as Howard holds the ball.

It is in this spirit that I am making a declaration to NBA coaches: Get off the court! In the last week alone, two coaches have interrupted the flow of the game by walking onto the court during play. It was a fairly harmless incident Thursday, when Dallas coach Rick Carlisle took a step onto the court with about 10 seconds left and patted Kevin Durant on the back; Dallas had conceded the game to Oklahoma City, and the players were just standing around. But the gesture surprised Durant, who turned and handed the ball to Carlisle with about seven seconds left. Hilarious! The refs whistled Durant for a turnover, everyone had a nice laugh and DeShawn Stevenson used the extra possession to hit a garbage-time three-pointer.

It was less funny on Tuesday, when the Heat surprised Milwaukee coach Scott Skiles by firing a cross-court pass to Carlos Arroyo in the right corner — the same corner where Skiles was standing on the three-point line. Skiles and Arroyo bumped lightly before Arroyo missed a long jumper. The refs correctly whistled Skiles for a technical. (See the play below starting at the 1:45 mark.)

Again: Get off the court, coach! This is not to single out Skiles and Carlisle. Lots of coaches routinely stroll a full two steps onto the floor, particularly when their point guard is bringing the ball up toward midcourt and the defense has retreated. There’s really no harm if the coach is on the floor in this case because the game is in a brief early-possession lull and there’s no player close by to bump.

Still: Get off the court! You can call the play from the sideline by yelling a little louder, and you’ll look less like a screaming lunatic if you stay in your territory. And if we set the precedent in this mundane situation, we won’t have things like the Skiles-Arroyo incident or the Jason Kidd-Mike Woodson run-in from last season. (Kidd took a lot of flak for that play, but I sort of like it. Woodson was a full step on the court when the Mavs started in transition, and it doesn’t really matter to me that Woodson was — perhaps — all the way back on the sidelines by the time Kidd hit him. Get off the court!)

The rules are clear on this: Coaches are to be assessed a technical foul when they step on the court without permission from an official (it’s on the bottom of page 40 of the rule book).

So let’s enforce this little rule and get the coaches back to where they are supposed to be: on the sidelines, making faces, screaming and waving their arms outside of harm’s way.