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Make the Crime Fit the Punishment

In basketball, doing something patently illegal can be beneficial. In cricket, on the other hand, there is absolutely no advantage to breaking the rules. The bowler’s aim is to throw the ball into the wickets – three wooden sticks stuck in the ground – that the batsman protects, and it’s against the rules for the batsman to place his legs in front of them as protection. If the ball does hit the batsman’s legs on its way to the wickets1, the umpire declares the batsman ‘out LBW’, where LBW is short for ‘Legs Before Wicket’. You foul, you’re out. In contrast, in basketball, the opposing team merely gets a couple of free shots at the basket.

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