The most dreaded words in the NBA -- besides "Uh, oh, Stephen Jackson's at a strip club" -- are: "He's in foul trouble, and we gotta get him outta there."

As exquisite as Monday night's San Antonio-Phoenix game was, it could have been even better if not for the minutes that Tim Duncan and Amare Stoudemire (both of whom finished with five personals) had to spend on the bench because of foul trouble. And it's happened before to those two prime-time players. Plus, in the past week I've either been at or been watching games in which Detroit's Chauncey Billups and practically the entire Utah Jazz team have been in foul trouble. Jazz point guard Deron Williams was sitting on the bench next to Jerry Sloan with two personals before most of the Game 3 fans at Oracle Arena in Oakland had spread the mustard on their pregame hot dogs.

This is not to suggest that this season's playoff teams are encountering foul trouble among their top players at any greater rate than in past years. It's always been an issue. But this is the first year that it's driven me nuts -- have you seen the Pistons play without Billups? -- and led me to ponder this question:

On what stone tablet is it written that players have to foul out?

Basketball is one of the few sports that expels its players on a nightly basis. You can go offsides all day or commit six pass-interference penalties and you're still legal in football (though you'll probably be benched by the coach). You have to throw a couple pitches at a guy's head or a haymaker at an umpire to get ejected in the majors. Nothing less than a charge of second-degree homicide will get you tossed from an NHL game.

So why should a player have to go to the bench for, say, some charging call that's probably a block? (By the way, in my world, 90 percent of block-charge calls would be called blocks.)

The NBA instituted the six-foul limit in 1947. That's 60 years ago if you're counting at home. The Providence Steamrollers were in the league. Neither George Mikan nor Bob Cousy was playing then. Since that year, there have been countless alterations of the rule book, including a widening of the lane (twice); adding a three-point line, the 24-second clock, 20-second timeouts and a third referee; eliminating the center jump in the second, third and fourth periods; and legalizing zone defenses, among many others.

So what's so magical about six fouls? Sure, it's part of the mythology of the sport. Superstars like Wilt Chamberlain and Moses Malone were legendary for avoiding the six-foul limit, avoiding fouls altogether, as a matter of fact. You know how? They either stopped playing defense or were protected by referees who were -- still are -- reluctant to call a sixth foul on superstars. I don't blame the refs. I wouldn't want to send Duncan to the bench and watch the Spurs play down the stretch without him.

So why even raise that possibility? Why make a team take a superstar out in those all-important minutes right before halftime, which is frequently when a prime player collects his third foul?

Generally, the pattern goes like this. The referees, with league support, want to keep the game from being too physical. So they call one early foul that's legit. Then they make a ticky-tack call or a call that could go either way. Then they make a bad call. There are eight minutes left in the first half and an important player has three personal fouls, two of which, quite possibly, shouldn't have been called. This isn't a comment on the refereeing -- it's about the draconian stipulation that allows a player, in an extremely physical game, to commit only one foul every eight minutes.

What could be done? Lots of things. Raise the foul limit to eight. Abolish the limit altogether. Give the opposing team an extra possession on a player's sixth foul but let the player stay in. The idea that players would begin fouling indiscriminately is ridiculous, as the opposition still would shoot free throws. Such a rule change would only marginally affect statistics -- foul-prone notables such as Stoudemire, Miami's Shaquille O'Neal and Washington's Gilbert Arenas might get about two more minutes per game -- and it would only enhance the quality of the game by keeping the best players on the floor.

Abou Taleb is the great patron of the city; and there are many persons at Mekka who, though they would have little scruple in breaking an oath taken before God, yet would be afraid of invoking the name of Abou Taleb in confirmation of a falsehood. “I swear by the Mosque”—“I swear by the Kaaba,” are ejaculations constantly used by the Mekkawys to impose upon strangers; but to swear by Abou Taleb is a more serious imprecation, and is seldom heard upon such occasions. Opposite to the ruined tomb stands a public fountain, consisting of a trough built of stone, fifty or sixty feet in length, which is daily filled with water from the aqueduct. Near it grow a few trees. No buildings are seen beyond the fountain, till we come to a large palace of the Sherif, which is surrounded by high walls flanked with towers, and contains within the inclosure a spacious court-yard. In the time of the Sherif it was well garrisoned, and during his wars with the Wahabys he often resided here, as he could set out from hence upon a secret attack or expedition, without its becoming immediately known in the city. The building now serves as a barrack for the Turkish soldiers. To the north of this palace lies the quarter or suburb called Moabede, which consists partly of low and ill-built stone houses, and partly of huts constructed of brushwood; it is wholly inhabited by Bedouins, who have become settlers here, for the purpose of carrying on a traffic, principally in corn, dates, and cattle, between the town and their native tribes. I have seen among them Arabs of the tribes of Koreysh, Thekyf, Hodheyl, and Ateybe; and it was said that, in time of peace, individuals of all the great tribes of the Desert, and of Nedjed, are occasionally found here. They live, as I have already observed in speaking of those who occupy another part of Mekka, much in the same manner as they would do in the Desert.