Should I deflate a basketball?
If you regularly play basketball, keep it full of air and store it indoors at room temperature. If you don't use it regularly, or need to pack it, you can deflate it - but still store it at room temperature.
Wet a paperclip with saliva or water, insert it into the deflated ball, and press down until air escapes from the punctured area. Repeat until all of the air has been released from the ball. Store in a cool place for future use.
NBA rules dictate that basketballs should be inflated to between 7.5 and 8.5 pounds per square inch. If the basketball is inflated below this level, it won't bounce correctly. If it is inflated above this level, the basketball could be damaged or burst.
A ball with too little air is flat and difficult to dribble. A ball with too much air is too lively and more difficult to control when dribbling and shooting. Inflating a basketball with the correct amount of air is important to being able to play the game well.
Basically, any time a football is underinflated and softer, it's going to be easier to grip, catch and throw. This can make an especially big difference in games played in rainy or cold weather when it's even more difficult to get a solid grip on the football than normal.
see less If you don't have a pump with a air pressure gauge, you can reasonably judge whether the basketball is properly inflated by this method: Hold the ball in front of your face and drop it... if it bounces up to your belt buckle, then it is properly inflated.
To deflate: insert the pin into the hole of the basketball to allow air to come out – leave some air behind so the cover is not damaged.
The truth is most people already know the best way to deflate a soccer ball; it's with an air pump needle. Remember, you need the ball pump and air needle to inflate a soccer ball, but you can deflate a soccer ball without a pump and just the air needle.
The best way is to use a ball pump or needle. In a pinch, you can also use a paperclip, pen, or other small, sharp object to deflate the ball. This is recommended only in emergency situations, though, as using a ball pump or needle better protects your ball.
As far as shooting goes, the air pressure in a basketball has little effect on its trajectory. On the other hand it may affect how the ball bounces. A really low pressured ball will probably not bounce as high as one fully pressured.
How much psi does it take to pop a basketball?
A basketball is 9.23” in diameter, which means the surface area is 4*pi*(9.23/2)^2 = 267.64 square inches. A ball is inflated to about 8 PSI, so it would take 2141 pounds of force to crush a ball.
Basketballs bounce because of the pressurized air inside of them, gravity and Newton's Laws of Motion. When you dribble a basketball, your hand and gravity both push the ball towards the ground (Law #1). As it drops, the ball accelerates and speeds up (Law #2).

Sharp objects can puncture the ball and bodies of water can cause damage. Store your basketball in a cool, dry place, like a basketball bag. Be sure that nothing is on top of it or pushing on it from any direction. This can change the shape of your ball.
The air inside a basketball is like a tightly coiled spring. The tighter the spring, the more energy it has to bounce back up. Similarly, the more air inside the ball, the harder it pushes back against the ground, springing the ball higher into the air.
Once you pump extra air into the ball, packing the air more tightly than normal and stiffening the ball's surface, that additional air will appear on the scale's weight measurement. A properly inflated basketball has about 0.01 pounds of extra air in it, so it'll weigh an extra 0.01 pounds on a scale.
It's because the air inside of the inflated ball is under pressure, while the air inside of the deflated ball is under less pressure. Pressure means force, and Newton's third law says that when you push on something, that something pushes back.
Having an under-inflated ball also allows quarterbacks to throw the ball farther, Tompkins explained. When developing the grip for Baden's footballs, the company's R&D team found that by adjusting the RPM of a spiral from 5,400 to 7,200, it made a difference of four feet in distance traveled.
An inflated ball is heavier than a deflated one because the object filled with air weighs more compared to the empty one.
Spalding makes the game balls for the NBA and uses a rubber bladder wrapped in fiber with a leather outer casing (this is the part you see), and has a 29.5 in circumference. Regulation pressure for NBA games is between 7.5 and 8.5 psi.
According to ESPN's Baxter Holmes, O'Neal admitted he would walk up to the ball rack before the tip-off, "let a little bit of air out, squeeze it," and get it to his liking. "Sometimes, in the games during all my championship runs, if a ball was too hard, I let air out," Shaq said. "I'd have a needle.
Why did the NBA stop using Spalding balls?
But Spalding's sponsorship contract with the NBA expires after this 2020-21 season, and they were unable to agree on terms for a new deal. Spalding will continue to produce the official NBA backboards and rims, plus a full line of other basketballs, including the TF-1000 and my personal outdoor favorite, the Neverflat.
Made with Neverflat technology, this ball is injected with NitroFlate molecules which keep it inflated for longer than your average ball. The indoor-outdoor cover has a tacky feel and deep grooves to help sharpen up your handles.
The amount of air pressure a ball has is essential to the game. If it's even slightly deflated it can make it harder to be accurate when kicking. If you inflate it too much, it can feel hard when you kick it or even burst. Too little or too much will definitely affect the bounce of it.
When the temperature is warm it causes the expansion of air and the ball can become slightly over-inflated. Cold temperatures cause the contraction of air and under inflated ball.
For most footballs the deflation process is simple. Insert an inflation needle into the ball's inflation hole. This will open the valve. And instead of pumping air inside, squeeze the ball hard to push the air out.
When the ball is fully inflated, it squashes less than when it's not as inflated, so it heats up less. With less energy lost to heat, it can bounce higher.
When a ball has more air inside of it, there is more pressure which causes the material of the ball to be less floppy and deform less when bounced. Also, when there is more air there is a greater force acting against the ground upon impact.
Unfortunately, pumping the ball with more air won't help you shoot from farther away, because the air pressure only helps the ball bounce farther after contacting an object. In fact, more air pressure might make it harder to shoot because the basketball will bounce off the rim harder, making it less likely to go in!
Hold the ball up to your face and slowly let it drop. If the bottom of the ball bounces up past your waist or slightly higher, then it is fully pumped. If the basketball bounces up close to the chest, it means it has too much air. If it does not bounce up to the waist, it means there is not enough air.
A hard surface, like concrete or hardwood, hardly absorbs any, so most of the kinetic energy of the fall goes into bouncing the ball back up. A soft surface, like grass or carpet, absorbs more energy from the fall, so there's less left to push the ball back up, and it bounces pretty badly.
Why does my basketball feel heavy?
This is because the air inside the ball has mass.
The reason it doesn't bounce higher than where it started is simple: some of the ball's energy is lost as heat when it bounces, so it doesn't have as much going up as it did coming down. Knowing that, you might figure that a ball could never bounce higher than the height from which is was dropped.
A basketball feels about 1.5 percent lighter than its true weight, because the air around it helps to lift it up. A basketball is surrounded by air, and air pressure increases with depth. This means that the air below the ball pushes up harder than the air above it pushes down.
Jump balls can occur during regulation, though. In the NBA, a jump ball will take place if a disagreement among referees occurs, if a situation in which penalties/fouls may cancel each other out, or if a held ball is called.
The NBA practices with their new leather basketballs for a couple of weeks before they are game ready, so don't get disheartened if the process takes a bit longer than you expect. Your ball will slowly turn a dark brown shade as the leather starts to break in.
Football. Football is the sport that causes the most injuries, with an estimated 455,449 annually.
The NBA recommends that the air pressure in a basketball be between 7.5 and 8.5psi to ensure proper play.
Your basketball may have dirt, or something else stuck in the valve that needs to be cleaned out to help it seal properly. If you have a small leak, you can melt the hole shut with a hot melt, patch it with a kit, or you may have to resow the seam that has been broken and needs to be resealed.
According to Wilson, the new "Electric Orange" color in the Evo NXT allows players and fans to easily track the ball on the court, making it less likely to lose sight of the ball in darker settings. The NCAA does have rules over the ball's color and shape.
Dribbling with the heavy ball will strengthen your arms, giving you a more powerful dribble and a tighter handle. This is important because the harder and faster you can dribble the ball the quicker you can do anything with the ball in your hands.
Do basketballs that are fully inflated bounce better than flat ones?
Yes, fully inflated basketballs do bounce better than flatter ones. When a ball has more air inside of it, there is more pressure which causes the material of the ball to be less floppy and deform less when bounced. Also, when there is more air there is a greater force acting against the ground upon impact.
Once you pump extra air into the ball, packing the air more tightly than normal and stiffening the ball's surface, that additional air will appear on the scale's weight measurement. A properly inflated basketball has about 0.01 pounds of extra air in it, so it'll weigh an extra 0.01 pounds on a scale.
Grip. The technology used in the making of the Evolution series has a clear focus on the grip. Micro-pebble technology makes sure that the ball has the optimal contact surface and lies comfortably in your palm. Both sizes tested showed top levels of control and handling felt natural.
This Ball Is Super Bouncy: The small bouncing ball is made of special secret materials that make it a super high bounce ball. Throw it down hard and see it bounce to the sky!
The ball that doesn't bounce is made of a special kind of rubber, called butyl rubber. Butyl rubber is synthetic, or manmade, rubber that absorbs the kinetic energy from the ball falling.
Regulation pressure for NBA games is between 7.5 and 8.5 psi.
Originally Posted by UrinalCake: A basketball is 9.23” in diameter, which means the surface area is 4*pi*(9.23/2)^2 = 267.64 square inches. A ball is inflated to about 8 PSI, so it would take 2141 pounds of force to crush a ball. Assuming we are on earth (which is debatable when it comes to Zion), that's roughly a ton.
When the lighter ball bounces on the heavy ball they exchange energy, and the lighter ball flies off with some of the energy of a heavier ball. It reaches way higher than from the height it was released. The heavy ball, on the other hand, is left behind with little energy and does not move much.