It is crazy to remember how hard ML was to beat back then. That said, one tournament is not a longevity argument. And that ball was crappy in its own way, but it definitely didn't play quite like the ABS balls, but it did take more energy to get moving and encouraged more physical technique.
And you think this kind of arm usage is as effective with the newer balls?
You mean the Timo Boll who beat Joo just about every other time they played but that match? I believe Joo has that match up there amongst his biggest wins with his win over Ma Lin in 2003 WTTC higher of course
Doesn't matter. I mean Boll is still winning with that chicken wing stroke.
Boll's uses his legs *a lot*. People just focus on the lack of leverage.
That's one perspective - the other perspective is that if something shortens your career even if it gives you a high peak, maybe it is better to do something sustainable that may lengthen it, if it provides a lower peak. But when what causes the lower peak is not entirely in your control like the change of the ball, it remains an open question. As for scaling the wall, we can only scale what is in front of us, and father time remains undefeated.
Who better than you should know what missing training means for an athlete.
Look how Zhang broke the sides with his feet, undressed and threw his T-shirt into the hall after defeating Ma Long. And this was not an isolated incident. Is this the behavior of an exemplary athlete of the Chinese national team? Will such behavior, which millions of young Chinese will look up to, be approved by the Party? Perhaps the reason for the “injuries” lies not in the imperfection of Zhang’s technique, but in other possible reasons. After all, there are so many athletes with imperfect technique who are older than ZJK and still play at a high level, for example Timo Boll.
Maybe so. Maybe he had other physical issues that were much more important - maybe the over training of his task master coach? But he had a lot of shoulder issues, and that to me was because his forehand swing activated upper and and wrist more than hip movement. Boll largely played with faster equipment than Zhang Jike. But again, this is my view, yours is probably more respectable and correct. The bigger ball just put too much stress on arm based technique.
There are some heavy hitters among these youngsters like Xiang Peng and Lin Shidong. Tho many of them have a physically weaker forehand like Yuan Licen, but there’s one thing in common: they all generate power from their legs and hip rotation and unsurprisingly none of them have shoulder injuries (though they’re young but ZJK was relatively young as well when his injuries started to appear). On the other hand, I don’t necessarily think the new ball caused injuries to him but I see why others think so because you unarguably need more power for it and Zhang Jike generated more power from his upper arms unlike his teammates so it probably did contribute to his later injuries but his forehand was always like that, he didn’t change it for the new ball. That’s why I also think that Ma Long was better with the new ball, his technique was just more suited for it and at the time his backhand to forehand transition was faster and didn’t have his wide forehand weakness making his new style of backhand suitable for his game.
Thanks, Choosikick can see it his own way, but I think I have spoken to enough people that agree with me to know that I am not delusional. It is quite possible that ZJK had other issues with overtraining etc., but it is not hard to see that his approach to forehand is just a bit different.
Well, he did touch on that. We will see whether he waits for his turn or becomes another ZJK. Loosely speaking, he has already done it at WTTC 2022.
When did a one-off double win become the criteria to determine that Hari has surpassed Fan and Wang. The standard is to beat them at the big events, and win the big trophies, that was what Harimoto himself was referring to.
