Strategy for dealing with Harimoto's screaming

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This thread is a contest... grab that popcorn Mikey...

pissing contest.jpg
 
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Never gave any advice. As I've stated repeatedly now, I was speaking from the viewpoint of a certain type of person with a certain type of mindset (serious players). Feel free to respond to the core message of my post instead of being so triggered that I concluded that you're a casual. Still haven't told me my conclusion is incorrect, but there's nothing wrong with it either way.

I thought not.
 
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Look. People are allowed to like Harimoto, to not care about his screaming, to hate Harimoto, to hate his screaming, and anything in between. Both sides of this debate are silly.

For Fais, from my standpoint, I am not sure there is a tactic that works aside from something Der said: "If you keep winning points, the guy who is screaming will have far fewer opportunities to scream."

For those who don't like watching a match with a kid who screams at cheap points caused by mishits, so what. What will your complaining about it do? Turn off the volume or just don't watch.

For those of you trying to criticize the people who don't like Harimoto because of his screaming, your rational is lame and your motivation is just as annoying, trying to make the people who don't like it look bad and trying to insist they must be lower level players, that stuff just makes you seem petty: who carez what level.

When you play someone who yells, you find out if it bothers you or not. If it does, it is part of the game. If it doesn't, that head game doesn't work on you. I have seen both from players whose level was quite high.

I have also seen antics way way way way worse than Harimoto's screams. Stuff that is vile. Some of the players with a stong mental game figure out how to use it to their advantage. But not all players are in that category regardless of how high a level they are.

I just don't see this, as things are framed in this thread, to be a topic worth discussing. A strategy that works for one player against someone using yelling and mind games may not work for another player. And that second player's strategy may not work for the first.

Fais, if yelling as your opponent yells works when you play a screamer, great. I know that would not work for me and I wonder if it would work for anyone. Test it out and tell us if it worked for you. I would be interested in hearing those results. Discussing strategies different people use when facing someone who is effective at playing mind games would be a useful discussion. But criticizing someone for liking Harimoto, or criticizing someone for not liking his screaming, well, that is just circular and goes nowhere. Both sides have a right to their feelings about Harimoto, but once they are criticizing someone for feeling different, then there is a problem.

For me, someone else yelling usually does not bother me. If I was on the next court, and it was happening in the middle of points, it would. But not if I was playing the person. I have seen other mind games that work way better than a little bit of shrieking. And as far as I can see, Harimoto uses the shrieking to pump himself up; not as a mind game. Some people need to be more pumped up than others. I play best when I am calm. But I also know someone who plays his best when he is frothing mad and wants to cause physical harm to his opponent. So, everyone has their own optimum level of stress that brings out their best.

But, if your opponent yelling on points won, regardless of how they were won, gets inside your head, then, figuring out something that works for you seems to make sense to me. But don't think that what works for you will work for others.

For me, by the time I am set to serve or receive, I don't really have anything in my head except focusing on the ball and what the opponent does with the ball in real time. To me it seems that stuff that happened between points can't effect you if you are focusing on the things you should during the points.

So, despite the intention of the OP which was completely different than the bulk of the comments after, I honestly feel the discussion up to now is pointless:

-- "I hate Harimoto because he screams."

-- "Stop whining, you must suck."

So far I have not seen that either side of this has anything useful to offer. Sorry. But both of you should stop. In my opinion, neither side of that argument looks good.
 
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Look. People are allowed to like Harimoto, to not care about his screaming, to hate Harimoto, to hate his screaming, and anything in between. Both sides of this debate are silly.

For Fais, from my standpoint, I am not sure there is a tactic that works aside from something Der said: "If you keep winning points, the guy who is screaming will have far fewer opportunities to scream."

For those who don't like watching a match with a kid who screams at cheap points caused by mishits, so what. What will your complaining about it do? Turn off the volume or just don't watch.

For those of you trying to criticize the people who don't like Harimoto because of his screaming, your rational is lame and your motivation is just as annoying, trying to make the people who don't like it look bad and trying to insist they must be lower level players, that stuff just makes you seem petty: who carez what level.

When you play someone who yells, you find out if it bothers you or not. If it does, it is part of the game. If it doesn't, that head game doesn't work on you. I have seen both from players whose level was quite high.

I have also seen antics way way way way worse than Harimoto's screams. Stuff that is vile. Some of the players with a stong mental game figure out how to use it to their advantage. But not all players are in that category regardless of how high a level they are.

I just don't see this, as things are framed in this thread, to be a topic worth discussing. A strategy that works for one player against someone using yelling and mind games may not work for another player. And that second player's strategy may not work for the first.

Fais, if yelling as your opponent yells works when you play a screamer, great. I know that would not work for me and I wonder if it would work for anyone. Test it out and tell us if it worked for you. I would be interested in hearing those results. Discussing strategies different people use when facing someone who is effective at playing mind games would be a useful discussion. But criticizing someone for liking Harimoto, or criticizing someone for not liking his screaming, well, that is just circular and goes nowhere. Both sides have a right to their feelings about Harimoto, but once they are criticizing someone for feeling different, then there is a problem.

For me, someone else yelling usually does not bother me. If I was on the next court, and it was happening in the middle of points, it would. But not if I was playing the person. I have seen other mind games that work way better than a little bit of shrieking. And as far as I can see, Harimoto uses the shrieking to pump himself up; not as a mind game. Some people need to be more pumped up than others. I play best when I am calm. But I also know someone who plays his best when he is frothing mad and wants to cause physical harm to his opponent. So, everyone has their own optimum level of stress that brings out their best.

But, if your opponent yelling on points won, regardless of how they were won, gets inside your head, then, figuring out something that works for you seems to make sense to me. But don't think that what works for you will work for others.

For me, by the time I am set to serve or receive, I don't really have anything in my head except focusing on the ball and what the opponent does with the ball in real time. To me it seems that stuff that happened between points can't effect you if you are focusing on the things you should during the points.

So, despite the intention of the OP which was completely different than the bulk of the comments after, I honestly feel the discussion up to now is pointless:

-- "I hate Harimoto because he screams."

-- "Stop whining, you must suck."

So far I have not seen that either side of this has anything useful to offer. Sorry. But both of you should stop. In my opinion, neither side of that argument looks good.

Your post is mostly on point except I have clarified on multiple occasions that I am not looking down upon anyone for being a low level player. Maybe other people in the thread have, I don't know. I have stated and clarified many times that I am simply saying that those people who cannot control an external factor that is so prevalent in this sport, probably are not going to and have not made it very far. In fact I have clarified this stance on so many occasions it almost feels like it is being willingly ignored. So trying to apply this mentality onto actual pro players who play against Harimoto is nonsense. Perhaps the OP should have made a thread about strategies to deal with distracting opponents, that could be a good discussion. But people crying for years on end about videos that they had to willingly click into and watch with sound on is just absolutely mind boggling, and even more obnoxious, to me. It is like someone saying how much they hate eating pizza, and then going to a pizza restaurant, ordering a pizza, and then complaining more about how much they hate pizza. Truly ridiculous.
 
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Harimoto for me is a guy that is a roller coaster, his best is very good, his bad is very poor.

He has a decent ranking but not truly reflective of consistent results. I think like alot of young players under new table tennis trend, come out hot and firing and putting pressure on top players, but the top players find ways to figure them out. We see this time and time again. Needs a game style super consistent at top level. Watched a video good way to really play against him is stay close to table and play against his forward, strength more his backhand.

CCY has had recent success to, shows veterans on tour used to older style with old ball have adjusted well with new ball and new players hitting the Tour.

Hopefully Harimoto continues to progress, still very young and plenty upside, like a young Ma Long ready to break out to new heights, hope he continues his screaming, shows passion for the game.

His bad is very poor - like what, except for the Pletea and arguably Sathiyan loss?

This is a more interesting discussion that I'd like to continue
 
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It is like someone saying how much they hate eating pizza, and then going to a pizza restaurant, ordering a pizza, and then complaining more about how much they hate pizza. Truly ridiculous.

To me, it seems this is just as easy to ignore as Harimoto's screaming. So, why bother saying anything about it. Who carez.

Your post is mostly on point except I have clarified on multiple occasions that I am not looking down upon anyone for being a low level player.

The parts where you say this seem fine. And I would be happy if they were true. Maybe they are. But then, this post seems to confuse me:

I thought not.

Can you clarify what this is about if it is not trying to aggressively show that someone is what you have accused him of being? And if it is that, then there definitely seems to be a negative judgement being place. But of course, I could be misunderstanding your intentions here. :)

Your initial points are fine. But how you have aggressively attacked someone for their feelings seem to contradict some of your most valid points.

Why not leave this alone and ignore the guy with the pizza who keeps saying he hates pizza? Why make the post about reading between the lines which, was, most definitely insulting and a personal attack.

This is a more interesting discussion that I'd like to continue

Based on the content you quoted, this also makes it seem to me, you like winning arguments rather than having useful debates. And, of course, here too, I could be misunderstanding your
intentions. So, feel free to clarify why this is more than you wanting to show someone else is wrong on the internet. :)

Now these:

You are so mentally weak and insecure that you lose control based on another person's actions.

I'll translate piligrim's post since you missed the point. The only people getting upset over cho'ing are mentally weak, bad players who are upset that they lost....

Those are insults. Those are personal attacks. Or is there some other way of explaining them?

You are fairly new on the forum so I will give you some leeway. But, this is the kind of thing people do get banned for when it becomes clear that it is a habitual pattern.
 
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To me, it seems this is just as easy to ignore as Harimoto's screaming. So, why bother saying anything about it. Who carez.



The parts where you say this seem fine. And I would be happy if they were true. Maybe they are. But then, this post seems to confuse me:



Can you clarify what this is about if it is not trying to aggressively show that someone is what you have accused him of being? And if it is that, then there definitely seems to be a negative judgement being place. But of course, I could be misunderstanding your intentions here. :)

Your initial points are fine. But how you have aggressively attacked someone for their feelings seem to contradict some of your most valid points.

Why not leave this alone and ignore the guy with the pizza who keeps saying he hates pizza? Why make the post about reading between the lines which, was, most definitely insulting and a personal attack.



Based on the content you quoted, this also makes it seem to me, you like winning arguments rather than having useful debates. And, of course, here too, I could be misunderstanding your
intentions. So, feel free to clarify why this is more than you wanting to show someone else is wrong on the internet. :)

JustANoob wanted to start throwing insults around rather than actually talking about the core content of my post, quite hypocritically considering that is what he accused me of doing earlier in the thread to derail things. I do realize I may have come across as rude in my initial posts unintentionally so I made several attempts to clarify my position as not being condescending. But after an attempt to re-route the discussion to something meaningful it became clear who was trying to throw gas on the fire.

As for the bad losses thing, what does that have to do with winning any argument? The user I quoted stated that Harimoto has very low lows, so I was asking him to expand on that. I do not keep track of every pro tour tournament so there are some things I may have missed. The only bad losses I can think of since he broke out onto the scene are Pletea and Sathiyan. So I asked the user what I may have been missing. I am genuinely confused how you interpreted that post as me "trying to win an argument". I actually would argue that Harimoto has been remarkably consistent.
 
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As for my posts about a player who cannot deal with a cho'ing opponents being mentally weak, I will stand by that. I do agree I worded it maybe too bluntly there. Happy to delete or modify those posts. I think jfolsen made a good point about it being a big problem if it is happening on another court and the sounds are coming suddenly and unexpectedly. But if my opponent were doing it, and especially if it were known behavior, I think that is something I'd be able to tune out, and I think most experienced players I know of would be able to do the same. It's not an uncommon occurrence in TT, maybe the first or second time experiencing it was shocking, after a while it should not be anything new.
 
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JustANoob wanted to start throwing insults around rather than actually talking about the core content of my post, quite hypocritically considering that is what he accused me of doing earlier in the thread to derail things. I do realize I may have come across as rude in my initial posts unintentionally so I made several attempts to clarify my position as not being condescending. But after an attempt to re-route the discussion to something meaningful it became clear who was trying to throw gas on the fire.

When I wrote my first post, I gave equal time to some of the stuff on both sides of the argument. But right now this is about your behavior since it seems we are conversing one on one. If someone else's comments can get you to say: "....mentally weak, bad players..." directed personally at someone, then you should consider waiting till you can find more diplomatic words to express what you mean. I think I did it in my first post that said more than just "Yawn" so it can be done: "If your opponent's celebrations cause you to loose focus, that is a good thing to try to work on. Your own mental strength is a skill that can be developed and improved."

As for the bad losses thing, what does that have to do with winning any argument? ....I actually would argue that Harimoto has been remarkably consistent.

To me it sounded like you were implying he was wrong and he should prove what he meant or stand down. But I am okay if I was reading more into that than was there.

I think there have been a bunch of times where Harimoto walked into a tournament where he was expected to go far and got knocked out in the first or second round. But, the truth is, I have not been paying such close attention either so....I don't know. And I would say Harimoto is a remarkable talent whether he sometimes loses when expected to win or not. That happens to almost every top player.

As for my posts about a player who cannot deal with a cho'ing opponents being mentally weak, I will stand by that.

Again, I think I found a way of saying something similar in my first long post without turning it into an insult. The problem is the insult. Not the idea that someone who falls apart as a result of tactics from an opponent when the ball is not in play simply means, that player has something else to work on. By turning it into a personal insult, you were actually breaking a forum rule. To me, that is the issue. Just so you understand.

And there is no question that I have seen players who are fairly high level who fall apart when the right buttons have been pushed between points. So I don't really think it is an issue of level. Although I am not sure I know players who would have that happen from someone simply celebrating points won. But someone celebrating your misses and f-ups....I know some high level players who would see red for someone celebrating as a result of them missing on your net, or the ball hitting the edge of your racket.

I do agree I worded it maybe too bluntly there.

It really is not an issue of blunt or too blunt. The issue is, you used it as a personal attack and that it was aggressive. And the guy's user name is JustANoob. So, I think, his user name has already conceded what you began to insult him for.

And I really do feel all of this falls into the category of, "Shouldn't this be easy to ignore?" Like, if you think JANoob should be able to ignore Harimoto, why weren't you able to ignore him? Why did you eventually have to turn to personal insults? I do see that, for a while before you went after JANoob, you were making some excellent points. But then you showed that you fell right into the same sort of, being affected by stuff between the points when you attacked JANoob. His comments should not have gotten under your skin to such an extent that it caused you to go on tilt, be aggressive, and personally attack.

Maybe I can say the same to him. But, you are the one saying that kind of stuff should not get to you. So, do me a favor, in the future, try not to let it get to you and use words to explain as diplomatically as possible.

Really, that is all. Even when you disagree, try to be courteous, even if you feel the other guy is not. It will be easy for me to see if only one person has gotten down in the mud. :)
 
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Your points are all taken, I'll just make this post to add a little more nuance. Agreed on a kinder wording. I went down the route of harsher wording considering it was thrown at me first. I never said that everyone should be so mentally strong that nobody can ever piss them off, clearly that's proven not to be true in this thread. But I did say that if I was playing a table tennis match I would not be bothered by someone celebrating a point, especially if their manner of celebration was well known in advance. I strongly disagree with the assumption in the OP that Harimoto does what he does to get under the opponent's skin. If he were, then I see why people's disdain would be justified. But also, if he were, why does he turn away from the opponent to cho? If he were, why does he apologize verbally and with a hand gesture for edges and nets? If he were, why doesn't he save his bigger celebrations for unforced errors rather than great points that he deserved? If he were, why haven't we seen any of the guys on the other end of the table who ended up complaining to a referee who would then tell him to tone it down? Have we ever seen a pro player snap on him the way that Gauzy did on Shibaev when Shibaev clearly did something to get under his skin? Not to my knowledge. That is why it seems abundantly obvious to me that he does NOT do that to aggravate and disrespect his opponents. And I would think that these people who claim to watch so many of his videos would have picked up on that as well.
 
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Your points are all taken, I'll just make this post to add a little more nuance. Agreed on a kinder wording. I went down the route of harsher wording considering it was thrown at me first. I never said that everyone should be so mentally strong that nobody can ever piss them off, clearly that's proven not to be true in this thread. But I did say that if I was playing a table tennis match I would not be bothered by someone celebrating a point, especially if their manner of celebration was well known in advance. I strongly disagree with the assumption in the OP that Harimoto does what he does to get under the opponent's skin. If he were, then I see why people's disdain would be justified. But also, if he were, why does he turn away from the opponent to cho? If he were, why does he apologize verbally and with a hand gesture for edges and nets? If he were, why doesn't he save his bigger celebrations for unforced errors rather than great points that he deserved? If he were, why haven't we seen any of the guys on the other end of the table who ended up complaining to a referee who would then tell him to tone it down? Have we ever seen a pro player snap on him the way that Gauzy did on Shibaev when Shibaev clearly did something to get under his skin? Not to my knowledge. That is why it seems abundantly obvious to me that he does NOT do that to aggravate and disrespect his opponents. And I would think that these people who claim to watch so many of his videos would have picked up on that as well.

Said more simply:

And as far as I can see, Harimoto uses the shrieking to pump himself up; not as a mind game.

Wait, who said that. :) And the evidence does suggest this. But, I guess everyone has a right to say things how they will. :)
 
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Sure, and the person who opens a thread to attack someone's character has the burden of proof. Perhaps too much time quarantined has everyone on edge a little bit :)
 
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Again, I think I found a way of saying something similar in my first long post without turning it into an insult. The problem is the insult. Not the idea that someone who falls apart as a result of tactics from an opponent when the ball is not in play simply means, that player has something else to work on. By turning it into a personal insult, you were actually breaking a forum rule. To me, that is the issue. Just so you understand.



I think he is talking in general about people who can't deal with screaming players rather then attacking someone personally. You would right it he said: JustANoob you are mentally weak.But its not the case. Just my 2 cents
 
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Sure, and the person who opens a thread to attack someone's character has the burden of proof. Perhaps too much time quarantined has everyone on edge a little bit :)

I am pretty relaxed. I am enjoying my vacation time. I have not gotten so much sleep in years.

But that first sentence, I don't know, it still sounds like you are looking to argue with someone from where I stand.

Do something you enjoy. There has to be a few things that you enjoy that you do when at home. Forget about this thread.
 
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