Double serve like in tennis

[UpSideDownCarl]

I have a friend, he was a Pro tennis player and now he is a college tennis coach. He and I are about the same level overall. But he is way way better than me once we are in a rally. Makes sense. He was a decent level pro tennis player. He can get to everything. And he is pretty good at TT. When he rallies with guys who are semi-pro level TT players, if you take away serve and receive, he can rally pretty close to even with the semi pro players.

Anyway, he is bad at receiving short serves. He is bad at reading the spin. But I have another friend who is a semi pro level TT player. He likes to serve fast and long. He likes to have his opponent rip his serves back and he uses their attack on his serve to counter attack and that is a strategy this guy likes to use.

So he (fast serve semi pro) was serving to us for serve receive. I had no problem handling his short serves and putting them back on the table, doing something that limited how he could hurt me with the third ball. His long serves, I had a lot of trouble with them. They were really too good for me.

With my friend the tennis player, when he received, he had a lot of trouble with the short serves. He could not read the spin. But once the serves were fast and long, he had no trouble. Not only did he read the spin, react to where the serve was, and respond to the serve with really good returns, he was doing things like going around the net on the wide angle serves. His returns on the fast serves either won the point outright or gave the semi-pro player a challenging ball. Against the tennis player, the fast serves did not give this guy an advantage for his third ball.

Because of his skill of receiving fast serves from tennis, he actually could read the spin on the fast serves and could do whatever he wanted with them.

What is the point. Serving is a great skill to work on. But so is receiving serve. The guys who are really a notch better than everyone else are just better at everything. And I think it is nice that TT is an all-around game.

 

[NextLevel]

By the way, I think it is unfortunate that the disparity in level from the 5 or 6 best players in the world to the 7-50th players in the world is actually a real unfortunate thing and one of the reasons TT struggles for international recognition.

When one of the top 5 (not WR but top 5 actual best players) plays someone one notch lower than them, it is usually not a very interesting match and the higher level player will usually win quite easily.

This is true for most things in life though. Sports, business, working in a company etc. Hard to find anything where there isn't a significant gap between the very best and those that follow. Almost like life is a pyramid scheme...

 

[sderyke2002]

stop yelling for starters. Yes, Carl, that stat does mean a lot to anyone who ever looked at sports stats. If the game was serve dominated, we'd have seen the percentages skew drastically. Ma Long would've had 60-70% of his points come from the serves. But he doesn't and you're in denial.

A much more meaningful stat would be how many points ML won on the serve or third ball. By including all points contended (regardless of the length of the rally) you muddy the waters with the importance and significance of ML's other skills. Now maybe the stat I just suggested is not available (I don't know for certain how detailed the tracking system is), but we know ML wins points for any number of reasons (he has extensive and varied skills).

We have to remember that the point in any statistical study is to make sure you limit your variables to only those which are dependent variables. A survey of the results of entire points clearly does not do that.

 

[jawien]

By the way, I wanted to say again, the fact that 51% of the points ML wins, he wins on his serve, which also means that ML wins 49% of his points on his opponent's serves simply means that ML usually wins most of the points.

So this 51% ratio ... "simply means that ML usually wins most of the points"? I wonder what is the context, because in general it is simply not true.
He could be loosing all his games 1:11 and still had about the ratio you mentioned.

 

[ttmonster]

Carl , initially I thought people were being unfair with their tone of arguments to the OP and I tried putting some reason out here but clearly I was wrong. Since then I have lost interest in this thread, for multiple reasons ... don't wrestle with a pig, you get dirty, and besides, and the pig likes it. A lot of what the OP is saying makes no sense , but since he "does STATS" for a living and clearly a lot of his stats are wrong, lets not dent his confidence , he will need that to keep making his living ...

 

[Atas Newton]

A much more meaningful stat would be how many points ML won on the serve or third ball. By including all points contended (regardless of the length of the rally) you muddy the waters with the importance and significance of ML's other skills. Now maybe the stat I just suggested is not available (I don't know for certain how detailed the tracking system is), but we know ML wins points for any number of reasons (he has extensive and varied skills).

We have to remember that the point in any statistical study is to make sure you limit your variables to only those which are dependent variables. A survey of the results of entire points clearly does not do that.

unfortunately, yes, the stats available for table tennis, even for major events like Olympics and WC, are very scarce. There was a thread exactly about this not long ago. ITTF doesn't really care about stuff like that. For a very long time even their ranking page was an absolute shambles.

don't wrestle with a pig, you get dirty, and besides, and the pig likes it. A lot of what the OP is saying makes no sense

oh the sweet irony "I can not understand what he's saying, what a stupid pig he is".

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

So this 51% ratio ... "simply means that ML usually wins most of the points"? I wonder what is the context, because in general it is simply not true.
He could be loosing all his games 1:11 and still had about the ratio you mentioned.

Well, my memory of the Rio Olympics, where Atas took the stat, ML won the tournament and won the finals 4-0. My memory is that ML usually wins. Not always. I think Timo beat him a few times.

But in general, what you are saying is sort of true. The closer to 11-0 a win is, the closer to 50% of the points won by the winning player have to be points won on the opponent's serve.

Now say you had a game where the player lost 11-1 and the one point he got was on his serve: then 100% of the points he won were on his own serve. But if he got that 1 point on his opponent's serve, then he would have won 100% of his points on his opponent's serve.

But aside from that, I think the stats would work the close enough to the same.

Take that match I posted where I showed that ML won 66% of the points from his serve. In that match, his ratio of points he won on Dima's serve was still pretty similar. I don't want to go and count again. But he won 44 of a possible 44 points (11x4 since there were only 4 games in his 4-0 win). If he won 26 points on his serve, he must have won 18 points off Dima's serve.

Dima won 28 points total in the whole match (-9, -5, -10, -4). He lost 18 points on his serve. He won 13 points on ML's serve. It looks like he must have won 15 points on his own serve (15+13=28). If I counted right when I counted how many serves ML won on his own serve, then:

ML won 26 points on his own serve and 18 points on Dima's serve. 26+18=44

And Dima won 15 points on his own serve and 13 points on ML's serve. 15+13=28.

Looks like Dima won closer to 50% of the points on his serve in that match than ML did.

 

[Atas Newton]

So this 51% ratio ... "simply means that ML usually wins most of the points"? I wonder what is the context, because in general it is simply not true.
He could be loosing all his games 1:11 and still had about the ratio you mentioned.

51% ratio means that if Ma Long wins 100 points in Rio, 51 of those he won on his serve, 49 of those he won on the receive. Which means, in turn, that he's equally as good a server and a receiver. What he's not unique in, though, is that he's close to 50%, much like an average player on the Olympics. Jun Mizutani had 52%, so did Zhang Jike, Vladimir Samsonov stopped at 50%, Dima Ovtcharov posted a weak score of 47% which is surprising knowing his mastery of serving.

 

[Atas Newton]

Ah, Carl, taking one match that possesses a desired statistical property, good one. That's called cherry picking, mate. But you already know that, I'm sure. Anyway, knock yourself out if you'd like, please continue finding such matches to compete with 13500 points sample aggregated in Rio.

 

[jawien]

I understand your example Carl, but guys ... before you go any further and start to call each other names ... Be sure you are distinguishing the below, because I have an impression it is not always clear, who is talking about what. These are different things.

[1] take only points you won, and the percentage of your serves/receives within that.
[2] percentage of points you won while serving
[3] percentage of points you won while receiving

Say 12-10
[1] The ratio, when I was serving is 50% (6 to the overall 12)
[2] My 11 serves, won 54,54% (say about 50%) => 6 points
[3] Opponents 11 serves, won 54,54% (say about 50%) => 6 points

Say 11-1
[1] The ratio, when I was serving is 54,54% (say about 50%) (6 to the overall 11)
[2] My 6 serves, won 100% (totally not about 50%) => 6 points
[3] Opponents 6 serves, won 83,33% (totally not about 50%) => 5 points

Although, there is probably some general relation between those depending on the score...

 

[Atas Newton]

Correct, jawien, I tried to explain that in the post #65. And once again later. And once again later still...

 

[songdavid98]

Correct, jawien, I tried to explain that in the post #65. And once again later. And once again later still...

Usually, I don't involve myself with feuds like this, but I'm curious. Atas Newton, can I see the data that gives you the stats that you are referrring to? Or at least, a source?

EDIT: I think Ma Long is a special case and an unfair example.

Ma Long has always seems to be a player that didn't rely too much on his serve. Take a look at this:



I know this is only one example, but throughout his play, I don't really see him doing Xu Xin serve and attack that often.
If anything, Ma Long is very good at shutting down service advantage, and turning it into his own advantage.

 

[jawien]

Correct, jawien, I tried to explain that in the post #65. And once again later. And once again later still...

I believe you are doing stats for a living. Hope you are not teaching it ......
Atas, just teasing ; )

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

I decided I would do this because this is the actual central issue in my opinion.

thanks mate, this advice is what I've needed for my whole life. You saved me!

This is an example of you not acting so nicely to someone who made a decent comment.

I've no idea why you thought you need to point it out twice, but since you did I encourage you to read what I actually typed instead of attacking a strawman. Maybe you can serve like a pro 2 times out of 10, good for you then. I can not.

This is more of you not getting what the person was saying, feeling personally insulted because your reading comprehension in English is not as good as you think it is, and responding like a child whose feelings have been hurt. There is nothing wrong with having your feelings hurt. Sometimes they may be hurt for reasons that were not nice. But you have to act better than this.

Literally the only reason I even mentioned tennis is to refer to the rules of serve therein. But congrats on trying to ridicule me just for the hell of it. Attacking people on forums must be fun. Re your second point, it's just wrong and you contradict yourself. Everything that happens once in a blue moon is exciting by definition. Whenever an ace happens - it is exciting. When a players returns a serve to the bottom of the net, it's obviously not a spectacular piece of play, but that's simply a part of table tennis. Or if we must resort to snarky remarks in this thread, let me come back at you: if you just want exciting rallies and fast exchanges, why not ban deceptive serves entirely? Or while we're at it, ban everything but the topspin serves.

Again, to me this seems like you take something someone said and your response is a little out of hand. It is almost like a child who has had a toy taken away from them in a sandbox and decides to throw sand.

if you prefer to talk like a 13yo, talk to a 13yo. I'll lose no sleep over a random internet dude saying a silly idea I had is a fail and I wasn't referring to that. The last part of your post is basically "hurr durr you want table tennis to be tennis? lol that's stupid, bet you're better off watching this obscure mod of tt". It served no purpose in the critique of the OP and you included it in your post just to be an ass. Now get lost.

As you attack people their responses to you get less and less cordial and then you get more and more rude.

but you didn't say you have significant advantage on serve, you said servers in general do. Which is not the case. Shall I start ridiculing your post? jk

Again resorting to personal attacks and seeming to think that everyone else has the problem.

You're being rude, my friend. Even worse - you're being wrong as well. I can actually read I can also quote your post for everyone else who can read to see:

You might not know Der_Echte or his style. But you clearly didn't get what he was saying. And the rules have been changed to limit the advantages of serving quite a few times. Once upon a time fingertip serves were legal. Now you have to toss the ball and it is supposed to go up. That was to limit the potential for putting spin on the ball with how you project the ball at the racket. You used to be able to hid the contact of the serve. They changed that rule as well because servers had too big an advantage.

But it seemed you were more interested in arguing and trying to make other people wrong than to try and understand what he actually said.

So, from my perspective, you present as a person with an attitude problem who often argues and does not seem to understand what the other person has actually meant. So often you are arguing from a place where you seem to feel hurt and where you actually misunderstood the thing you are arguing against.

Here......in my post where I included the video with Dima, my last paragraph was this:

And, if the stat you are referring to says that 51% of all the points ML wins are points he wins on his serve, it simply means he wins most of the points on his opponent's serve as well which goes back to my point that your stat does not take into account disparity of level. If ML is winning 66% of the points on his serve and 64% of the points on his opponent's serve, it simply means he is better than his opponent. And that would also work out to 51% of the total points ML wins, being won on his own serve.

And yet so many of your responses to me that seemed to come from that same place of hurt and did not seem to come from a place of understanding that I presented that you may have meant that only 51% of all the points ML wins are won on his serve. Take 10 years of ML's matches. My guess from seeing the way the guy dominates, most of his matches with people outside of CNT are so lopsided that it makes sense he is winning only 51% of his points on his own serve because he wins such a high percentage of all the points in most of the matches.

In your responses to me, I can see you accuse me of being angry. I may have been trolling you. Yes, I do admit that. Perhaps I should not have. But I did. But I was not angry. You accused me of yelling. I used capitals, I used bold, underlined capitals, but I was not actually yelling. Nor did I hear it as that in my head as I said it. I was underscoring the idea that I felt that, for ML at least, if he only wins 51% of the points he wins on his serve, part of that probably has to do with how many of his points he wins on his opponent's serves. And I think there is actually a lot of that in TT because the pro matchups that are even are kind of rare.

Anyway, my suggestion, Atas, is that you try and step back and observe yourself a little.

I was able to quote way too many posts where your response shows you feel hurt and it seems that how you react when you feel hurt is to attack. When you feel attacked, please try and take 2-3 hours or even a day or two, before you respond so you can respond more thoughtfully. I would like you to do this even if you feel you are being attacked.

Right now, I have switched gears from trying to have a conversation or an argument with you about a subject and am now focusing on how to keep this forum level. You have many good ideas. You are a creative guy. But if I was able to quote that many posts where you are insulting someone, then I feel like you have to step back and have a look at things.

As a forum member I have fun posting and debating. But as one of the moderators of the forum, I can also recuse myself from an argument and ask you to step back and try for a little bit more introspection.

Thank you.

 

[ttmonster]

Its not the data david, its the calculations ... he does not have the slightest clue on which statistic to use to calculate efficiency of serves etc. It just somebody random who talks about implementing things from tennis and does not even know how things are calculated in tennis ... not worth debating over it .. unless you have a night when you don't get sleep and for the lack of anything better to do debate with him to pass time and hope you get bored and fall asleep.. like Carl did ...

Usually, I don't involve myself with feuds like this, but I'm curious. Atas Newton, can I see the data that gives you the stats that you are referrring to? Or at least, a source?

 

[jawien]

[...] you get bored and fall asleep.. like Carl did ...

Looks like Carl didn't fall asleep ... ; )

 

[Atas Newton]

Usually, I don't involve myself with feuds like this, but I'm curious. Atas Newton, can I see the data that gives you the stats that you are referrring to? Or at least, a source?

sure. It was initially on rio2016.com/en/table-tennis but that website is long gone. It can still be accessed via archive.org/web. Some of it survived here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...Vy1_KYMubx38tKqTXWrtmQJXMY/edit#gid=380636782
Beware of the percentages though, average percentages are calculated incorrectly.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

.. unless you have a night when you don't get sleep and for the lack of anything better to do debate with him to pass time and hope you get bored and fall asleep.. like Carl did ...

Looks like Carl didn't fall asleep ... ; )

You guys made me laugh.

 

[jawien]

sure. It was initially on rio2016.com/en/table-tennis but that website is long gone. It can still be accessed via archive.org/web. Some of it survived here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...Vy1_KYMubx38tKqTXWrtmQJXMY/edit#gid=380636782
Beware of the percentages though, average percentages are calculated incorrectly.

Wow, nice stats. I'll have a look a those too.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

that's as far as I got because it's already bullshit, Carl. I never initiate fights. What you call "a decent comment" was actually this:

The guy misread what I posted. Just like you, Carl, many times. I said most amateurs can serve like a pro 1 out of 10 times. His understanding of that was that I'm shit at serving, can do "1 good in 10" (lol) and should go back to the practice table. If that's a decent comment, I'll start talking to you like that, see how you respond.

Atas, I don't think you want to do this. Read what I wrote and try and take your time to respond to people's comments. Even if you feel attacked. Take your time to think about how you say things.

Personal attacks are not going to be responded to so kindly in the future.