What makes Table Tennis a sport?

[UpSideDownCarl]

Look at this from someone else's perspective. They could say Table Tennis is really easy to play and anyone despite their can also play the sport. Your weight also doesn't matter when playing so how is this a sport? This is what I see from someone else's perspective.

Yep. That is what many people think. The problem is, that you can be out of shape, fat, clumsy, old, unable to move, IN A WHEEL CHAIR and still be pretty darn good. For real. So it isn't an idea. It isn't a theory. You can have everything physically going against you and still play pretty high level table tennis.

To the guys who say that, I pretty much agree, and then I say, but look at what you can do also. And show videos like the first one I posted of Xu Xin doing multiball at lightning speed.

So it goes both ways. Not just one way or the other. You can have a guy with amazing athleticism and have him use all of that to make himself the best he can be at table tennis. And you can have a guy who is out of shape and lazy but still loves to play and he could play the athletic guy and be better than him. It is, without question, possible. So, TT is both, a game and a sport. Not just one or the other.

 

[TareqPhoto]

Look at this from someone else's perspective. They could say Table Tennis is really easy to play and anyone despite their can also play the sport. Your weight also doesn't matter when playing so how is this a sport? This is what I see from someone else's perspective.

That
That can be said/told about some another sports too, so why TT in specific?!
TO my opinion, asking people opinion even about very simple thing, say a water, you will get many opinions, so i just don't take it as facts, i talked with someone and he told me that money can't buy happiness, i told them yes, but it can be used to reach happiness, he disagreed with me, later on he cried because he doesn't have money and ask others even me for money, i told him that money doesn't buy happiness and i went away left him crying more.

Honestly speaking, even for sports itself, some really accept some sports and some doesn't accept it as sports, for example, in my country they really don't look at Baseball and Rugby and Cricket as sports, even boxing to us is very bad and shouldn't be a sport.

 

[Der_Echte]

Look at this from someone else's perspective. They could say Table Tennis is really easy to play and anyone despite their can also play the sport. Your weight also doesn't matter when playing so how is this a sport? This is what I see from someone else's perspective.

OK, here is USA Basketball Star BLAKE GRIFFIN, a pro who NO ONE will deny is an ELITE ATHLETE at the highest level and easilya player who loves sports.

Here is how he fared vs an elite Amature FEMALE player who happens to be a fashion model.

Tell me if anyone sees this clip they don't know TT is a difficult sport even for elite athletes...

 

[Broken]

But at the professional level don't you have to be insanely athletic in order to compete at the top level?

I mean, it doesn't hurt, but look at JO Waldner for example. He could compete as long as he did because he read the game very well and hardly ever had to work as much as his opponent. I'm not saying that he wasn't in a good physical shape, just that he didn't have to use it as much as other players.

People tend to bring up his incredible touch and his game play when they talk about him, but it was his eye for the game that made it look as he where a level above everybody else when he was at his best.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

I mean, it doesn't hurt, but look at JO Waldner for example. He could compete as long as he did because he read the game very well and hardly ever had to work as much as his opponent. I'm not saying that he wasn't in a good physical shape, just that he didn't have to use it as much as other players.

People tend to bring up his incredible touch and his game play when they talk about him, but it was his eye for the game that made it look as he where a level above everybody else when he was at his best.

When he was young Waldner was in good shape. By 2000, not so much. By 2004 he was probably 30lbs (13.5 kg) heavier than his weight in 1997 WTTC and in 2004 he had a bad back. And yet he got to the Bronze medal match at the Olympics. And that was when countries were not limited to 2 players in singles.


Sent from the Subterranean Workshop by Telepathy

 

[Shuki]

If table tennis wasn't a sport we'd call it ping pong. When someone asks me to play ping pong, I'm just hitting around and having fun. when someone asks me to play table tennis, I'll be playing a different game.

What makes boxing a sport? The best boxers in the world upon becoming old, can still out-box any non professional.


define sport: an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment.

table tennis lies within this definition.