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Speaking of Pin-Pong the ANN article has the first ep airing Thursday at 12:50 PM ET. Maybe they don't feel like making a page until the last minute, for whatever reason.
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Apr 7, 2014 20:50
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Seconding Haikyu being fantastic. Great writing, great animation, great cast. e: I didn't think there was anything wrong with the pacing personally. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Apr 13, 2014 |
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Apr 13, 2014 19:12
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You're missing the best part of that scene. TENNIS SPERGIN' TIME.  DON'T DO THIS. Bad idea. More likely than not, you'll get hit in the face with the ball, or the kid's racket. Or both. And trust me, kids never swing soft. It's in their nature to whack every ball over the fence.  Heh, maybe in anime land. As far as I know, the ONLY Japanese tennis player I know who is any good is Kei Nishikori, the highest ranked Japanese player ever at 11, which is pretty drat good. Anyone in the top 10 has made history, 30 can be called successful, 100 can be called good, and everyone else is either just barely getting by either because they are varying levels of unlucky, or just suck rear end (relatively; they could still wipe the floor against 99% of the world). As of now, there are very few asian players, let alone Japanese, that are actually good. On the women's side, there's only Li Na (China) at 2 (she has a very interesting life story), and on the men's side there's Nishikori at 18 and Hen-Hsun Lu at 51 (Taiwan). Doubles doesn't fare much better with only a couple Indians and a Pakistani (very interesting relationship) on the men's side and a couple Chinese and a Taiwanese on the women's side. Tennis is pretty much dominated by Europeans, especially Russia. The US only has a couple good players and a few ok players, and Britain has all their hopes riding on the lonely Andy Murray, currently ranked 8. Serving: I couldn't get a good gif of it, but that speed is pretty absurd. Not that it can't be hit that fast (I probably could if I tried), but that's more of a pro player's default serve, not a high school player's practice serve. You're gonna break your shoulder practicing like that.  He found the sweet spot. Hitting the ball there is always a great feeling, mostly because there's very little shock/vibration when the ball hits there. Hitting the sweet spot maximizes the elastic energy of the strings, and the momentum of the racket, that goes into the ball. Otherwise you'll generally feel some amount of vibration and instability in the racket as you hit. The sweet spot is different for every racket and string setup. A larger racket with high tension strings will have a massive sweet spot, but a weak one. A smaller racket with lower tension strings is going to have a minuscule sweet spot, but if you hit it that ball will fly like it was fired out of a cannon. Differences in the sweet spot also affects spin in odd ways, and is usually what people mean when they talk about the "feel" of a racket. What kind of sweet spot you want depends on your play style and what feels good to you. Good form only amplify's that feeling, and that screenshot is pretty good form.  This is me trying to hit a backhand after 2 weeks of not playing. My hand goes all wonky and jittery when I try to parse hitting a backhand and I just end up doing lazy slices instead. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 00:04 on Apr 14, 2014 |
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Apr 13, 2014 23:57
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The Black Stones posted:Uh, I know dick all about Tennis and don't feel like googling this, but perhaps she meant "pro within Japan" and not "pro Worldwide"? So that makes a little bit more sense if there is a pro circuit in Japan. When people say "pro tennis", you're talking about being part of the ATP (or the WTA, since she's a girl), which is a global organization that ranks players on a point system based on how they place in ATP recognized tournaments. For a lower level ATP player (somewhere in the hundreds in the rankngs), the majority of your income will be tournament winnings, which isn't as much as you think. But at the higher levels, 100 and up, companies will start to pay you sponsorship money to wear/play with their stuff, and the tournament prize pools will be a lot higher. The US Open currently has the highest prize at $2.6 Mil, which you can increase if you come first in the US Open Series, which is a series of slightly lower level tournaments across the country. My point is if you want to make a living playing tennis you can't stop at the national level. e: I mean there's always the option of becoming a certified coach if you think you can't make the big leagues (I assume there's some kind of certification for coaches in Japan), but I'm getting more of a "compete at a professional level" vibe from her. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 00:38 on Apr 14, 2014 |
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Apr 14, 2014 00:16
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XboxPants posted:ViggyNash, are you sure about your info? Wikipedia has info on lots of other Japanese pro players, even among the top 100. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Japanese_tennis_players There's a single Japanese male singles player currently in the top 100, and 3 Japanese females I've never heard of before currently in the top 100. I'm sure there have been more throughout history (Michael Chang (China) was a big name in the 90's), but Nishikori is one of the very few big asian names currently. As for the second part, assuming the club has been around for a few decades, then I suppose that was probably what she meant. Not sure why I didn't parse it as that.
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Apr 14, 2014 00:44
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XboxPants posted:To be fair they don't really focus on the club as being some huge institution or anything and it kinda comes off more like a neighborhood tennis club. They don't really give the impression that it has been around for decades, though it's certainly possible. That probably happens all the time in the lower tiers, but considering that no one knew them in the first place they don't ever get mentioned. There are rankings for over 1500 people, on both the men's and women's side, not even counting doubles, but the only names people generally care about are in the top 150 or so for singles, and maybe the top 50 or so for doubles.
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Apr 14, 2014 01:12
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I think baseball is a dumb sport. ... One Outs is fantastic and I have so much more respect for baseball as a sport now, even if the stuff he pulls is a little more off the wall than normal.
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Apr 20, 2014 14:39
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Haikyu continues to be fantastic, but more importantly the music in the montage segment was amazing. The music in general is pretty good too. MORE TENNIS SPERGIN':  HOLY. poo poo. He's not gonna be able to move tomorrow. For comparison, 3 hours of constant practice will almost completely wear out the average player. I don't have the best stamina, so it's more like 2 in my case. I'm pretty sure 6 hours would kill me. An actual match doesn't take as much out of a player as practice, so it's common to see 3 hour long 5 set matches. If you're curious, the longest match ever played was 11 hours and 5 minutes between John Isner (USA) and Nicholas Mahut (France) at the 2010 Wimbeldon. It took place over 3 days: 3 hours on the first day and suspended due to lack of light, 7 hours on the second day and suspended due to lack of light, and another hour on the third day. The 5th set itself lasted 8 hours and 11 minutes.  If anyone was wondering, his racket isn't anything in particular. The extra crossbar in the throat (triangular hole between head and handle) is pretty rare to see though. It's not something that you see on modern rackets.  About 105 mph. Not too shabby. The average pro serves at around 120-130 for a first serve, a bit less on the second. The fastest serve to date was clocked at 163 mph by Smuel Groth (Australia) at the 2012 Busan Open, which I've never heard of.  Goodbye, Ei-chan. We knew ye well.
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Apr 20, 2014 15:55
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DurosKlav posted:Oh god I dont watch tennis but I watched a lot of that game, it was amazing. The ending was really pitiful to watch though. Both of them were on their last legs, and just getting a single point on the opponent's serve was a feat.
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Apr 20, 2014 22:36
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Your weekly Tennis sperg post: Nope. If you pull back that much on a serve, the racket will never meet the ball, especially against that monster serve. All you really need to do is put your racket in the way of the ball with stable footing. When the ball has that much power behind it, either from a serve or a particularly strong ground stroke, you don't need to add any to it yourself, so simply blocking the ball is a better option...  ...than this. Now, this isn't wrong by any means and is in fact a good way to think of a return in general, but it takes time you might not have to put yourself in the right position. But if you have the reflexes and the speed to do so, you can hit a very dangerous return like this, especially when the ball has as much power in it as Takuma's serve.  Oh, you dick. A slice serve is when you brush sideways on the ball when serving, thus giving it a sideways spin that causes the ball to curve out. For a right handed player, this always means curving to the left (brushing to the right) because it meshes with the standard service motion well. Attempting to slice the other way won't accomplish much, and most likely will lead to a hilarious failure.  Unless the system is different in japan, that does not mean he is the #5 ranked player on the local rankings. His #5 seed refers to his seed for the tournament, meaning he is the 5th highest ranked player playing in the tournament. He might actually be the #7 ranked player, but the #6 and #4 ranked players decided not to play in this particular tournament. It works this way in the pro leagues as well.
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Apr 27, 2014 15:50
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XboxPants posted:I thought Baby Steps was my favorite new sports show, but man Haikyu had a really strong episode this week. A lot of sports anime don't really integrate teamwork into the story that well; even on team sports like baseball it's often just a pitcher vs batter thing. Or in other shows, they'll have a teamwork theme but only to the extent of "you handle your opponent and I'll handle mine and never the twain shall meet"... Yowapeda has a lot of this (though they also do cooperation sometimes). Eyeshield 21 did heavily coordinated teamwork really well, and this last episode of Haikyu did a great job of team-play as well and it was great to watch. As much as I'm loving Baby Steps and sperging about it, Haikyu is definitely the sports show of the season with great everything, even music. I wasn't expecting to hear a soundtrack this good in a sports shounen.
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Apr 28, 2014 23:21
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This being the first match of the show, get ready for a GIGANTIC post about tennis. Kanzaki mentions when Ei wins the next point that he won a break, which is when you win a game off the opponent's serve. But this point, where Ei will win the game if he wins the next point, is called a break point - this specifically is called a triple break point since Ei has 3 chances to win the game before his opponent catches up - and is a very important statistic. Put simply, the number of break points you get, regardless of whether or not you win them, represents how much pressure you are putting on your opponent. When you serve, you generally start with an advantage since you control how the point begins, so losing points on your serve will add pressure. But if you're giving an opponent a break point, it means your advantage has been completely meaningless, so it does a lot of mental damage even if your opponent doesn't win the point.  I'm rather surprised they didn't say anything about deuces, though maybe that will come up later at a critical moment for ~drama~. I supposed I'll leave that alone for now then, just in case. Unless people want to know about it right now, in which case I'll edit in an explanation.  This is the tennis version of the coin toss. It isn't always used - higher level tournaments will generally use an actual coin since spinning the racket on the ground like that will scratch the grommet (the plastic/rubber coverin around the outer edge of the racket). Here's why:    This is the buttcap for a Head/Prince/Wilson racket (all three are well-known racket manufacturers). As you can see, it's pretty easy to distinguish when it's pointing up or down. For the Wilson and Prince rackets, you might say "W"/"M" or "P"/"d" instead of "Up"/"Down". It's a handy alternative to the coint toss.  Serve and Volley is a specific style of play centered around... well, that should be obvious. Serve and Volley is an aggressively tactical offence where you begin with a tricky serve and immediately move in to take the ball early, hopefully catching your opponent off guard. A serve and volley player will generally try to win points quickly and decisively. Obviously, this only really works when you are serving, so when returning, a player whose game hinges on serve and volley tactics will be at a big disadvantage. With the power and speed that modern players have, the serve and volley has become a rather outdated style of play. It might be used occasionally to catch an opponent off guard, but very few people use it as their primary style of play.  Is that so... well gently caress YOU JAPAN. I hate collared shirts. Vehemently. This is not a rule in the US. T-shirts are perfectly normal attire at a tournament. e: I forgot to mention, but the Wimbledon Open, one of the 4 prestigious Grand Slam tournaments, still has a dress code for no particular reason: "No solid mass of colouring; little or no dark or bold colours; no fluorescent colours; preference towards pastel colours...and all other items of clothing including hats, socks and shoes to be almost entirely white." (why white?  ). The tournament as a whole is pretty strict and obsessive over tradition. For example, all spectators are offered strawberries and cream as the typical stand food.  Though they're probably just being lazy and cutting down on animation, I kind of like that they did this because now I can talk about HawkEye. HawkEye is a ball tracking system consisting of 6-7 1000fps cameras that's been implemented in a lot of high-end stadiums and is accurate to about 5mm. It is most often used in the challenge system, where a player can challenge any call made by a line-ref, or a call overturn by the umpire, and watch as HawkEye animates the exact path of the ball and showing exactly where the ball bounced. It looks like:  Look familiar? The challenge system is pretty simple: Each player starts each set with 3 challenges. If you win a challenge, no challenges are used, but if you lose then you lose a challenge point. Run out of challenges, and you can no longer challenge for that set. An extra challenge is given to each player if the set reaches a tie-breaker, or 6-6 (6 all, as it would be called) in the game count.  Normally, a player would take a serve from a couple feet behind the base line (the line at the back of the court). But here we see the #5 seed standing several feet inside the line. This is perfectly valid, and in fact you could stand right next to the service line if you really wanted to. And with Ei serving like a little girl it's not like he's gonna get hurt if the ball hit him.  Normally I would call him a hipster for bringing such a big bag as a beginner player, but this being Ei - who carries 10 pounds of notes everywhere - it's a different story. A beginner player isn't going to need anything but a racket, some water, a towel, and maybe a small snack. There's no need for that big a bag. But at the higher levels, it's pretty much standard to bring a couple rackets, a couple bottles of water (or one giant bottle), a couple towels, and maybe even a change of shirt or two, so a big bag would be pretty useful. The pros normally bring a bunch of rackets, some strung at slightly different tensions in case they need to tweak their style on the fly.  This is actually very important, because at the professional level it would be neigh impossible to hit most balls without doing this. At higher levels, tennis can sometimes become a game of chicken. You have to guess where the opponent is going to hit the ball next and make a move early, but if you move too early then you'll give yourself away and the opponent might change their shot. But if you move too late, you might not make it in time. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 16:17 on May 4, 2014 |
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May 4, 2014 16:07
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It isn't the worst, but the animation could be a lot better. Still, it's a decent enough show to enjoy.
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May 4, 2014 23:07
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Sindai posted:The best part in Prince of Tennis was the guy who plays tennis at you so well you go blind and deaf. ... so basically a generic as hell shounen show. e: VV Nichijou of Tennis. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 15:00 on May 5, 2014 |
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May 5, 2014 04:17
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Weekly Tennis Blog: So, since they didn't talk about deuces even though one obviously happend (and a ridiculously long one at that), I might as well. A deuce is when both players are tied at 40-40, or 3 points each. In a deuce, you must get a net gain of 2 points over your opponent to win. When a player wins a point on deuce, their score is changed to Advantage, and the score is called out as "Advantage, [player]." If that player wins the next point, they win the game. If not, the score goes back to duece. This can happen indefinitely, so you can have some stupid long games if both sides are evenly matched. As Kanzaki already said, Pushing is:  Also, pushing will make everyone hate your guts. It's generally seen as a lazy, half-assed tactic for people without any actual skill. Of course, Ei was David fighting Goliath so really it's all he could do.  I think they're way overstating the effectiveness here. If you're drastically changing the spin of every shot you hit, it's gonna be noticeable in the way you swing even if you don't have Ei's eyes, and that means the opponent might eventually be able to predict what's coming. But, having to flexibly cater to every shot could trip a person up, so there is an advantage. Usually, when it comes to good control, you also vary height, depth, and speed if you really want to make an advantage out of variety. More importantly, those are much easier to mask than changes in spin, although topspin/flat (low topspin) shots are also easy mask as well. Since there really wasn't much to talk about today, and this show refuses to name-drop any pro players, I guess I'll mention some of the pros the seeded players reminded me of.   John Isner (USA) is a 6 foot 10 lanky giant. He's currently the figurehead of US mens tennis because, unfortunately everyone else sucks rear end. That said, he's still a really good player because he utilizes his extreme proportions well. His highest rank was 9, but he's currently sitting at 10.   Look at 'em big beefy arms. Rafael Nadal (SPA), aka Rafa, is a freaking monster. Current world #1 after trailing Roger Federer for years, he puts all of that muscle into 1 thing: racket speed. Not power. The core of his game is all about generating so much spin that even if the opponent knows what's coming they'd still be overwhelmed. This effect is compounded on clay courts where the uneven nature of the court together with that absurd spin can make the ball bounce in really weird ways. In fact, it was so effective that although Federer was undoubtedly the reigning champion, it took him years to finally win a French Open, the only Grand Slam played on clay, and only because Rafa had unfortunately been knocked out by a newcomer. But what makes him really untouchable is that he can use the absurd amounts of spin he generates to hit stupefyingly impossible shots, even when he's on the run.  Holy poo poo, he's Isner with a 2-handed forehand?  There are only 2 players I know of from recent years that used a 2-handed forehand: Marion Bartoli (FRA) and Fabrice Santoro (FRA).   Santoro retired a few years ago, and Bartoli retired last year (I didn't know that. I thought she was still going strong, but apparently there's something wrong with her body that she can't overcome). ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 16:08 on May 11, 2014 |
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May 11, 2014 16:04
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XboxPants posted:Oh, that reminded me that I wanted to ask about what tennis courts are usually made out of. When it occurred to me to wonder about it, I realized that I couldn't come up with a definite answer at all. You mention clay but implied that's abnormal - what's the standard? Something hard like asphalt? How different is it to play on an indoor court that I'm assuming is some kinda plasticky rubbery surface? I feel like I've seen or heard of playing on grass or grass-like surfaces, but that seems like it'd be super weird; is that done? Clay is certainly not abnormal, but it really depends where in the world you're talking about. I suppose I should clarify what I said about the French Open as the only clay Grand Slam. There are 4 Grand Slam tournaments every year, and they are the highest tier of tennis tournament in the world. Of those 4, the Australian Open in Melbourne and the US Open near NYC are both hard court, the French Open in Rolland Garros is clay, and Wimbeldon in the UK is grass. Tennis began on grass courts in the UK, which is why Wimbeldon, obsessed with tradition as it is, is a grass court tournament, and in fact grass used to be the most common surface but it's expensive to maintain and is now only common in the UK. However, Continental Europe and much of Latin America prefer clay courts, though they do also have hard and maybe a grass here and there. They're easier and cheaper to make, but require quite a bit of work to maintain. The US and Canada mostly prefer hard courts, though you do see clay courts here and there at clubs. There's a club near where I live that has a bunch of green clay courts out front. That place also built a tennis court in a barn for some reason. As far as what they're made of, there's a lot of variations. For clay, red clay uses crushed brick, green uses basalt, other courts might use minor variations. Apart from that, the water content of the clay and how compactly its pressed can also affect the court. For hard court surfaces, the standard is a synthetic/acrylic with an asphalt or concrete base underneath. As far as grass courts being weird... well I wouldn't know having never seen one in real life, let alone played on it. The soil is generally heavily compacted and the grass is cut like a golf putting green, so the balls still bounce but they tend to slide off the grass. That means that spin is relatively ineffective, the exact opposite of a clay court. It also means the ball retains a lot more speed off a bounce, and so grass courts are considered the "fastest" type of court of the 3.
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May 11, 2014 19:47
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Mo_Steel posted:Are you sure he doesn't have bionic arms because holy gently caress he looks like he could tear a car in half with those things. Here's Roger Federer for comparison:  He looks like the Hulk by comparison. In the US, ESPN or NBC will generally have grand slams live, and ESPN sometimes shows other lower tier tournaments, but if you have a sports package then you might also have the Tennis channel. e: Dude who wanted to know what a grass court looked like, there you go. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 05:19 on May 13, 2014 |
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May 13, 2014 05:17
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Haikyu continues to be the most gif-worthy show this season. e: VV Exactly. Tennis talk: I was going to comment on how Ei's precise control would not make him invincible, but the second half of the episode said that for me. Even if you know exactly what you need to do, getting it done is far easier said. Also, mind-gaming your opponent, like Takuma did a couple times (stopping short, switching directions), can be a very useful tactic to put an opponent mentally off balance.  This is truth, though not the whole story. The moment the ball falls below the net, you immediately lose a whole bunch of potential options. If you try to hit it deep, you have to hit a slow, looping ball that the opponent will have no trouble with even if it's a difficult angle. However, trying to hit it short or at a sharp angle is very difficult and requires great control and touch, otherwise you'll be handing over a free point.  I figured out what kind of racket he has. It's a Prince, or at least based on it. See those holes in the frame? That's a feature Prince introduced last decade and has since become their gimmick, per se. For the most part, it reduced drag while swinging thus allowing you to swing faster. There's a whole host of other benefits that Prince touts; there's some silly ones, but not all.  This has nothing to do with tennis. It was just too hilarious not to post.
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May 18, 2014 22:11
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XboxPants posted:Was Maruo's whole "I gotta aim for the back if I wanna hit the front and vice versa" a common tennis idea, or was it just an instance where that's what works for him, and different people have to adjust in different ways? It's all about feel, and that's different for everyone. For some people, like Ei, they control the ball through minor adjustments in their swing. Others might do it though timing, and yet others through positioning. Another thing to consider is that direction control is really all Ei does. As far as we know, he doesn't mess around with spin, power, or height, so the extent of his thoughts while swinging is 1)what's the opponent's status, 2)where should I hit the ball, and 3)how should I adjust my swing to hit the ball there. e: New Episode: Well, that year went fast. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 15:56 on May 25, 2014 |
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May 19, 2014 00:36
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Everything Burrito posted:Thread needs more Haikyuu gifs This really is the most gif-worthy show this season. Someone asked earlier about watching pro tennis. The French Open will be going on for the next 2 weeks, and I know for a fact that ESPN has streaming rights. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 19:05 on May 26, 2014 |
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May 26, 2014 17:04
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Tennis Talk: What Kanzaki tells Eichiro at the beginning is very true; you always need to warm up before a match, but overdoing it will definitely hurt you. Usually, you get 5-10 minutes of warm up time with your opponent before the match starts. Start of with a ground stroke rally, then one person goes to the net for a while to hit volleys and overheads, then the other, and finally both players hit some serves until they feel ready.  So very true as well. Once you start feeling the pressure, any number of things can go wrong. It all depends on how strong you are mentally, but I doubt anyone is immune to it.  They are really hurting for budget, aren't they? No, nets do not work like that. The top of the net is always very taut, but the webbing is meant only to stop the ball's momentum, so it's nothing more than a loose web of fibers. Fun fact: it is possible to get a ball stuck in the holes, like they tend to do in fences. It's really unlikely and impossible to replicate if you do, but I personally have managed it a few times out of sheer luck while playing.
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Jun 1, 2014 20:12
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AVeryLargeRadish posted:Any comments on Maruo's next opponent? Hmm... I already mentioned that a 2-handed forehand is extremely rare, and I only know of two (former) pro players that used it. This episode, bro mentions that he doesn't have "soft touch, depth perception, or what they call natural ball sense." What this amounts to is that he's not very good at net (volleys and general net play), but there's more to it. He can't hit anything creative or that requires a lot of finesse, which ultimately means that he's actually very predictable because of those restrictions. His opponent can rule out him pulling some crazy trick shot out of his rear end and expect something more generic and therefore easier to counter. This could serve as a huge advantage to Eichiro who's very good at controlling a point with good directional control. He can try to force Miyagawa to come to the net where a bad volley could give Ei an easy point, and if Miyagawa tries to back up to the base line it leaves a lot of openings and puts him off balance. That said, he did say that he'd figured out Ei's weakness. I wonder he's thinking... e: What does "finesse" look like? Federer being normal. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Jun 2, 2014 |
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Jun 2, 2014 00:32
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AVeryLargeRadish posted:Ahaha, Federer is like :swag: incarnate. He must have made some people break their rackets at some of the stuff he pulled on them. Not :swag:, really. he's just the chillest, most aloof player ever, and pretty much everyone like the guy, or at the very least respect him. He also holds every other record there is to own, such as winning the most grand slams at 17, a record previously held by American Pete Sampras in the 90's - early 00's who was also the coolest dude around in his time.
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Jun 2, 2014 05:04
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French Open women's final starting right now. Men's final is tomorrow.
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Jun 7, 2014 14:04
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Eichiro vs. Miyagawa: I thought there might be a lot to talk about, and I was right.  For a first thought, this is the right idea. Miyagawa's strength is that his powerful and variable groundstrokes allow him to effectively dominate a point in a baseline battle. If Ei can keep him off balance, he might be able to win points. That's easier said than done.  So that's what they've been talking about. It's also very true. Ei is a very solid player, a jack of all trades, but he doesn't have a single ace in the hole. What's worse, his general play style plays right into Miyagawa's strenghts; because Ei needs to be patient and methodical, tactically constructing each point, he needs longer points, but that gives Miyagawa more time to wrest control away. Without an ace in the hole, Ei has no way to get that control back or outright win the point.  He is referring to the serve timer. After each point, the server has 20 seconds to serve the next point. Fail to do that, and you get a warning and lose the point. Fail again and you lose the game. However, that's all up to the umpire's discretion. In the French Open final yesterday, Maria Sharapova received a pre-warning of sorts in the third set, even though she had been intentionally delaying points the whole match. That tactic is something that she's rather infamous for, and she's lucky that the umpire was as forgiving as he was. Halep could easily have won the match if given the chance. Btw, that was an amazing final and if you have any interest in watching tennis you should watch that match. There's no good screenshot of this, but Bro mentions, and Eichiro finds out, that Miyagawa has been experimenting during Ei's service games in order to figure out what works best against Ei. This is a pretty common practice between high level players that have never met before, and to a lesser extend during any match. Since a match usually consists of a best out of 3 or 5, most players tend to use that first set to test the waters; they poke and prod at their opponents to get a sense of their style of play and to see what tactics work best against them. You can only learn so much from scouting, but in the end nothing beats the experience of actually playing the person.   That is exactly how you make a comeback. Though Ei is putting himself at a disadvantage by playing with a style he's not used to, he's also voiding Miyagawa's groundstroke advantage. If Ei continues to keep Miyagawa on his toes like this, he has a real chance. But don't start cheering for Ei yet. Miyagawa still has another chance at 5-4 assuming he wins his service game, and another at 6-5.  This isn't that important to the match itself, but is something I found odd. In that screencap, and throughout what we were shown of the match, the umpire has been making the out calls. In the absence of linesmen/women, out calls are up to the player, and the umpire has the authority to overrule a player call. That means they can call outs, but an umpire shouldn't need to since it's the players' job.
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Jun 8, 2014 20:31
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Emalde posted:This cliffhanger broke me and I too have joined the "now reading the Baby Steps manga" bandwagon. If you mean "Is it possible to play like Nadal/Federer/Djokovic?" then the answer is maybe, because it depends on whether you one of them or not. But who knows, maybe someone else will end up being better than them in the future. I'm not following the manga, and we haven't seen him play yet, so I don't know exactly what you're talking about, but the best players can always find a way to surprise you.
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Jun 9, 2014 01:44
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Van Dine posted:ViggyNash, I love your tennis posts about Baby Steps. At some point anyone who was watching the show will have jumped to the manga and will be way ahead of me and so all of my posts will be super belated. That's a bit depressing somehow.
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Jun 9, 2014 13:31
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Sorry, had a small crisis and didn't have a chance to watch the latest episode, until now. First, some technical details:  This is an approach shot. It's an aggressive shot used as you move up to the net. Since you're taking the ball early but still have most of the power of a groundstroke and have more options in terms of angles, it's a really good way to throw your opponent off before you finish the point with a volley. It was a neat trick, waiting till the second to last point to pull this.   What the gently caress is that? It sure as hell isn't how you hit a lob.In general, there are two ways to hit a lob: 1) Offensive lob: Where you hit the ball in a high, arcing loop over your opponent's head, but with enough top spin to make it land near the baseline. 2) Deffensive lob: Where you just kinda throw your racket out and it happens to hit the ball upwards because you were sprinting for the ball and hope it lands somewhere in the court. What's Miyagawa doing? Trying to hit someone's car in the parking lot nearby. Now for some match analysis:  It really shouldn't bother me that much since this is a good idea (as we saw at the end of last episode), but nearly the entire time I was watching this episode, I was thinking, "Hit a drat drop shot already!" Here's why: Eventually, Miyagawa will get somewhat used to Eichiro coming to net, and will figure out what shots he needs to hit to get by him, namely passing shots and short-angle cross court shots, both of which he started doing later on. Regardless of what Eichiro is doing, Miyagawa is still in his preferred position. However, a drop shot would force him to come forward and put him in an extremely unfavorable position. On top of that, Eichiro can use his high level of accuracy to then hit the same passing shots and short-angle shots that Miyagawa starting using this episode. They would be much more effective for Eichiro than they were for Miyagawa.   This is shameful. Just shameful. First of all, this is Miyagawa's first serve. You don't take chances on a first serve. That's what second serves are for. In general, a player's first serve is their biggest weapon because it gives them control of the whole point right off the bat. It's often very difficult for a returner to win points off a first serve. Secondly, hitting an inside-out forehand (running around a ball when it should be a backhand) takes a lot of time to set up and for that very reason is a really stupid idea unless you have the agility, speed, and technique to pull it off. You don't even see pros doing it very often. That was ENTIRELY your fault Ei.  Miyagawa is a relatively experienced player, so this should have that much of an effect on him. However, he's had an extremely stressful set that really hasn't gone the way he'd planned and they're at the butt end of a tight tiebreak; maybe he just wasn't thinking straight or was just really tired. So it did affect him and he did gently caress up. Oh well. Guess Ei's stupidity paid off.AVeryLargeRadish posted:Maruo may have won by a fluke but a win is a win. At least he managed to get his racket up in time, otherwise he would have lost. I guess it was kind of a fluke, but I also think it was entirely possible that Miyagawa's approach shot could have been out. He had practiced, and all but perfected, hitting groundstrokes from the baseline. So what do you think would happen if he suddenly tried to hit a shot from the service line? HOWEVER, if the ball had hit Ei, it would automatically have been Miyagawa's point. This Q&A will clear up any questions more thoroughly than I could. All in all, good job Ei. He worked for that win, and he deserved it. AVeryLargeRadish posted:I liked Takuya's expression when Maruo won, just disgusted at him winning in such an awkward way.  Also:  They gave him the best faces this episode.
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Jun 19, 2014 00:21
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AVeryLargeRadish posted:Ehhh, I've seen top level pros get thrown off their game by various things happening during a match. I think I remember one time where one of the Williams sisters made a whole mess of errors after her opponent suffered an injury, so I can see things going awry for a junior level player pretty easily, especially given the situation. Yeah, they aren't all mentally strong enough to let mind games get to them, and even Federer has a breaking point, but Miyagawa's situation was kind of drastic and, in my opinion, a little contrived to create drama. If Ei had succeeded with that return I could see him suddenly developing a complex, but since he missed in the most spectacular fashion possible I really can't imagine that really happening. And about the Williams sisters... yeah... Her sister Venus is a rather low key person, but Serena is pretty hotheaded sometimes.
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Jun 19, 2014 03:00
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I don't have the time to do an info-post right now, but there was some interesting stuff in this episode that I'll mention. First of all, that famous tennis academy in Florida that Mike's from? It's a real place, and well worth mentioning. Secondly, there's quite a bit to talk about on the topic of racket stringing. The show just passes it over though, which is a shame since it could be used as a small drama element to decent effect, at least. Thridly, Iwasa already seems like a weird dude. I can't wait to see this weird style he has.
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Jun 23, 2014 03:52
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Since I didn't get to do a Baby Steps infopost last week, I'll have a double feature today... ...once I get to watch the newest episode.
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Jun 30, 2014 14:21
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Last week's episode: Mike: The Nick Bollittieri Tennis Academy (aka IMG Bollettieri Tennis Academy), located on the west coast of Florida, is perhaps the most prestigious tennis academy in the world, having trained the likes of Maria Sharapova, Andre Agassi, and Boris Becker, along with a long list of equally successful and prolific professional players. So a high level tennis coach from Florida that works with pros? Mike's probably a coach at the Bollettieri academy. Racket Stringing: The strings of a racket are just as important, if not more so, as the racket you play with. When you choose a racket, you generally look for weight, weight balance, head size, grip size, string pattern, and material, all of which change how the racket swings and feels. With strings you need to look for softness, material/design, roughness, width, and whether you are using only one string or a hybrid setup. On top of that, you need to determine what tension to keep the strings at and whether or not to prestretch the string. All of these factors can change the feel, spin, and power of a shot. For example, Federer uses a very small racket (90 sq. in.) with a dense string pattern and very loose strings; that gives him a great combination of control and power that requires a high amount of precise control, which Federer has in abundance. On the other hand, Nadal is focused purely on maximizing spin, so he uses a larger racket with an open string pattern and rougher, more taut strings. Stringing a racket is something anyone can do if they have the right tools, the most essential of which is the stringing machine. They can range from a couple hundred to well into the thousands of dollars, and come in a couple of types: dropweights, "lockout" mechanisms, and electronic pullers. My(dad's) stringing machine was of the dropweight kind, which isn't very accurate but is relatively cheap. But a couple years ago I(my dad) dropped several hundred on a standalone electronic puller that we could attach to the rails on the machine. It's much more accurate and much easier and faster to use. I've never seen the mechanism type and I'm not even sure how they work, so I couldn't tell you much about them. This week's episode: What the gently caress? I didn't know playing tennis by drawing was a real thing, and Iwasa takes it to the farthest extreme by drawing Van Gogh and Monet. But I guess confusing the gently caress out of your opponent can be a viable strategy. But he does have skill. From what everyone's been saying about him, that he has amazing technique and can hit anything from anywhere, sounds a lot like Federer, and we know how successful he is. What's holding Iwasa back is what his coach was talking about : he puts his drawing before his tennis. So, as Iwasa himself noted, a better player will wreck him quick and easy without him having much of a chance to fight back, but he'll walk right through anyone not good enough to keep up. But when he got serious...  To be able to hit the ball consistently that deep and with that kind of variety is a very difficult thing, especially with the kind of power he's hitting them with. Ei's going to need quite the plan to beat him.
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Jun 30, 2014 17:55
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Shakugan posted:I challenge ViggyNash to do these tennis infoposts for a few episodes of Prince of Tennis. You'd better be paying me. All contributions will go towards copious amounts of Advil.
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Jun 30, 2014 22:31
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Not much to talk about in this week's episode since it was mostly talking and drama, so I guess I'll give my impressions of Araya from what we know so far. What we know is that he is a hard hitting power player, a-la Andy Roddick in his early days of bashing the ball as hard as he can (and setting some new serve speed records in the process). After a couple years of bashing, everyone got used to it and Roddick quickly became irrelevant at the higher levels, even after he hired tennis legend Jimmy Connors and restructured his entire game. This is how I think the next (possibly 3) episode(s) will go: Maruo will be overwhelmed by power, Maruo will learn to control the power, Maruo will learn to use the power to his advantage with superior technique to effectively redirect the ball, Maruo eventually wins and collapses on the court. Given how ridiculously build the man is, I doubt Araya will run out of steam, so it'll be a matter of outplaying him and winning quick points, ideally winning in straight sets (it won't happen because ~drama~, and because Maruo isn't used to 3 set matches).
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Jul 7, 2014 22:08
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Dick Spacious CPA posted:i wish someone else was doing the subs for the volleyboys show because this had me very confused because it showed them scoring points every scene I didn't catch that at all. I just assumed the name below the higher number was Karasuno. So I didn't do a tennispost last week, so I'm doing a double feature again. The first on will be pretty long since it's the Araya match. First of all, Ei's "Take Down Araya File": 1) Slow starts because he needs to get fired up. - I'd also add "doesn't want to tear his shoulder off" as another reason. Stretching or not, going full-power right off the bat is a terrible idea, but in Araya's case, power shots are probably what's most comfortable. - Countering with quick, aggressive returns is a good idea since his movement won't be at peak shape either, and because it takes advantage of his slow start. 2) Slow down the game because he's impatient. - Ok, that's kind of a dick move, but Eichiro needs all the advantages he can get. 3) Contests of endurance. - Makes implicit sense; he's a heavy hitter, so he'll tire out during long points and hopefully make a mistake. - As Ei notes, his game is perfect for an contest of endurance. This will probably be his best strategy throughout the match since Araya can only get more tired. - "Aim for deep center, at his feet!" This forces Araya to have to step back, meaning his shots will have a little less power and the ball will have to travel longer. This also limits the kind of angles available to pass with. A note about that last tick. There's a new pro player on the tour, a Canadian named Melanie Bouchard, whose entire game revolves around being as aggressive as possible. More often than not, she will be hitting groundstrokes while standing inside the baseline, often called no-man's land. As soon as she gets the chance, she'll move in and take the ball out of the air, coming to the net in control of the point. Unfortunately, she's super cocky and stubborn about her game so when she went up against Kvitova in the Wimbledon finals this year, a veteran player who was really on a role this tournament, she got her poo poo wrecked in straight sets. 4) Be willing to concede points now and then to reduce the mental damage. - With a player like Araya, you're going to be passed by the occasionally impossible groundstroke or ace. Just move on with the knowledge that it's impossible for him to do that every time. 5) Keep the tempo down while throwing in surprises. - Well, an underhand serve is pretty surprising. Since literally no one does it. Because the surprise is less useful than the popcorn you just handed your opponent. Unless you do it really well, an underhand serve is not worth the risk. - But the sentiment makes sense. If Ei can keep him off balance mentally, he won't be able to get into his groove. Now Araya does something rather interesting. He gets pissed off and challenges the umpire's call. Up front this just makes him look like an angry, spiteful rear end, but, as the show notes, it's more calculated than that. Simply put, this is Araya finding a different way to get himself fired up while also resetting the mental advantage Ei had. It's not unlike the antics of a certain John Mcenroe. Of course, he's not always that bitchy or violent about it, but his antics did spawn commercials this this and another that got removed from the internet for whatever reason . (It was a National Car Rental commercial if anyone can find it.) Speed and power was the modern game. This was back in the last decade. But now we've got players like Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic who have as much speed an power as the rest, but they also have the technique to fly right by them, and everyone else is starting to catch up. It makes sense that the show is a little behind the times since it's an adaptation, but oh well. It's not like the studio was putting that much effort in to begin with, so I didn't really expect them to do any kind of research.  Unfortunately, it'll still be pretty effective against an amateur like Ei who doesn't have the physical capacity to keep up.  Playing like Iwasa could help. Though unintentional, his style served to keep the opponent guessing what he might do next since there wasn't much of a pattern to follow, unless you know what he was really trying to accomplish. If Ei can keep Araya off balance, Araya might not be able to overwhelm Ei with a powerful shot, giving him time to take control of a point, or at least predict Araya. Looks like Araya gives no fucks though.  I'll do the next episode tomorrow, got stuff to do. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 19:29 on Jul 21, 2014 |
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Jul 21, 2014 18:42
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Episode 16 Ei's strategy here is pretty legit. As a short, scrawny, weakling like him, the best way to counter a power-player is to hit the most awkward shots possible. It's really hard to hit a low slice with a lot of power because not only is the ball well below the net it's also spinning backward which means that, unlike with top spin, the ball won't inherently bounce at an upward angle off the racket.  That volley is no joke. Even if you guess the direction, it's still a hell of a stretch to get it when it's that wide even with explosive movement.  Not really... well, it depends on the player. Araya is characterized as being fiery and impatient, so there's a good chance this strategy will work against him. But if Araya could control his patience and stay focused, he would have no trouble punishing Ei for those lobs. Also, you might tire yourself out with that frantic defense faster than Araya's hard hitting will tire him out.  Seriously, Ei is superhuman if he can keep track of stuff like this while fighting that hard for each point. NOTE: Just putting this here temporarily, since I'm not sure if I should make a new thread or not. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 21:30 on Mar 31, 2015 |
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Mar 31, 2015 21:12
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Strong Mouse posted:I say make a new thread. There is only going to be Baby Steps and Ace of the Diamond (and some girls tennis thing) this season, so it would probably be better to start over. Teekyu doesn't count as sports anime, and they gave up all pretense after the first season. Still, I guess we could make a combo thread for Baby Steps and Ace of the Diamond. I don't know anything about the second one except that it's a baseball thing though.
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Mar 31, 2015 21:25
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 15:37 |
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Made a thread for Baby Steps: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3710164 Since I only watched up to episode 15 of the first season, I'll be (probably) doing info posts on the rest of the episodes.
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Mar 31, 2015 22:11
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