Yoshimura Serve Techniques

Berndt, I would compare it more to the strike zone in baseball, where different umpires call things a little differently.

Baal wrote: Berndt, I would compare it more to the strike zone in baseball, where different umpires call things a little differently.

Here's a better baseball comparison:

wturber wrote: lineup32 wrote: The difference is that in baseball they actually make calls on every pitch, and on many other issues related to the game in progress.If they are unsure they can consult the video replay.   TT even at the international level is more a pick up game  from a rules point of view and below that it hardly exists except on paper. Even though they don't verbalize the call when a serve is deemed legal, an umpire is supposed to be actively determining "legal/not legal" on every serve.

I understand that additions to the rules were not made for no reason, but those additions were made in a different era and their application in this era is no longer integral. As I said, the ball no longer carries as much spin and service receive techniques have advanced in this era.

Fingerspin serves should not ever be allowed under any circumstances, as they go against the spirit of the game. We play a racket sport, and the skill and dexterity used to produce spin should be created entirely by the racket. Although hidden serves might make the game a little too deceptive for some people's tastes, you still have to create spin with the paddle and not your fingertips.

Thinking twice, I would agree with you about the need for a rule regarding a stationary hand. Make it 3 rules then!

Quiz time, Ringer84:

Name three ways to (try to) safely return serves with combinations of sidespin, underspin, corkscrewspin or topspin.  Name one way to return such services in order to force an error or produce a winner.  Discuss the risk factors involved in the possibilities of returning services, especially if you only have hundredths of a second to judge the amount of spin imparted by a server who hides contact with the ball from your view so that your recourse is to judge the amount, type, height, and depth of spin on the ball once it hits your side of the table.

Fun, huh?  Play ball!

Ringer84 wrote: My favorite serve in this video came at the :53 second mark.  I think it gives you a good idea of how short the acceleration at contact of a pro player is.  I had a hard time even telling whether this serve was regular pendulum or reverse pendulum the first time I saw it. http://www.infinitelooper.com/?v=WiuMB7yYRDI&p=n#/52;60   Edit: Ignoring the fact that the serve is almost certainly not visible to the receiver at contact.

Ringer84 wrote: The more I think about this, the more I become convinced that there are just TOO MANY freaking service rules in table tennis.  Honestly, there should only be 2 rules: 1. The ball should be tossed at least 6 inches in height.  2. The ball shall be tossed from the palm of the hand and above the height of the endline. (To prevent fingerspin serves) Seriously, that's all that's needed. "Oh, but I can't see the ball and the server is hiding contact!"  Who cares?  Learn to read how the ball bounces on the table and work on a good hidden serve yourself.  The ball is bigger and less spinny now than the 38mm era, and we can always add a seam to the ball if we feel the server has gained too much of an advantage. "Oh, he's throwing the ball backwards and getting more spin!" Again, who cares?  Learn to read the ball on the table and try to watch  the trajectory of your opponent's toss more closely.  Take this into account in your read.  As long as the server is throwing the ball up in the air 6 inches, then I consider that he's throwing the ball up "vertically". There's just way too much crap for the umpires to be looking for.  Get rid of all these stupid rules, let the umpires focus on the height of the toss,  and let's just play ball.

Thanks for the correction.

Let me just go ahead and say that I really do think table tennis is better without hidden serves. I really do wish that the current rules would function. I would love if every professional player was willing to serve like Samsonov, if every umpire was competent and willing to enforce the rules as written, if we had the resources to add a third umpire behind the receiver to more accurately gauge visibility, if players stopped bitching every time their serve got faulted, etc. The rules as currently formulated truly are ideal, as they strike the perfect balance between banning hidden serves and not limiting the creativity of the servers and their repotoire of serves. But the fact of the matter is that we don't live in an ideal world and all the things that need to come together to make the current service rules work just aren't happening. I don't see much hope for changing this culture in the future, either. Sometimes I think rules sound good in theory, but just don't pan out in practice. I think we are at the stage where we can now say that the banning of hidden serves was a failure, and it's time to go back to a time when we at least weren't at each others' throats. Besides, the question of visibility will always be an issue in non-umpired matches, regardless of whether the rule is perfectly formulated or poorly formulated.

Some players might think that hidden serves give too much of an advantage to the server, but I think such a slight imbalance is a small price to pay if it means putting an end to the constant bickering and controversy. I'm sure table tennis was a lot of fun in the hidden serve era, and I can't see why it wouldn't be fun now either.

Edited by Ringer84 - 09/09/2015 at 10:05pm