Different rules for Serena

[uspta146749877]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/sports/tennis/16rhoden.html?_r=1&ref=sports

[jeffreycounts]

Interesting article.

I thought about this too and considered the possiblity of sexism. But I think the author misses a few important points. First, Serena wasn't going after the umpire like Mac and Conners did. She went after a really small line judge who was really unprotected - unlike the chair where they sit up high and have the power to throw the player out. Second of all, I think that "I'm going to stick this f-ing ball down your f-ing throat" to be more sinister than "You can't be serious!". Also, the Mac/Conners behavior was like 30 years ago so its hard to consider it relevant to whatever is happening today.

So I guess I totally disagree with the author. Having said all that, I think it's one of the worst calls ever and the lines judge should be fired. There should also be a challenge system for these foot faults if at all possible. I think Serena is as little nuts - I've seen her mouth some crazy things after losing points. So when you combine a horrendous call with a juiced up Serena, all bets are off. That line judge is probably lucky to be alive.

[uspta146749877]

Do we train linepersons?

Jeff,
an issue here is time/money/effort spent to train linespersons.

[uspta990770809]

Training linespersons

Jeff,
an issue here is time/money/effort spent to train linepersons.

Anyone working the semis of the US Open on Arthur Ashe had had a ton of experience and earned a lot of "merit badges" with the umpiring association before they are allowed to get on that court. It's possible she made a mistake, but I really doubt it.

As has been espoused here in other posts, if they don't want her to call footfaults, they have to instruct the linespersons accordingly before the match (not something I would agree with). Alternately, they could take footfaults out of the hands of the linespersons and leave it up to the umpire (also a big mistake).

don

[uspta146749877]

I failed geometry in a first grade

Anyone working the semis of the US Open on Arthur Ashe had had a ton of experience and earned a lot of "merit badges" with the umpiring association before they are allowed to get on that court. It's possible she made a mistake, but I really doubt it.

As has been espoused here in other posts, if they don't want her to call footfaults, they have to instruct the linespersons accordingly before the match (not something I would agree with). Alternately, they could take footfaults out of the hands of the linespersons and leave it up to the umpire (also a big mistake).

don

I am probably missing something.
How an umpire can have the same angle as a linesperson 2 see
a potential footfault?

[oliensis]

I read that article in the NY Times about sexism and Serena. I thought it was absolute total bullshit.

I agree w/ the comment that going after the Ump is different, esp. in fans' eyes, than going after a linesperson.

Case in point: I saw Johnny Mac in a seniors event in Central Park maybe 10-11 years ago. The surface, though har-tru, was very slippery, because laid quickly. It was not conducive to his game and he was playing miserably. He went after a linesperson for a questionable call, calling her fat, and going on from there, elaborating on her corpulence. The crowd absolutely turned on him. It was a charmless, vicious, personal attack. It was off the subject, wasn't even calling her "blind" or anything that could remotely be pertinent to the call. It was an embarrassment that a man of about 40 was behaving like that. And the crowd let him know it.

Can you imagine if a MALE tennis player had said to a female linesperson what Serena said? ...Something like, "I'm going to shove this ball down your f****** throat and kill you with it?" Wouldn't your (and everyone's) reaction have been even worse? In this case, I think Serena got a relative break by virtue of her being female. If a male said that to a female linesperson the reaction (mine included) would have been exponentially more intense. So, if there was sexism in the public reaction, it was of the variety that cuts Serena some slack for being a woman, rather than the opposite.

Hell, if we're going to accuse the public of sexism in this case, let's throw some racism in there too, just for kicks and giggles! (And BTW, I actually DO think that some of the intensity of the reaction to the healthcare debate IS unconscious or latent racism against a black president...so it's not like I'm not hip to racist (or sexist) underlying issues when they actually ARE a factor.)

[uspta990770809]

And I failed physics my freshman year in engineering school

I am probably missing something.
How an umpire can have the same angle as a linesperson 2 see
a potential footfault?

Fortunately, we were on an s/x grading system so I just had to spend the summer doing extra work for the professor to make it up.

I agree. The ref can't see it as well, but if they don't want anything except the most obvious footfaults to be called, that would be one way to do it. But I'm really just playing devil's advocate there. It's a bad idea.

don
PS I got a B in my 3rd semester of physics and never took another physics course!

[uspta146749877]

Bad news for you

I have a Ph.D. in theoretical physics

[CraigC]

How is it a bad call?

She violated the rules by moving her foot over the line. The end. If you don't want the linespeople to play by the rules, change the rule. If you think a quarter inch doesn't make a difference, then why bother with the challenge system--any ball that is a quarter inch out can now be called in. The fact that it came on a critical point late in the match is irrelevant. Allowing her to cheat at this time is like allowing Tiger to move his ball a half-inch out of the deep grass and up onto a better lie on the eighteenth hole.
Does it suck that it affected the match? Sure. But what if Serena served and volleyed on that point and dug out a first volley off her shoelaces instead of playing a more difficult half volley? Would that have been fair to Clijsters? The linesperson has no idea what Serena's gameplan is, and allowing her to gain any advantage as a result of breaking the rules goes against the entire point of having rules.
It's pretty pathetic that people claim racism or sexism in regards to a linesperson doing his/her job.
If you think the rules should only apply in certain situations, what other rules do you think can be broken in the heat of the moment? Double hits? An extra serve? More recovery time for the person who had to run more? Extra time for medical time-outs? A little cocaine on the lips?
The more the officials let the rules slide, the more players will take advantage of them. In the end, it will harm the integrity of the sport.
CC

[jeffreycounts]

She violated the rules by moving her foot over the line. The end. If you don't want the linespeople to play by the rules, change the rule. If you think a quarter inch doesn't make a difference, then why bother with the challenge system--any ball that is a quarter inch out can now be called in. The fact that it came on a critical point late in the match is irrelevant. Allowing her to cheat at this time is like allowing Tiger to move his ball a half-inch out of the deep grass and up onto a better lie on the eighteenth hole.
Does it suck that it affected the match? Sure. But what if Serena served and volleyed on that point and dug out a first volley off her shoelaces instead of playing a more difficult half volley? Would that have been fair to Clijsters? The linesperson has no idea what Serena's gameplan is, and allowing her to gain any advantage as a result of breaking the rules goes against the entire point of having rules.
It's pretty pathetic that people claim racism or sexism in regards to a linesperson doing his/her job.
If you think the rules should only apply in certain situations, what other rules do you think can be broken in the heat of the moment? Double hits? An extra serve? More recovery time for the person who had to run more? Extra time for medical time-outs? A little cocaine on the lips?
The more the officials let the rules slide, the more players will take advantage of them. In the end, it will harm the integrity of the sport.
CC

I think the NBA and NHL serve as good examples here. In the last two minutes, let the players decide it unless there is an over the top foul. The commentators are always happy when the refs "let the players decide the game" in the last two minutes. You hear them say that all the time.

With Serena, if she had been called for a foot fault at any time previously during the match, I'd say fine. But to call it for the first time right before match point doesn't make sense to me.

It is exactly like calling a player for "palming" the ball in the last 30 seconds of an NBA finals. No official would ever call it. Nor would they call other minor infractions. A foot fault is a minor infraction that should be called any time during the match except for match point or the point before match point unless it is a dramatic foot fault - which Serena's wasn't.

[uspta990770809]

I think the NBA and NHL serve as good examples here. In the last two minutes, let the players decide it unless there is an over the top foul. The commentators are always happy when the refs "let the players decide the game" in the last two minutes. You hear them say that all the time.

With Serena, if she had been called for a foot fault at any time previously during the match, I'd say fine. But to call it for the first time right before match point doesn't make sense to me.

It is exactly like calling a player for "palming" the ball in the last 30 seconds of an NBA finals. No official would ever call it. Nor would they call other minor infractions. A foot fault is a minor infraction that should be called any time during the match except for match point or the point before match point unless it is a dramatic foot fault - which Serena's wasn't.

That's a pretty good comparison...if the NBA had at least one pair of eyes responsible for watching each player on the floor. The NBA refs can't see everything going on on the basketball floor because there are 10 players and only 3 refs, and the ball. So they settle for "controlling" the mayhem. Get's pretty physical. But we do have the equivalent of more than one pair of eyes on each and every player. There are in fact 2 linesman plus the umpire watching for a footfault on a serve (more if you count the linesmen on the other side of the net. In fact, the only responsibility of the linesperson who called the footfault at the time of the serve is to call footfaults and to report any unsportsmanlike conduct. The lineswoman appeared to be going to let the swearing pass, but Serena forced the umpire's hand by continuing on and extending the swearing to the point where the umpire almost had to call the lineswoman up to the chair to tell her what Serena had said. It appeared the lineswoman would not have stopped play to report the swearing if Serena had just gone ahead and played the next point. Probably would have gotten a stiff postmortem fine, but not the default. But that's a separate question.

Imagine there is a referee at that NBA game whose sole responsibility is to call palming the basketball of the one player he is assigned to watch (yes, that is a lot of officials, but less than the 8:2 or 11:2 ration that we have on Arthur Ashe. Would the rules be written that he couldn't make that palming call in the last 2 minutes?

Perhaps a better comparison would be no offsides calls in the last 30 seconds of a football game, or maybe only no illegal motion calls, or no pulling the opposition offsides...you get the idea!

It's a different game and an entirely different circumstance.

don

[oliensis]

How about the out of bounds line in basketball? Should it be elastic in the last 2 minutes?
Blocking, palming (in basketball) are rules that have subjectivity built into them. "Blocking" involves "impeding the progress" (from NBA rulebook) of a player. What constitutes an impediment is at least somewhat subjective. Palming is also somewhat subjective...or has become so in the modern game of basketball.

I don't think anyone would say that the boundary lines of the court should be elastic in basketball during the last 2 minutes. Or that serves that are 1/8" out should be called in during match point or the point before match point.

If anything, the code violation called on Serena could have been overlooked, as there is at least some subjectivy built in there...I don't think anyone really thought Serena was seriously threatening the line judge.

The only cogent argument against the footfault call is if she was footfaulting earlier in the match and it wasn't being called....and then they called it in the final game. Other than that, you're right the officials should not decide the match...but it's clearly up to the players not to commit infractions that let the officials decide the match.

But here's the main thing. In tennis, if there's any doubt about a call, you're supposed to give the benefit of that doubt to your opponent. Isn't it the clarity of the lines and this sporting spirit in which players are supposed to call lines the greatest part of the underlying value of the game? Have we really forgotten that? Tennis builds character. And one of the ways it does that is by teaching us to "force our heart and nerve and sinew to serve" our "turn long after they are gone" --to try our hardest to beat our adversary...while at the same time giving our adversary the sporting benefit of the doubt?

In that spirit, if there's any DOUBT that I committed a footfault, then I should be just fine with having it called on me. And it is in that spirit that almost all pro players leave a clearly visible margin between their feet and the line when they serve. If Serena didn't leave such a clearly visible margin, then she was just asking to have a footfault called on her.

That's the spirit in which the rules of the game are supposed to be executed.

[CraigC]

A very slippery slope.

Let's be fair with the analogy. If a toe is one quarter inch on the three point line with thirty seconds left in the game, how much is the shot worth? Do we change the rules because the shooter "intended" to shoot a three. Once you start breaking the rules, it's a pretty slippery slope. Here are a few more that I wonder if you'd let pass. A player reaches over the net to make contact with a volley at 7-7 in the tiebreaker. A player touches the net with the tiniest edge of her shoe just before the ball makes its second bounce on the other side. Do you let these slide too? Both players are exhausted and one of them continues to push the 20 second rule while the other is more fit and ready to play, and is complaining that the other player is breaking the rule--do you let it slide, and for how long? Rod Laver said there are no big points, and that all points should be treated like match point, thus, the "let the players decide because its late in the match" theory would not apply for him. Finally, since you don't like the foot fault call that late in the match, what would you say if she had foot-faulted by two feet, instead of an inch...and then served and volleyed...and then dug out a low volley for a winner...and then Clijsters complained about the "non-call". The rules are there for the integrity of the game and no player or situation is above the rules.

[jeffreycounts]

Good arguments and I definitely see your points.

I wish they had a clip to verify the foot fault call. If I could see it, I would definitely change my mind. From the camera angle they showed you couldn't see a foot fault.

But of course it was a bad angle and the lines judge had the best view. Hopefully one day this will also be challengeable. Serena's tirade would look a lot sillier if they could have broadcast the foot fault on the big screen.