An engineer overthinks tennis in a daily journal.
So many times in this project I have made a plan on how to cover material, only to veer off onto a rabbit trail or discover that I don’t have as much to write about a given topic as I anticipate. With that backdrop, let me outline my intended content over the next three days.
The next two subsections of “A Good Return” deal with unusual situations involving the net post. I have never personally encountered either of these situations in a live match.
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As mentioned yesterday, I inadvertently thoroughly covered many of the cases in “A Good Return” within the ITF Rules of Tennis. As a result, I am anticipating that we will move through this section with an unprecedented speed to content ratio.
Today we celebrate moving into “A Good Return” in the ITF Rules of Tennis as published within the USTA Friend at Court. Sometimes in tennis vernacular, the word “return” is specific to the first shot after a service. However in the rules of tennis, the word return includes every shot after the service.
At first glance, the last USTA Comment in the “Player Loses Point” section in the ITF Rules of Tennis is arguably the most bizarre encountered to date. The comment is related to a net configuration that I initially had difficulty imagining.
It is pretty common in doubles for two doubles players to simultaneously attempt to play a ball resulting in a clash of racquets. While this happens most frequently at the net, it can actually anywhere on the court with one exception.
The final case ruling in the “Player Loses Point” section in the ITF Rules of Tennis is one that almost everyone has absentmindedly violated from time to time. The technical term for this is “brain fart.”
A couple of days ago, I smugly observed that I had delayed discussion on jumping over the net in the middle of a point. That deferral was because I knew it was coming up in a future case ruling and I needed to leave myself something to write about. Today I am confronted by an ITF Case Decision that I have already covered fairly thoroughly. Oops.
If I was ever going to completely phone in my daily essay, today would be the day. That is because today’s case ruling was thoroughly covered in “Racquets gone Wild.” So what is different about this rule?
For me, some of the tennis rules are aspirational. Today’s ITF case decision falls firmly in that category. I simply do not have the athleticism to successfully violate this rule. In fact, if you ever see me even start to attempt this, just go ahead and call the ambulance. I am going to need it.
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