Mistakes and Rules

Mistakes and Rules

Yesterday I was talking to a guy over at the tennis center; we were discussing the idea of changing the size of the service area so as to reduce the dominance of the serve. The guy, Antonio, was born in Cuba, moved to the USA at an early age, and now lives in Spain; he is 85 and a retired finance guy. Perfectly intelligent, decent tennis player. I remarked that I had changed the rule about serving in table tennis precisely for that reason, requiring that the serve land on only one half of the opponent’s side. He said that was the usual rule in table tennis. I said it wasn’t. He told me he had seen it with his own eyes at the Olympics. I said I have been playing my whole life and I have never seen the game played that way. He seemed skeptical and asked if I was sure. I said I would google it. I did and of course I was right—it’s common knowledge. It is true that the rule is different in doubles, for obvious reasons, but in singles the rule is as stated. Why would a person make that kind of mistake? He seemed quite sure he was right and I was wrong and was unwilling to take my word for it. Did he watch a doubles match and infer that the same serving rule applies in singles? I doubt it. It’s a complete mystery (I will grill him when I see him again, if I do). This is a fine example of human error—preposterous yet startlingly common.

But it got me thinking about rules in sports, their arbitrariness and mutability. We take the established rules for granted without asking whether they are best for everybody and whether they have become outdated. The rules determine the level of difficulty of the game. They were fixed at a given time for a given selection of players, but do they work more generally? What about a lower net in tennis, or a smaller (or larger) service area, depending on the ability level of the players? What about netless tennis and a smaller court? How about enlarging the size of the holes in golf? Wouldn’t football be more exciting if the goal were bigger (more goals scored)? What about lowering the hoops in basketball or making them wider, so that shorter players get a look in? Why not weight classes in strength-based athletic events like discus and shotput? It is not clear that the existing rules are serving the participants that well. And yet they are remarkably resistant to change. What if tennis reaches a point at which the majority of serves are aces, say 90%? What if elite basketball players were regularly over 8 ft? We could always split the sport into different sub-sports and cater to a wider variety of player. The problems here are practical and financial not philosophical and ethical. I’d like to see more flexibility on the question—the rules were not made in heaven, after all. We don’t have a platonic form of the Tennis. Perhaps Antonio was confusing what the rules of serve in table tennis ought to be with what they are. The human mind is a funny thing.