everything is bigger yet smaller

September 19, 2008 at 4:46 am | Posted in brian, technology, tennis | 1 Comment

i finally found out why, in televised tennis, they never show both the replay and hawk-eye (or spot shot or whatever corporately-sponsor name they come up with). i used to think it was because spot-shot was wildy inaccurate and probably rigged. now i know it’s because spot-shot is mildly inaccurate. but more importantly, spot-shot collects more data about the incident (by incident, i’m talking about the information relative to the spot the ball touches) to reach it’s conclusions than our eyes or our brains or even our video cameras.

hawk-eye takes information from a number of cameras, probabilitizes (which i’m using to mean assessing the probability of) things like trajectories, spins, velocities and then creates a simulation of the flight of the ball to locate where the ball hit.  this means spot-shot, because it interprets more data, can know things about the location of the landing we, even with our eyes or our brains or even our video cameras, cannot perceive.

take for instance the 2007 final at wimbledon between federer and nadal.  nadal smashes a shot to the baseline.  federer, believing it to be out, doesn’t make a play.  the chair umpire rules out.  the video replay rules out.  however, hawk-eye says in.

the reason: due to it’s superior information gathering and processing, hawk-eye knows that that ball hit with that power will,  on a grass surface, compress and skid for about 10 centimeters.  so while the all of us, even our video cameras, witnessed the ball as out, spot-shot knew, in its heart of hearts, the shot was in.

so the question is, should who should interpret our sport rules?  humans or god or given that god isnt around, the next best thing, super-sensitive computers?

i keep forgetting

September 12, 2008 at 7:04 am | Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

sep 5

i’m watching college football.  ecu is beating west virginia 24 to 3 which, i hear, the people of greenville really needed given the hurricane that just passed through town.  you probably saw it on the tv.  the hurricane, i mean.  hurricane gustav.

previewing tim tebow

this is what i learned:

not only is he the first sophomore to win the heisman trophy, not only is he the first player to score 20 plus touchdowns running and passing in a single season, not only is he the first player to have at least 1 rushing and 1 passing touchdown in 14 consecutive games, not only is he a phenomenal athlete, but he’s a remarkable human being as well.

here’s the proof the tv gave me:

when other guys are going to exotic locals on spring-break, tebow is off to the philipines (which, i guess, isn’t exotic) on a mission with his dad to build hospitals.  (tebow;s a christian, right?)  oh.  also, he refused to be featured in playboy magazine.  they were doing some article about possible preseason heisman canidates.  and tebow refused.

back to the game

there are all these rules in college football.  like you can’t celebrate.  ever.  and they changed the time-keeping rules.  to make it harder for comebacks.  to keep the games shorter.  to give us something to talk about.

check out the ecu coach’s sunglasses.

now it’s the post-game

i dont get the set design.  there’s too much information.  that guy’s tie matches the computer-chip background.  there’s always information scrolling along the bottom and down the side and in the background.  and it’s all the same stuff.  repeated over and over and over. they’re talking about the byu/washington game. some guy on washington scored a touchdown with 2 seconds left to cut the lead to 1. but he was flagged for excessive celebration. 15 yard penalty. then the extra point is blocked. washington loses by 1.

quotes from the post-game

-a pac-ten (officiating) crew who threw the flag on a pac-ten team!  ( he seemed suprised by this.)

-what do you think?
-i think it was a strike out . . . the officials should never decide the game!
-that was a travesty of justice! that wasn’t celebration; that was joy!

(there’s a lot of exclaiming)

-a point of emphasis.

-a sever tactical error.

sports!

September 3, 2008 at 3:04 am | Posted in blood, college football, fight, murder, tennis, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

if you didn’t get a great big sports boner (girls included) this weekend then you missed out on pure pleasure. the spanish karate kid (nadal) wasted everybody in tennis. and tennis was awesome. somehow i don’t think the us open will have as much of an emotional effect on me as wimbledon did (it was probably the most fulfilling emotional experience of my life) but you never know. it’s amazing that there are actually some american men in the next round. which is good because that means they’ll show mens tennis over the williams sisters. i was getting tired of watching women play (sorry), except that there are some major babes this year. remember the final is next sunday. moving on to college football. the university of utah is awesome! they beat michigan. michigan! in michigan. awesome. i noticed the nationally televised game had a lot of praise for utah. it seems utah and byu will probably be the best non major conference teams this year, which may mean nothing. but it could mean…something. and their (hopefully) perfect seasons up until they meet at the end of the season will be memorable. maybe. seems like they both play some weak teams. and now the best part about sports….DVRs! that’s right. and HD. wow. sports look so cool. and i am writing about it. oh:


“stop copying us.” i hate that i put a commercial on here. but i told brian i would blog about it. kill me.

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.
Entries and comments feeds.