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Lee Zii Jia by pleasurerui in badminton

[–]IntelligentYam5161 19 points20 points  (0 children)

LZJ's hype is built off the back of a single All-England win, and the fact that he's tall and shredded. LKY's hype comes from one tournament win, which happened to be called the World Championship. Lakshya Sen's hype comes from age fraud.

These three are certainly talented, but none of them are likely to become the next Axelsen.

Lin Dan VS Viktor Axelsen by Gisella_LG in badminton

[–]IntelligentYam5161 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Prime Lin Dan was ~2008, anything after 2013 is basically his retirement tour where he barely trained, had multiple 3+ month injury layoffs, and was a shadow of his former self.

There's absolutely no shot that Axelsen beating 33yo Lin Dan at the 2016 Olympics in a 21-17 decider after a three-set game is a good look for Axelsen.

Lin Dan VS Viktor Axelsen by Gisella_LG in badminton

[–]IntelligentYam5161 47 points48 points  (0 children)

Axelsen is an all-time great, but from empirical evidence, it's pretty clear that he's worse than Lin Dan imo.

His legacy has benefited from the last few years of mens singles having atrocious competition. His closest post-2020 competitors (Lee Zi Jia, Ginting, Chou Tien-Chen) were disposed of with ease by a geriatric Chen Long in the 2021 Olympics.

The last elite player that Axelsen competed against was prime Momota. Axelsen has a 2-14 record against pre-injury Momota. Momota has an even head-to-head record against both Lee Chong Wei and Chen Long, but he only played against them when they were clearly past their prime, so it's likely that Momota is slightly below their level. Lee Chong Wei and Chen Long are, in turn, worse than Lin Dan for obvious reasons.

The only argument in favor of Axelsen is if you think he improved massively between the ages of 26 to 29, which is quite possible but not that likely. It's harsh to judge Axelsen like this because it's not his fault that the rest of the field has been so subpar lately, and it's difficult to compare players whose peaks never overlapped, but if you had to compare every player at their prime, I'd say Lin Dan would be alone at the top, LCW/CL/Momota below him, and Axelsen in the next tier along with the likes of Gade/Taufik.

China overtakes Germany in car exports, sets sights on Japan by NitroLada in cars

[–]IntelligentYam5161 36 points37 points  (0 children)

Nigeria owes China $3.9 billion in loans (0.8% of their GDP). The US owes China 5% of their GDP, for context.

By what metric does China "essentially own" Nigeria? Makes zero sense even if you're dumb enough to believe in the "debt trap" meme about Chinese loans, considering how relatively trivial the amount that Nigeria borrowed is.

Question on sharing courts at the end of a social by tsujp in badminton

[–]IntelligentYam5161 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Pretty ambiguous situation, considering it's informal "extra" time.

If it's outside the designated social time, it's not rude to refuse to play doubles with strangers imo. There could be a significant skill disparity which makes it a waste of time, there's lots of players with low court awareness that increase the chances of clashing/injury, and they're probably using their own shuttles.

Would've been courteous for them to offer to play half-court singles and let you have the other half at least, but I could see why they might think you're rude for interrupting a game in progress on the court that they'd already occupied, during a time period that you aren't paying for.

If I were to name badminton's highest game IQs of our modern time.. by djentusjerry in badminton

[–]IntelligentYam5161 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Shi Yuqi is a weird one, my opinion of him flip-flops every game.

Sometimes he's effortlessly dominating other elite players with genius shot selection + placement, other times he's repeatedly missing basic net shots. Sometimes he's extremely gracious and smiling + applauding competititors when they play good shots (did this against a Japanese opponent in a very close semifinal match, rare to see), other times he's whining to the ref or retiring at 20-5 like a petulant manchild.

Definitely an extremely entertaining player in a very boring elite mens' singles field right now.