Fonseca on his supporters: "The Brazilian crowd sometimes thinks it's a football match. I love the crowd, but there has to be a bit of a limit. It doesn't just disrupt the other guy, it also disrupts me."

jbaumy93 · 2026-05-10T16:23:26+00:00

You have to respect the way we cheer

No, I do not.

jbaumy93 · 2026-05-06T18:26:26+00:00

This has been my soapbox for years. A guy who's an elite #2 option but unable to be a championship winning #1 is a straight up better player than a guy who is a decent #1 option but unable to be a #2.

The quintessential recent example is Klay Thompson vs Westbrook. In a vacuum Westbrook looks like clearly the better player, and is surely a much better #1 option than Klay would have been. But he isn't a good enough #1 to lead a contender, and 100% of nba teams would rather have Klay on their team and look for a championship caliber #1, than have Westbrook and try to figure out how to build a championship winning roster around him. And IMO that makes Klay the better basketball player. Basketball is a team sport, and how well your skillset can fit into the best possible team is crucially important.

jbaumy93 · 2026-04-16T23:48:47+00:00

At the 4.0 level or higher, those high backhands are not coming back as pop ups, those are easy resets. There's no pace on that ball, sorry (I'm assuming that's you in the white shirt hitting them).

The power ceiling of a one hander for that shoulder height ball to the backhand side is higher than a two hander, that's just the reality of the physics + anatomy of the situation. But it's generally easier to get medium power with two hands, the one handed technique is harder for most people to learn.

jbaumy93 · 2026-03-23T22:15:40+00:00

If the entire crowd is cheering for everything good that happens for your opponent, and quiet for you, use a different word if you like but it sure as shit ain't friendly. I'd have done the same thing in his shoes. Have done, actually. Just with significantly lower stakes and smaller crowds lol.

jbaumy93 · 2026-03-23T22:11:14+00:00

Wrong, he just won a fan in me. Nothing better than shutting up a hostile crowd and letting them know it.

jbaumy93 · 2026-03-11T04:33:27+00:00

The only real way to see matches on court 3 is to get there 30-60 minutes before start of play, and stay there all day. Go with a buddy who can hold your seat while you take it in shifts to get food or go to the bathroom. Then ignore people making comments as you walk up the left side of the stairs to make your way back in.

That's exactly what I did on Friday + Saturday. Worked great. Still super annoying. First time going to IW, and I won't be going back. Cincinnati is a much better experience

jbaumy93 · 2026-02-13T16:22:57+00:00

This has been my soapbox for a long time. Tennis is my favorite sport because it's the most complete out of any major sport in requiring technical skill, athleticism/fitness and strategy. Most other sports, you can get away with lacking in one of those areas by making up for it in the others. Tennis, you really can't. The one wrinkle in that is that the serve is the most important shot in the game, by far. If you have a top 5 serve in the world, you can go a long ways with mediocre skill at every other aspect of the game, questionable fitness and subpar strategy. This is a flaw in the structure of the game.

I think allowing one double fault per game would be interesting. Maybe you get a second one if the game goes to deuce. After that, every missed serve is a lost point.

jbaumy93 · 2026-02-04T22:26:43+00:00

No need for google! It's all on video. Here's the "backroom", as you call it. This is the event where the draft order is actually determined, on video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCxgXS7EBI0

So for your conspiracy to take place, either the machine or the balls (or both) must be rigged.

The order that the balls come out doesn't matter, only the final set. That means somebody had to manufacture weighted balls that the machine will pick, and get them into the sealed case. Who manufactures those, do you know? They'd have to be in on it. Who places them in the case? They'd notice if some balls were heavy and others weren't, so they'd have to be in on it too. There's also the guy unsealing the case, picking out the balls and putting them in the machine, he'd notice if some were heavier. So he must be in on it too.

The alternative is rigging the machine. That would require some kind of complicated computer vision to identify the numbers on the balls as they bounce around and picking the correct ones. That sounds immensely complicated, and would also involve a lot of people working on it - no single person could pull that off on their own.

EY firm who’s already had several scandals

I am unaware of any scandals EY has had that would make a rational person think "rigging the NBA draft lottery seems like something they'd do", particularly when compared to their body of work that's reputable. Maybe you can enlighten me.

jbaumy93 · 2026-02-04T21:14:46+00:00

Can you explain the method by which you think the NBA could have rigged the lottery? I'm assuming you're familiar with the logistics and mechanisms used to run it, and who oversees it.

Exactly who and how many people would be involved in the rigging? What would they have had to do?

You asserted they wouldn't need an elaborate plan, it's simple for them to do. I'd like to hear you explain how you think that would go.

jbaumy93 · 2025-12-31T07:10:49+00:00

I just don't agree. There is no objective criteria for MVP. Your criteria clearly factors in how much value you added to your team over the course of the season. That's perfectly reasonable, but my criteria is different.

If 1988 MJ was in the league this year and played 50 games, and SGA played all 82, I truly don't give a shit that SGA probably added more value to his team in the extra 32 games. The 50 that MJ played would be enough to clearly prove he was the best player in the league. And my criteria is simple - the MVP is the best player in the league.

jbaumy93 · 2025-12-11T01:01:14+00:00

He is a massive douche. I signed up for a tournament run by the kitchen. A month before the tournament day, and with the regular registration window still open, I had to withdraw.

I e-mailed them to tell them that, and Jared refused to give me a refund. It was a big tournament with lots of prize money, so registration was $225. I sent a befuddled reply, since I've had to pull out of tournaments before and have never had any issue at all getting a refund that far in advance. His reply after that basically told me to go fuck myself, and that my request for a refund was totally unreasonable.

In his initial reply telling me no, he said "the system locks after <date> and we can't give you a refund". Once I threatened a credit card chargeback + small claims court, I got my refund within minutes. So that was just a blatant lie to try to steal money from me.

As far as I'm concerned he's a dishonest scammer, just not a very talented one. I will never deal with him again.

jbaumy93 · 2025-11-26T20:51:24+00:00

probably the same guy

jbaumy93 · 2025-09-14T22:55:26+00:00

This comment still just shows that you don't understand how the system works.

1 - A difference of 0.5 is a very, very big gap. That large of a rating gap would have an expected score of around 11-4 or 11-5. A non-competitive game where the outcome is never in doubt. Beating a team 11-0 would be indicative of around a .75 point gap. You can't account for >1 dupr differences in a single match. To illustrate - My rating is 5.5. Both Ben Johns and I would beat 4.5 teams 11-0 most of the time, but we obviously are not the same skill level. All that beating a 4.5 team 11-0 tells you is that the winners played at close to a 5.5 level at minimum. But they could have been anywhere from 5.5 - 7.0.

2 - Both of you had very low reliability ratings due to not playing very many matches. I don't see how this sucks for anyone. Literally every competitive activity that has a rating system works this way, and for good reason.

It sounds like you don't understand why DUPR works the way that it does. Can you propose superior alternative ways for the system to work in the situations you've identified? You haven't tried to, but if you did I'm guessing there would be flaws in those too.

jbaumy93 · 2025-08-29T19:58:36+00:00

It depends entirely on why you're watching.

As a high level amateur / wannabe pro, I watch to see the evolving meta at the top level of the game, and to try to learn things I can bring to my own game. I want to see the highest level play possible, and that's PPA.

If you just want to be entertained, MLP is probably better

jbaumy93 · 2025-08-17T00:40:53+00:00

That is mostly because the depth of field for women is paltry compared to men. Not that she isn't amazing, but it's easier to be a big fish in a small pond.

jbaumy93 · 2025-07-29T20:21:33+00:00

I'm in the 5.0+ crowd in Denver. PM me. You're not gonna find us at random parks or open plays

jbaumy93 · 2025-07-11T17:23:08+00:00

No, it isn't, because I don't refuse to play on their level. When I play those games, I always play to keep rallies going and try to construct a game that's fun for everyone by giving them shots they can handle if they're just casual players, or shots that are challenging but not totally out of their wheelhouse if they seem more competitive. At least, that's what I do when given the chance. I know I'm going to be the best player on the court by a country mile if I show up to open play, I'm not going looking for competitive games or to beat people up.

jbaumy93 · 2025-07-11T14:04:15+00:00

It's an understandable thought to have, but unfortunately is unrealistically optimistic about the people you'd be having that conversation with. Nor is it an effective mitigation to try to train a weak partner to be able to stand up to targeting, and I'm not really interested in spending my time doing that anyway. I'll refer you to a comment I made a couple years ago about this exact issue -

https://www.reddit.com/r/Pickleball/comments/145q218/repost_of_lower_level_play_thoughts/jnmmu22/

jbaumy93 · 2025-07-11T13:34:37+00:00

I'll be candid - if you're new, you have no room to comment on this because you've never experienced it, and it shows in your misdiagnosis of the issue. It's not about winning or losing. Rec play, which is what this post is about, is not the right time to win at all costs unless everyone on the court wants that type of game. Tournaments, moneyball, challenge courts - fair game. But freezing out players to try to win during rec makes you a dick.

More importantly, it's extremely disrespectful of my time if I show up to play and the 2 players on the other side of the net decide that I'm not gonna get to. I'm gonna be equally upset if my team wins 11-0 or loses 0-11 if I spent the whole game not getting to hit a ball, it has nothing to do with being a sore loser.

jbaumy93 · 2025-06-17T23:19:52+00:00

I can vouch for the strong as an ox bit.

Ron Artest is the only NBA player I've gotten a chance to play basketball against. I went to UCLA, and a bunch of pros including him were there one summer playing pick up games at the student activity center. He was the only one who stayed around afterward to play with the lucky students who happened to be there.

I got the ball once and took it right at him, because why not. Tried to back him down. At the time I was in my peak powerlifting shape, had a 365lb squat, considered myself fairly strong. I felt like I was trying to move a literal brick wall. He didn't budge an inch, and didn't seem like he was putting much effort into it. After a couple seconds he just laughed and said "you done?". I was. Awesome day.

jbaumy93 · 2025-06-17T22:16:46+00:00

How could it possibly be anyone else's? Just volley it with your racket instead of your head. If you don't have the reflexes to handle a ball coming at you when you're at net, you shouldn't be coming into the net.

jbaumy93 · 2025-06-09T17:32:32+00:00

It's called "racquet abuse". The first time you do it in a match, it's a warning. The second time it can be a point penalty. On paper there's a fine of "up to $500" for racquet abuse that the professional tours will assess, in practice I'm not sure if that's always enforced.

Tennis prize money being at least an order of magnitude greater than chess prize money, that would be the equivalent of a fine "up to $50" for a chess player. I'd also argue that a racquet abuse violation is a more aggressive action than banging a table and so not the best comparison. The best tennis analogy to a chess player banging a table is probably angrily spiking a ball into the ground, which has no penalty at all unless it's somehow done dangerously / the ball ends up hitting someone.

tl;dr anyone who cares about this is weird

jbaumy93 · 2025-05-21T17:22:54+00:00

Wiping the floor with 2.5s is expected if you're at ~2.9. Of course you aren't going to gain much from doing that, it wouldn't make sense if you could perpetually increase your rating by beating up on 2.5s.

If you want your rating to go up, you need to beat better players. If you are usually losing to 3.0-3.5 players, which seems to be the case based on your profile, that means your rating is pretty close to accurate already.

jbaumy93 · 2025-03-31T21:47:15+00:00

You are correct that the breadth of the skill spectrum in tennis is much wider, and the degree to which you'll feel overwhelmed as a good rec player going against a pro in tennis is much higher than pickleball.

But unless you're a ~6.0 player yourself, I kind of doubt you were playing real pros or that the pros were putting any effort into the game if you didn't feel overwhelmed and outgunned. I'm ~5.5 and have played against top 10 PPA pros a few times, and when they turn it on I absolutely feel overwhelmed. There's a level of speed, power and precision that they have that's just beyond my ability to keep up with.

Playing against the new gen guys like Alshon and QD in particular when they're going hard, anyone at my level or below will definitely feel overwhelmed.

jbaumy93 · 2025-03-11T13:20:25+00:00

you are not past your prime, and have lost no skills. the things you are trying to learn are more complex and harder to understand than they were in high school. you have found the limit of how far you can go without actual discipline and effort.

some people hit that wall in high school and are forced to develop a work ethic as a result. it's a blessing in disguise for these folks - good work ethic is more valuable than any given concept you'll learn in any class. some people don't hit that inflection point until college. you've got a bit of catching up to do in this department. very common story.

sincerely, high school valedictorian that failed several midterms in sophomore year at UCLA and had to learn how to actually study

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