Stupid stats question

steven · Tennis legend

RE: Stupid stats question

angry1 · Lower Club Player

indiana wrote:

angry1 wrote:

indiana wrote:

Hmm, interesting. Check Karlovic's stats v Federer in the Wimbledon quarter finals.

23 aces and 29 winners ( IN TOTAL ). Karlovic surely had a whole lot of unreturned ( touched ) serves.

That pretty much proves to me that on serve only the aces are being counted as winners.

This would fit in with angry's original thoughts, and mean they could be subtracted straight off to tell you for instance that Karlovic achieved 6 winners in general play.

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 04:16:23 PM

That makes a lot more sense to me.I did think it was an implausibly low number for Federer.Your example proves to my satisfaction that at least sometimes, touched serves don't count as winners.

angry, I really think it actually proves no touched serves are being counted. Karlovic surely had many not just unreturned, but absolutely unreturnable touched / framed etc serves.

So you can now I think happily do your subtractions for in play winners

Thank you.I was just being cautious and saying it proved it for that match,not for all matches.I didn't want to commit to trusting tennis authorities to be consistent and logical.

angry1 · Lower Club Player

The two of you have proven I was right to be confused,even if not neccesarily right to be bothered.

steven · Tennis legend

indiana wrote:
I read what you report this evidently distinguished gentleman as saying Steven, but someone then explain to me Karlovic's stats v Federer ?!

Are you telling me apart from aces he only had 6 more unreturnable serves or general winners in the whole match ?

No I'm not, just trying to say that there seems to be a range of deinitions and a fair bit of subjectivity involved, e.g. the definition of a winner may be slightly different at each of the four slams.

I could believe that Ivo might not have had more than one or two winners in open play against Fed, but it is hard to believe that nearly every serve Fed got a racket to almost got back in court - we'd need someone to watch the match on Iplayer and record the outcome of each Karlovic serve to be sure though!

indiana · Tennis legend

Note, I added a PS to my last post.

I am now even more satisfied that all service winners ( though possibly not general play ) "winners" need to be untouched.

Steven's post about this stats guy then really more explains what constitutes an unforced error.

What Doctor Levin apparently indicates does not tie in with the USTA saying that any touch and it is not a winner.

PS ( another smile

): I actually think it is the guy who contacted Doctor Levin that is getting confused between winners and forced errors ( and terming some touched shots winners when maybe Doctor Levin is trying to distinguish as forced as against unforced errors )

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 04:58:30 PM

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 05:02:59 PM

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 05:14:49 PM

indiana · Tennis legend

steven wrote:

indiana wrote:
I read what you report this evidently distinguished gentleman as saying Steven, but someone then explain to me Karlovic's stats v Federer ?!

Are you telling me apart from aces he only had 6 more unreturnable serves or general winners in the whole match ?
No I'm not, just trying to say that there seems to be a range of deinitions and a fair bit of subjectivity involved, e.g. the definition of a winner may be slightly different at each of the four slams.

I could believe that Ivo might not have had more than one or two winners in open play against Fed, but it is hard to believe that nearly every serve Fed got a racket to almost got back in court - we'd need someone to watch the match on Iplayer and record the outcome of each Karlovic serve to be sure though!

Ha ha, I can pretty much assure you that you wouldn't have to watch iplayer for vrey long to find 6 Federer returns that were nowhere in the vicinity biggrin

indiana · Tennis legend

What would be good would be to think that there was consistency between tournaments ( and even within tournaments ).

I think, as some folk have indiucated, particularly at lower levels, there must be extreme doubt.

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

I've always assumed that a winner is a shot that the opponent doesn't get a racket to, as if they do get a racket to it, then it isn't a winner as they had a chance to get the ball back, however slim that chance is.

I think the problem lies in the fact that each tournament seems to have a different understanding of how they count winners/unforced errors etc, and thus it confuses people when they compare events.

steven · Tennis legend

Last 'alternative definition' - from the Enclyclopedia Britannica:

"With a combination of power and clever angle and spin, he can win points outright with the serve, called an ace if the opponent cannot get his racket on the ball and a service winner if the opponent reaches it but cannot play it, or the server can force such a weak return that his second shot is an easy kill.

A service winner if it forces such a weak return that the server's second shot is an easy kill?! I can't believe that. I wonder where they got that one from!

-- Edited by steven on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 05:02:07 PM

indiana · Tennis legend

Steven, that sounds more just a general definition of a winner, which is of course open to even more interpretation than the official stats ( and they seem hard enough biggrin

). It is most certainly not really releavant here to official stats "winners". Of course the volley, but not the serve, may then count as an official winner.

But thanks, indeed for more info. Imagining Steven googling like mad smile

I actually myself think you got the the proper answer with the USTA version that you found for us. i.e. that if it is touched ( and I believe they mean at any time, serve or later ) before the second bounce, it is not a winner. I think the guy that contacted Doctor Levin has got a bit confused associating "winners" with what Doctor Levin meant as forced errors, or at least very careless in his terminology,and has maybe wrongly used the term "winners".

While I think what the USTA says, is very probably the official ATP stance, and makes sense to me, wherther the stats guys at all ATP tournaments are totally on the same wavelength who knows. But hopefully they are, since "touched" does seem something pretty clear to take account of. Anything else would be pretty fraught with inconsistency.

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 8th of July 2009 05:27:23 PM

imoen · Admin: Moderator+Tennis Legend

I always thought unreturnables were not included in the winners count, but then I've no idea where I got that from.

On a related and yet also different topic, does anyone know if Wimbledon was using a new and improved system to count UEs? Only it seemed to be incredibly low numbers across the board, ie not just Murray/Federer matches, only 2 or 3 ues per set in more than one case.

johnnylad · Tennis legend

Federer is a winner

Chris Eaton is an unforced error

The Hoose · Satellite level

The Wimbledon stats often broke winners down by type of winner (service, volley, forehand, backhand - or something like that) - I noticed that service winners always equalled the number of aces that person had served.