OT: a great read in "The Sports Gene"

[DobbsRover2]

Every once in a while I read a terrific book about sports science and culture that also touches heavily on WCBB. A few years ago I mentioned the book Soccernomics, and I just put away a book called "The Sports Gene" by David Epstein that I would highly recommend to anyone who is interested in why humans compete the way they do in sports. Basically revolving around the nature vs. nurture question and all of the overlapping of the two, the book is a great read with a huge amount of stories, study glosses, and anecdotes mixed in. I'm sure Meyers would love the opening, which deals with why Barry Bonds and Albert Pujols were turned into pathetic complete-miss pudding by Jenny Finch, since he always wants to know why women play softball.

Although women's basketball is only directly touched upon in a few places in the cited examples from a huge amount of different sports and some other pursuits such as violin playing, almost everything discussed in the 16 topic chapters can be related to WCBB and the UConn Huskies. A few mentionables:

• There is a loose axiom thrown around that elite athletes in any sport are the ones who have spent 10,000 hours of hard practice at it gaining expertise, though as the book says, this axiom is a very fuzzy generalization that has giant caveats. But generally for WCBB, the idea is that all the practice gives you "muscle memory" and a visual court sense so that you know where the ball is going next from all sorts of cues you pick up around you and that you can then react more quickly without thinking. Thinking during a game is usually bad. For the Huskies, it reminded me of all the continuous drills and variety of situations that Geno throws at the players so that they are ready to react instantly to offensive and defensive alignments thrown at them in a game and their muscles just take over.
• There is a chapter on the evolutionary reasons for the approximate 11% gap between average men and women in speed activities and far higher gap in strength activities, which kind of centers around testosterone levels and all the bodily changes it works on guys at puberty. It also delves into the question of whether we can definitively say whether an athlete is male or female, and says that there is a large mixed range in between. Ironically female-designated athletes who load up on artificial testosterone are often more accepted by the public because they still fit a publicly accepted view of who is a female (even though it gives them a huge artificial advantage over other female athletes), while athletes with less usual genetic features (almost certainly the case) that give them a body that has many similarities to tall male basketball players get huge amounts of bile thrown at them even though they were born with those genes and have no natural testosterone advantage besides maybe that they kept on growing when most girls had stopped. I know that certain Orange-slime throwers still won't believe this news.
• Yeah, the huge ACL issue for women is built around those hips (plus the weaker knee muscles), which maybe could have been avoided if Lucy Naismith had nailed up a cassava basket a few million years ago and women's bodies could have learned about the advantage of narrow hips like guys. What that would have done for all those child-birthing issues and the continuance of the hominid race is debatable, but we all need to set priorities. And for today, players with wider hips especially do need to be trained to avoid certain types of moves and jumps that put their knees at big risk.
• There is that old saying that "height can't be taught," which is also applied to speed sometimes. A lot of countries now do tests of youths to see who may be built for special aptitude in certain sports, and though nurture and coaching can improve players hugely, there appears to be strong evidence that for instance certain players in basketball just are genetically blessed with speed, power, visual acuity, height, etc. traits and that training actually increases the difference between the physically gifted and us common schlubs. How that thought applies to the Husky team I haven't a clue, but obviously Geno does. And I was pleased to read in a section about the phenomenally talented Steffi Graf, that she could also have probably been a world champ in the 1,500m due to her lung capacity if she had been sent down the right path (at least as far as we runners are concerned). Also, it appears that unless you have a minimum of around 20/15 vision, you can forget about becoming a top softball or baseball player, and you really should be at 20/11 if you hope to make a pro squad. Guess my dreams of becoming the Dodgers SS with 20/200 vision are officially over.

 

[meyers7]

I'm sure Meyers would love the opening, which deals with why Barry Bonds and Albert Pujols were turned into pathetic complete-miss pudding by Jenny Finch, since he always wants to know why women play softball.

Well I imagine because of all the changes. Different bat, ball, distance, movement, spin, release point. Which just goes to my point of why women have to change a game around on it's head, when they can play it just like it is (i.e. baseball)? No logical reason.

But generally for WCBB, the idea is that all the practice gives you "muscle memory" and a visual court sense so that you know where the ball is going next from all sorts of cues you pick up around you and that you can then react more quickly without thinking. Thinking during a game is usually bad.

Geno has mentioned some of his smarter players (Jones for instance) have had trouble because they think too much out on the floor.

There is that old saying that "height can't be taught," which is also applied to speed sometimes.

More fast twitch muscles. Which is mostly genetic. Read part of a book (didn't finish it - something I should probably do someday) Taboo - Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports And Why We're Afraid To Talk About It by Jon Entine, a few years back. It discussed from genetic point of view the differences in black and white athletes.

And even more interesting the difference in east and west coast (Africa) black athletes. The east coast athletes (Ethiopia, Kenya) having less fast twitch muscles and hence more distance runners than west coast athletes (Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria) having more fast twitch muscles and more speed athletes (100m, 200m, soccer, American football, basketball). And how the America's black population (America, Jamaica, etc.) were mostly descendents of the west coast of Africa due to the slave trade. Hence why an abundance of very fast twitch muscle black athletes.

Just an interesting read. I might have to take a look at this "The Sports Gene" also.

 

[DobbsRover2]

Well I imagine because of all the changes. Different bat, ball, distance, movement, spin, release point. Which just goes to my point of why women have to change a game around on it's head, when they can play it just like it is (i.e. baseball)? No logical reason.


Geno has mentioned some of his smarter players (Jones for instance) have had trouble because they think too much out on the floor.


More fast twitch muscles. Which is mostly genetic. Read part of a book (didn't finish it - something I should probably do someday) Taboo - Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports And Why We're Afraid To Talk About It by Jon Entine, a few years back. It discussed from genetic point of view the differences in black and white athletes.

And even more interesting the difference in east and west coast (Africa) black athletes. The east coast athletes (Ethiopia, Kenya) having less fast twitch muscles and hence more distance runners than west coast athletes (Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria) having more fast twitch muscles and more speed athletes (100m, 200m, soccer, American football, basketball). And how the America's black population (America, Jamaica, etc.) were mostly descendents of the west coast of Africa due to the slave trade. Hence why an abundance of very fast twitch muscle black athletes.

Just an interesting read. I might have to take a look at this "The Sports Gene" also.

Well, speed does definitely have a lot to do with twitchy muscles, but there are so many factors and likely gene snippets involved that's it's not just one thing. And big lung capacity is always a great thing. One of the fascinating comparisons in the book were between 5'10' Swedish and 6'8" Bahamian high jumpers and the different routes they took with their physiques, jumping technique, and mental command to get to basically the same height. And also the huge difference in their jumping leg's Achilles tendon, which is the key body part for high jumpers.

And it is indeed the baseball sluggers' complete inability to recognize the visual patterns that even middling college softball players have ingrained in their memory that makes the women dominant. Just no experience. And yeah, I just think it's great to have some sports that women dominate in, though some may see that as a mark of condescension.