Category: Sports

3-Point Space & Time

May 29, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

Not long ago basketball was dominated by very tall men who positioned themselves near the basket to score, rebound, or discourage any opponent from getting to the hoop. The closer a player got to that hoop, the better, as shots from up close earned him…

Butterfly Goalie

January 18, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

When something grows, other things shrink in comparison. Sports are often an interesting discipline to investigate this simple principle and its effects. In ice hockey the relatively small size of the goal makes it effective for a goal tender to put as much of the…

Hard(en) Deceleration

May 3, 2021 By arne hendriks Off

According to Marcus Eliott, who has analyzed the biomechanics of hundreds of NBA players, Brooklyn Nets basketball player James Harden is pretty pedestrian by all traditional performance metrics. But when Harden came for a closer examination there were several areas in which Harden was an…

Harden’s Step-back

December 20, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

Team sports are to a large extent about the creation, or reduction, of space and time. While the offence tries to find space and time to score, the defence is trying to shut these dimensions down. Therefor, in theory, each offensive act is countered by…

Down with the Dead Puck

January 31, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

When John Chayka, general manager of the Arizona Coyotes of the National Hockey League, used his seventh-overall draft selection to pluck talented centre Clayton Keller, he was sold on the teen’s playmaking ability and his knack for creating what in any competitive sport is the hardest to create:…

Shaq Sequence

May 4, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

Shaquille O’Neal is an American retired professional basketball player. At 2.16 m tall and 147 kg, he was one of the heaviest players ever to play in the NBA. His size inspired the Shaq Sequence, an number of images used by The Incredible Shrinking Man to illustrate the ramifications…