Paul Graham on Conversations with Tyler

Re:Paul Graham on Conversations with Tyler by dagw on Thursday August 10, 2023 @04:52AM (#37073630)

Football (and most other similar sports) offer more chances for creativity and variation than batting in baseball. Hitting a baseball is a very narrow and defined task with limited room for novel development or breakthroughs. Unless there are significant rule changes in baseball we're not going to see any batters revolutionise the act of batting in any meaningful way.

Getting a ball past several defenders and scoring a goal on the other hand can be done in a near infinite number of ways, meaning there is much more room for variation, improvement and evolution.

The closest equivalent I can think of in football is a penalty kick, and I don't think there is any evidence that players are getting significantly better at scoring off penalties.

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Re:Paul Graham on Conversations with Tyler by paganel on Thursday August 10, 2023 @05:23AM (#37073830)

> Football (and most other similar sports) offer more chances for creativity and variation than batting in baseball.

I agree, with the caveat that football is becoming more and more like baseball and other similar (mostly US) sports which are very heavy on numbers and on stats. The recent Norwegian sensation, Haaland, seems exactly to fit that trend, as he's not particularly super-good at anything but his numbers have just been phenomenal in the last 3-4 years (when he's been fit to play, that is).

We'll see if the future will bring more Kevin De Bruyne-type of players (i.e. a very creative guy) or more Haalands.

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Re:Paul Graham on Conversations with Tyler by BurningFrog on Thursday August 10, 2023 @06:59AM (#37074469)

Football has intentionally changed to become a more attractive sport.

Mostly by cracking down on violent play and letting forwards use their skills without being injured.

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