This system has turned me off of tennis anymore. It is not acceptable to totally rely on this technology when they already have a system available to more accurately determine what happened. It's called HDTV. They have enough HD cameras around the court to show what happened from more than one angle.
A few years ago I watched some of the French Open and the system was not officially being used, but it was used in the booth and the announcers commented on close line calls with it. I saw five line calls that were close enough that they used the system to 'check' the officials and 3 of the 5 Hawkeye results were wrong! How do we know? Easy! Playing on clay leaves visible marks on the surface that are proof of the contact area of the ball. Since I rarely watch anymore, do they use it at the French now?
Still, I do not believe that the computer system can accurately calculate the deformation of the ball as it impacts the surface and the distance the ball slides before it leaves the surface. Finally, if the system is now used as the ultimate authority there is no reason to have any line judges. The umpire remains to run the replay controls, but all judges should be removed so that there is no confusion introduced by humans. Players makes their own calls and if the opponent questions it, they show the replay. Gameplay would only be slowed momentarily because they should remove all the animation and just show the final frame and say 'in' or 'out'.
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This system has turned me off of tennis anymore. It is not acceptable to totally rely on this technology when they already have a system available to more accurately determine what happened. It's called HDTV. They have enough HD cameras around the court to show what happened from more than one angle.
A few years ago I watched some of the French Open and the system was not officially being used, but it was used in the booth and the announcers commented on close line calls with it. I saw five line calls that were close enough that they used the system to 'check' the officials and 3 of the 5 Hawkeye results were wrong! How do we know? Easy! Playing on clay leaves visible marks on the surface that are proof of the contact area of the ball. Since I rarely watch anymore, do they use it at the French now?
Still, I do not believe that the computer system can accurately calculate the deformation of the ball as it impacts the surface and the distance the ball slides before it leaves the surface. Finally, if the system is now used as the ultimate authority there is no reason to have any line judges. The umpire remains to run the replay controls, but all judges should be removed so that there is no confusion introduced by humans. Players makes their own calls and if the opponent questions it, they show the replay. Gameplay would only be slowed momentarily because they should remove all the animation and just show the final frame and say 'in' or 'out'.