Talk:American handball

Untitled
I would like to include a link to a very popular handball related, non-profit commercial-free web site: The Colorado Handball Association Gene Waldvogle Webmaster for COHandball.com Genewald 21:38, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not a native english speaker and therefore I don´t feel myself able to edit anything here in the english version of wikipedia, but I definitely think that this should be somehow added to the article. What you call 'American Handball' is played proffessionally here in Spain and other countries. --Iluntasun 20:52, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. Sure it wasn't even invented in America, it was invented in Ireland and brought over. I think this should be merged in with Gaelic Handball
 * I was thinking the same thing. It seems to me that this article and the articles on Gaelic handball and Australian handball are all really about the same sport and that the games played in the US and Australia all originated from the Irish game when they were brought there by Irish immigrants. I think the three articles should be merged into a single article called "Wall handball". There's a precedent for using the name "wall handball" since it appears on the official site of the World Handball Council. I'm not knowledgeable enough to say for sure or not if the rules and history of the sport in the three countries are different enough to justify there being three articles for them, though. I'd like to know what everyone else thinks. Sky Blu 2 (talk) 21:09, 19 June 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, after giving it some thought, I strongly feel the three articles should be merged. The handball federations in the three countries interact with each other on a fairly regular basis. There are some variations between the versions played in the three countries, but there is a great deal that is the same, too. Also, the Encyclopædia Britannica has only one article for "handball". I have created a page called Handball (wall game) that everyone can take a look at which attempts to combine the three articles. If there are no objections in the next few weeks, I shall redirect the links to American handball, Gaelic handball and Australian handball to point there. Sky Blu 2 (talk) 09:15, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
 * EDIT: The sample for a possible merger between the three articles has been moved to my sandbox page: User:Sky Blu 2/sandbox- Sky Blu 2 (talk) 15:55, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

The claim that gaelic handball was first played in Scotland and then in Ireland is flawed it presumes that the earliest referenced date means the earliest time that it was played. A referenced date can only mean a referended date.The location of where the game originated in any case is lost and irrelevant. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.43.195.221 (talk) 01:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

National champions
It would be nice if we had mention of the great players. Kdammers 07:59, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't trust many of the great players mentioned in the main article, considering that anyone can freely edit the article and vandalize by putting their names in as great players when in fact they're not. I'd only trust those players whose names are highlighted in blue, although, some names highlighted in red are reputable, like Satish. Readers should use their own judgement.

block
Strangely enough, the word block is not defined in the USHA rule-book, only "blocking." The definition of blocking uses the word bolck.

In our Wik article, block is explained in terms of "another player" - this should be clarified: any other player? opponent? team-mate? Kdammers 01:16, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

feet vs meters
I'm sure there's a wider wikipedia guideline at work here, but since American handball is American, AND the measurements originated as feet and are even feet - 20 feet (and uneven meters - ~6.1 meters), can we show feet first (and parenthesize meters) ? If no complaint I'll make the changes. --Justfred (talk) 18:35, 20 March 2008 (UTC)


 * 40 feet (12 m) long by 20 feet (6.1 m) - Can't we be consistent?  6.1X2 =?12 Kdammers (talk) 01:26, 25 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if you corrected to this, or corrected from this, but there are not only 2 feet in a meter. I think it's a little more than 3 feet in 1 meter. Don't remember the exact number. See meter (unit of length) ~ GoldenGoose100 (talk) 02:37, 25 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I didn't make any corrections. I was just pointing out that in the same description, we are claiming that a meter is 40/12=3.3 feet but also 20/6.1=3.28 feet.  If we say 20 feet are (about) 6.1 m, then why do say that double that is 12 feet instead of 12.2?   It's okeh by me to round off, but let's be consistent. I don't know what Your reference to 2 feet in a meter is about. Kdammers (talk) 03:01, 25 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh I see now. I misunderstood the 6.1x2 = ?12 part. Yes it should say 12.2 for consistency - or whatever the closest exact round-off would be - it's always good to do to two decimal places. ~ GoldenGoose100 (talk) 06:06, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The article uses the convert template: 40 ft - changed it to 40 ft and it seems to work.--Justfred (talk) 16:47, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Leading players
I re-added the leading player content because it had been deleted "in secret" - i.e., it had been removed with-out explanation and under a totally unrelated label pertaining to other changes made at the same time. It is misleading to say that there are no refs.: some (but, admittedly, fewer than most) of the people have Wik links where their fame is documented (I only included players who are in the American handball association's hall of fame when I started the list; we had some people adding a few legit. players and a fair amount of apparent vandalism). Can we do this: only players with links to articles are accepted. Those articles will give the documentation (hall of fame membership)? Kdammers (talk) 12:24, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Leading Players
I too hope that we can reach some agreement on this.

In fact, I noticed that you shortened the list, which is a step in the right direction. I do not know what the "American Handball Association" is but I would certainly accept the U.S. Handball Association's hall of fame as a source for "leading players" (http://www.ushandball.org/content/view/70/128/) and thus agree that such players could be included on the list. But it is critical that a source be given. Otherwise, the page becomes an open invitation for handball afficionados to add their personal favorites -- and maybe even friends -- to the list.

Accordingly, I have mentioned the USHA hall of fame and not included anyone who is not in it. If I've compared the lists properly, this means the deletion of David Chapman, Jack Hulik, Fred Russo, Buddy Gantt, and Jose Espinosa.

By the way, lest anyone call me ignorant about who the "leading players" are, I am in fact familiar with many of the people I am deleting. But what is the point in creating a category called "leading players" if there is no objective source given? I repeat: it only opens up problems in the future with everyone wanting to add their favorites (where is Rookie? Joe Durso? etc.).

Also, the mere fact that a player has an article should not qualify him/her for the list. Anyone can create such an article and it opens us up to the same problems. The David Chapman article has no source given whatsoever. If the article had a source to testify to his "leading"-ness, that would be a different story.

Finally, it is pointless to create links to names with no article. I have deleted such links (that is, for all players but Haber, Obert and Hershkowitz).

Again, I hope you will see my point on this. I am convinced the strict adherence to a policy of giving an unbiased source for this extremely subjective category will advance the goal of having readers take each aspect of the article seriously.

Force106 (talk) 02:12, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't think leading players should even belong on this page at all. If you look at any other articles for any sport (pick one) there's no mention of who the greatest players of all time are or who the current leaders are. It should be strictly about the sport, not it's players. I would think players would belong on a page for the USHA, since that's a governing body. For example, the basketball and ice hockey pages don't mention Jordan or Gretzky, but under the NBA or NHL section, it does. If this article had a section for USHA that linked to a page just for USHA, I think that would probably be consistent with other sports on WP. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Senormime (talk • contribs) 17:54, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I see that the leading player section is now gone. I don't know whether I agree with the delection or not, but I do note that some sports in Wik, e.g., tennis and squash, which are more closely related to handball than hockey and basketball, do in fact include top players. In any case, readers should have easy access to information on the leading playes.Kdammers (talk) 00:20, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

French game
There is a sentence about a Basque game and a French game, stating that handball et al. are all derived from the French game. I looked at the Wik article on the French game and could find nothing indicating an age as great as that given for Irish/American handball. The Basque game's article doesn't go back further than the 19th century. Unless some-one comes up with some evidence, I'll delete the origins claim and change or remove the Basque game mention. Kdammers (talk) 05:10, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Squash
There is no mention of squash in this article. Where-ever I used to play four-wall, the courts were convertable handball/racketball/squash courts, with removable tins and some-times friendly, some-times acrimonious conflicts between players of the sports. I don't know if this sort of info warrants entry or not.Kdammers (talk) 00:22, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Always called it wallball myself —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.198.248.44 (talk) 23:14, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Terms and Techniques
Hi, can somebody throw their eye over the Terms and Techniques section - a lot of those terms look dubious and are unreferenced. Terms like "Ambi", "Ball-bounced-on-water", "Bashya", "Beast-mode", "Bullet", "Crack", "Double-down", "Ezekiel's Receive", "Exorcism", etc. Some terms such as "Slicey" have been in the article for a long time. Is there a reference available for any of these terms? --HighKing (talk) 14:37, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

What about playing with a big red ball - those basketball sized rubber balls?
Thats the way we always played as kids. Is that a different game or just a different ball? Fresheneesz (talk) 06:45, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 3 external links on American handball. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111002032206/http://www.ushandball.org/content/view/451/243/ to http://www.ushandball.org/content/view/451/243/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20100713234354/http://www.ushandball.org/content/view/457/426/ to http://www.ushandball.org/content/view/457/426/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150510140321/http://wallballworld.com/home/links/wall-ball-rules/ to http://wallballworld.com/home/links/wall-ball-rules/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 22:15, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

How are the hands held?
To add to article: when returning a serve, are the player's hands held flat (almost like a paddle), or can the fingers be curved somewhat? I couldn't see that this is explained in the article currently. 173.88.241.33 (talk) 03:15, 18 October 2017 (UTC)


 * I couldn't find anything in the rules that explain this, but in practice the hand is usually held with the fingers slightly curved or, less commonly, in a fist. I have written to the USHA asking about this. Kdammers (talk) 19:59, 27 July 2018 (UTC)

Blue ball
The section on balls says that something called a blue ball is larger than the standard (black, in my experience) ball. How-ever, the adjacent picture shows a ball that is blue in color yet described as a small ball. This is confusing. Kdammers (talk)

1427
"The first recorded game of striking a ball against a wall using a hand was in Scotland in 1427,"

However, the fives article gives us " Actions against the game (then referred to as either "hand-tennis" and "hand-ball") have been found as early as 1287, when the Synod of Exeter banned the game due to the damage it caused to church buildings. Other notable examples of wall ball games being banned include Robert Braybrooke, Bishop of London, who in 1385 prohibited the game" 124.187.219.128 (talk) 21:54, 16 October 2023 (UTC)