The people at ABC Television keep breaking their collective arms by patting themselves on the back and proclaiming how original and innovative their “Wide,Wide World of Sports” series was/is, featuring mostly obscure people in obscure sports. Well, maybe so for television, but Columbia, Universal, Paramount, RKO, 20th Century-Fox and Warners had been doing the same thing for at least 12-14 times a year each for over thirty-five years and released at least 2700 Sports Shorts over those years featuring mostly obscure people in obscure sports narrated by early-day versions of ABC’s Jim McKay—-as good as they come—-such as sportscasters/writers Paul Douglas(before he turned to acting), Mel Allen, Red Barber, Bill Stern, Bill Corum, Grantland Rice, Ed Herlihy, Knox Manning, Ted Husing, Red Barber and others. ABC can rightfully make many technical claims regarding “Wide World” but plowing new-genre ground isn’t one of them. They just started doing on television what the Hollywood studios were no longer doing on the film screens. This one finds Bill Stern, taking time out from the never-ending shorts featuring water skiing at Florida’s Cypress Gardens, putting the focus on badminton and table tennis—-called Ping Pong by everybody except the people who play it—-and narrates a badminton match between the top professional player—-Badminton was a Professional sport?—-Hugh Forgie and one Stig Larson whom Stern didn’t call the top professional player. Only room for one at the top. Then Sandor Glancz, former world and European titleholder, plays Table Tennis against American champ Lou Pagliaro. The Chinese came along a few years later and displayed a much-faster brand of Table Tennis and most of the wide, wide world retired their own Ping Pong racquets/pallets after that.