Pancho Gonzales and Maxwell’s Demon

Tickey de Jager

A science fiction story

“Did you see Sampras play Pioline in the Wimbledon final?”

“Yes. All so dreary and predictable. No finesse, no delicate touches. All power and clinical precision. Ace, ace, serve-volley, ace. One love. Games went to service until Sampras broke Pioline’s service twice in the first set and once in the others. 6-1, 6-2, 6-2. Yech.

“The trouble with men’s tennis at the moment is that Sampras is so much better than the rest that when he is on form it’s a walk-over. He must be the best player that ever lived.”

“Maybe. There’s always Bjorn Borg, of course. He won Wimbledon five times running when John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors were in their prime. I can’t remember which of his opponents said: ’We all play tennis. Borg plays some other game.’ I think he was the best player that ever lived.”

At this stage I chipped in:”I agree. But not the greatest. That was Pancho Gonzales. He not only dominated the game for more than a decade, but he had class in everything he did. He played with effortless ease and immaculate courtesy and was respected and loved by everyone connected with tennis. Even by his opponents, who called him the Magical Mexican.

“Moreover, the Collins English Dictionary gives his name:

Gonzales, noun, Ricardo Alonzo, known as Pancho, born 1928.
U S tennis player.

I rest my case. Mind you, I’m biased. You see, I once played him.”

“You!?”

“Yes me. It is quite a story.”

“It would have to be.”

* * *

It all started in the summer of 1950, when David Dorfan in my top maths set asked me what entropy was because he had read that the fundamental law of science was the law of increasing entropy.

So I sat on the table, and David winked at the class, and they put their pens down and smiled. “Well done, David. Here we go!”

“The law of increasing entropy is more than the fundamental law of science. It is the fundamental law of life. Entropy is the degree of disorder of a system.”

I first came across the law of increasing entropy when as a small boy I watched my mother stir the ingredients for a cake.

“Why do you stir it?”

“To mix it, of course.”

“Why will stirring mix it? If you stir for long enough, why won’t all the raisins come together in one place and all the dates come together in another place? …. Well , what do you think? … Peter?”

“Probably because there are more ways for the raisins and dates to be mixed up than for them to be separate, Sir.’

“Sure. And that is why entropy will increase and the universe will eventually run down.

“The law of increasing entropy says that the entropy of any system will increase, that the system will become more and more disorganised. Our very lives depend on that.

“For instance, there are lots of germs in this room. By the law of increasing entropy they are more or less evenly spread throughout the room. If not, they could all be in one place. Right in front of your nose. And your next breath could be your last.

“Yes, the law of increasing entropy, the law of the triumph of muddle, is the fundamental law of life. Look at David’s hair. Look at my desk. Unless, of course, we do something to organise things, like putting books in alphabetic order on a shelf.

“So now you know why entropy will increase, why muddle will triumph, why the universe will eventually run down. A dreary prospect.

“Still, Ik hef me doots. The universe has been around for a long time, so it should be pretty disorganised by now. But we still have trees and flowers and pretty girls. How come?

“There must be something working against entropy. In fact, James Clark Maxwell guessed that there was a little demon that could control the movement of every individual molecule. It came to be known as Maxwell’s Demon. So everything that is wonderful and beautiful in the world is the work of Maxwell’s Demon.

“For instance, look at you lot. The top mathematical set of the school. Big deal. How do you think you got to be so unbearably brilliant? Chance. Chance. The ever present alternative hypothesis. Let me show you.

“Say there are ten factors that make you bright or dumb. Let us say this coin was spun ten times to decide how bright or dumb our brilliant Michael would be. Heads for bright, tails for dumb. Here goes.”

Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads, Heads .

Nine heads in a row. My hand shook a little.

Flip. Heads.

TEN HEADS OUT OF TEN!

“The probability of that is 1 in 1 024. So now we know why Michael is the way he is. Why you lot are the way you are. As Adam Small nearly said:

Die Here het gaskommel
En die dice het reg geval vir djul —
Daai’s maar al.

“You owe it all to chance. You owe it all to Maxwell’s Demon.”

Unknown to me, floating near the ceiling of my classroom, Maxwell’s Demon heard all this and thought: “What an admirable young man. I think I will take a hand in his affairs.” In fact, he had just done so.

“Sir, what do you mean when you say he can control the movement of every individual molecule?”

“Well, the molecules of air in that tennis ball lying on top of the cupboard are moving at random. If Maxwell’s Demon could suddenly let them all move upwards, the ball would rise.”

The ball rose, moved slowly across the room, and when it was nearly above my head, dropped slowly into my hand.

IT WAS COLD TO THE TOUCH …

That afternoon there was a tennis match, school versus staff, and I had to play against their number one player, who was far too good for me. The chances that he would start the match with four double faults were remote, but that is what he did. And it never got better for him, so I won easily.

It will take too long to give the train of events by which I found myself playing Pancho Gonzales in the Wimbledon final that year. To understand how I got through to the final you must understand one thing:

Hitting a tennis ball is a delicate matter. The ball must be in exactly the right place for the shot you want to play, and you must be sure it will be there. If it moves unpredictably just before the racket hits it, the best player in the world cannot play any shot with confidence or success. And if by chance all the air in the ball moved in the same direction for a moment, that is what will happen. Not likely. One chance in millions. But it can. There was one chance in many millions that there would ever be a batsman who would have a test batting average almost forty more than any other player. But Bradman did happen.

My passage to the final was a nightmare for all my opponents and an unbearable irritation to the spectators. A five foot four maths teacher of forty had no business at Wimbledon, never mind the final. Even the strawberries had been sour that week.

So when Pancho stood ready to serve in the first game of the final, there was an expectant hush. There was more at stake than the Wimbledon title. Everyone was looking forward to seeing how their idol was going to demolish this little rabbit who had made a mockery of tennis for two weeks. And did not even use a Maxply.

Pancho tossed up the ball, pulled back his racket, transferred his weight from his right leg to his left as he reached up and came forward to hit the ball at the top of its arc. The classic technique. A model for all great players ever since …

As the racquet was about to hit it, the ball moved suddenly forward. The service hit the top of the net and fell back.

“FAULT!”

For his second service Pancho used his famous American topspin back-kick service. At the last moment the ball moved sharply forward and he missed it completely.

“FAULT! Love fifteen.”

After four double faults a bewildered Pancho stood ready to face my first service.

I hit it with all my strength, and as the racquet was about to hit it, the ball suddenly rose and I just clipped it. It rose high in the air, landed just over the net with vicious backspin, and bounced back over the net onto my side of the court.

“Fifteen love.”

And it was recorded as an ace.

In the end Pancho got desperate and used only little lobbed services. Volleys and ground shots were equally impossible. He was reduced to playing like a beginner and found himself two sets to love down.

Then, out of a clear blue sky, came a shower of rain and we had to go into the pavilion. As a bemused Pancho was having some tea, a gentle, grey-haired old man joined him and put his hand on his arm:

“Pancho, I am a physicist and I know what is happening to you out there: You are playing against Maxwell’s Demon.”

“I know I am playing against some kind of devil.”

“Yes, Pancho, but this devil was invented by a physicist, and I know what he can do and what he can’t do. I think that for some reason he is trying to let your opponent win, and he can do that by making the ball move suddenly up or down, or back or forward, or left or right, so that you can’t hit it properly, and your shots will go out or into the net. But even he has a rule he must stick to: He must always let the most improbable thing happen.”

“Improbable? What is that? I am a Mexican and my English is as bad as my tennis was today.”

“He must always let the most impossible thing happen.”

“So?”

“So I think that there is a way that you can win. Keep on trying to do the most difficult things. Close your eyes just before you hit the ball, aim for the outside edges of the line, or aim for a net cord shot. Hit some shots with the edge of your racket. Since what you are trying to do is almost impossible, and it is almost impossible for de Jager to hit a good shot, Maxwell’s Demon will not know what to do and you will have a chance. Try it. What have you got to lose? Things can ’t get worse.”

“OK. Us Mexicans are all superstitious. I will fight this devil with madness.”

“Go for it! I never liked Maxwell anyway.”

And so things changed completely in the next two sets, and the old Pancho seemed to be back, although he did some absurd things and played some incredible shots. His overhead backhand smash with the left hand is still in the Guiness Book of Records as the greatest shot ever played.

In no time at all he took the next two sets 6 — 0, 6 — 0.

But as I sat in my chair before the final set, I realised that the old man I had seen talking to Pancho was the great physicist, George Gamow. I had guessed that Maxwell’s Demon was taking a hand in my tennis, but now I remembered what George Gamow had written about Maxwell’s Demon:

He must always let the most improbable thing happen.

So, to have a chance of winning I must also try to do the improbable.

It worked. Poor Maxwell’s Demon did not know which of two improbables he had to let happen, and so the match was even.

At last I was serving for the match at 8 — 7 and 40 — 30, and Pancho presented me with an open court and a gentle lob at the net. I did not need Maxwell’s Demon for this. I hit the most perfect smash of my life: In the corner, three inches inside the base line and three inches inside the side line.

The chances that the linesmen at Wimbledon would call that out were one in a million …

Pancho took the next two points, and then the next two games, and so justice was done after all.

As Pancho waved to the crowd, they rose as one in adulation and my heart lifted with their cheers.

What a relief! I could look the world and myself in the face again.

With my crossbow, I’d missed the albatross.

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