OT: No American Men in Top 30 of Tennis Rankings
For my fellow tennis fans out there, this is the lowest we have ever seen the American men ranked; this is the FIRST time since computerized rankings that we did not have a representative in the top 30.
https://www.espn.com/tennis/story/_/id/31421430/no-american-men-top-30-1st-computer-tennis-rankings
To those more positive than myself, give me some hope... Please.
I still don't accept that we don't have enough people playing tennis; I feel the same way as I do about those excuses for soccer. We just need this darn country to spit out ONE OR TWO elite tennis players; why can't that happen??
It's because everyone plays on hard courts here so no one knows how to do anything other than serve and hit forehands. With the slower surfaces of this era, that's pretty bad.
Edit: Also consider that the vast majority of hard courts in the US are poorly maintained. That makes the surface smoother and therefore even faster.
That's a valid point; however, you would think that we could get someone to win something of substance on the faster surfaces.
This could be completely speculative, but I just don't see anyone in the American camp willing to put in the work. Look at Shapavolov. I would argue that someone like Taylor Fritz has about the same amount of skill he does; however, Shapo is absolutely fired up on the court. I get the feeling that all of our dudes outside of Tiafoe are just happy to be there. At least Tiafoe looks like he gives a damn.
I think it's crazy to say Fritz has the same skill as Shapo. Fritz is your classic modern American player--tall, huge serve, huge forehand but poor defensive skills, poor athlete compared to international peers, doesn't know how to build points, has no transition game, etc. Shapo has a big enough forehand, big enough serve, but has all those other things that Fritz lacks.
Like the OP mentioned, American players these days are extremely rigid and one dimensional.
Considering Fritz went 5 with Shapo the last time they met at a major and Fritz went 5 with Djoker at the Aussie Open, yeah, I think they are somewhat level in skill.
Style and skill are two very different things.
Oh I see you're talking about ability not style. But even at that Shapo is at least a level or two above Fritz. Shapo's cracked the top 10. Fritz has never cracked the top 30. Also I don't think anyone will tell you Fritz has more potential than Shapo.
so no one knows how to do anything other than serve and hit forehands
I wanted to say something similar. It seems like US players have relied on big serves and big forehands for some time now. That will work against some of the lower ranked opponents, but the top players have become so good at returning serve (Djokovic) or just playing defense (Nadal, Djokovic) that these tactics just don't work anymore.
Tend to agree. I think there was better balance overall during the mid 80s - early 2000s - baseliners/all court types included Courier, Agassi, Chang, Lendl, Mecir, Wilander, Sampras; serve and volley types included Rafter, the mighty Edberg, Becker, Krajicek, Cash, Noah, Goran iirc - yet I don't recall any prominent US serve and volley players from that era. Agassi with his elite service return and baseline lasers (and the flamboyant mullet) certainly influenced my style of play back then.
Roddick and Blake slot neatly into that huge serve/huge forehand category and after that...here we are.
Pete Sampras was absolutely a serve-and-volleyer lol. There's a reason he dominated Wimbledon, yet never made it past the semi-finals at Roland Garros.
Sampras is my favorite tennis player ever; I'll debate this all day lol. He both attacked from the baseline/chipped and charged and served and volleyed. He was an all-court player.
"Although not simply a serve-and-volleyer, Sampras did possess the greatest serve-and-volley game of all time. Both on his first serve and his second, where nobody else has come close."
https://www.usopen.org/en_US/open_questions/detail/pete-sampras/index.html
Okay, that’s totally fair, but IMO that’s the same as calling Rafa an all-court player, Rafa definitely has a great net game, but they call him the king of clay for a reason. Yes it’s true, skill-wise, but kind of glosses over how dominant they were at their “preferred” state. I wholly admit my argument is semantics based at best
If Pete were 5 years younger and played into the mid-2000s after the turf change at Wimbledon, though, it would’ve forced him to play more baseline and I would’ve definitely categorized him as an undisputed all-court player.
As the dad of a junior tennis player, I think the simple answer is $$$$ and the USTA sucks...a lot. It is very expensive to raise a champion level player and tennis players earn a small fraction of what team sports (football, basketball, baseball, hockey, etc.) pay.
This is a good video with a good take on the U.S. Men's tennis situation. Nik Aracic was a top junior player in Germany, played college tennis in the U.S. and now lives and teaches in FL. He says there are plenty of good American junior players, we have all the resources in the world but we suck at transitioning these kids from juniors to the pro level. What works against kids does not always work against grown men and we don't have a system that gets the kids playing against men. In Europe, they do a much better job of getting the advanced juniors playing against pro players. A lot of the kids here in the U.S. go to college which is not an ideal path to the pros.
Here was a follow up video...
Why would poorly maintained public courts matter? Practically every top juniors in my area play at private clubs and top notch facilities. Lack of high quality courts is not the reason why US players are doing so poorly. Just look at the ladies side, they are doing fine.
John U. Bacon had an answer:
Thank you!
I'm definitely no tennis fan by any means but the drop in popularity in Tennis from the late 70's - mid 80's to today is amazing. Back then just about every "super house" had private tennis courts and grabbing a buddy and going out to play was a pretty commonplace thing to do. Courts were everywhere and almost everybody played a little bit (hence the term "tennis elbow") French Open, Australian open were big deals. US open was a bigger deal (mostly because of Conners & McEnroe) and Wimbledon was "must see TV" over the 4th of July. Tennis stars were all household names and everybody had a favorite.
Nowdays I never see anyone play, dont know (or care) when the majors are on and couldnt name a single Tennis star if you paid me a million dollars.
What happened?
Quite honestly, I think the popularity dropped because we don't have a star- that's probably why you can't name anyone.
We don't have guys like Agassi, Sampras, McEnroe, Roddick anymore. Those guys could grab attention. Our best players (Isner, Fritz, Tiafoe, Querrey I guess) are really just kinda boring (except Tiafoe, I think he does care a bit).
If someone like LeBron played tennis instead of hoops, a lot more people would pay attention. Our current group of American tennis players have no personality.
My couch has more personality than Sampras.
Eh. His play more than compensated for it.
I know you said you don't accept it, but I think you have the cause and effect backwards.
We have fewer big stars because lower popularity has led to fewer people playing the game. Great athletes like Lebron are going into basketball or football or even soccer, which is seeing an explosion of American talent. Tennis just isn't attracting the athletes it used to in the USA.
Disagree. Tennis was never a mainstream sport that competed with kids going into sports like basketball. It's a niche sport that I don't think is any more or less niche than it was in the past.
The data don't support this. While the number of tennis 'players' has stayed roughly flat for the last decade (and up over the prior decade), the number of tennis 'play occasions' as defined by the industry has dropped 25% in the last decade. There are more 'occasional' players and fewer serious/competitive players in the US.
If you go back even further, there are about half as many Americans who play tennis today than did in the 70s and 80s, which is an even larger per capita decline since the US population is 50% larger today.
Ah, very interesting. Thanks for pointing out.
It got boring.
Tennis used to be a much more tactical sport, with more variation in player styles and vertical footwork. It’s not the players’ fault, but modern S&C and high-tech racquets mean now every competitive player is a baseliner. You literally can’t react in time to an ATP tourney level forehand if you play at the net. The ball almost exclusively goes corner to corner, with angles or drops saved for the coup de grace.
It’s like if baseball pitchers could throw 150mph or they finally banned pass coverage in football. The result is a one-dimensional game because players aren’t stupid.
The game desperately needs an overhaul but don’t hold your breath.
I think you're right (it got boring). And I cant help but wonder if Baseball isnt heading down the exact same path. Nowdays it's all homeruns or strikeouts and nobody puts the ball in play anymore. I find baseball today to be kinda like watching tennis - it's definitely not the same game I grew up with and not for the better IMO.
Tennis and baseball have the same fundamental problem; sports technology (S&C, sabermetrics, equipment) have isolated them into a few winning strategies that exceed human performance. You can’t field most home runs or volley a modern forehand.
Both sports need to make the ball more “dead” to enrich the games, but that’ll never happen because fans lurve radar guns.
Bring back the wood racquets with the tiny heads! :-)
"Bring back wood racquets with the tiny heads"
+1 you nailed it. As someone who grew up playing and loved to watch tennis, it's honestly a chore to watch the slams some time. While I respect the ability and conditioning of the players, watching all these dudes bang their topspin forehands to the opposite baseline with their Babolats is just so boring lol. Even the one-hand backhand is dying out, let alone serve-and-volley (in the singles game).
I'll watch doubles all day though.
1v2 handed backhands are pretty much cyclical at this point. We're seeing an increase at the top of the sport of 1 handers again. And anecdotally, I can tell you there are more kids coming in asking to be taught a 1 hander. It's always going to be more visually pleasing, and has never stopped being a status symbol.
+1 I'll take your word for it. It's just such a pretty shot lol. Gasquet, Federer, Sampras et al.
It is a bit surprising to me as well. Tennis seems to be a sport that translates fairly well to TV. I remember in the earlier years watching matches for hours on end. The points are tense, plenty of action, etc. But I, like many others I guess, kind of lost interest. Now trying to think of the last time that I watched a significant portion of a match.
All this tennis talk and no mention of M Women's tennis making the S16 in the NCAAT!?
Down 3-1 to 12-seed LSU, the lady Wolverines won the next 3 matches for the 4-3 win. (The teams play 9 matches - 6 singles, 3 doubles - first to win 4 matches is the winner, so this was really close!)
Next up 5-seed Pepperdine!
(The teams play 9 matches - 6 singles, 3 doubles - first to win 4 matches is the winner, so this was really close!)
Huh? How does this system work? It would seem like in a "first to 4 wins" system, they could not go past 7 matches tops. Are they playing the additional matches even if they do not impact the out come? If so, can one school win 5 matches and the other 4 but the school with 4 win because they won the matches earlier in the contest?
Across D1 the doubles matches only count as 1 point. Whoever wins 2 of the spots takes the point.
I am honestly more confused after this clarification.
EDIT: I went and googled this. Results:
In the majority of cases, college tennis matches start with doubles. All 3 doubles matches happen simultaneously, and the first team to win 2 out of the 3 matches takes the doubles point. If the third match is still going on after a team wins the doubles point, that match is usually stopped.
College doubles matches are played in a single-set format up to 6 games. If the pairs tie at 5-5, the first team to get 7 games wins. If they tie at 6-6, the teams will play a tiebreak to 7 points and the winner takes the match.
In addition, the matches are played in a no-ad format – which means that when the game score reaches 40-40, the receiving team decides which player will return the serve. The winner of the point at 40-40 wins the whole game. There are also no “lets”, which means that if a serve hits the net and lands on the service box, the point will continue on.
As a person who has watched approximately a billion hours of pro tennis and literally zero minutes of NCAA tennis, this format is WILD to me.
Thanks for clarifying.
Well, on the bright side, the Swiss don't have a player in the top-5 (ducks for cover).
As someone who works in schools, it would be an awesome gym class sport but none of the schools in my district really have outdoor space for such a thing at the elementary level. It's a very fun sport to play and could be more popular. I don't pay attention too much at the competitive level, but I've played for fun since college. Great exercise, easy to play once you get into it. I think kids would really enjoy it if were a more accessible sport as a youngster.
If you'd like to get your school to involve tennis in their PE curriculum, please suggest that they contact the local USTA office. There are programs specifically tailored to work indoor with elementary children to introduce tennis. Often at no cost to the school.
https://www.usta.com/en/home/organize/creating-play-opportunities/national/tennis-in-schools.html
Our PE teacher is always begging for equipment donations as he only gets $60 a year from the district to replace items. I'll be passing this along to him.
Another resource could be the local NJTL. They can put you in touch with teaching pros who might be interested in volunteering some time. I know several who work with PE teachers who aren't comfortable teaching tennis.
And if you're near a university with a team, I'd reach out to the coach or staff at the indoor center if they have one.
We still dominate hot dog eating.
We do have an elite tennis player
The days of McEnroe, Connors, Agassi, Sampras, and Roddick are in the distant past. I had hoped Blake would pick up the torch a while back, and then Isner.
it stinks because I remember being into EVERY grand slam as a 90s kid. Now I’ve only been watching Federer, and he’s pretty much toast.
Money can't fully explain it, because there's plenty of that available at the top end.
That would help explain soccer (which the OP mentioned). In terms of the skills required it's more like football and basketball (which pay well at the top end and consequently get the best athletes) than tennis, which is also country-club all the way.
Let's not forget the recently retired Bryan brothers, the most dominant pair in men's doubles. There are current active American men who are at or near the top of the game in doubles, but doubles just doesn't get the same level of respect that the singles does. Personally, I find doubles is often more entertaining and fast-paced.
I think it is tough for kids in America to become top ranked players in a sport that is essentially a solo act. The appeal to be part of a team and to have peers to practice with may be tough to overcome. Why is it different for women? Not sure, but I wonder if the ladies are more supportive of each other than the men and friendships are more easily formed.
It's the same thing in soccer. The men's team sucks, yet the women's team is the best in the world.
Well if you are interested in US men’s sports you have no shortage of options. If you’re a woman, you are much more limited so soccer gets more of their elite athletes than in the men’s game.