Don Budge, Jack Kramer, Gonzales, Sampras...

[stotty]

Agassi, Connors, McEnroe, Courier...great players...

...but the well seems to have run dry. What's happening over the pond? I don't like to gloat but you just lost to Great Britain in the Davis Cup for the first time in 79 years. You don't seem to have any players of greatness coming through over there. You didn't have Isner but I doubt that would have made much difference.

What on earth has happening to American tennis...the most successful tennis country in the world? Has the well really run dry? Haven't you got anyone coming up?

[gzhpcu]

Sadly, it is probably all about money. In the old days, you hardly made any big money in any sport, so why not play tennis? Nowadays, even though the prize money in tennis is high, in the States, you earn a lot more playing football, baseball, etc., so the talented youngsters are lured to other sports.

[GeoffWilliams]

It's also about difficulty, athletic combined with mind, stamina, speed ability. This sport is more difficult to perfect than most, if not all, pro sports. Obsessive discipline and desire don't usually reside in children.

[stotty]

It's also about difficulty, athletic combined with mind, stamina, speed ability. This sport is more difficult to perfect than most, if not all, pro sports. Obsessive discipline and desire don't usually reside in children.

Tennis is very poor at getting young athletes to be disciplined compared to swimming and gymnastics, in my experience. A lot of the young tennis elite are very spoilt in my country. Training before 8am would be out of the question for most.

Swimmers are incredibly regimented by comparison. And as for those young gymnasts in the former Soviet Union...phew.

It shouldn't be all about money as Phil suggests. Young children tend to get captivated by a sport at an age when money is just something for mum and dad to worry about.

I just find other sports are often cheaper to take up and more accessible than tennis, so maybe this is one of the reasons.

[gzhpcu]

I know it shouldn't just be about money, but, unfortunately, I have the impression that is what it all boils down nowadays...

[stroke]

The money to be made in tennis vs swimming or gymnastics really skews things when it is decided some young player is a prodigy, or future champion. It seems to me we just don't have any players in the US that are willing to do the very hard defensive work, the grinding it takes to consistently win matches in today's game. I was watching the Davis Cup match of Murray vs Querry. It was one all after 2 sets. Gimelstob, commentating on the match, said that Murray was going to put up a defensive wall, do the work to win the match, and it will be a huge ask for Querry to match him. Querry had the bigger serve and forehand, Murray had the better backhand and certainly movement. Murray just worked very hard and won the next two sets, just took the match.

[stotty]

I was watching the Davis Cup match of Murray vs Querry. It was one all after 2 sets. Gimelstob, commentating on the match, said that Murray was going to put up a defensive wall, do the work to win the match, and it will be a huge ask for Querry to match him. Querry had the bigger serve and forehand, Murray had the better backhand and certainly movement. Murray just worked very hard and won the next to sets, just took the match.

I saw much of the match, not all. I knew Murray could win that match any time he wanted by shutting up shop and blanketing the court. He is really tough to beat when he does that. He even did it to an extent against Djokovic in the 2013 Wimbledon final.

It's a shame Murray doesn't have the forehand of the other top three because it would make all the difference, especially when it comes to dispatching the journeymen of the tour, winning against such types would become an easier and more efficient business.

It's a real shame what is happening over there. A country of such immense size and population and with such history in the game. I find it a touch sad.

Get working on it, stroke...kick ass

What you need is a hundred 10splayers over there. You'd have some darn good players then. The problem is coaches as good as 10splayer don't grow on trees.

[stroke]

I saw much of the match, not all. I knew Murray could win that match any time he wanted by shutting up shop and blanketing the court. He is really tough to beat when he does that. He even did it to an extent against Djokovic in the 2013 Wimbledon final.

It's a shame Murray doesn't have the forehand of the other top three because it would make all the difference, especially when it comes to dispatching the journeymen of the tour, winning against such types would become an easier and more efficient business.

It's a real shame what is happening over there. A country of such immense size and population and with such history in the game. I find it a touch sad.

Get working on it, stroke...kick ass

What you need is a hundred 10splayers over there. You'd have some darn good players then. The problem is coaches as good as 10splayer don't grow on trees.

I've said it before, 10splayer knows his stuff.

[klacr]

What you need is a hundred 10splayers over there. You'd have some darn good players then. The problem is coaches as good as 10splayer don't grow on trees.

Tennis players willing to listen, have little ego and enormous heart don't grow on trees either.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[stotty]

Tennis players willing to listen, have little ego and enormous heart don't grow on trees either.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

Very true...very true....if only our students were as keen as us.

[klacr]

Very true...very true....if only our students were as keen as us.

To be fair, perhaps if we were also as keen as our students. Its a two way street. it requires hard work, patience, understanding and dedication from both players and coach. Some of those qualities I mentioned are not as abundant today. I don't want to come off sounding like an old codger (I'm only 31) but no doubt the our culture is changing and drifting away from where it was. Change is inevitable, but decline in positive characteristics should not be.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[GeoffWilliams]

Nobody is naturally talented at tennis. It's harder to master than other sports, pays less for mid range talents who can make more in virtually any other pro sport. Audiences all over the world don't pay to watch, esp. female/doubles/mixed/challengers/semi pro/masters matches. The powers that be have turned it that way, due to rules changes, attitudes of the refs, time violations, personality wash out rules, pressure from sponsors to clean up the violent outbursts, psych jobs, that made the old school matches so entertaining. Can anyone hide under the curtain like Nasty did? Or pound the ice cubes into the face of the Spanish king!

[stotty]

The USA Tennis Federation has to stop abusing parents. Everything you hear from them is about how parents should step back and let the experts take over. Well they've successfully socially isolated this generation of parents, and put in place programs to dissuade mom and dad from being involved, and boom, what can I say, the results simply speak for themselves. Tennis is a FAMILY sport where top players develop with their older brothers and sisters, mom's, dad's and friends spending hours and hours on the court. It's a sport where coaches should step back and let development happen instead of constantly meddling, interfering and attempting to confuse with mumbo-jumbo. Kids need to play a lot to be good, and their's way to much structure, politics and games being played behind the scenes with to many overly involved parties. I think what the USA needs to get back on top is a few more rebel parents like Richard Williams, Yuri Sharapova and Mike Agassi who'll stir up some shit, create some conflict and do whatever the hell they please. Also, tennis in the USA needs a few guys who know shit about the game, who can start academies where kids can play, and play, and play and not put up with the insane rules and politics of these out to lunch associations and administrators. Maybe bad coaches who dont know any better would be better for development! I read about bolletieri when he first started at img, it was small mom and pop and he admitted he did not know shit and he brought a lot of kids in on scholarship and some even lived at his home. they were great because they did not know any better! Now, its so socialized and professional at img they cant do what they did 30 years ago when they were mom and pop with no insurance rules and freedom. kids excelled their because it was a vast tennis playground where everyone beat the hell out of everyone, had no rules and did things that encouraged innovation. Players today are overcoached. In the old days their used to be a lot of what I call playground tennis, and its not there anymore, and of course the system is broke. Take away the playground and fun and the kids dont develop creativity. Way to go, you've developed some nice robots. Let the kids figure it out on their own, in the short term the results may not be there, however in the long haul they'll be better! Kids invent. Let them! We have to be careful not to stiffle talent! And trust me, the smarter we get, and the more techical we get, the worse these kids get! I got to say I respect a coach like Robert Landsdorf who says the kids don't need me more than once a week and they need mom and dad to go and hit balls with them for six days a week. Anyways, my way would not work because it would take less money. These days everyone thinks lets throw more money at the issue. Funny how its not working. Lets get parents less involved. Next it will be, lets build more facilities, and hire even more coaches. Its a revolving door. Meanwhile, excuse my english, some uncle tony, jerk mama or papa, kid playing on a court in a gheto with broken beer bottles, a dad who teaches his overweight daughter to play double backhands, papa merciless graf, insane tennis ball machine dad agassi or someone playing in a swimming pool or parking lot in some buttfuck third world country (excuse the language but I want to make a point) is going to be the next wimbeldon champion whether we like it or not. Whats funny is some tennis academy and celebrity coach who entered the picture late in the process or put in 5 percent of the work will always step up and take the credit and the well oiled money machine of tennis will continue to press forward.

What you are saying is very generalised and sweeping.

The scenario for many coaches is they see a child once maybe twice a week for an hour. The kid then runs off and spends many hours playing with his friends during the rest of the week, usually forgetting and unravelling all that you've worked on in the lesson. So the following week he comes along for his lesson and it's right back to square one. This is real life as a tennis coach. It's far from over-coaching that's the problem...rather not enough coaching.

Academies fair better because they see the players for longer and more often throughout a week.

For every Richard Williams there are a hundred dads like him whose kids don't have the talent of Serena and Venus. Dads like this drive most coaches round the bend. There is nothing worse than a manic, driven parent jumping down your throat every week. I agree, however, one of the parents has to be a little mad, or driven for the child to succeed.

I think when trying to find root causes in a system one needs to take aim carefully. We all live in a tiny corner of a given country and it may be unfair to assume local problems are also widespread throughout the land. America is huge. How can a coach in Boca Rotan know what's going on in Washington or New York?

I think what Klacr allured to is about right. The coaching has to be good, and the kid has to be receptive and responsible...the type that carries out all he learns in a lesson when he plays elsewhere and retains it for his next lesson.

It's unlikely a self-taught player could make it to the top. No one picks up a racket and does everything right naturally. Even Nastase and McEnroe needed some help. The game is high specialised right now and coaching is playing a big part.

[gzhpcu]

Nobody is naturally talented at tennis. It's harder to master than other sports, pays less for mid range talents who can make more in virtually any other pro sport. Audiences all over the world don't pay to watch, esp. female/doubles/mixed/challengers/semi pro/masters matches. The powers that be have turned it that way, due to rules changes, attitudes of the refs, time violations, personality wash out rules, pressure from sponsors to clean up the violent outbursts, psych jobs, that made the old school matches so entertaining. Can anyone hide under the curtain like Nasty did? Or pound the ice cubes into the face of the Spanish king!

I don't agree. Pancho Gonzalez being a prime example of natural talent. Federer also. Then you have hard workers like Jim Courier, David Ferrer, etc.

[don_budge]

Just Great hockeyscout!

I do have one big problem with your post. Like players, certain parents are "special." Like come on, comparing a difficult tennis dad at your club to Peter Graf, Richard William's, Mike Agassi's, Miroslav Navratolov, Walter Bartoli and Yuri Sharapov's is laughable. The dads I mention weren't great athletes who had kids who were "born stud talents" who appeared out of no-where to win Wimbledon. These kids were mentored by very intelligent parents who were all 10-20 years ahead of the curve in every way.

When Martina Navratilova was 15 the Czech Federation stepped in and said: "Okay, Miroslav, you need to step back now. We need to take over, work on the technical aspects of her game and now it's time for the experts to take over." Needless to say Martina was killing every player the country, and the world at the time, and she stated: "No." Three years later she defected. She said in an interview thank god I did not listen to them and serve and volley, and hit from the baseline more."

I read one post where klac said "tennis players willing to listen, have little ego and enormous heart don't grow on trees either."

He's right about the "heart don't grow on trees" - in order to survive the parents like Graf, William's, Agassi's, Navratolov, Bartoli and Sharapov certainly had to have huge nuts to take on the tennis system, and put up with the abuse they took. And, wow, their kids followed suit and became big time pro's. The apple does not fall to far from the tree. Interestly when they won, the parents never got the credit they deserved, and self serving individuals like IMG stated: "Yah, Yuri copied everything from us", and then stated "Yah, Kournikova's mom ruined her daughter, and we were never able to teach this natural talent."

Like come on.

I do not think a tennis player can make it if he has no ego and is willing to listen. The best players in any sport are usually uncoachable, and never listen to anything anyone ever tells them. Coaches, who've actually coached top talent understand this clearly. Trying to reach a high level player is interesting, because their not stupid. The great ones know the game better than the coaches. They have spent many hours developing their skill-sets, and they know what feels good and what doesn't feel good. And they live for the sport. They'll test you. The best athletes have the ability to listen, think on their own, act on the information they want to act on and develop their own unique style which will benefit. The daddy Graf, William, Agassi, Navratolov, Bartoli and Sharapov's created kids with unmatched tennis IQ.
The great ones are all self created talents, who have the ability to figure it out. I hate to say it, but, the young kids will always be smarter than us old farts. They'll always out-invent, and out think us. Tennis is a self taught sport. Everything in life is self taught. The world is changing, and the kids who will get ahead are the ones who'll be able to figure it out on their own. Their's so much information and ways to connect right now. This is the future.
Tennis (and business - sports and anything else) is a creative, inventive process, and the greats like Ali, Gretzky, Graf, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and all the rest (you name it) got to where they got because of (1) LOVE of the sport (or computers, business or whatever), (2) Surrounded by the people who had a true interest and belief in their way of doing it and (3) They did not conform to the norm, and (4) They'd spot a weakness they had, and they'd work, and work and work on it to the point of exhaustion (on their own), when no coach or teacher was watching and patch it up no matter how much time, energy, sacrifice or pain it took and (5) They'd solve or figure out a technical problem better than anyone else.

You know I read a great article on this site about the GREAT BORG. It said basically tennis coaches didn't understand what he brought to the table in terms of technical work until after his career was over. Bjorn invented. Coaches didn't. Smart players trying to copy and emulate. The champs emulated, and improved on their own.


Now to the self taught thing!

Well, if you can't teach a kid basics, and have them retain them, then it's very clear to me you need to explore why this is the case.

If you're continually returning to square one with a player you should really encourage a player to get a new coach, get more serious, study on his own or explain to you why he doesn't want to do what you are teaching.

It's likely a case of you the coach not communicating to the player what's required, and reaching an understanding.

God help the kid when he gets into a match if he can't retain things from lesson to lesson. It will all fall apart, and you won't be their in the middle of a set to help him.

Don't sweat it. Remember back to your days in school. Was their one teacher you performed for extremely well. We're their others you drove up the wall? Well, it wasn't your fault as a student you didn't get it (you were a child or teen after all), it was the adults fault for not having the professional skills to cultivate your interest in the subject, give you freedoms to develop on your own, at you own pace and get the needed end results. You know, I did well for one teacher because he'd stay after class and chat about hockey with me, and discuss how my life was going with playing sports. He'd call my mom and dad every few weeks and praise me. I tell you, I never wanted to let that guy down. I worked for him. 95's in his class. He knew how to reach his student. He loved his work. We all knew it. We all retained. Was he a great teacher? No. He didn't have to be, he had great students in the first place. I remember he used to come with his wife and play open pick up hockey with us. When it was your birthday they'd bake a cake and have a party for you.

Great coaching really is about loving what you do, making your student feel it and passing it on in the most appropriate matter. Coaching isn't about teaching technique and rotation. It's about planting a seed. Mother nature will take care of all the rest.

The goal of coaching is to make the player not need you. Unless of course, you're intent is to be a factory farm and mass produce robotic athletes.

And you know I hate the word coach. The best in the business are not "coaches." Their mentors. Its a big difference.

Now to parents! If a parent is jumping down your throat every week their is usually a good reason for it. END results never lie. This is life as a coach. You are hired to be fired. I say, welcome to the real world. If you weren't a tennis coach some manager would be down your throat demanding results as well. Difficult bosses, difficult tennis dads. Same shit.

To often it's easy to take the cop-out road and say "bad parent" or "bad boss at work" and not fix the underlying problems.

Just remember, you've always got the option of saying "take this job and shove it."

So what can USA Tennis do to fix the problems? Nothing. They've forgot how to create a perfect storm. However, right now in some third world country, or annonymous tennis club or small town their is an annonymous mentor (notice that word, mentor) and a parent with a revolutionary plan (another papa or mam Graf, William's, Agassi's, Navratolov, Bartoli and Sharapov) who'll take the game to that next level.

It just won't happen at a sanctioned USA Tennis facility, even though I am sure if it does they'll somehow try and take the credit for it (-:

What a wonderful post! So much food for thought. Thanks for sharing. Let's get together and call ourselves an "Institute of Shamanic Mentoring"! I will have an office and you will have one too. A playground too! We'll bounce the little squirts back and forth like ping pong balls. They will sort it out.

Put enough monkeys in a big enough room with enough typewriters and sooner or later one of them will type out the King James version of the Bible. It is possible that the biggest contribution that the USTA could make is to provide an organization and facilities for competition. Let everyone just have at it. The competition will sort it out. The competitive coaching styles will sort it out. Instead of producing robots...produce innovative and spontaneous play. Have fun. Meanwhile it is only "Tennis for the Bloody Fun of It!".

You know what the problem is with things today...generally speaking? Everyone fell for the money is everything paradigm. The problems are too big for any possible solutions to work. It's time to tear it down and build it again.