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Anthology

On By ethomasparhamIn A2. THE LITTLE GREEN BOOK OF TENNISLeave a comment
Image of all of Tom Parham's books

For anyone who is interested in my writing, here are links to free versions of all of my books. Just tap the book title to access a free PDF file on Google Drive.

Little Green Book of Tennis (3rd edition)
A new 2023 digital-only version of the Little Green Book edited to only tennis related writing, including some new chapters from the past few years. You can also download the3rd edition— a revised edition. Play is Where Life is is the first book I wrote.


Em Ole Coaches
Lessons learned from my family, friends, and colleagues over my career. This book is a personal collection of insights from some of my favorite people.


A Level of Thinking
A collection of essays on a wide variety of subjects including sports, politics, and American culture.


Helping
A collection of essays on tennis and coaching, many of which are posted here on the blog. The second half of the book chronicles the impact of international players on college tennis.


Thanksgiving
A collection of personal thoughts, stories, and pictures. Many of the essays were also posted here on my blog.


Nearly Fifty
For almost fifty years, my closest friends gathered once a year for a men’s weekend. This book collects some of my favorite stories and pictures from this tradition. If you would like a copy of this book, please email me.

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTLESS

On By ethomasparhamIn E. SPORTS COMMENTARYLeave a comment

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTLESS

I chose the history of football for my first term paper topic.  Early 1950’s. 

FOOTBALL by Chuck Klosterman (2026 ) is available.  He adds a lot to “kicking the head of the Dane.”

 Mr. Klosterman’s work is unique, well written, thorough, and entertaining.  And frightening. 

He covers sports history, great players and coaches, teams, and fans.

He covers controversial topics (CTE and injury, Gambling, NIL and PORTAL dangers, Salary,  owners, TV limits. Plus others. ) 

Here are some samples:

 HIS GOAL ( page 11 )

*“This is an expository obituary, published before the subject has died, delivered by someone who wants to explain why the victim mattered so much to so many, despite so much evidence to the contrary.”

 On the future of football:  People will always need to watch football.

*“This,  I must concede is true—if the scenario I described were happening today.  But it is not happening today.   It is something that will happen in the future, to different people, and those future people will not be like you.  They will live in a version of society where football stops and no one  cares.  And that is inevitably why I wrote this book.”

NOTE–Klosterman describes this “future scenario” in detail, later in the chapter entitled NUCLEAR  FOOTBALL.

CHILDHOOD ( page 57)

*“ In the summer after fifth grade, I spent a lot of time imagining me and my friends playing football and winning championships. These daydreams were not just mental visions”

Deja Vu. *My small high school played 6 man football.  Mr. Klosterman comments on this 

wide open variation of a game that was fun.  ( Page 77 )

“But 6-man is its own animal, too arcane to be seen as the bastardized version of anything else. It’s structured bedlam with jankier rules….

EDUCATION/TEACHERS (page 120 )

**Here’s what I mean;Let’s say the salary of every public school teacher was tripled over night. A third grade teacher making $45,000.00 a year on Monday is now making $135,000.00 on Tuesday. In the short term, that change would  make little  difference in how well third graders are educated. A teacher doesn’t become a different person just because their paycheck changes. But the long-term impact this would have on education would be seismic. The realization that becoming a public school teacher was now a six-figure profession would change the type of person who decides to pursue teaching as a vocation.

*Every member of society would live a life conditioned to believe that becoming a public school teacher was a rarefied human experience, reserved for the elite and worth whatever sacrifice was necessary in exchange.”

*Triple the average U.S. teaching salary and the public education system is reinvented within ten or twenty years.”

CANADIAN FOOTBALL  (page 208,209 )  

*“ I Love the people of Canada.  They are self-deprecating, well informed, and open to drinking in the afternoon.”  See Joke by Donald Sutherland.

2040 -THE FUTURE (page 246-249)

  • “ College football becomes  a less interesting version of pro football, nothing more than a feeder system for the NFL. That’s the part that is visible.  The invisible part is the corrosion of football participation at the high school level.” 

*So this is how the future will go….

For the next 5-15 years, football becomes eleven more dominant than it is right now. This, incongruously, results from the mismanagement of college football.  ( i.e. the Portal /NIL impact).


*Football is now an exclusively professional pursuit, watched and supported by millions of fans who have no personal relationship to the game itself.The sport has progressed to its social and economic end point. This is where the plane hits the mountain.

Economic escalation has made pro sports fragile.

The NFL’s total revenue hit one billion dollars for the first time in 1988. By 2065 the number will be two hundred billion, and the face value for a ticket will exceed $3000.00 .

*For more than a hundred years the NFL only got bigger and richer.  It was designed only for imperial expansion, which is the only thing it did.  But now it has to somehow get smaller, and that is something it cannot do..

  • “Somewhere in the middle of the current century there will be a panoramic realization about TV advertising.  The realization will be this : It doesn’t work, at least compared to what it costs.”
  • ”…and when it happens the reaction will be startling, unsuspected indifference.” “ ` ` ` ` `***********************************

This is a timely book.  

APROPROS?

On By ethomasparhamIn M. POLITICS, N. RELIGION, WAR, P. BOB DYLANLeave a comment

May 25, 2026–HAPPY 85TH, MR. DYLAN

1962 ? 2026 ?

Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin’
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times, they are a-changin’

*****************


You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud

**************************

Mama, put my guns in the ground
I can’t shoot them anymore

********************

“…if God is on our side

He will stop the next war.”

*********************

Quotes from Bob Dylan


War:
“If God is on our side, he’ll stop the next war.” (With God on our Side)
“And his brain has been mismanaged with great skill.” (License to Kill)
“Alright – where do you want this killing done?” (Highway 61)
“Is your money that good? Will it buy forgiveness? Do you think that it could?” (Masters of War)
“Things are breaking up out there, High water everywhere!” (High Water)
“Let’s disconnect the cables, over turn the tables. The place just don’t make sense
to me nor more.” (Senor)
“And I’ll tell it, and think it, and speak it and breath it.” (Hard Rain)

**********

I’m trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others, But oh, mother, things ain’t going well

**********

May you have a strong foundation, When the winds of changes shift

**********

“Bury the rag deep in your face, for now is the time for your tears.” (Hattie Carol)

**********

Something is happening here, But you don’t know what it is, Do you Mister Jones.

**********

”Is your money that good? Will it buy forgiveness? Do you think that it could?

**********

Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.—

*********************

“There’s a big gaping hole in my chest where my heart was,
and a hole in the sky where God used to be.
My American dream fell apart at the seams.
You tell me what it means. You tell me what it means.”
Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson

“…’BACCA,BBQ, BALL GAMES, AND BROWNBAGGIN'”

On By ethomasparhamIn Wilson, RaceLeave a comment

The recent video PICK UP YOUR BED AND WALK revisits Fike High School’s three state football championships.  Russell Rawlings’ book, CYCLONE COUNTY, also explores this scene (Wilson, NC –late 1960’s ). 

I wrote PLAY IS WHERE LIFE IS about twenty years ago.   The link below includes a chapter on Wilson and Eastern North Carolina, and Atlantic Christian College (now Barton College ),  with many comments on this same period of time and some later. 

On the link below I have listed several “tales”.   I think this is the best chapter I have written, mainly because of all the area’s characters.

https://littlegreenbookoftennis.com/category/h-wilson

SCROLL DOWN

  1. TEAM SPIRIT
  2. A SENSE OF HUMOR
  3. DEPARTMENT CHAIRMAN
  4. DOC AND PEAHEAD
  5. HAND WRITING
  6. HOMER CLOCK
  7. THE SCAR OF RUSSIA
  8. GEOMETRY
  9. RUNS IN THE FAMILY
  10. THE GYM
  11. TOP HOT DOG
  12. THE OLD, OLD GYM
  13. FROM BOHUNK TO HAWN
  14. ODE TO THE GYM
  15. RASSLIN WITH BUDDY
  16. POSSUM
  17. ROCK RIDGE UPDATE
  18. CPR
  19. DINNER TABLE CONVERSATIONS
  20. TELEPHONES
  21. PIER WALKING
  22. COUNTRY STRIKES AGAIN
  23. WEDDING PLANS
  24. THE MAYOR
  25. DR. HAMLIN
  26. YOU CAN CALL ME AL
  27. OLYMPICS BOUND
  28. BLOCK/CHARGE CALL
  29. CHARIOTS OF FIRE
  30. 1984
  31. COMMON SENSE
  32. AIN’T IT FUNNY
  33. HEARING AIDS
  34. RESUMES
  35. Wilson-65 years ago 
WILSON, NC-65 YEARS AGO.
  1. FIKE HIGH SCHOOL
FIKE HIGH SCHOOL
  1. Peanuts and tennis
Peanuts and Tennis

Main blog and all books:

https://littlegreenbookoftennis.com

LUDDITE LITERATURE

On By ethomasparhamIn K. PHILOSOPHY, M. POLITICSLeave a comment

LUDDITE LITERATURE

I resisted the email, technology world that cropped up at the end of my coaching, teaching career.

We moved to the beach just before winter.  I had never cut on my college issued computer.  High school typing class was in 1956.  Health issues, injuries, age, weather chipped away at my physicality. 

I began to “hobby write “.   Self-Publishing was possible and I waded in.  

Any old person will tell you of the “nightmare of the new age”.    Even now.

My seven “books” and 700 blog articles attest to one virtue–VOLUME.  And while the process has been a retirement hobby, I haven’t changed my name to Shakes Parham.

Vanity has caused  me to wonder “ is it any good ?”

In toto it is a jumbled mess.  At 85 years and “ circling the drain “, finding out its worth is beyond me.

Here is a thought.  With the galloping advances, will there be a way to edit out the good parts?

There are bigger questions:

Are there large numbers of people like me, who given self publishing, produced some unique period and worthwhile contributions?

  • Will an advanced editing tool be developed to glean items of value from this plethora of effort from us Luddites ?

GUEST COMMENT

On By ethomasparhamIn C. COLLEGE TENNIS and INSTRUCTION, D. INTERNATIONALSLeave a comment

This clipped from James Haslam

Is The Foreign Student College Tennis Debate Really About Player Development?

Players recruited from outside The US dominate D1 college tennis . This might mean that American tennis is doing something wrong in developing the best players … Or it might mean that in the US, fewer families choose to see the pro tour as the ultimate goal of playing tennis to achieve a better life for their children. Instead they prioritize tennis participation as a pathway to greater health, wellness and career success. In the latter case , it might be concluded that they are doing many things right. No matter what the outlook is , the economic realities of this issue are significant. For those not convinced that the foreign student college tennis issue is primarily about who should be given the opportunity to be a “student” driven by economic allocation , here are some numbers that frame this issue :

There are about 2500 D1 Tennis student athletes in the US with about 2/3 of these athletes or 1675 being foreign students on F-1 or M-1 visas.

When the cost of conducting the program , tuition, books, housing, fees , travel , medical care are broken down and calculated, a conservative estimate is that each student each year receives about $200,000 in value, before NIL monies.

So the cost to the college system yearly we can estimate to be about $335 million dollars before NIL. This means that in aggregate , in D1 tennis alone , four year scholarships cost the system well over one billion dollars. We can further extrapolate by understanding that the median lifetime earnings of a college graduate over just a High School degree is 1.2 million dollars. So each year an astonishing future earnings of over 1 billion dollars are facilitated by the opportunities given to foreign D1 tennis players who graduate each year. Even if we see more conservative numbers we can’t escape that an enormous amount of money is being used to further the educational opportunities of foreign nationals . With team roster’s limited to 10 spots , it’s a zero sum game in which the opportunity for a player outside the US is one less opportunity for a player in the US. As a precedent , enrollment in high school is not guaranteed to non district residents. It is usually evaluated on a case by case basis and the issue is not “fairness” ,”protectionism ” ” player development ” or ” rigorous competition”. It’s the question of how to allocate finite educational resources.

T. Parham: This seems more pertinent than the suggestion that this dilemma can be cured by American teaching pros and coaches.

AMERICAN

On By ethomasparhamIn Wilson, RaceLeave a comment

Tom Parham:  “ In the 70’s a lawyer opined that the then ITCA could limit international college tennis players .  The membership voted to do so.  The “big boys” threatened to withdraw their membership.  Others advised a quota would be found illegal.  There was no litigation.

Given the current conservative bent , would now be a time to “screw up some courage”?

Note : Coaches and Athletics Directors aren’t the sole input (IDS 1357 ).

“GORILLA BUREACRATS?” : NATIONALcaa, UNITED STATES ta, USpta, NATIONALfhsaa. Global sports.

Now is the hour.

BOYS VOLLEYBALL IN NORTH CAROLINA HIGH SCHOOLS

On By ethomasparhamIn Wilson, RaceLeave a comment

This announcement from THE NORTH CAROLINA HIGH SCHOOL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION :

Boys’ volleyball, like girls’ flag football, is rapidly increasing in popularity in some parts of the state. The board voted 10-7 to add the sport in the spring of 2027. Tyson said Queen’s University in Charlotte has been reserved by the N.C. Volleyball Coaches Association to host a championship with proceeds benefitting the NCHSAA.

Ten years ago, there were four boys teams playing, according to Sarah Conklin, the Weddington High club coach and a longtime organizer of the sport in North Carolina. Today, there are more than 120 schools playing, or about a quarter of the NCHSAA’s membership.

Last year, 36 states sanctioned boys’ volleyball, according to the American Volleyball Coaches Association, and the NFHS reports that participation in the sport has grown — from 43,000 athletes nationally in 2005-06 to nearly 96,000 in the 2024-25 school year.

***************************

Great Decision

Statement from the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Regarding the State of College Athletics, Recent Program Eliminations, & International Student-Athletes

On By ethomasparhamIn C. COLLEGE TENNIS and INSTRUCTION, D. INTERNATIONALS, E. SPORTS COMMENTARYLeave a comment


This is the link to the ITA  Statement

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MWiaejUXfubelwdH2JQD4bzwSrVJ3_MxWhQq8Qa-OWM/edit?tab=t.0

Author’s comments on specific points are in RED

One topic that has received increased attention is the role of international student-athletes in college tennis. This is a complex matter and requires more nuanced public discourse.

This is not a new problem, nor is it limited to tennis.

*****************

There are presently approximately 20,000 college tennis student-athletes. It should be noted that without international student-athletes, many programs would struggle to field full rosters. Efforts to limit their participation risk undermining competitiveness, reducing institutional revenue, and ultimately threatening the viability of programs themselves. This is not a hypothetical concern; this is playing out in real time. Recent developments in Idaho, for example, underscore these broader concerns. Athletic directors and coaches across the state strongly opposed proposed legislation (ID S1357) that would have capped international student-athlete scholarships at 10%. Ultimately, the legislation did not pass, but it highlighted how policy decisions can directly threaten the viability of college tennis programs. Efforts to cap international student athlete participation in any U.S. college sport may also run afoul of existing federal and state laws and regulations, risking increased litigation and costs. 

********************

THE HEART OF THE MATTER: SCHOLARSHIPS  FOR AMERICANS

Is it illegal or unreasonable to award a percentage of scholarships to our youngsters first?

The issue has never been litigated: (  “…may run afoul” and “…risking litigation” ) 

For 50 plus years any allotment or quota that saved scholarships was dismissed by a lawsuit feared;  a threat based on “ discrimination based on national origin. “ 

*************************

Age disparities, particularly cases involving significantly older incoming international student-athletes, have drawn understandable review. The NCAA is expected to address eligibility rules in the near future, and moving forward, there must be a fair and consistent framework in which all student-athletes, both domestic and international, compete on equal footing.

The age issue is another variable that hampers our kids in no small way.  It will soon dawn on other global sports, most significantly Basketball, they are also in the crosshairs.  

******************** 

For those who care about the future of college tennis, there is also a role to play. Supporting local programs through attendance, advocacy, and financial contributions helps ensure these opportunities remain available for future generations. Sustained visibility and investment are critical to the long-term health of our sport.

These variables are directly related to American children., parents and taxpayers–the very people excluded.  

Isn’t it about time some of our organizations screw up their courage and use their time, money and efforts to make these facts available to American 

parents and players.  CHANGE THE TERMS AND RE-TRY THE ISSUE!

***************************

Mr. Rudy Washington, Editor-in-Chief The BCA Journal (BLACK COACHES ASSOCIATION)
P. O. Box 4040
Culver City, CA 90231-4040
Dear M.r Washington:
I’ve coached college tennis for 30-plus years and I have been dismayed by the preponderance of international players who have usurped many tennis scholarships from American youngsters.
There seems to be a trend toward this in basketball. Has the BCA addressed the danger to American student athletes this poses, in particular college basketball. Should there be a limit to this?
If your Journal has addressed this issue, please let me know. It seems basketball is a game that this should concern.
ETP:1h
Sincerely,
Tom Parham
Men’s Tennis Coach
March 9, 1998