TIPPING POINT
“SPOT ON’
I posted this earlier and can’t recall the source
“… if you don’t start out with a trust fund, you’re stuck, especially for a sport like tennis that requires years of youth investment. This is a major, fatal disadvantage for American tennis. In Europe, South America and lately in Asia, kids from all social classes have a shot at a tennis career. If they show sufficient talent and motivation, there are numerous community organizations, government programs and general social assistance systems to help build up their careers, in part because these other societies strongly support investment in their youth. ”
Malcolm Gladwell’s follow up book, REVENGE OF THE TIPPING POINT, comments on the expense issue. The list of needs for wannabe great tennis players looks to be about 100-150 k annually. Six year cost ? 600 -900 thousand . Anyone wishing to follow junior tennis into pro tennis will probably have to go the Challenger route at 100k for expenses and 100k for a coach. Average time to develop needed tools about 3 years ( or 600k) to “make it”. ???
North Carolina has 4 men in its total tennis history who made enough to cover the tab and break even.
One spinoff will surely affect the only other way to recoup some of the investment: College Tennis scholarships. Tennis scholarships, already usurped in large part by internationals, are about to become even more rare for Americans. Two main reasons are 1. Sizable amounts of cash are now legal. Enough that the college route will attract more talented internationals. These people now know the harshness, expense, and probabilities of the Challengers tour. 2. A seismic shift is aided by the attractive improvements in College tennis such as the new money, competition levels that can aid development, no expenses, great coaches, facilities, teammates. What the hell, I may even go to class.
The new ITA’S new video on the history of American college tennis is enlightening. Seven minutes of the video address the international issue
(minutes 50-57 ). The one point I take issue with is the suggestion only parents were concerned and disappointed. Young Americans are eliminated . 300 schools have dropped men’s teams for reasons Coach Benjamin cites. Many Coaches throughout the nation had nice local programs rendered unacceptable. Fans and students say who cares? Still American Parents and citizens write the checks. To have Parents and youngsters dismissed to go hunting for a fifth option for their higher education is not acceptable .
With the door shut to scholarships, the expense of tennis player development becomes more and more a questionable sport to pursue.
Along with many American aspirants another group is about to be bumped : Marginal Internationals.
FOR YOUR INFORMATION
ITA HISTORY VIDEO (link below ):
FROM THE ITA
FROM STANFORD UNIVERSITY
Stanford senior Filip Kolasinski can envision the different paths his tennis career might have taken simply by looking at the group of players he trained with back home in Poland
Some now work or attend university in Europe, playing tennis only in their free time; others took coaching jobs. It’s a far cry from four years ago, when their schedules necessitated online high school, practicing four to five hours a day and traveling 25 to 30 weeks per year for tournaments and training. Several within this group of Polish junior players decided to turn pro, Kolasinski said, but it has been challenging for them.
Four years into their professional careers, some are still barely able to break even financially, Kolasinski explained, in spite of achieving decent on-court results. “I think the important thing is that you have to be really, really good in tennis to make significant money,” he said. “Because the costs of basically training and traveling are so high.”
Kolasinski, a Warsaw native once ranked among the top 100 juniors in the world, ultimately took a different route: NCAA Division I tennis. He is one of an increasing number of international players who are choosing to postpone or forgo professional careers in favor of additional years of competition and education at American universities.
And while collegiate tennis in the United States has long been an option for non-domestic players, athletes and coaches say that the financial incentives, professional opportunities and motivations for prospective international student-athletes have only grown in recent years.
According to an NCAA Research report published in December 2022, 61% of male and 66% of female Division I tennis players are international students, up from approximately 38% and 50% reported in 2006-2007. Many attribute this large increase to high-profile professional players who successfully transitioned from collegiate tennis to pro careers. Currently, 15 men in the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) top 100 are former college players, and six of those are in the top 50.
Recent talent to emerge from the collegiate sphere includes the American phenom, Ben Shelton, who won the 2022 NCAA singles and team titles for the University of Florida and reached a major quarterfinal less than a year after turning pro; American Danielle Collins, a two-time NCAA singles champion at the University of Virginia and now Australian Open finalist; the top-ranked British male, Cameron Norrie, who held the No. 1 national collegiate ranking in singles while at Texas Christian University; and Diana Shnaider from Russia, who spent this past season alternating between dual matches for North Carolina State and various pro events, scoring her first two major match wins in 2023.
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“The success of some of the collegiate players on tour has increased the viability for international student-athletes to consider college as a pathway to professional tennis,” said Stanford men’s tennis head coach Paul Goldstein.
Students can also benefit financially from playing pro events while at school, though only to a certain extent. NCAA eligibility rules state that Division I tennis players may collect up to $10,000 in prize money from professional tournaments each calendar year. Any additional money accepted after reaching that limit may not exceed the athlete’s expenses for participating in an event.
The ATP announced an additional incentive last January, unveiling a partnership with the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA). The top 20 players in the June ITA rankings and any other player who reaches the quarterfinals of the NCAA Tournament singles draw will now be awarded wildcards into Challenger 50 and 75 events, entry-level tournaments designed to provide upward mobility to lower-ranked players. Those ranked in the top 10 will be entered into a tournament’s main draw, while Nos. 11-20 will gain still sought-after places in qualifying brackets. These opportunities, the ATP said in a statement, are intended to help the next generation of collegiate athletes jumpstart their professional careers.
“AND THE BEAT GOES ON.”
The Little Green Book of Tennis 