By Matt Hill
Since Rome is a two-week tournament, this week we are going to jump into a hot topic in tennis and what looks like the decline of the sport in the United States and what exactly happened. In this article we are going explore a group of topics involved in the sport, and even though there are some signs that it is still going strong, the negatives seem to be outweighing the positives right now. Strap on your seatbelts, this is going to be quite a ride.
THE GOOD OLE DAYS
The 70s, 80s and 90s were the golden days of tennis in America. It all started with Jimmy Connors and then John McEnroe showed up. Breakfast at Wimbledon was a must for the public. The rivalries were off the charts. Players had no filter and it was entertaining for people to watch. Connors especially had a way of drawing audiences. People who knew nothing about tennis watched his run to the semifinals of the US Open in 1991. He was must see TV. Probably the rivalry that attracted audiences the most to tennis was Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. Even though Navratilova was not a natural born American, people watched these matches. In my opinion Navratilova is the best to do it and Evert is not far behind. In the 1990s, fans enjoyed the Steffi Graf-Monica Seles rivalry, but you also had the next generation of American men arrive with Pete Sampras, Michael Chang, Jim Courier and Andre Agassi. Agassi was the most influential player of this generation and honestly my All-time favorite. He was a trendsetter and had so much charisma. Sampras was just really good. Tennis was in the mainstream as well. In the 90s you could find it frequently on CBS, NBC and ABC along with ESPN. This all began to change about the time of Agassi’s retirement in 2006 when tennis went global, and we hit the “Golden Era”
GOLDEN ERA NOT SO GOLDEN FOR AMERICANS
As we turned the page to the 2000s, women’s tennis was dominated by the Williams sisters Venus and Serena and while that was a story that captivated millions of people, the rest of the American tennis scene seemed to be in decline. When Andy Roddick won his first and only grand slam at the 2003 US Open, it signaled the end of almost 30 years of dominance by the American men and ushered in a European dominance of epic proportions. When Roger Federer won Wimbledon in 2003, it signaled a new era, the Big 3 era. Federer, Rafael Nadal and later Novak Djokovic have combined to 64 slams. Throw in three from Andy Murray and three from Stan Wawrinka and Europe has completely dominated the last two decades. I personally have been criticized for mentioning that this era, as great as it was, caused a downfall for American tennis and for the fan interest. I do believe it to be totally true, this Golden era was not really accepted in the United States. As a result, the networks and ESPN slowly backed off on tennis unless it was a grand slam. The big matches started appearing on a premium channel called Tennis Channel, which in my opinion, has made the sport less accessible to the casual fan. It has created a sport where only four tournaments mattered and even Roland Garros is now mostly on Tennis Channel other than some bonus coverage from NBC. I really blame the lack of Americans in tennis for this. ESPNs flagship station Sportscenter, took tennis off their highlights in favor over more NBA and NFL (American football). In 2021, Tennis Channel acquired the rights to every ATP and WTA Tournament, leaving ESPN to cover the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open. ESPN does a great job on these tournaments even showing qualifying on ESPN Plus and ESPNEWS. Tour tournaments, though, are very hard to find on television people can afford. About this time, an alternative sport to tennis appeared in the United States and it may be doing the most damage of them all. Tennis has gotten into a pickle.
PICKLEBALL TAKING OVER
About the time of the Covid Pandemic, a new sport started taking over the United States called Pickleball, and it has taken America by storm. You wouldn’t think on the surface that it would damage tennis, but unfortunately it has as many tennis players have moved over to Pickleball. Even former No. 1 doubles player in the world Jack Sock made the switch last year to the sport. Honestly, I have watched the sport a few times on television and from a viewer’s standpoint I just don’t get it. However, Tennis Channel does get it. In their spare time they simulcast its sister station Pickleball TV and show the sport on TC. Tennis Channel honestly gives more attention to pickleball than they do doubles in tennis. Recently I was watching the match of the decade between Iga Swiatek and Aryna Sabalenka and they are airing promos for pickleball. It makes no sense. A lot of people watching tennis channel want to see tennis and they have made it clear. However, TC just seems to be ignoring them. Several tennis courts in my area have been converted into pickleball courts, including a club that I used to play tennis tournaments at. New pickleball facilities are being built every day. Recently I attended a high school or junior tennis match between Science Hill and Dobyns Bennett in my hometown of Johnson City, Tennessee and I asked local coach Kelly Lane about how pickleball was affecting high school and junior tennis. “I believe that both sports can co-exist,” he said. “Both are lifelong sports. I know tennis may be going away in some areas, but not here at Science Hill. We have some great club professionals in this area who run quality programs. It may not be this way other places, but things are going very well here.” Though the high school game has not greatly been affected yet, the USTA has started an initiative to make the United States the No. 1 tennis playing country in ten years. Hopefully it will happen, but it might be too little too late for the USTA. As far as TV wise, summer little league baseball outdraws a Masters 1000 tournament and sports like MMA that would have been an afterthought during the heyday of American tennis, have totally overtaken the sport. Tennis is not generating with younger generation, pickleball is. The only way tennis is going to survive is to support it at the grass roots level and get young people out to play.
JUNIOR TENNIS VITAL TO THE SPORT’S SUCCESS IN AMERICA
In America and unlike Europe, sports are played competitively in schools and the competition between rivals is intense. In my area, there is no bigger rivalry on the tennis court than Science Hill and Dobyns Bennett and even though the competition was fierce, the sportsmanship was off the charts. This honestly felt like a European futbol (also known as soccer) match and both teams were cheering on their players. In a sport known for etiquette, we are seeing positive changes with the new generation. Even though most players playing high school tennis will not play in the pros, their participation will lead to fandom later down the line. “Our players work hard every match, and they always pick each other up,” Lane said. “We have worked hard to build a positive culture here and it showed today when two of our top players from last year (Both Pre-Med Students), came to support us. The culture we have built give us a big boost when we are playing.” Lane’s fellow coach, Ricky Pelton, showed that you never know what tennis going to do for a person, especially when he was a manager at East Tennessee and met Roland Garros men’s doubles finalist Sander Gille through there. The tennis team also has some of the highest-grade point averages in the school but playing team tennis creates bonds that will never be broken. “You saw today with the former players coming back what a family atmosphere this is,” Pelton said. “Tennis is in great shape at Science Hill.”
THE LACK OF AMERICAN INTEREST IN THE COLLEGIATE GAME
I personally love college tennis and I think as much as I love March Madness in college basketball, there is nothing better in collegiate sports than a collegiate tennis match that is 3-3 in the deciding match. Passion is just off the charts. However, the biggest complaint I have heard about collegiate tennis is the lack of American players in the game. It is very rare to see an American player on scholarship and if the American player is that great, they probably aren’t going to college. There have been Americans succeed coming out of the collegiate ranks. Ben Shelton was a semifinalist last year at the US Open from Florida and John Isner out of Georgia was the No. 1 American for many years. The kind of success those two had has been few and far between for the Americans as college tennis is dominated by Europeans and South Americans. I don’t think there is anything wrong with that and it does give people a chance to get an education, but the sport without Americans can’t contend with American football and college basketball. I am not sure the sport would be that much more popular in America with Americans as American football, men’s college basketball and when Caitlin Clark playing, women’s college basketball dominates the airwaves. Even niche sports like college hockey and lacrosse get more attention than college tennis. College tennis will be shown more starting next year at least on stream thanks to a new NCAA contract from ESPN, but it is so frustrating every year not being able to find the NCAA tennis championships. Not everything is bad right now with tennis in America and even though I don’t think things are totally worth being ecstatic, the cupboard is not all bad.
ATP, WTA AMERICAN PLAYERS ENJOYING SUCCESS
If you look at the women’s game right now, you would never know the game was hanging on its last leg. Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula are in the top 10, Danielle Collins is having a dream season and Madison Keys and Emma Navarro are both in the top 20. As a matter of fact, there is a good chance a US player will be in the top 20 and miss the Olympics. This is how good things are now for the US women. On the men’s side, no real grand slam threat but Ben Shelton, Taylor Fritz and Tommy Paul have all made quarters or better in slams. Unfortunately, none of those players have reached a grand slam final and that seems to be a barrier the men are trying to break through. Success doesn’t seem to be an issue right now, but it could be in the future. A lot of these players started playing before the pickleball era. As soon as they retire or get close to it, that is probably going to be when you start seeing the sport really begin to suffer.
SO WHERE DOES THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN TENNIS LIE
I feel tennis is always going to be around, but in America it looks like it will be a sport strictly for the wealthy. I think as far as the general public they are going to go with pickleball. I am hoping this pickleball phase with go away but as the saying goes Time Marches on. Also, things evolve and stuff changes. In America it seems like the normal casual sports fan has moved on from tennis. What can be done? A new TV or stream contract would help. If you are going to get new fans into the game, you are going to have to get with the times on how the game is presented. Either a return to ESPN for ATP and WTA Events would be good or possibly a Netflix deal that can reach younger viewers. Tennis could also be taught in P.E. Classes and there could be programs at the junior level to try to get kids involved. Unfortunately, though, tennis has become known as a European sport and American Football and NBA has taken over the airwaves in the United States. But we must hope this sport that I have watched since Connors, Evert and Navratilova just doesn’t fade into the sunset.
