The final matches of the Orange Ball Box league during the spring of 2017 were critical. After five consecutive months of weekly matches hosted and organized by Center Court Tennis Academy in Chatham, NJ, the point spread between the top performers was marginal. My son, Rafael, was the youngest competitor on a roster of…
Many people have their opinions of how someone became so good on the ATP Tour and then there are those who played and saw the progression of how someone became such a great tennis player. I am not sure if I was fortunate or unfortunate to have played Kevin Anderson five times on the…
There are several important factors that contribute to match performance of a tennis player, including: Physical, Psychological, Technical and Tactical (management of skills or decision-making), respectively. Although these different factors all together contribute to a tennis player’s match performance and will determine a player’s average level of play, for the purpose of this article,…
Hurry! Turn! Move your feet! Watch the ball! Hit up! These are catch phrases that so many instructors use that are really meaningless without explanation. Yet they are yelled across the court everywhere as though repeating them over and over will do the trick. Then, we have an overload of online instruction with enough…
On a flight returning from Portugal this past June, I was with 24 varsity collegiate players from the Oneonta State Tennis program. I had eight hours with my thoughts on a transatlantic journey from Lisbon to New York. We were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to play some team exhibitions in Europe and…
Tennis prodigies—gifted and precocious players—are rare, but very special. I have had the good fortune of working with many young players whom I would consider to have been tennis prodigies and they exhibit certain traits that all players, coaches and parents can learn from. Maturity and emotional control Prodigy players that I have worked…
I’ve been involved with tennis for more than 40 years now, and have seen the game evolve to what it is now. There is no doubt in my mind that the racket size should have remained their original size when invented. That decision, which was ultimately a commercial decision, would change the game forever. The…
The tennis racket spins on its head. Someone says “Up.” Four tennis players crowd around the spinning racquet. It falls to the ground. A player examines the butt of the racquet and says, “It is up and I defer.” “Oh, fudge. Gosh darn it,” I think. “The dreaded ‘defer’ … now what do I do?”…
You’ve battled for 12 straight games against a formidable, evenly matched opponent and now it’s come down to one game. Your heart rate is picking up and your feet are barking. The end is inevitable, sudden and even the name, “Tiebreaker,” coined by Tennis Hall of Famer Jimmy Van Alen, says, “Everything is on the…
The majority of our area’s top tennis coaches and program directors are tennis lifers who picked the game up at a young age and took to it right away. That isn’t exactly the case for Manhattan Tennis Academy’s Executive Director John Curtis. “I grew up as a baseball player, which wasn’t too far of a…