Tennis Anyone? : There Are Some Positive Signs, but Many See Disaster Ahead

Each day, it seems a new American star, former star or tennis guru predicts doom for the sport’s future in this country. But at first glance, Southern California appears to be returning the overhead smashes and high-kicking serves that the American tennis community has been missing lately.

Newport Beach teenagers Taylor Dent and Brandis Braverman are considered two of America’s brightest prospects. The upcoming crop of Southern California senior boys is being hailed by college coaches as one of the best in years, and two of Orange County’s top junior coaches say they haven’t noticed a decrease in the quality or quantity of talent.

But many other longtime Southern California tennis observers say they are not fooled by a few positive signs.

“Our membership has dropped eight or nine hundred in the last year in the juniors,” said Jim Hillman, director of junior tennis for the Southern California Tennis Assn. The junior SCTA--ages 10 to 18--still has about 12,700 active members. “We don’t really know why we’re having that kind of a decline. It was a surprise to me.”

Tennis officials worry about losing America’s youth to team sports such as volleyball, basketball and soccer and more trendy individual sports such as golf and surfing. They yearn for a flashy young star who can do for tennis what Tiger Woods has done for golf. They worry about a college tennis system that has become dominated by foreign players, and they fear that too many vital junior programs have been eliminated by the U.S. Tennis Assn.--the national governing body for tennis--because of a few over-publicized cases of tennis burnout.

“The last five years of American junior tennis has been the worst ever,” said Dick Leach, USC men’s tennis coach and a Laguna Beach resident. “Pete Sampras, Jim Courier and Michael Chang are all about 25. After that, we’ve had Michael Joyce, Justin Gimelstob and that’s about it.

“Lately, we’ve had the Bryan twins [Mike and Bob], Kevin Kim and Mike Russell. Looking for players for Davis Cup in the future is going to be tough. None of these kids now are ready to win a match.”

Even Nick Saviano, the USTA’s director of men’s coaching at the college and pro levels, is troubled by American junior players’ recent lack of success at the professional level.

“Certainly there is concern,” Saviano said. “We’re constantly looking at ways to improve ourselves.”

Tim Pawsat, a former tour player who coaches juniors in Orange County, said he isn’t as worried about American tennis as is Leach, his former college coach.

“I think things are cyclical,” he said. “Tennis is not going anywhere. It’s just in a little bit of a down period.”

How much of a down period? Participation in the SCTA’s seven designated tournaments and team tournaments has remained steady, according to Hillman.

“I’m hoping we’re just losing the casual player,” Hillman said.

Hillman said he is so concerned about the sport’s declining popularity among young kids that he will probably begin taking preventive measures.

“This year, there’s been so much emphasis on golf,” Hillman said. “I think we need to start programs at younger ages to compete with the other sports. We’re probably going to have to start looking at something for kids 8 years and below, maybe look into a modified court for younger kids or a different scoring system. That might be one of our goals for 1998.”

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No matter how much time and money is spent trying to attract kids to a racket and a little yellow ball, Hillman realizes that today’s youth are getting hooked on kicking a big, white ball into a net.

“Soccer has been one of our biggest problems,” Hillman said. “Kids can start kicking the soccer ball around on their own when they’re 2 or 3. In tennis, you need some basic coaching to get started. In soccer, you blend in with the rest of the field. In tennis, there’s the constant pressure on the individual. That’s why we started team tennis, to make it more of a team sport.”

Steve Clark, UC Irvine men’s tennis coach, said soccer is fast becoming the ultimate team sport. He said he can hardly go anywhere without seeing a field, full of kids chasing a soccer ball around.

“They always look like they are having a blast,” he said. “They look like lemmings following that ball around.”

Clark said he understands why kids are choosing soccer over tennis.

“Tennis is such a hard game,” he said. “You have to work your butt off to get the ball over the net. We’re such an instant gratification society and that hurts tennis. You can see positive results much quicker in other sports.”

Sheila McInerney, women’s tennis coach at Arizona State, didn’t have as many options when she was growing up in upstate New York. But she says tennis is becoming a young girl’s last option.

“So many girls are playing team sports, and the sports are getting to be year round,” McInerney said. “That doesn’t leave much time to take up another sport like tennis. Most sports are cheaper than tennis and kids can be on a team with their friends. Kids don’t want to just sit out at the club and play tennis all day anymore like we used to.

“It used to be that golf and tennis were the only sports you could make a living at as a women. Now you’ve got the WNBA and beach volleyball, and that is probably taking more girls away from tennis.”

Saviano said he is not convinced tennis is in trouble in this country.

“Other sports will continue to have their successes and that’s fine,” he said. “I would not say tennis is in a decline. I think we’ll continue to see it grow.”

Faye DeVera, whom McInerney recruited from Villa Park High last year, said she tried dancing and gymnastics before settling on tennis.

“I never really liked any of the other sports,” she said. “Tennis was in my family. I’d follow my brother around to his matches. It just looked like a lot of fun and it looked like he was meeting a lot of people through tennis. So I figured I’d try it.”

DeVera admits tennis is an incredibly demanding sport.

“It takes a lot of time to be really good at it,” she said. “It’s basically the only sport you can play. I’ve never been snowboarding in my life, but it’s something I’d love to do. I’ve decided I’ll have to wait to snowboard until I’m finished playing tennis.”

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Although DeVera was introduced to tennis by her family, many of her peers were introduced to tennis by such female stars as Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert and Tracy Austin.

McInerney said she hopes the next wave of female phenoms--Martina Hingis, Venus Williams and Anna Kournikova--can get little girls excited about tennis again.

“They all have such contrasting personalities,” McInerney said. “It’s going to be exciting to see what they do. Martina has an all-around game, Venus is athletic and Kournikova is a beauty queen.”

Undoubtedly, there are thousands of boys playing tennis today because of Andre Agassi, John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors. But Servite High’s Ryan Moore, a member of this year’s talented Southern California senior class along with Foothill’s Joost Hol, Woodbridge’s Chase Exon and San Marino’s Andrew Park, said there is no male star like those three females on the tour today.

“Sampras is good, but I think people would like to see more color from him,” Moore said. “As a player, I don’t really see the popularity of tennis dropping. But as a tennis enthusiast, I can see it. Tennis really needs a personality.”

Said Clark: “The popularity of a sport is often based on who are the figures at that time. Andre Agassi could be that figure but he plays one of five tournaments. Part of that is because of television. There isn’t as much tennis on anymore. You have to sit through a lot of tennis to learn a few new names.”

If you watched the final few rounds of the last two Grand Slams and were looking to learn some new American names, you would have been out of luck. The only American women to reach the quarterfinals of the French Open were Monica Seles, who was born in Yugoslavia, and Mary Joe Fernandez. No American man reached the quarterfinals. Wimbledon was even worse. Sampras, who won the men’s title, was the only American man or woman to make it past the round of 16.

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Looking for American stars coming up through the college ranks? Don’t get your hopes up. Of the top 100 men singles players in the final Intercollegiate Tennis Assn. rankings, 62 were foreign born, including six of the top 10 and 16 of the top 25. Of the top 100 women, 54 were foreign born, including 14 of the top 25.

Clark said there is a simple reason why foreign players dominate U.S. college tennis.

“Tennis is huge around the world, a lot bigger than it is here,” said Clark, who has two foreign players among his top six. “I’ve got foreign kids dying to come here. I get hundreds of letters from foreign kids every year. If I wanted to, I could easily have a team of all foreign players.”

Some schools are going that way. Mississippi and Mississippi State, ranked fourth and sixth in the final men’s poll, did not have an American among their top four players. McInerney said she will have two foreigners and four Southern Californians among her top six, but she is in the minority. California, USC and Arizona will have at least four foreign players among their top six.

“I know four or five college coaches who are going to Europe to recruit now,” said McInerney, who was the ITA women’s coach of the year in 1997. “I know a college coach who spent $6,000 recruiting American players last year and he didn’t get any of them. This year, he went to Europe.”

Said Saviano: “Tennis has evolved into an international sport. It’s second or third in popularity in most European countries. That creates a formidable challenge for us in this country.”

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Leach fears college coaches will continue to recruit Europeans unless drastic measures are taken to strengthen U.S junior tennis. Leach, whose son Rick plays on the tour, said much of the damage has already been done by the USTA.

“There was this big outcry about us burning out our young players,” Leach said. “The USTA heard that and they overreacted to the cases of Andrea Jaeger and Jennifer Capriati. They eliminated the 12-and-under national tournament. They eliminated the national hardcourts in Burlingame, the one national tournament where boys and girls were together, and they eliminated the Junior Davis Cup program. That’s a program that really helped my son Rick. Now they realized they blew it and they’re trying to do something about it.”

Leach believes the USTA simply has too much authority over tennis in this country.

“They have to go back and decentralize,” Leach said. “Our country is just too big. We have to utilize our club pros more and put more emphasis on college kids. Everybody doesn’t mature by the time they’re 18. Todd Martin, Mal Washington, my son Rick and Patrick McEnroe all played college tennis and they didn’t turn out too bad. College coaches know a lot about tennis. The USTA should take advantage of our knowledge, rather than leaving everything to two or three guys with the USTA.”

Saviano said the USTA will be addressing Leach’s and others’ concerns in an upcoming survey “Project 2000,” which is being headed by former USTA president Bob Cookson.

“You’ll see a lot of new programs introduced in the coming months,” Saviano said. “We’re interested in getting young people started in the game and keeping them excited about it.”