2027 USTA League regulations published - DQs at Nationals?

We are in the heart of 2026 USTA League season with leagues in many areas in full flight and some districts are getting ready for playoffs, and some sections will even have Sectionals soon.  So why am I writing about the 2027 regulations?

Well, this is the time of year they get published as some areas (Georgia) have Early Start Leagues for the 2027 championship year starting soon, and the regulations need to be published in order to administer the leagues.

You can see the whole 2027 USTA League Regulations document if you like, but I've given it a quick read and here is a summary of changes.

The big news is highlighted as #4 in the major changes for 2027 and is this:

Players may now be dynamically disqualified through National Championships 2.04B(2)

Does this mean what it sounds like?  Reading that paragraph of the regulations, the answer seems to be yes.  Specifically:

Players who are NTRP dynamically disqualified during National Championships shall be notified by the National staff, who shall follow 2.04B(2)a and 2.04C(2)

What is 2.04B(2)?  It is the option where dynamic ratings are calculated throughout the event and disqualify players that meet the criteria, and reverse their matches.

This is a big change.  In the past players could get disqualified as a result of matches at Nationals, but it was calculated and checked only at the conclusion of the event and notification done post-event with no matches reversed.  With this change, it is possible a team could make the semis only to have a player disqualified and matches reversed and fall out of the semis as a result.

It appears sections will still have the option to enforce strikes during playoffs or only at the conclusion, but National has changed what they are electing to do.

Is this a good change?  I think so, as a strategy some teams would employ would be to hide players in the regular season, and use them just enough in playoffs to advance, and once they made it to Nationals they wouldn't need to worry about strikes and could go all out.  And yes, every year there would be some players disqualified after Nationals, so it did happen.  Now, it didn't happen a lot, so this really probably only affects those few scenarios, but when it did happen, observations were it was pretty egregious seeing the level of play exhibited.

Now, one can argue that every team has above level players at Nationals and that is generally true, but the strike thresholds are high enough that to get strikes you really have to be clearly above level and this rule change may help combat the tactic I describe above.  Also, one could make the case it isn't fair to a player to travel to Nationals and potentially get disqualified after one match, but it also isn't fair to at level players to have to play a clearly out of level player, and it seems the USTA is perhaps now putting the interest of the other players ahead of the out of level self-rate.

What do you think?

But there are other changes in the regulations as it relates to dynamic ratings and disqualifications.

A subtle change is that Mixed exclusive players are now eligible to be dynamically disqualified.  Astute readers may ask, didn't this already happen?  Yes, the 2026 regulations state that participants in Mixed leagues can already be dynamically disqualified, but those are for self-rated or appealed rating players playing Mixed.  The change for 2027 seems to be that players that get a Mixed exclusive M rating are still subject to strikes and disqualification unlike players that get a C rating from Adult play.  This is probably a good idea but perhaps begs the question, why not do it for C rated players too?

Another change is that dynamic ratings will now be calculated for Adult 65 & Over and Mixed 55 & Over leagues.  In the past, it was just Adult 18/40/55 and when Mixed was added the 18/40 divisions, but now really all the Nationals/Invitational leagues will be included.  Another good change in my opinion.

One non-rating related change is that electronic line calling may now be used for USTA League play.  Specifically, sections can declare if they will allow it and establish procedures for it.  I haven't played with electronic line calling so can't offer an opinion on how accurate or useful it is, but an unbiased line calling mechanism seems like a good thing in those tight matches when players are sometimes seeing the ball land where they want and not where it really landed.

There are some miscellaneous other changes, but I think I hit the big ones.

Do you like these changes?  Are there others you'd like to see made?

Pacific Northwest / Northwest Washington ESL playoffs this weekend - Follow along!

I live and play in the Seattle area and we have a few leagues run as early start leagues (ESLs) and those leagues have their local playoffs this weekend, the leagues being Adult 55 & Over and Mixed 18 & Over.

Something cool that our League Coordinator has done before and is doing this year to make it easier to follow along is to have a Google Sheet that will show results (that one for 55+) as they happen to make it easier for folks to follow along that aren't at the event, or even are at the event.

I've advocated for awhile for doing more to make these events easier to follow so it is great to see this being done.  Thanks Jill!

How do you follow playoff events in your area?  Do you just click refresh on TennisLink incessantly hoping scores get entered?  Is there another app/site/page used to provide updates?  Is social media used to push real time updates out?

Analyzing 2025 USTA NTRP year-end ratings - Bump rates by level and gender

The 2025 year-end NTRP ratings have been published and that means we get to take a look at how ratings have changed.

In this post I'll take a look at bump rates by level and gender.

First, here are the overall bump rates by level for 2025.

2025 Bump Rates by Level

For comparison, here was last year.

2024 Bump Rates by Level

The rates are not dramatically different, but 2025 bump ups are perhaps a little lower with about 12.5% of 3.0s being bumped up compared to nearly 15% in 2024.  At the 3.5 level also slightly lower at 7% versus 7.5%, but 4.0s are right about the same and 4.5s perhaps a little higher.

But doing it by gender is more interesting, here are the women in 2025.

2025 Bump Rates by Level - Women

And for comparison, 2024.

2024 Bump Rates by Level - Women

Similar, at 3.5 and below the bump up percentage is down a bit, but at 4.0 and 4.5, perhaps slightly higher.

And then the men.

2025 Bump Rates by Level - Men

And 2024.

2024 Bump Rates by Level - Men

Again, similar here.

So at the lower levels, while bump rates remain higher there than at higher levels, the bump rates are trending down slightly from last year.

2025 USTA NTRP Year End Ratings Are Out!

The year-end NTRP ratings were published last night, a little earlier than expected at around 9pm EST, and with that players are rabidly checking their rating and determining what that means for what teams they can join and how captains can form their teams.

I'll try to post some analysis shortly, but my quick observation is that there seems to have been fewer bumps up and down than normal.  I haven't run across many surprising bump ups, but quite a few surprises where players perhaps should have been bumped up and weren't.

Stay tuned for more.

Simulating 2025 USTA League Nationals - 40 & Over 3.5 Women

USTA League Nationals for 2025 continue this weekend!  The schedule is slightly less compressed this year being played in five instead of four weekends, but still more compressed than past years where it was seven weekends.

This weekend has three events, 18 & Over 3.0 in Scottsdale, 40 & Over 3.5 in Surprise, and 40 & Over 4.5 in San Diego.

I've been doing simulations since 2018 and have found that the four semi-finalists are usually in the top six to seven projected teams, and more often than you might think, I project the four semi-finalists perfectly.  There are surprises sometimes and a mid-pack team overachieves and advances, that is why the matches are played on the courts and not on a computer.  Still, it is interesting to do these simulations and see how the projections do.

Why do these simulations you ask?  The primary reason is that the format for USTA League Nationals is now a flight-less random round-robin where each team plays four other random opponents.  This introduces significant variations in schedule strength, the possibility of an undefeated team not making the top-4, and teams vying for the top-4 perhaps not having played head-to-head and unfortunate tie-breakers being used.  The simulations aim to educate folks on how it all works and look at what may happen.  Also see this write-up for some things to know about Nationals.

Because of the fairly compressed schedule, I likely won't have the time to do previews/simulations of all events, but will try to do a few.  Let me know which you'd like to see!

Like I did last year, I'll be primarily just giving the data from the simulation and not writing a bunch of words.  Most of it is self-explanatory, but the favorites and contenders will be listed in alphabetical order.  The strengths are based on played averages.  Contact me if you want to learn more.

On to the projections from the simulation, here is the 40 & Over 3.5 women.

Teams: 17

Chance of 3 undefeated: 13%
Chance of 4 undefeated: 1.3%
Chance of 5 undefeated: <1%

Chance of 6 undefeated: <1%

Chance of tie for last spot / most likely size: 90% / 4
Strongest / weakest team strength: 3.63 / 3.37
Toughest / easiest schedule: 3.58 / 3.48
Favorites: Florida, Intermountain, Southern
Contenders: Eastern, Middle States, Midwest, New England, NorCal, SoCal

Have a chance: Caribbean, Mid-Atlantic, MOValley, Southwest

Just three teams are favorites, but there are a bunch that are contenders for the last spot and more that have a chance.  I have just four teams without a realistic chance of making the semis.  When looking at most-likely record, 5th place is 2-2 so it will be really competitive to see who steps out of the 10 teams projected to finish 2-2 and try to get a semi-final spot.  Or could we have our first 2-2 semi-finalist?

Given how competitive it may be, there is little chance of four 4-0 teams, but there are still scenarios where there could be five or six.

What do you think?

Simulating 2025 USTA League Nationals - 40 & Over 3.5 Men

USTA League Nationals for 2025 continue this weekend!  The schedule is slightly less compressed this year being played in five instead of four weekends, but still more compressed than past years where it was seven weekends.

This weekend has three events, 18 & Over 3.0 in Scottsdale, 40 & Over 3.5 in Surprise, and 40 & Over 4.5 in San Diego.

I've been doing simulations since 2018 and have found that the four semi-finalists are usually in the top six to seven projected teams, and more often than you might think, I project the four semi-finalists perfectly.  There are surprises sometimes and a mid-pack team overachieves and advances, that is why the matches are played on the courts and not on a computer.  Still, it is interesting to do these simulations and see how the projections do.

Why do these simulations you ask?  The primary reason is that the format for USTA League Nationals is now a flight-less random round-robin where each team plays four other random opponents.  This introduces significant variations in schedule strength, the possibility of an undefeated team not making the top-4, and teams vying for the top-4 perhaps not having played head-to-head and unfortunate tie-breakers being used.  The simulations aim to educate folks on how it all works and look at what may happen.  Also see this write-up for some things to know about Nationals.

Because of the fairly compressed schedule, I likely won't have the time to do previews/simulations of all events, but will try to do a few.  Let me know which you'd like to see!

Like I did last year, I'll be primarily just giving the data from the simulation and not writing a bunch of words.  Most of it is self-explanatory, but the favorites and contenders will be listed in alphabetical order.  The strengths are based on played averages.  Contact me if you want to learn more.

On to the projections from the simulation, here is the 40 & Over 3.5 men.

Teams: 17

Chance of 3 undefeated: 24%
Chance of 4 undefeated: 6.2%
Chance of 5 undefeated: <1%

Chance of 6 undefeated: <1%

Chance of tie for last spot / most likely size: 89% / 4
Strongest / weakest team strength: 3.68 / 3.39
Toughest / easiest schedule: 3.65 / 3.49
Favorites: Caribbean, Southern, Texas
Contenders: Middle States, NorCal, Northern, PNW

Have a chance: SoCal

I list just three favorites, but two of the contenders are a fraction away from being favorites, and the other two are nipping at their heels.  So it feels like 7 teams vying for 4 spots.  All 7 have a better than 11% chance of going 4-0, so it should be very competitive.

There are some ways for there to be five 4-0 teams but it seems pretty slim.

What do you think?

Simulating 2025 USTA League Nationals - 40 & Over 4.0 Men

USTA League Nationals for 2025 continue this weekend!  The schedule is slightly less compressed this year being played in five instead of four weekends, but still more compressed than past years where it was seven weekends.

This weekend has three events, 18 & Over 4.5 in Surprise, 40 & Over 3.0 in San Diego, and 40 & Over 4.0 in Scottsdale.

I've been doing simulations since 2018 and have found that the four semi-finalists are usually in the top six to seven projected teams, and more often than you might think, I project the four semi-finalists perfectly.  There are surprises sometimes and a mid-pack team overachieves and advances, that is why the matches are played on the courts and not on a computer.  Still, it is interesting to do these simulations and see how the projections do.

Why do these simulations you ask?  The primary reason is that the format for USTA League Nationals is now a flight-less random round-robin where each team plays four other random opponents.  This introduces significant variations in schedule strength, the possibility of an undefeated team not making the top-4, and teams vying for the top-4 perhaps not having played head-to-head and unfortunate tie-breakers being used.  The simulations aim to educate folks on how it all works and look at what may happen.  Also see this write-up for some things to know about Nationals.

Because of the fairly compressed schedule, I likely won't have the time to do previews/simulations of all events, but will try to do a few.  Let me know which you'd like to see!

Like I did last year, I'll be primarily just giving the data from the simulation and not writing a bunch of words.  Most of it is self-explanatory, but the favorites and contenders will be listed in alphabetical order.  The strengths are based on played averages.  Contact me if you want to learn more.

On to the projections from the simulation, here is the 40 & Over 4.0 men.

Teams: 17

Chance of 3 undefeated: 37%
Chance of 4 undefeated: 14%
Chance of 5 undefeated: 1.4%

Chance of 6 undefeated: <1%

Chance of tie for last spot / most likely size: 83% / 4
Strongest / weakest team strength: 4.10 / 3.86
Toughest / easiest schedule: 4.01 / 3.91
Favorites: Florida, Middle States, Midwest, Texas
Contenders: Missouri Valley, Southern

Have a chance: NorCal

This event appears pretty top heavy with four pretty clear favorites and thus a decent chance of four 4-0 teams.  The overall favorite to make the semis isn't the strongest team, but benefits from the easiest schedule.  There are a few contenders that could spoil it and there is a 1.4% chance of five 4-0 teams.

What do you think?