It appears the answer is no, there will not be a blanket extension of the suspension and it will be up to each section or district to determine how to begin sanctioned play again for USTA League and other team, junior, and social events. National events including Pro and other ITF related events remain suspended through July 31 in line with the ITF and ATP suspensions of play.
Beginning June 1, the suspension of USTA Sanctioned products and events noted below will now be at the discretion of the USTA Sections and local health authorities. USTA Southern is passing the decision on to our nine State Associations and local health authorities.
Perhaps sections had this information prior to this announcement and were making plans to resume events in June, but June 1 is just 5 days away now so sections may be scrambling to come up with plans, but hopefully they had tentative plans that are ready to go if they deem it appropriate and local rules allow resumption of play.
Stay tuned for announcements from sections. What are you hearing in your area?
USTA League Nationals has been canceled, and with that, some sections have decided to cancel Sectionals and other playoffs leading up to those. With varying levels of playoffs being played, the need to play regular season leagues varies too.
In some areas, play started and a regular season was mostly but not completely finished. Some of these areas are planning to resume play and complete the season, but others have already said it is canceled.
Other areas may have completed a regular season, but did not get to playoffs yet.
And many areas, for one or more leagues, didn't even get started yet, and it is questionable if matches will ever be played. Some areas are planning to begin play when allowed for at least a few leagues
Those that do start or resume play may do so with revised formats, some dropping to 3 courts to make more available for more matches, others choosing to play 5 courts instead of 4 (as was the new rule for 40 & Over this year) since it won't be leading up to Nationals.
Many players are just wanting to be able to play again. I know in my area clubs are just beginning to re-open with restricted rules, but players are flocking to public courts seeking out an opportunity to play. Will these players want to get back to playing USTA League? Or with the season disrupted to they not feel the need?
Regardless, there have been and will be more USTA League matches played this year, and as such a big question becomes, what will the USTA do with 2020 year-end NTRP ratings?
Some players played a fair number of league matches as originally planned, and as such have played enough to ordinarily get a new year-end rating. Those areas that resume/begin play will only add to this total. So even without Nationals or other playoffs leading up to that, there is sufficient match play to calculate ratings.
But, year-end ratings normally factor in Nationals and how sections and specific players did there as part of their benchmark calculations. These are an important part of ratings, to help balance things across all of the sections to try to make sure that a 3.5 in Mid-Atlantic is relatively the same as a 3.5 in Northern California. In the absence of Nationals, what should be done?
One approach would be to just throw 2020 out as if it never happened, and have players just keep their 2019 (or prior if they didn't have a 2019) year-end rating and use it for 2021. This has some merit, teams were formed and never had a chance to play or finish a season, this approach would let those teams stay as-is for 2021 and get their chance then.
Another approach is to go ahead and calculate 2020 year-end ratings for those that played enough matches with an alternate approach to doing so. This could simply be using a player's final dynamic rating, or some other factors could be included in the absence of Nationals.
The problem with the first approach is that player's abilities do change year to year as players practice and improve, or as they get older and skills diminish. Throwing out 2020 completely means there is no chance for any of these changes to be reflected. It would seem that if a player played the minimum 3 matches to get a new year-end rating, they should get one so if their game improved or declined, that can be reflected and they play at the appropriate level for 2021.
This is especially true for self-rated players. If they get the requisite 3 matches in, why should they have to stay self-rated for 2021 leagues? About 35% of all self-rates in a given year are bumped up or down at year-end, so it would seem to be a big miss if all of these players remained self-rated. You would have a significant number of players who should have been bumped up and get to play too low a level, or another significant group that lost badly in 2020 and are stuck having to play at too high a level.
Appeal players are also a group that one could argue should get a new year-end rating. These players had a higher or lower rating but were close enough to appeal. If their rating has leapt up or down from the matches they did play in 2020, that would seem to be a pretty strong data point saying the appeal was perhaps not appropriate and they really should be at the higher or lower level.
Personally, I think there should be 2020 year-end ratings and all players that played 3 matches should get one. I think there are more problems from players playing with ratings that are based on results from 18+ months ago than there are for 2020 teams not having had their chance to play a full season.
Now, the dark side of league play is that some players that know their remaining matches will count will use them to tank matches to try and offset good results from earlier in the year to stay at their level, or try to get bumped down. If this is a significant concern, the USTA could elect to only use matches played prior to the suspension of play. This still seems more reasonable to me than throwing out the whole year.
Note that even if all matches played are used, and certainly if only those played prior to the suspension count, there will be a lot of players that don't end up playing 3 matches and have their 2019 rating carry over anyway. It just seems wrong to not use matches played in good faith for those that did play, especially for self-rated players.
For reference, in the 2019 rating year, there were just under 134K team matches played in 18/40 & Over leagues. So far in 2020, just under 35K have been played. Thirty-five thousand is a significant number, but about 25% of what might have been played had 2020 been a normal year. This means, a lot of players will stay the same for 2020 anyway, no need to throw all of 2020 out to accomplish that.
But what do you think? To get your feedback, I've set up a poll with a number of options, please vote as I'm genuinely curious what people think in general.
Should the USTA publish 2020 year-end NTRP ratings?
There was a lot of angst and discussion about USTA National's move to a 4-court format for 40 & Over in 2020 and most sections following suit. General feedback I heard, and survey's I did, revealed the vast majority of players didn't like the format for a variety of reasons.
I've heard that some sections as they plan to resume play for 2020 are going back to a 5-court format for 40 & Over since there are no Nationals and in most cases no Sectionals or other playoffs, as this gives more opportunity to play and I think sections heard that player's didn't like the 4-court format.
In my section, Pacific Northwest, we were promised a survey after the season, and while the seasons in most districts were stopped short, in Seattle we got all but one weekend of regular season play in, and since none of the leagues are being resumed, the season is over and we have our survey!
I just took the survey, and here is what was asked along with my answers and thoughts.
Player, captain, or did not play?
I did not captain this year, was only a player. It will be interesting to see if they break the results out by player vs captain and how different they are.
Did you like the 4-court format with 1 singles and 3 doubles?
Which match format do you prefer for the Adult 40 League 3.0-4.5+ levels? (pick 1st/2nd of)
1 singles / 4 doubles
1 singles / 2 doubles
2 singles / 3 doubles
3 doubles
2 singles / 2 doubles
1 singles / 3 doubles
This is a reasonable question and has numerous options, so hopefully the bad math National used to move to a 4-court format doesn't happen again. It does offer two 5-court formats, two 4-court formats, and two 3-court formats. It is light on singles with just two options having 2 singles courts and one having no singles.
I picked 2S/3D as my first choice because I think that is the right combination of singles and doubles and gets 8 players in a match and has an odd number of courts so team wins are clear.
My second choice was 1S/4D. I struggled with this as I hate to drop to just 1 singles court, but the only other 2 singles court option was 4 courts which is even and I don't like, and only gets 6 players in a match which I don't like.
Which team match scoring method do you think works best for this league for 3.0-4.5+ levels?
Team wins (if even courts, normal tie-breakers ultimately 1D winner the last breaker)
Points per position
I chose team wins as my preferred. Teams are, well, teams, and I think each match having a winner based on courts is important. I did comment that I do prefer PPP if it is an even court format as I don't like the tie-breakers used to break 2-2 ties.
Should Points Per Position continue to be used in the Pacific NW?
I answered it should be if a league uses an even court format, otherwise it should not.
What is your first choice for some Points Per Position options?
Three options for 1S / 3D listed along with other/comment
3321
1211
2221
This is an impossible question, and three options is pretty slim given the infinite possibilities. They also focused on just 1S / 3D, which I guess you have to lest this explode with all the permutations. I picked 3321 of these simply because I believe PPP should give more weight to court 1 and go down from there, and that is the only option that does that.
All in all, a reasonable survey. I look forward to seeing the results and how the section interprets them.
If you play in PNW, please do take the survey yourself. You should have received an e-mail from the section with a link. If not, reach out to your League Coordinator or drop me a note.
It has been a few weeks since I posted an update, mainly because there hasn't been much to report on. But enough time has passed, that there are a few things worth discussing.
First, many areas are beginning to slowly re-open and tennis courts that were closed are starting to be made available again. In my area most high school and other public courts were closed, and players had to scrounge to find the few private or community courts that were still open. Thankfully, a couple weeks ago as phase 1 of reopening begin some high school courts were opened, and they have been mostly flooded with players, many from my club (it is about a mile away). However, my club remain closed.
That changes later this week though as tennis clubs are being allowed to reopen, it seems for just tennis. My club is a health club with a pool as well and only tennis is being opened and with these rules:
Court times will be 1 hour and 15 minutes with a 15 minute changeover period [we are normally 90 minute court times]. You must exit the court when your court time is up.
Singles play only. The only exception for doubles play is immediate family members living under the same household.
Maintain the 6-foot social distancing requirement.
Please go directly to your court and avoid socializing before or after.
No bathrooms will be available.
All garbage cans, benches, and scorecards have been removed.
No towels or water will be accessible (please bring your own).
This is a step forward and will ease the burden on local high school and other public courts.
What about USTA League play? Several sections have outlined plans to begin play again, I wrote about Southern California having a plan to resume and even play Sectionals, while Pacific Northwest threw in the towel on 2020 leagues and will just begin league play with our 2021 early start leagues in the Fall.
Other sections have been trying to map out plans to complete leagues and even get playoffs in, but Southern has canceled most Sectionals (18/40/55/65/Mixed/Combo) and I wouldn't be surprised to see more follow suit.
What is going on in your area? Are courts and facilities reopening? Is there a plan to get league play going again in June or July?
Organized tennis has been suspended in the United States for a couple months now, but some areas have announced plans for restarting leagues, and ALTA has joined those doing so.
Right or wrong, some states are opening for business more quickly than others and Georgia is one of those on the quicker route, and as a result ALTA notified members in an e-mail that registration for Summer leagues on Monday May 4.
Now, that doesn't mean play begins right away, leagues don't actually start until mid/late June, specifically:
Senior Women - June 18 - July 30
Senior Men - June 19 - July 31
Mixed Doubles - June 20 - August 1
The e-mail does not that the dates are subject to change, but there is at least something to look forward to for Atlanta area players.
