Will there be 2020 USTA League year-end ratings? Still to be determined 😕

USTA League play was suspended for several months, and even though it has resumed in a number of areas, there will be no Nationals this year, and in most sections it appears Sectionals and lower rounds of playoffs may not happen either.

A natural question then becomes, what will happen with year-end ratings for 2020?  I wrote my thoughts on the subject a couple months ago and have asked questions and been on the lookout for any indication of what might happen, but heard today that the USTA has not made a decision one way or the other yet.

There are pros and cons to publishing ratings, although I fall on the side of seeing more pros in doing the publishing, at least on a limited basis.  I did run a poll in my earlier post and here are the results as I write this today.

While there is not a clear cut consensus, it does seem more players are wanting ratings calculated than not, with 63% wanting them calculated, perhaps with limited matches and/or more lenient appeal thresholds.  Just 22% voted an outright no, with another 14% with qualified no's.

It may be the USTA knows, or at least has a good idea, what they will do and is just waiting to announce so that leagues are played with a little doubt to prevent all out tanking of matches in the event matches played now do count.  For now though, we wait and see.

For what is is worth, I got this news indirectly via an NTRP Ratings webinar National (Heather Hawkes) put on for NorCal.  Thanks to my NorCal readers for the info and it is good to see National is continuing with this webinar series which Heather has been doing across all the sections the past few years.