However, as with most things in life, league play isn't all a bed of roses. Some players take things very seriously and get too competitive leading to sportsmanship issues and confrontations, there are chronic bad line callers, and players that self-rate too low and captains that encourage it, players that will throw games or matches to manage their rating, and the list goes on. By and large, there are certainly more positives than negatives, but reducing the negatives should certainly be a goal of the USTA.
The National regulations outline a standard procedure for filing grievances for many of these situations, but there has not been a structure, that I'm aware of at least, for meting out punishment for various violations should they be determined to have occurred. That is until now.
For 2022, the Mid-Atlantic section has published a "USTA League Suspension Point System" that outlines specific violations and the suspension points they will accrue, and the point totals at which specific suspensions will be levied. Some examples:
- Equipment abuse - 2 points
- Unsportsmanlike conduct - 2-4 points
- Tanking - 2-4 points
- Threaten physical violence - 8-10 points
- Gambling - 8 points
- Self-rating lower than true ability - 2-5 points
- Omitting information during self-rating - 8-10 points
- Misrepresenting scores - 18 points
- Misrepresenting identity - 24 points
There are more, but that gives you the idea.
Once a player accrues 10 suspension points in a 12 month period, they are suspending from league events for three months. A second suspension occurs if another eight points are accrued (combined with those rolled over) in the next 12 month period, and another six points accrued or carried over results in a TBD suspension.
This is just a summary, there are other provisions outlined in the document, so give it a read if you are interested in all the details.
I do not know what precipitated creating this suspension point system, but suspect it was wanting to take some of the subjectivity out of handling complaints with repeat offenders. Rather than simply giving consideration to past offenses, this structure lays out clear rules for how things should be handled.
If their goal was to scare players into behaving, perhaps that will work on the surface, but the challenge will always be what it has been in the past, how are any of these violations reported and proven? Some are factual or can be fact checked, but others are still a subjective decision or he said/she said scenarios, so they will likely be hard to prove without video evidence or the like. Perhaps this will lead to players recording their matches so they have evidence should something occur.
Additionally, I believe any violations have to be reported through the grievance system that requires the filer to pay a fee, so that alone will likely reduce a lot of the noise. But I'm sure there will be some annoyed players that will file grievances because Sue habitually makes bad calls or because Bob is clearly tanking games, and it will be interesting to hear how things play out.
What do you think? Is a suspension points system like this needed? Or is it overkill? Given it is in place, how do you think it will work? Will grievances be upheld and players accrue points for suspensions?
