VENEZUELA AND THE FAILED USTA LEADERSHIP By Javier Palenque

What? One is a Banana Republic, and the USTA is the world’s best-funded sports not-for-profit that hosts the US Open every year. What can they possibly have in common, Javier? The simple answer to that fair question is the tyranny disguised under democracy in the case of the failed state called Venezuela, and the similar tyranny of the USTA disguised as a not-for-profit sports organization that cares about tennis in our country.

Yesterday, Venezuela’s Maduro lost the election, but somehow won the election this morning. This, of course, is part of the false narrative they use to continue to use the state of Venezuela to send drugs and crime all over the world, including the United States.

When was the last time you participated in or were invited to a USTA meeting where dissent is allowed? When did we see open and transparent elections? When does the USTA provide a forum for them to be held accountable? How can we question how the money claimed in Community Tennis does not add up? Why does the CEO of Community Tennis have to be a board member of the TIA, which conveniently reports marvelous participation numbers that are false? (Just like Maduro claims he won the elections). And the list never ends; it is so long.

I do not think the tennis people in the world understand just how well-funded and wasteful the USTA is, and how miserably poorly run it is. Imagine the absurd choices the USTA’s CEO makes to promote tennis:

- Have the organization listen to no one.

- Forbid any opportunity for dissent.

- Keep raising prices to watch the professionals play, this way more and more people leave the sport.

I do not want to bore you with geopolitical conflicts; after all, this is a growing tennis newsletter. But the fact is, it is inevitable that you ignore what is around you. I am just trying to open your mind and eyes.

Venezuela is a wealthy country, destroyed by socialism and the tyranny of the state. America is a wealthy country, and tennis is a fabulous sport that has been destroyed by the leadership of the USTA. How is that possible, you may ask? Aristotle would easily answer that question: it is called governance.

The USTA’s failure is its governance, the leadership, and the limited mindset they have. Taking all the resources the game brings, dressing it up as a progressive organization, woke-friendly, and macabre as it can be.

Tennis needs a summit, Mr. CEO, a meeting of the brightest tennis minds, to tell you what to do and to hold you accountable for your monumental failures.

In the last six months alone: defending the sexual abuse cases, hiding many more, raising US Open ticket prices, and avoiding dissent. If we go back fourteen years, not having new sponsors of any significance, and still getting paid is beyond absurd. In the real world, people get paid by results, not by attendance. Your mission states growing the game, you understood that to mean growing revenues of the US Open. Nowhere is that written.

I suggest we have a meeting in Jekyll Island, GA, the same place where the Federal Reserve was created decades ago. The USTA organizes it, and we can all broadcast the discussion openly for the world to see, for the fans to engage, and for the people to question. We can have live discussions on resource allocation, press coverage, and pricing discussions; parks and recreation folks can come and ask for help.

Who can oppose this kind of engagement so we can all see that those who control the sport are being held accountable and transparent?

We can then discuss if the US Open is a pop-up event (it shows up for two weeks of the year only). Why does it need a DEI department when it needs coaches in all kinds of neighborhoods?

We can then ask the failed CEO to establish a day of “the state of the sport,” in which the CEO has to give an address following the yearly Jekyll Island summit to explain to people the accomplishments and failures of the leadership.

To me, that sounds perfectly reasonable, open, and a great way to move the sport forward. But wait, Maduro just lost the election in Venezuela. Do you think he is going to allow his fraud to be exposed?

Well, I do not know, but if the USTA board and leadership are guilty of nothing, why would they not have a summit and welcome all new ideas from people from all walks of life?

The answer is, of course, clear. Just follow the news about Venezuela, and you will reach only one conclusion. How can the country with the most oil reserves in the hemisphere, Venezuela, not have money and be under a dictatorship? And then ask yourself, how can the best-funded sport in the country be played by only old people and no kids, the sport destroyed and yet record revenues?

When you figure this out, let me know when the Jekyll Island summit will take place, because if it does, I will make sure that we no longer have the sport under a tyranny of the inept.

I say NO to ineptitude and YES to growing the game.

I can be reached at [email protected]

If you want to laugh, watch the movie The Dictator with Borat, and you will understand how foolish it all is. It needs to stop, and tennis needs to be saved from the grip of the incapables’. This is the only way to save the sport. The other option is to lose the sport as we are doing now. If you are not inclined to believe me, on your way to work, watch the parks, watch the tennis courts, and if someone is playing, figure out their age, there is your answer. You are being fooled, America! If you want a laugh, watch Borat speak.