WHY I WANT USTA LEADERSHIP OUT OF TENNIS. by Javier Palenque

The daily cost of payroll for the USTA is $195K, per hour, is $24K, and per minute think of it as $405.00. So, by the time you are finished reading this three-minute article, tennis in America will have paid the USTA people $1,215.00.

To me, that is beyond absurd as the US Open is only for two weeks out of fifty-two and the working year has 260 days and the US Open is only for 10 of those days (10/260 = 4% of the time). Of course, we all know that things take time, and I am not suggesting that putting the show up takes three weeks, what I am saying is that the part-time vs full-time breakdown should be more like 90% and 10% respectively, and not as how it is now which is 10% part-time and 90% full time. The only loser of this dumb math is of course the sport. This means plenty of money for workers who most of the year have nothing to do, while the sport is barely funded by design and approval of the board. To the board members who read my articles yet pretend they do not (this is where they get many policy ideas without giving credit to the author) what I am stating so firmly they will obviously oppose.

This morning a good friend sent me an article that highlights that at The Davis Cup finals, three thousand Finns (people from Finland) showed up in Malaga, Spain to support their team. I immediately thought of the incapable USTA executives and the topic for my Thanksgiving article. As a reference point, Finland has one top 100 player and is a country of 6 million people, 3000 of whom decided to visit Spain to support their nation.

As a comparison, the USA is 57X larger in population and is not even among the final eight teams. Three Thousand people from Finland is the equivalent of 170,000 US fans attending the event in Spain and lastly, they have one top 100 player with a 6M population, the logical comparison would be for the US to have 57 top 100 players to be equivalent, we have only 10.

To bring even more perspective to the numbers and data, in the two weeks of the Miami Open 386K people showed up, and at Indian Wells, 485K people showed up. Compare this to the relative 170K fans that should show up in Spain if the USA qualified and you will realize that tennis is a disaster (though the best-funded sport) for the country. To explain even further my point, the USA has only 330K adults registered under its programs or only twice the relative amount of Finns visiting Spain to support their tennis team.

Just like in any other country in the world, tennis is the sport of the 1%. So a country of 339 million (USA) should have 3,390,000 players; 600,000 kids play. The reality is that only 98K kids play, most quit by age 14, and there are only 330K adults registered in the USTA. In other words, the USTA has managed to attract only one-tenth of the ideal tennis population and one-eighth of the kids. To be where it needs to be (the sport of the 1%), adults participation would have to grow 10 times and kids participation would have to grow eight times. But the reality is that the numbers are closer to zero and moving in that direction and the useless board does nothing about it.

In the 2023 budget, of course, there is zero funding to do either and the USTA wonders why tennis is dying, yet a $70M payroll budget is approved with no metrics to evaluate results and plenty of "pretending" to care, the only care that matters is called "funding", and there is none of that for tennis just cheap words, like the mission statement. These people have no dignity or shame.

I think I made it abundantly clear that the path for tennis under the Ol’ boys is the oblivion of the sport, and yet the board when it sees the picture above, thinks the Dachshund is doing a great job when the potential and size of the great Dane is ignored. for those that do not understand we are in size like the Great Dane and have Dachshund results, only a pathetic board can fail to see the difference. This is why I want them all out of the sport.

As always, I am unequivocally certain of my opinions and sadly correct.

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

I can be reached at [email protected]

PS. Who in their right mind thinks that tennis under the Ol’ Boys has a future? I want them all out of the sport since they have proven not to even understand the size of the country.

Please see how Finland reports participation, and compare it to the USTA which hides all information while wasting all the money it gets every year not on tennis or promoting the sport but on people who barely have enough work throughout the year.