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Great Christmas Gifts for Tennis Players (2024 Edition) Ultimate Stocking Stuffer List for Tennis Players (2024 Edition) Secrets of Winning Tennis The USTA Encourages Double Dipping The Speed Ladder Tennis Beyond the Headlines: November 18, 2024 A Balanced Diet: Healthy Tennis Engagements

Time for a New Look (and Feel)

Yesterday I made significant updates to the look and feel of this site. It was the first major structure revision since Fiend At Court was launched on New Year’s Eve in 2019. At that time, I had little experience with WordPress themes and even less of an idea what this blog would eventually turn out to be. Two plus years into this project, I now have a more refined sense of the content and flow. Improvements to the presentation and navigation features on the site were long overdue.

Thank God It’s MRI Day

As a senior tennis player, I am always on the lookout for ways to put a little more “pop” in my game. Unfortunately, last weekend I wrong-footed myself trying to recover position from a deep lob and felt a “pop” in my foot and ankle area. It was immediately apparent that I would be retiring from the match. I couldn’t take a step without excruciating pain. I am having an MRI today and will know on Monday the full nature and extent of the injury. (I have a pretty good idea what it is.)

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Doubles Domination

When I published a summary of all the doubles books reviewed on this site last year, a couple of people asked me how I managed to miss “Doubles Domination: The Best of the Best” by Bob Allcorn. Quite frankly, I didn’t even know that the book existed. In retrospect, the omission is a travesty. It is very good.

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See No Evil: The Line Umpire in Tennis

Today I was astonished to discover that I haven’t written directly about a rule that appears in the USTA Friend at Court since November of last year. It is high time we resumed our (apparently no so) steady march through the Rules of Tennis. We are currently in the “Role of Court Officials” section and this week will turn our attention to the line umpire.

Leverage and Momentum in Tennis

A data and analytics research group will soon release a paper that studies momentum swings in tennis. “Live Counter- Factual Analysis in Women’s Tennis Using Automatic Key- Moment Detection” uses machine learning to predict how certain events in a match will play out before they occur. The paper defines some new metrics for tennis that could potentially extend the state of the art of analytic data analysis in tennis.

These Shoes Were Made for Walking?

Last weekend one of my league matches was relocated to an indoor facility after our match was unexpectedly disrupted by rain. As we converged on the pro-shop, one of the players snapped up a pair of shoes in her size from the very depleted inventory. She wasn’t wild on the color, but these are desperate times. Recently I have been wondering if the shoe shortage will result in significant migrations in brand preference once the supply chain issues are resolved.

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How I Learned to Love the Tennis Paywall

I subscribe to Tennis Channel Plus and ESPN+, the two primary paid streaming services for tennis coverage. As a tennis super fan that writes a daily tennis blog, it would only be surprising if that was not the case. Access to great matches that will never be granted a moment of airtime is a clear benefit to me. However, the matches I elect to watch are also a form of tennis activism. It sends a signal to the tennis broadcast companies on what the public might also want to see.

Hot Shots: Playing a Ball Past the Net

As a lifetime tennis player and fan I have seen a lot of unusual shots. In a league match last Sunday, I successfully played a rare shot myself. For the first time in my life, I hit a winner from the opponents side of the net. In fact it is the only time I have ever been in position to even attempt such a shot. If I didn’t have such poor footwork, it probably wouldn’t have happened.

7 Days in Hell

A couple of weeks ago the Monday tennis news roundup post on this site referenced an article posted by tennis.com on the “best” tennis movies. I filed the titles away for those inevitable times when I don’t have the bandwidth to read a full book. I had to take a business trip this week on very short notice, so it was the perfect time to screen one of those films on my flight out. This movie… should not be viewed in a public setting where someone else can see your screen.