During the 2023 US Open, I was astonished to see Hsieh Su-Wei commit an egregious dad joke during her semifinal women’s doubles match. My definition of a tennis dad joke encompasses a wide range of on-court actions or generally inoffensive utterances. However, in the spirit of a true dad joke, the tennis variation produces a grimace or a groan rather than a laugh. Tennis dad jokes are funny because they are either sincerely or intentionally not funny. In any case, I don’t recall ever seeing this particular move in professional tennis. In the almost two years since I witnessed this original incident, I have yet to stumble across another instance of this occurring.
Hsieh was partnered with Xinyu Wang against Gabi Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe. At 2-2 in the first set, Hseih swung over a ball that was clearly going to sail past the baseline. That created an intentional whiff, which is a classic tennis dad joke. It gives the other team momentary hope that the point might not be over, only to dash their hopes.
I was watching the match live and was surprised to see an intentional whiff in a Grand Slam tournament. In fact, I immediately started doubting whether it was intentional or a split-second realization that the ball would be out. Fortunately, I could rewind, and that second look confirmed that it was deliberate.
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Hseih swings over the ball rather than pulling the racquet back, which is what a player who almost hits an out ball and decides against it at the last moment typically does. Routliffe, who missed the volley, does not bite on the psych-out and was already turning presumably to apologize to her partner and discuss the next point.
I used to frequent a drill where a couple of regulars would perpetrate the intentional whiff at every possible opportunity. That would almost always prompt everyone else to sarcastically mutter, “That never gets old.” I think this joke is best limited to a single occurrence per match or drill.
I can confidently attest that I have never intentionally whiffed in any situation. That is a pragmatic decision because I would 100% accidentally hit the ball. This is the only tennis dad joke that I kind of consider a jerk move. In fact, jerk was not the first word that sprang to mind.
I have a couple more tennis dad jokes coming tomorrow. In the meantime, I would love to hear about your favorite tennis Dad jokes.
