The Delusion of ROI: What Junior Tennis Gets Wrong—and Senior Tennis Gets Right

A follow-up idea stemming from yesterday’s post about the economic inequities between junior and senior tennis is a related micro-topic. It centers around the illusion of return on investment. The junior tennis ecosystem is largely fueled by a powerful fantasy. Parents (and sometimes even the players themselves) believe that with enough money, sacrifice, and hard work, tennis greatness and a lucrative professional career are within reach. Failing that, at least there is the potential of a college scholarship.

Junior tournaments are populated by families burning vacation days to stand on blistering hot sidelines, pouring resources into private lessons, national travel, custom stringing, fitness trainers, and sometimes even homeschool tutors. It adds up—quickly. And while few say it out loud, the intentions are clear. The hope of a future payoff. Framed that way, junior tennis isn’t an indulgence, but rather an investment.

The emergence of NIL (Name, Image, Likeness) deals has clouded the dynamic for college tennis. In marquee sports like football and basketball, NIL opportunities have turned collegiate athletics into quasi-professional ventures. However, for “minor” sports like tennis, it is starting to show the opposite effect. Athletic departments and third parties are directing resources toward programs that generate visibility and revenue. Meanwhile, tennis slips further into the background. The money is flowing, just not toward tennis. All that to say, players who earn college scholarships for tennis receive far less in financial remuneration than what was poured into their junior development.

If you watch “King Richard” or read Ben Rothenberg’s “Naomi Osaka: Her Journey to Finding Her Power and Her Voice,” you can see the same haunting story of staggering costs and financial strain that comes with chasing tennis greatness. In both stories, the results are extraordinary. However, the outcomes were more likely to be ruinous for all but the most statistically improbable outliers. For every Serena or Naomi, there are thousands of families who went all in, only to come up empty-handed. It’s a system built on dreams, but powered by delusion.

And yet… that delusion is part of what keeps the junior tennis engine running.

Contrast that with senior tennis. No one is playing the sport at more advanced ages because they are expecting an endorsement deal or hoping to be scouted by IMG. Any delusion of ROI is gone. What exists in senior tennis is the sport in its purest form. People compete for love of the game, for the pursuit of personal excellence, and for the camaraderie of seeing familiar faces across the net year after year. Tennis is both the purpose and reward of a life well lived.

That is what makes it so frustrating that senior tennis remains overlooked, underfunded, and underpromoted. I’ve had well-placed individuals in the tennis industry tell me, with complete seriousness, that there’s no future in senior tennis. That is cited as sufficient justification for advocacy organizations, including the USTA, to deprioritize it. Through a purely financial lens, they’re arguably right. Senior tennis will not generate new revenue streams, glamour, or send high-achieving players into a pipeline leading elsewhere.

But that also misses the entire point.

Senior tennis is the culmination of a lifelong relationship with the sport. It’s what happens when the joy, grit, and community is all that is left. It’s the part of the tennis ecosystem that most purely represents what the sport is supposed to be about. If the goal is to foster a culture of lifelong engagement in tennis, then we should be spotlighting senior tennis, not ignoring it. That’s where the real return on investment lies.

If the USTA truly wants to fix the participation problem in senior tournament play, it cannot come from tweaks to the ranking points tables or tournament framework. Instead, it has to start by celebrating the essence of senior tennis and the people who play it. It’s not because they’re the future of the sport, but because they’re its most authentic expression. Senior tennis isn’t a dead end, but rather a destination.