everyone is a 4.0

[lendl lives]

as i travel around to different clubs and facilities i notice everyone seems to lump themselves into the the 4.0's. seems like there are more good "4.0's" than 4.5's. a friend shared he new a guy their that ranked himself a 3.5 but won an open tournament!

[Morpheus]

I agree. There seems to be a sweet spot if you want to play a lot. If you say you are a 4.5, you won't get to sub in 4.0 leagues because you are "too good." If you are a 3.5, you are "not good enough." 4.0 is the level where the tennis is fun and the good can play with the developing without a lot of frustration.

[moonshine]

So in MD there is a guy who played for Clemson playing as a 4.0. In Texas, it was a guy who played for Iowa. At 4.0 Nationals there was a guy who played for USC (I think) and he got beat...badly. How is it that I got moved up?

Self-rate as low as possible and enjoy the ascension.

[lendl lives]

also, all players who are obviously not 4.0's are 4.5's. saw this teaching pro who was about 24yrs play yesterday in a 4.5 league match. he played in the french open and it was obvious he didn't have any business playing at the 4.5 level.

also as a side note a friend played he is ranked 1 in 5.0's (doubles) norcal. if you look at him play he looks like a mediocre 4.0 but he always wins. bizzare.

[Gaines Hillix]

It seems that the self rating scale is deceptive. From what I see and hear, if you honestly rate yourself a 4.0 on the NTRP skills scale, most players of equal skill level will actually be playing a 1/2 or full level below that in USTA. I agree there seem to be a lot of sandbaggers at the 4.5 level.

[Gaines Hillix]

Ed, ALTA has no player rating system, per se. There are 4 major levels, AA, A, B, C. They have mens, womens and mixed leagues and seniors and juniors. There are about 60,000 or so members and about 4,000 teams. Teaching Pros and active college players are always supposed to be on a AA team. Active high schoolers are supposed to play in B or above. AA has 4 sub- levels. The others have 8 or 9 sub-levels. A group of people with no previous ALTA record can enter a team at any level they want. This is where sandbagging is common. But, if a new team wins their division or the city tournament at their level they get moved up 2-5 sublevels. Eventually a team will reach their proper level if they stay together. If players with previous experience at a higher level are added to a team, there is a formula that is used to determine the sub-level the team will be placed in. It is common for teams to have a variety of skill levels on them. I am on an A8 team and we have players from age 30-56 and from 3.0 to 4.5 in NTRP rating. If a team gets too frustrated with not winning any matches, they may drop out for a year and rejoin at a lower level. If they lose more than 2/3 of their matches they will get moved down by ALTA. The ATLA website is www.altatennis.org .

[Roger Vallejo]

I agree with many of the comments in this string.

When the NTRP system first arrived in the 80s, advocates claimed it would solve the problem of grouping players by skill level. Instead, I'd say that 2/3 of all players are ranked either 3.5 or 4.0. How fair is that for dividing folks up? (Maybe USTA should formally recognize a 3.75 level and a 4.25 level to break folks up even futher.) I found the old system of rating people as A, B, or C players wasn't too shabby for grouping players.

It also seems that many teaching pros have a vested interest in pumping up their students by telling them they're rated higher than is actually the case. And a lot of students can execute certain shots when a pro is feeding them the ball. Match conditions are much different.

Finally, the NTRP system is based on how you execute certain shots. Match play is much different. We all know folks with awkward or unconventional strokes who manage to win regularly. Conversely, we all know players with beautiful strokes in warm-up who fall apart once a match begins.

Why isn't there more of a push to re-visit the NTRP system with an eye toward improving its predictability of a player's ability to compete at a competitive level?

[Robert Jones]

Well in my area most of the leagues are 3.0 to 4.5. 4.0 is probaby the most popular. Within the 4.0 league there are players that are really closer to 5.0. They like to come in and stomp. I can see why it happens. There are not as many true 4.5-5.0 players so where do they go to play? The 4.0 league is where.

Some leagues force the guy up to the next level as soon as he wins the league. Self rating system is flawed for sure.

I have seen some 2.5 players join 4.0 league. Its not pretty. My only guess is that they self rated and thought they were better than they really were.

I would say the 4.0 level has the most cheaters. More 4.5-5 players vs true 4.0 players. This forces the true 4.0 players to seek greener pastures. They end up in the 3.5 leagues which then becomes more like a 3.8 league.

I think Pros should do the ratings not the wannabes.

Lots of cheaters out there but that seems to be the nature of sports. How many golfers really count all the strokes. Mulligans, foot wedges etc. hehe.

Women cheat too. I went and watched MSU vs U of M womens big ten tennis. They let them call the lines on the honor system. I never saw so many good balls called out in my life. I'm talking lobs hit 8 inches inside the green called out.

When I play if its close and maybe even a little out I call it good. Saves on dirty looks. I have had nicest of people give me the meanest look on balls called long that are like a 1 inch out. Not worth it to me.

[10s247]

everyone in HS seems to be 4.0s also

[bruce]

Sandbagging is common. As another poster observed, mostly it's sandbagging by men. My 3.0 league has a team with a self-rated 3.0 who entered and made the round of 16 in a pretty large draw 4.0 tournament. I'm really not quite sure why such people want to sandbag at the 3.0 level. What ego boost is there demolishing someone who's a true 3.0? Playing up and beating someone you weren't expected to beat, now that's an ego boost.

[baseliner]

Gaines, in my experience, the sand-bagging has been much worse in ALTA than USTA. I played as high as A-1 (#2) for several years and as low as #1 on a B-1 team. On the B-1 team I lost to 2 guys who had just graduated from UT (full scholarship). Of course some might point out my partner at A-1 was an ATP tour refugee. In USTA at the 4.0 level in Atlanta the competition is fairly good once you get to the playoffs. I have only had one opponent I felt was not close to the 4.0 level--to USTA's credit they double bumped them to 5.0 mid match (unfortunately week after they cleaned my clock).
For those of you not familiar with ALTA, winning teams get moved up to higher levels. If you win your division, you get bumped. If you win several playoff matches you could get bumped 2 levels or more (ie if an A5 team wins the city they probably get moved to A-3 level next season. The higher level team the less of a bump. If a C-4 team wins city they get bumped at least to C-2. If an A-2 team wins city, bump is only to A-1.

[Raqueteer]

This may seem like a stupid question but, How do you know what level player you are?

[Phil]

This may seem like a stupid question but, How do you know what level player you are?

You either get rated by a "rater" or you self-rate based on the NTRP ratings criteria (you can find this at the USTA's website). I'm not even sure "raters" are used anymore...it may have all gone to self-rating since I was last rated about 10 years ago.

Anyway, in my USTA experience, our 4.0 team had quite a few 3.5's (which is legal-teams could fill so many spots with players one level below the team level)...we had no sandbaggers. Our captain was an honest and earnest fellow. However, we got absolutely destroyed in league play because nearly every team we played had at least one sandbagger. Also, the 3.5's on our team didn't know how to play doubles. They hung out at the baseline and allowed the opposition to win points literally at will. To me, the doubles strategy-challenged 3.5's on my own team were far more frustrating than playing sandbaggers. Once I knew I was playing a 4.5'er or 5.0-and it didn't take long-I just did my best to rise to the occasion, and ended up playing a few close singles matches, because I played "like I didn't care" and didn't worry about "winning". In doubles, I often ended up covering most of the court, and I'm not a speed demon.

[BreakPoint]

This may seem like a stupid question but, How do you know what level player you are?

If you don't know, then you're a 4.0. Just kidding. ;) LOL

Find some people with real computer ratings and play against them and see how you do. If you play against a 4.0 and they beat you convincingly, like 6-1, 6-2, you're likely a 3.5 or 3.0. Or find a USTA League team and play against some of the guys on the team and see how you do.