R you ready for some USTA league stats?

[time_fly]

In preparation for ratings day, I scraped ratings information for my home area of Southern Connecticut from the USTA site. Slow night, so I started looking at some plots and stats. I'm not as into this as @schmke so don't expect any polished blog post here. But here are some things I found interesting, especially when looking at men's and women's data separately.

• The ratings distribution for men and women is very different. For men, it's approximately a bell curve from 3.0 to 4.5, with a peak at 3.5 and 4.0 being the next highest bar. For women, the peak is at 3.0 and goes sharply downward from there. 37% of all the ladies in this area are 3.0 and only 29% are 3.5; 18% are 4.0. For the guys, only 25% are 3.0, 36% are 3.5, and 27% are 4.0.
• The proportion of men to women overall is about 3:7.
• For the men, just shy of 50% of 3.0 players are S-rated, and 42% of the 3.5 guys are S-rated. That means that new player recruiting is substantially defining the levels for the guys, because on average any doubles match is expected to have at least one S-rated guy. For the ladies, these proportions are 36% and 18% respectively. Overall, 27% of ladies and 39% of men are S-rated in our leagues. That's way higher than I expected.
• 1.3% of guys are A-rated, and 3.1% of ladies are A-rated.
• We have very little 2.5 ladies' tennis in our area, and no 2.5 and very little 3.0 men's tennis. Therefore only 11% of the ladies are 2.5, and only 2% of the men are.

Based on the distributions I think they seriously need to plow a bunch of 3.0 women towards 3.5 and 4.0 (that should help mixed doubles leagues stink even more, lol). The men could stay as they are, although with New England's men's 40+ nationals 3.5 team out of northern CT doing well for the first time in recorded history, plus the sectionals and districts results being reasonably competitive (they weren't an isolated ringer team), we expect some guys will get bumped up.

If I get motivated (slim chance) I might compare this to a completely different region to see how much all of this is unique to CT.

 

[kevrol]

Only numbers that surprise me are how many self-rates y'all have. Wow those are big numbers. Guessing it's not a huge league.

 

[time_fly]

We have 2,934 women and 1,361 men. I could scrape TR next to look at dNTRPs and see how their estimates correlate with S vs C ratings at the same level, but I should probably get back to work and I don't really trust the TR estimates that much anyway. But my informal observation as a 3.5 captain is that all those S-rated 3.5 guys tend towards the extremes. They were either recruited to be ringers, or they read the description of 3.5 and self-rated on their own, and are now getting smoked. I see a lot of old guys in particular with ratings egos that they can't back up.

To see how this is playing out in practice though, consider this: I have a female 3.5 friend who wants to get bumped up. She's around 3.35 on TR, but she wins about 85% of her 3.5 matches and about 50% of her 4.0 matches (with the caveat that she seems to play against a good number of 3.5s on 4.0 courts). So a bump up seems clearly reasonable. Now consider me. I rate about 3.40 on TR and I went 2 and 3 at 4.0 this year (most opponents being actual 4.0C), but I also only win about 66% of my 3.5 matches. I've had weekends with a 3.5 match and a 4.0 match and I swear the 3.5 guys were stronger. The huge number of self-rates in our league is creating a very broad band of skill levels that IMO overlaps 3.0 and 4.0 to an unusually large degree.

 

[travlerajm]

We have 2,934 women and 1,361 men. I could scrape TR next to look at dNTRPs and see how their estimates correlate with S vs C ratings at the same level, but I should probably get back to work and I don't really trust the TR estimates that much anyway. But my informal observation as a 3.5 captain is that all those S-rated 3.5 guys tend towards the extremes. They were either recruited to be ringers, or they read the description of 3.5 and self-rated on their own, and are now getting smoked. I see a lot of old guys in particular with ratings egos that they can't back up.

To see how this is playing out in practice though, consider this: I have a female 3.5 friend who wants to get bumped up. She's around 3.35 on TR, but she wins about 85% of her 3.5 matches and about 50% of her 4.0 matches. So a bump up seems clearly reasonable. Now consider me. I rate about 3.40 on TR and I went 2 and 3 at 4.0 this year, but I also only win about 66% of my 3.5 matches. I've had weekends with a 3.5 match and a 4.0 match and I swear the 3.5 guys were stronger. The huge number of self-rates in our league is creating a very broad band of skill levels that IMO overlaps 3.0 and 4.0 to an unusually large degree.

Looking forward to this.

Also would be curious to see the shape of the self rate curve. Will the tails at both ends might be wide?

That is, even if the average dNTRP is comparable to the computer rated average, I’d expect there to be more self rates at the margins (more sandbaggers as well as more overraters).

I’d also expect the women to have more overraters, and the men to have more sandbaggers.

 

[loveallcats]

I’d also expect the women to have more overraters, and the men to have more sandbaggers.

Interesting, why do you think this is the case? I agree, but would like to hear others perspectives.
(While waiting on ratings we might as well do some speculative psychoanalysis to pass the time)

 

[travlerajm]

Interesting, why do you think this is the case? I agree, but would like to hear others perspectives.
(While waiting on ratings we might as well do some speculative psychoanalysis to pass the time)

Women crave the social status of higher ntrp rating, so that they can impress the men.

Men want to be able to brag to the women that they are winners.

 

[ktx]

Agree with @travlerajm except that women don't want to impress men, they want to impress each other.

 

[Pspielha]

Agree with @travlerajm except that women don't want to impress men, they want to impress each other.

As a woman, I can confirm this.

Although I’m not sure I would even use the word impress. It’s more of a desire to get ahead in the pecking order.

 

[time_fly]

So I did the TR scrape and analysis today for 3.0 and 3.5 levels in SCT, men and women. Thanks to @travlerajm to encouraging me to procrastinate on other work to do this. I focused on players in TR that had at least 3 matches, a valid dNTRP estimate for 2023, and a C or S rating. What's the easiest way to post images on this site? I could share some graphs. But in the meantime, here's what I found:

For the C ratings only, all the graphs (men and women, 3.0 and 3.5) followed a typical bell curve. For 3.5, both genders, it was generally centered around 3.25 and had small but noticeable tails hanging out into the neighboring levels. For 3.0, both genders, the curves were shifted towards the higher end (centered around 2.8 to 2.9) and had a significant spill over into 3.5 territory. I think the 3.0 curve shows that if you are around the league long enough to get a C rating and playing at least 3 matches in a year, then you will become good enough to be a 3.5 most of the time.

The self rates get interesting. At both 3.0 and 3.5, the ladies follow a bell curve but it's shifted towards the low end of the level. It peaks around 2.6 for the 3.0 ladies, and around 3.15 for the 3.5 ladies. There are very few female self-rates at either level in the "sandbagger zone" (very top of the level and above). For the men, it's just barely a curve. The "peak" is a broad plateau centered around 2.8 for the 3.0s and 3.25 for the 3.5s. However there are significant tails in both directions. In the TR version of the data (filtered for number of matches and sufficient data to estimate dNTRP), 30% of the 3.5 guys are self-rated. But among those with dNTRP of 3.40 and above, 44% are self-rated. And for the weak side, dNTRP < 3.10, 56% of the guys are self-rated. The numbers for the ladies at 3.5: 8% of the 3.5s are self-rated, 19% of the weak players are self-rated, and only 4% of the strong 3.5s are self-rated.

Again, this is specific to my area: Southern CT. We have 292 3.5 guys that passed my filtering criteria from TennisRecord, and 666 3.5 ladies (yes, really).

 

[travlerajm]

So I did the TR scrape and analysis today for 3.0 and 3.5 levels in SCT, men and women. Thanks to @travlerajm to encouraging me to procrastinate on other work to do this. I focused on players in TR that had at least 3 matches, a valid dNTRP estimate for 2023, and a C or S rating. What's the easiest way to post images on this site? I could share some graphs. But in the meantime, here's what I found:

For the C ratings only, all the graphs (men and women, 3.0 and 3.5) followed a typical bell curve. For 3.5, both genders, it was generally centered around 3.25 and had small but noticeable tails hanging out into the neighboring levels. For 3.0, both genders, the curves were shifted towards the higher end (centered around 2.8 to 2.9) and had a significant spill over into 3.5 territory. I think the 3.0 curve shows that if you are around the league long enough to get a C rating and playing at least 3 matches in a year, then you will become good enough to be a 3.5 most of the time.

The self rates get interesting. At both 3.0 and 3.5, the ladies follow a bell curve but it's shifted towards the low end of the level. It peaks around 2.6 for the 3.0 ladies, and around 3.15 for the 3.5 ladies. There are very few self-rates at either level in the "sandbagger zone" (very top of the level and above). For the men, it's just barely a curve. The "peak" is a broad plateau centered around 2.8 for the 3.0s and 3.25 for the 3.5s. However there are significant tails in both directions. In the TR version of the data (filtered for number of matches and sufficient data to estimate dNTRP), 30% of the 3.5 guys are self-rated. But among those with dNTRP of 3.40 and above, 44% are self-rated. And for the weak side, dNTRP < 3.10, 56% of the guys are self-rated. The numbers for the ladies at 3.5: 8% of the 3.5s are self-rated, 19% of the weak players are self-rated, and only 4% of the strong 3.5s are self-rated.

Again, this is specific to my area: Southern CT. We have 292 3.5 guys that passed my filtering criteria from TennisRecord, and 666 3.5 ladies (yes, really).

Those some hefty tails on the men’s self-rate side.

 

[travlerajm]

So I did the TR scrape and analysis today for 3.0 and 3.5 levels in SCT, men and women. Thanks to @travlerajm to encouraging me to procrastinate on other work to do this. I focused on players in TR that had at least 3 matches, a valid dNTRP estimate for 2023, and a C or S rating. What's the easiest way to post images on this site? I could share some graphs. But in the meantime, here's what I found:

For the C ratings only, all the graphs (men and women, 3.0 and 3.5) followed a typical bell curve. For 3.5, both genders, it was generally centered around 3.25 and had small but noticeable tails hanging out into the neighboring levels. For 3.0, both genders, the curves were shifted towards the higher end (centered around 2.8 to 2.9) and had a significant spill over into 3.5 territory. I think the 3.0 curve shows that if you are around the league long enough to get a C rating and playing at least 3 matches in a year, then you will become good enough to be a 3.5 most of the time.

The self rates get interesting. At both 3.0 and 3.5, the ladies follow a bell curve but it's shifted towards the low end of the level. It peaks around 2.6 for the 3.0 ladies, and around 3.15 for the 3.5 ladies. There are very few self-rates at either level in the "sandbagger zone" (very top of the level and above). For the men, it's just barely a curve. The "peak" is a broad plateau centered around 2.8 for the 3.0s and 3.25 for the 3.5s. However there are significant tails in both directions. In the TR version of the data (filtered for number of matches and sufficient data to estimate dNTRP), 30% of the 3.5 guys are self-rated. But among those with dNTRP of 3.40 and above, 44% are self-rated. And for the weak side, dNTRP < 3.10, 56% of the guys are self-rated. The numbers for the ladies at 3.5: 8% of the 3.5s are self-rated, 19% of the weak players are self-rated, and only 4% of the strong 3.5s are self-rated.

Again, this is specific to my area: Southern CT. We have 292 3.5 guys that passed my filtering criteria from TennisRecord, and 666 3.5 ladies (yes, really).

With disproportionate number of self-rate men on the margins, what is % of self-rates in the middle. Let’s say between 3.15 and 3.35?

This is an interesting study in human psychology. It seems the 3.5ish men would prefer to impress their peers/ladies either by ntrp social status or elevated winning percentage than to just be part of the herd where they would fit and just blend in.

 

[time_fly]

For completeness I did look at 4.0. In our area, self-rates aren't that big of a factor at 4.0 for either gender, athough technically the men have noticeably more of them. They tend to fall fairly evenly at low levels throughout the range for both genders. If anything, there are a few more in the "sandbagger zone" for the ladies at this level, but not enough to make a big difference for the rating level overall.

 

[time_fly]

With disproportionate number of self-rate men on the margins, what is % of self-rates in the middle. Let’s say between 3.15 and 3.35?

This is an interesting study in human psychology. It seems the 3.5ish men would prefer to impress their peers/ladies either by ntrp social status or elevated winning percentage than to just be part of the herd where they would fit and just blend in.

About 18% of the guys in that middle range are self rated, much lower than the overall proportion of 30% in the whole range. And for completeness and inclusion ... for the ladies it's just over 5% versus their self-rate proportion of 8% for the whole range, with most of the rest being on the lower side.

So I guess the lesson for the guys is that if you think you should self rate at 3.5, that means you probably shouldn't.

 

[sovertennis]

As a woman, I can confirm this.

Although I’m not sure I would even use the word impress. It’s more of a desire to get ahead in the pecking order.

100% agree. I coach some borderline 3.5 women; when they get rated down to 3.0, they appeal back up to 3.5; although they could still play 3.5 league matches with a 3.0 rating, they seem to think they'll be stigmatized if they're rated 3.0. One woman went so far as to change her name on her USTA membership when her appeal was denied. Under her new name, she became a 3.5.

 

[cks]

So I guess the lesson for the guys is that if you think you should self rate at 3.5, that means you probably shouldn't.

Agreed. If you haven't played a lot of matches with rated players, then I think it almost impossible to self rate correctly without having input from someone who has. There is a huge difference between hitting with someone and playing that person in a match.

 

[loveallcats]

100% agree. I coach some borderline 3.5 women; when they get rated down to 3.0, they appeal back up to 3.5; although they could still play 3.5 league matches with a 3.0 rating, they seem to think they'll be stigmatized if they're rated 3.0. One woman went so far as to change her name on her USTA membership when her appeal was denied. Under her new name, she became a 3.5.

Wow a name change... That's pretty drastic

 

[sovertennis]

Wow a name change... That's pretty drastic

But very easy. She changed her USTA membership for first-and-last name to first initial, middle name and last name. Bingo. She's back to 3.5.

 

[cks]

She changed her USTA membership for first-and-last name to first initial, middle name and last name. Bingo. She's back to 3.5.

Interesting. USTA doesn't allow you to have more than one active membership at a time. See 2024 National Regs.

1.04E(2) Membership. All individuals who compete in the USTA League must be current USTA members in good standing through the local league season. Any individual who progresses to a championship level in the USTA League must be a current USTA member through each championship progression. Individuals shall only have one USTA membership account/ USTA number. Individuals who obtain more than one USTA membership account/ USTA number may be subject to a grievance and such suspension penalties as outlined under the League Suspension Point System.

I wonder how often dual USTA accounts occurred and how often folks get caught. Or if someone actually files a grievance.

 

[Pspielha]

Interesting. USTA doesn't allow you to have more than one active membership at a time. See 2024 National Regs.



I wonder how often dual USTA accounts occurred and how often folks get caught. Or if someone actually files a grievance.

Usually people with dual accounts do it so they can sandbag down. I’d imagine doing it to get rated at a higher level is pretty uncommon. I’m not sure anyone would care enough to pay $50 to file a grievance if it’s someone trying to rate themselves up.

 

[schmke]

Usually people with dual accounts do it so they can sandbag down. I’d imagine doing it to get rated at a higher level is pretty uncommon. I’m not sure anyone would care enough to pay $50 to file a grievance if it’s someone trying to rate themselves up.

Sometimes a duplicate account is innocent, if they forgot their USTA number or login which can happen if it has been a few years, so they just register again.

Sometimes it is with purpose though, and IMHO there should be repercussions for that when it is uncovered. I don't know how often something happens other than just merging the two accounts. I have observed that when merging accounts if the old one was a higher level, the merged account will be the higher level so at least if they did self-rate lower, they are unable to keep playing at that level.

 

[romano]

Interesting. USTA doesn't allow you to have more than one active membership at a time. See 2024 National Regs.



I wonder how often dual USTA accounts occurred and how often folks get caught. Or if someone actually files a grievance.

Anyone who is aware of duplicate accounts should contact their local USTA office, they will look into it. Nationals does run checks based on names/birthdays and informs appropriate Sections. year-long suspensions are granted if a grievance is filed and upheld.

 

[cks]

year-long suspensions are granted if a grievance is filed and upheld.

Has this happened before? Do you know of any instances of a grievance upheld against a player with more than one USTA account?

 

[romano]

Yep, sure have, several times (NorCal section).

 

[cks]

Yep, sure have, several times (NorCal section).

Wow. I'm just amazed folks would think they could just get away with it. There is so much data in Tennislink.

 

[romano]

Yeah, but I’ll just say you can game the system if that’s your intention. Condoning it is just as bad so glad some folks actually speak up….

 

[naylor73]

Has this happened before? Do you know of any instances of a grievance upheld against a player with more than one USTA account?

It happens more than you think. Imo certain captains are putting pressure on the players to be rated a certain level. I know of 3 instances that were uncovered locally and at sectionals this year. That’s a minute sample of total players out there.

 

[sureshs]

Agree with @travlerajm except that women don't want to impress men, they want to impress each other.

About half of the men shouldn't even be on the stats, because they don't play tennis. They play a racket sport in which foot faulting is allowed. Women rarely foot fault. A 2.5 woman who doesn't FF is a tennis player, but a 4.5 guy who does is to be considered way inferior to her and not a tennis player.

 

[Moon Shooter]

Since the men have no 2.5 leagues the men 3.0 level basically goes from women 2.5 to the lower end of women 4.0. This explains why the men’s league has less then half of the players as the women’s league. No captain is going to play a 3.0 male that plays like a 2.5 to lower end 3.5 female. All of these men are rated out of the system. I am a 3.0C male player. I will probably stay at that level again this rating year - even though I was hoping to get bumped up for various reasons. I just finished playing at Tri level regionals and many of the guys I played against could easily play on the d1 or d2 3.5 courts.

I think a whole slew of problems would be solved if Men were simply bumped up to the point where their tennis ability matched the female rating. This would mean that there would be many more opportunities for men who are about as good as typical female 3.0 and 3.5 players to actually get chosen to play on a team. I’m not a great tennis player at 3.0 but I have been playing for 5 years and I am certainly much better then when I first picked up a racket. It is somewhat discouraging that the rating system in no way acknowledges this. I know other guys who are not as good as I am that would like to play league play and be on a team but get discouraged because they are not chosen to play.

When I look around my club or local courts I tend to see more men playing tennis than women. It may be 7/3 men/women. Yet the leagues are the opposite with more than double the women playing, and it really doesn’t take a genius to see why. Most of these men would be in the women’s 2.5-3.5 category. But there really is no league option for them until they get to be about the same skill level as a lower level 4.0 female.

This would also make mixed doubles play better.

 

[Moon Shooter]

Tennis record is pretty crazy when it comes to self rates. I am not sure why.

A self rate player plays with a 3.30 partner against a 2.96 and a 3.23. They win 6-3 6-4. What is his match performance rating? 3.43.

Same player plays with a 3.50 rated partner against a 3.20 and a 3.03. They win 6-3 7-5. Another performance rating of 3.43

Seems to me the first performance should be about 3.10 and the second about 3.00.

So a 3.0 self rate who is about as good as me is currently rated by TR as being about a mid 4.0 player.

It seems like this is deliberately off.

 

[time_fly]

I agree that on the ladies' side, there are total beginners playing USTA league as 2.5 and 3.0 players. There is really no corresponding level on the men's side. Our 3.0 USTA men's players are still mostly experienced players and very athletic fast learners, even the ones playing D2 and D3. What separates our 3.0s from 3.5s is that the 3.0s either are old and have mobility problems, or they have big consistency & decision making issues. But they generally know how to play.

Even worse, the men's leagues follow the expected bell curve from 2.5 to 4.5, with a peak at 3.5 and 3.0 and 4.0 close to balanced. The ladies have a big pileup at 3.0 and steady decline after that; the 4.0 level is less than half as large as 3.0. There are about as many 4.5 men as women, despite there being a 3:7 M:F ratio overall. So if the league wants to "fix" the league size imbalances then they will have to push the ladies up and create an even bigger skill level imbalance with the men.

 

[travlerajm]

I’m not a great tennis player at 3.0 but I have been playing for 5 years and I am certainly much better then when I first picked up a racket. It is somewhat discouraging that the rating system in no way acknowledges this. I know other guys who are not as good as I am that would like to play league play and be on a team but get discouraged because they are not chosen to play.


This would also make mixed doubles play better.

This is a great point that the usta rating system does a poor job of acknowledging level improvement for beginners.

It seems like it is in the usta’s best interest to have more granular ratings at the lower levels, to help motivate players to participate.

 

[JordanWinning]

This is a great point that the usta rating system does a poor job of acknowledging level improvement for beginners.

It seems like it is in the usta’s best interest to have more granular ratings at the lower levels, to help motivate players to participate.

More granular scaling would also help with players intentionally playing out of level imho. A higher end X.X player is supposed to double bagel a lower end X.X player. Makes bumps infrequent and easy to manipulate. This skews ratings, which discourages and disenfranchised, which encourages out of level play and so on and so on.

I recognize part of that equation is people playing low level rec tennis solely to win matches (which I’ve called lame in as least the other threads so I won’t start down that hill today) but people are competitive and I’m sure there’s some arm chair psychology to play with wanting to control/feel successful in one aspect of their life. Sorry, I’m digressing. To loop back, USTA is built for passionate players (I’ve spent probably 2k this year on USTA and USTA related expenses on an Indiana teacher salary), and empowers those passionate people to manipulate their system for gain.

 

[time_fly]

This is a great point that the usta rating system does a poor job of acknowledging level improvement for beginners.

It seems like it is in the usta’s best interest to have more granular ratings at the lower levels, to help motivate players to participate.

NTRP isn‘t about judging players‘ skills, it’s about forming groups of players that have competitive matches. Hypothetically if 5 or 6 new guys jump into a 3.0 league on various teams and they have reliable 100+ mph serves and big groundstrokes, they could play against each other, have competitive matches and stay where they are. Eventually perhaps that league would accumulate enough of those players on one team that they would win Nationals and get moved up, or perhaps they would start playing up on their own and get bumped that way, but unless one of those things happens there’s nothing in the system that prevents them from being 3.0. It’s not an absolute skill level.

 

[travlerajm]

NTRP isn‘t about judging players‘ skills, it’s about forming groups of players that have competitive matches. Hypothetically if 5 or 6 new guys jump into a 3.0 league on various teams and they have reliable 100+ mph serves and big groundstrokes, they could play against each other, have competitive matches and stay where they are. Eventually perhaps that league would accumulate enough of those players on one team that they would win Nationals and get moved up, or perhaps they would start playing up on their own and get bumped that way, but unless one of those things happens there’s nothing in the system that prevents them from being 3.0. It’s not an absolute skill level.

That’s the problem.

 

[cks]

This is a great point that the usta rating system does a poor job of acknowledging level improvement for beginners.

I just wanted to point out that the USTA does maintain your dynamic NTRP, but they have decided not to share it. If they did share it, I would assume it would resemble your UTR rating. As most folks on this board know, instead of showing your dynamic NTRP of 3.24, they show 3.5 (3.01 - 3.50).

Heather Hawkes from USTA shared this information during her talk with Ian with Essential Tennis. They covered that USTA NTRP was designed to support league play (i.e. bands), while UTR decided to go after the junior market to show two (2) decimal places for juniors and college recruiters.

 

[travlerajm]

I just wanted to point out that the USTA does maintain your dynamic NTRP, but they have decided not to share it. If they did share it, I would assume it would resemble your UTR rating. As most folks on this board know, instead of showing your dynamic NTRP of 3.24, they show 3.5 (3.01 - 3.50).

Heather Hawkes from USTA shared this information during her talk with Ian with Essential Tennis. They covered that USTA NTRP was designed to support league play (i.e. bands), while UTR decided to go after the junior market to show two (2) decimal places for juniors and college recruiters.

We are thankful always for TR.com.

 

[Doubles specialist]

TR is notoriously inaccurate as it takes Mixed into consideration plus they are constantly changing the algorithm. Also the ratings are different for every region meaning the criteria they use to determine the ratings is different. So a self rate 4.5 who is 26 and played D3 could rate a 4.0 in Fl may not be able too in CT. It is all over the place. But I will tell you this you need the self rates if you are going to compete at Nationals I was there twice this year and there were several players that were playing above their rating; and even still that may not be enough.

 

[travlerajm]

TR is notoriously inaccurate as it takes Mixed into consideration plus they are constantly changing the algorithm. Also the ratings are different for every region meaning the criteria they use to determine the ratings is different. So a self rate 4.5 who is 26 and played D3 could rate a 4.0 in Fl may not be able too in CT. It is all over the place. But I will tell you this you need the self rates if you are going to compete at Nationals I was there twice this year and there were several players that were playing above their rating; and even still that may not be enough.

But we love TR.

 

[silverwyvern4]

TR is notoriously inaccurate as it takes Mixed into consideration plus they are constantly changing the algorithm. Also the ratings are different for every region meaning the criteria they use to determine the ratings is different. So a self rate 4.5 who is 26 and played D3 could rate a 4.0 in Fl may not be able too in CT. It is all over the place. But I will tell you this you need the self rates if you are going to compete at Nationals I was there twice this year and there were several players that were playing above their rating; and even still that may not be enough.

Tennis record does not use mixed as you say

 

[Doubles specialist]

Tennis record does not use mixed as you say

in Fl they do.

 

[Doubles specialist]

Wow a name change... That's pretty drastic

That will get you banned for a minimum 6 months up to a year. It happened to two of our players one was not intentional the other was questionable.

 

[silverwyvern4]

That will get you banned for a minimum 6 months up to a year. It happened to two of our players one was not intentional the other was questionable.

I know someone who made new account and self rated lower. They were caught after half a season at the new rating but their results in that time were so bad, the section let them keep the new lower self rating.

 

[cks]

That will get you banned for a minimum 6 months up to a year. It happened to two of our players one was not intentional the other was questionable.

Do you know if someone submitted a grievance on the two players for duplicate USTA accounts? or did USTA find them some other way?

 

[silverwyvern4]

Do you know if someone submitted a grievance on the two players for duplicate USTA accounts? or did USTA find them some other way?

Either they emailed coordinator or filed grievance online, not sure which one.

 

[Doubles specialist]

they filed grievances based on the fact they were self rates and felt they were sandbagging; one was bc a lady was bitter she got beat by her in a combo match of all things. Through that process they discovered the multiple accounts for both players. One was on accident she married and hadn't played in ten years so it was an honest mistake originally they had the suspension at 1 year but reduced it to 3 months the other though i dont have the details was a little more egregious I believe he was banned for at least 6 months. One was a 3.5 lady who imo was borderline and tbh I saw better 3.5 ladies at sectionals for 18 and over we had to run the gauntlet our state is notoriously difficult to get out of. The other man should have been a 4.0 IMO but at sectionals and nationals I saw other 3.5 just as good. The worst part is the DQ'd our woman after sectionals and we really could have used her at nationals if we have her I think we win it; we came in third. It usually comes down to the women. Sadly at 18 and over we discovered a player who had multiple accounts but since it was at nationals they claimed there was no process in place to do anything. This guy was insane and a jerk to boot, he never lost more than 2 games in any set he was rated a 4.5 but had a USTA 5.0 tournament rating and two accounts. He had I think 3 or 4 bagels at nationals; thankfully their team wasn't deep enough and didn't advance. But 10.0 was there as well and I saw a 4.5 who played at University of San Francisco who was insane; his team won it all he was from SoCal who also won 8.0 mixed at both 18 and 40's; we lost to them both times. A bitter pill to swallow. I mean I get complaints about me being a 4.5 but the one with two accounts was better than me but the other guy from USF was insanely better than me. Just goes to show you need sandbaggers and self rates if you want to compete and win at nationals.

 

[Doubles specialist]

Anyone who is aware of duplicate accounts should contact their local USTA office, they will look into it. Nationals does run checks based on names/birthdays and informs appropriate Sections. year-long suspensions are granted if a grievance is filed and upheld.

once you are at nationals they cannot touch you unless it is a different player all together. I have seen that at Sectionals and they got caught and banned but never at nationals.

 

[Moon Shooter]

I agree that on the ladies' side, there are total beginners playing USTA league as 2.5 and 3.0 players. There is really no corresponding level on the men's side. Our 3.0 USTA men's players are still mostly experienced players and very athletic fast learners, even the ones playing D2 and D3. What separates our 3.0s from 3.5s is that the 3.0s either are old and have mobility problems, or they have big consistency & decision making issues. But they generally know how to play.

Even worse, the men's leagues follow the expected bell curve from 2.5 to 4.5, with a peak at 3.5 and 3.0 and 4.0 close to balanced. The ladies have a big pileup at 3.0 and steady decline after that; the 4.0 level is less than half as large as 3.0. There are about as many 4.5 men as women, despite there being a 3:7 M:F ratio overall. So if the league wants to "fix" the league size imbalances then they will have to push the ladies up and create an even bigger skill level imbalance with the men.

There are just many more tennis players at the lower levels then there are at the higher levels. Usta has no leagues for all those lower level men players so men have far fewer players participating in usta. The answer is to bump the male players up to the women’s levels so lower level men can have a league they can be competitive in.

 

[naylor73]

There are just many more tennis players at the lower levels then there are at the higher levels. Usta has no leagues for all those lower level men players so men have far fewer players participating in usta. The answer is to bump the male players up to the women’s levels so lower level men can have a league they can be competitive in.

You’re always going to have non-competitive players…at every level. It really shows up in larger, more competitive cities with bigger player pools. The lower of the at-level players of the larger cities would be plenty competitive in smaller, less competitive areas.

 

[silverwyvern4]

2.5/3.0/3.5 Trilevel for men

 

[Moon Shooter]

You’re always going to have non-competitive players…at every level. It really shows up in larger, more competitive cities with bigger player pools. The lower of the at-level players of the larger cities would be plenty competitive in smaller, less competitive areas.

Not really for the women. They have smaller buckets for each level. So for the women usta 3.0 you may have a utr 1.5 playing a 2.5 and that will be more competitive then the men’s usta 3.0 where you have the utr 1.5 playing a utr 4.5.

The lower at level players in bigger areas would be competitive against the lower at level players of smaller areas but get blown out by the higher at level players of smaller areas. In other words top 3.5 players in big areas are as good as top 3.5 players in smaller areas. If anything smaller area’s top at level players may be better, and the bottom may be worse, because there are fewer established players to equalize everything.