Jared Donaldson (1996) Trains in buenos aires

[cmb]

American junior has been living in Argentina throughout the Juniors, played his first futures this week, qualied and then beat the number one seed ranked 290 atp in the first round! Nice start for Donaldson!

http://www.itftennis.com/procircuit/...erid=100176409

[El Nino]

Ranked 290!? I saw Jared on YouTube playing the Orange Bowl U12's and He Had Game. Looked mentally bad though with a short temper. Shows how much you you can develop your game.

[tenniscp]

Originally Posted by cmb

American junior has been living in Argentina throughout the Juniors, played his first futures this week, qualied and then beat the number one seed ranked 290 atp in the first round! Nice start for Donaldson!

http://www.itftennis.com/procircuit/...erid=100176409

That s a pretty impressive result. Kozlov, 14 years old, played one Future event, made the quarterfinals about 3 or 4 months ago. Also impressive!

[cmb]

we can start the Donaldson/baughmann comparisons now :P

[coaching32yrs]

Originally Posted by cmb

we can start the Donaldson/baughmann comparisons now :P

I saw both play at the USO. Donaldson is younger. He is the better ball striker. He is about 6'2" but not filled out. I would say he weighs 120. DB much taller and stronger. He has a man's body. I would say Donaldson has more upside.

[tenniscp]

Originally Posted by coaching32yrs

I saw both play at the USO. Donaldson is younger. He is the better ball striker. He is about 6'2" but not filled out. I would say he weighs 120. DB much taller and stronger. He has a man's body. I would say Donaldson has more upside.

Donaldson is a talented player, as well as has the finances to hire very good coaches and travel the world to encounter higher level of competition than DB. DB is certainly able and capable of matching Donaldson in the talent department, but one has to question whether not having "professional coaching" could be the difference.

It will be interesting to see how things develop in the next two years. Donaldson plays the tournaments in the right places, lie this week, for example he has to win one match against some poor soul in Venezuela (with no ranking) to qualify for the main draw of a 15,000 future. In US Or other places, to make it to the 15,000 md, one would have to win 3-4 matches in quailed and encounter possibly guys from 120-400 in the main draw. So money does buy you certain favorable conditions, although this is not to say that JD can t play. Just these particular two players could not be more different in their social status and very different from the coaching perspective.

It would be more fair to compare JD to guys like Kokkinakis or Quinzi or even Rubin or Kozlov, who do have either the money or the financial backing of the federations. They are all born in 1996 and yet Quinzi will be around 700 ATP when rankings come out, Kokkinakis around there as well. And both Rubin and Kozlov already have Atpbpoints and are way ahead of JD on the ITF scale.

[coaching32yrs]

Don't think money is the issue. DB could go to USTA HP for free or go the college route for free training. Donaldson the better ball striker. He is competing against men with a boy's body.

[tenniscp]

Originally Posted by coaching32yrs

Don't think money is the issue. DB could go to USTA HP for free or go the college route for free training. Donaldson the better ball striker. He is competing against men with a boy's body.

DBs father for better or for worse decided not to let his son go and is coaching him. Donaldson is a very good ball striker, no doubt, however winning one match against one older opponent can t lead us to believe that he s ready to do that consistently yet. Donaldson is not the dominant force in juniors yet, other kids his age as we know are way ahead of him in the ITF scene. Quinzi, Rubin, Heong Chung, Kokkinakis, Ymer, Halys are all better players for now and Quinzi and Kokkimakis are consistently beating men and older players on ATP futures level.

Let s wait and see if Donaldson s win against one older player will tanslate into a consistent success on that level.

[tenniscp]

Great win for Donaldson against Matteo Martinez of Argentina . Tough match but pulled it out 7 6 3 6 7 6. Martinez is top 10 in ITF

[Number1Coach]

Originally Posted by tenniscp

Great win for Donaldson against Matteo Martinez of Argentina . Tough match but pulled it out 7 6 3 6 7 6. Martinez is top 10 in ITF

Great for Jared and not surprised he is hungry despite being from money 'I believe ' , he wants to play and wants to get better from what little I have been around him , he is a great kid and has real nice parents .

I like Jared and hope he continues to climb the levels .