USTA Sectional Opens Counting for TRN Rankings - 4/1 - 7/31

[dallasoliver]

People have requested for quite some time that TennisRecruiting.net (TRN) publish tournaments that will count towards its rankings. Historically, we have used the USTA National Schedule, ITF tournaments on U.S. soil, and additional USTA sectional and ITF tournaments with sufficient cross-play. These "additional tournaments" were added after-the-fact once we could analyze the strength of the tournament.

http://tennisrecruiting.net/faq/rankings.asp#Rankings-J

Going forward, are going to modify our policies - we will continue to use the tournaments above, but we will also include a set of Sectional Open tournaments that are historically strong. These Sectional Opens will definitely count towards TRN rankings - as well as towards qualifying competitors as "national players" at TRN as long as the competitor has a win in these tournaments.

Here is a partial list of such tournaments. We will update this list from time to time:

4/7 – GA State Spring Open Chmps. (Rome, GA) [USTA Tournament ID 703468012]
4/9 - L1 Port Washington Spring Classic (Port Washington, NY) [100312712]
4/14 - USA Drug Spring Classic Open (Little Rock, AR) [703300212]
4/14 – ZMG @ Boca Super Series (Boca Raton, FL) [153824112]
4/26 – 112th Annual Ojai Valley Jr. Tourn. (Ojai, CA) [651747812]
4/28 – Anaheim TC Spring Jr. Open (Anaheim, CA) [651701812]
4/28 – Aquafina RTC Open State Chmps. (Ridgeland, MS) [703833612]
4/28 – Rio Del Oro Jr. Chmps. (Sacramento, CA) [508342712]
5/5 – 33rd Annual Lakewood Spring Jr. Open (Lakewood, CA) [651727512]
5/5 – Super Series @ Midtown AC (Weston, FL) [150755512]
7/14 – GA State Jr. Open (Rome, GA) [703460612]
7/16 – 19th Annual Costa Mesa Summer Classic (Costa Mesa, CA) [651753012]
7/19 – 41st Annual Knowlwood Jr. Tourn. (Santa Barbara, CA) [651704012]
7/30 – 20th Annual Northridge Open (Northridge, CA) [651754412]

You can find any of these tournaments by entering the USTA Tournament ID here:

http://tennislink.usta.com/TOURNAMENTS/Common/Home.aspx

As I said above, this is a partial list, and we will update it as we become aware of additional tournaments. If you know of a historically strong Open tournament that we should consider for this list, please contact us at info@tennisrecruiting.net.

[MarTennis]

Good to know.

[10ismom]

Dallas,

Thanks for the post and expanding more tournaments calculated and reference group players.

Extending reference group beyond national players might be a way to save American prospects for college tennis.

[Tennisstringz]

Originally Posted by MarTennis

Good to know.

Thanks Dallas. This is a great relief for American kids trying for scholarships.

Most of the kids and parents really only care about your ranking system. It encourages looking for the strongest competition. In USTAs, players looked for the weakest draws and the weakest fields. Because of your site, we look for tourneys with the best players. And when we get a seed in the first round, we are happy, because we have a chance to pull off an upset and move up in TRN. My kid's abilities have really improved since we adopted this approach. Try to gain skills that can beat the best rather than playing a style that gets cheap wins.

I bet most college coaches believe your ranking. If not, they re missing out. The only time I ve seen it not predict well, is when one player has been hiding ( sandbagging), coming back from injury, or there is a psychological factor between the players.

Someday, there ought to be a TRN tournament series for juniors in highschool. Blue chips are taken care of on the national level. We need a four star five star showdown. It would be cool to see how predictive your rankings would be.

[jbw]

Another USTA open sectional was added to the published list after I spoke with the tournament referee. It is the L1 Port Washington Spring Classic (Port Washington, NY) that begins on April 9th. Entries are still open and its TennisLink ID is 100312712.

[Erman]

You said"I bet most college coaches believe your ranking. If not, they re missing out. The only time I ve seen it not predict well, is when one player has been hiding ( sandbagging), coming back from injury, or there is a psychological factor between the players."

The system is still getting rigged. There are a couple of 2013 players who decided to repeat or prolong or redo their sophomore/junior year and now jumped up in rankings and stars/chips. Almost like an artificial "gap" year.

[tball2day]

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[tennis5]

Originally Posted by Erman

The system is still getting rigged. There are a couple of 2013 players who decided to repeat or prolong or redo their sophomore/junior year and now jumped up in rankings and stars/chips. Almost like an artificial "gap" year.

We have been talking about this for over a year, but no sign that TRN will address it.
( They stated legal issues, which doesn't make sense as the ITF shows birth dates.
And also, when TRN is posting on Tuesday, a past weekend tournament with a qualifier...
well, if you wanted to kidnap that junior, you would know where to show up the following weekend,
so not sure about the privacy issues.)

In my son's grade, he had kids that are 18 months older than him on TRN.
Some kids, player A and B have two years difference.
I know hard to believe.
Some kids will turn 18 in the fall of college year, and other kids will be turning 20.
Of course, it will all even out after everyone is matured, but it looks quite different when you are in the middle of it
and a kid looks like a superstar, but they really are just playing younger kids...

So, either you can keep your son/daughter in the correct grade, and play by the rules.
Or, leave them back a grade as no one will ever know.
But, if you are going to do it, then it must be at the latest by summer of the end of 8th grade.
Once high school starts, the clock is ticking, and you won't be able to manipulate the system.

The biggest caveat I have noticed among the kids who do it are they tend to be the heavier partiers among the tennis kids.
( And I can tell you the majority of tennis kids don't party ( drink, smoke pot)).
But, they are the first to drink in their school grade, etc. I don't know why.

Obviously, a personal decision, but the issues of transparency that I have with the USTA, apply here too.

[Misterbill]

This is from the TRN FAQ section:

What is so important about ranking by graduating class?

Rankings by graduation year are important to college coaches. Colleges recruit based on graduation year, and age-based rankings - particularly two-year rankings like 18 & Under and 16 & Under - are too coarse for college coaches.

[TennisFan2Day]

There is no way to control this. Any parent can hold back their child if they want to. All they have to say is that they don't feel that their child is prepared for the next grade. This has been going on in football and basketball for decades.

TRN is done by a player's year in school, regardless of how old they are. Just like scout.com and rivals.com do with football and basketball. They don't list a player's birthdate and they are owned by major corporations.

Once a player turns 19 then they are not going to be playing any tournaments that will be on the TRN system. If a player turns 19 at any point in a calendar year then they cannot play Junior ITF tournaments in that calendar year.

The USTA stopped putting DOB up years ago because of legal issues. At the BG16&18 Spring Supers they put the players DOB on their player cards that are put on the fences by the courts. One parent demanded that they take their daughter's month and day off the card.

When an 18 year old freshman has to go up against a 23 year old senior in a regular match in college nobody cares about age. That is the position you are in and you have to fight your way out of it.

[CoachDad]

Originally Posted by TennisFan2Day

There is no way to control this. Any parent can hold back their child if they want to. All they have to say is that they don't feel that their child is prepared for the next grade. This has been going on in football and basketball for decades.

TRN is done by a player's year in school, regardless of how old they are. Just like scout.com and rivals.com do with football and basketball. They don't list a player's birthdate and they are owned by major corporations.

Once a player turns 19 then they are not going to be playing any tournaments that will be on the TRN system. If a player turns 19 at any point in a calendar year then they cannot play Junior ITF tournaments in that calendar year.

The USTA stopped putting DOB up years ago because of legal issues. At the BG16&18 Spring Supers they put the players DOB on their player cards that are put on the fences by the courts. One parent demanded that they take their daughter's month and day off the card.

When an 18 year old freshman has to go up against a 23 year old senior in a regular match in college nobody cares about age. That is the position you are in and you have to fight your way out of it.

Scout.com provides the birth dates on their paid service. But its apples and oranges because its a team sport and tennis is one on one.

TRN could use a non specific formula, say within 15 days of the actual birth date. I am sure a computer person could figure a way to include approximate age in the calculation without giving the actual birth date.

I think in junior tennis is would be proper to somehow weigh the age into the rankings.

[Tennishacker]

Originally Posted by CoachDad

Scout.com provides the birth dates on their paid service. But its apples and oranges because its a team sport and tennis is one on one.

TRN could use a non specific formula, say within 15 days of the actual birth date. I am sure a computer person could figure a way to include approximate age in the calculation without giving the actual birth date.

I think in junior tennis is would be proper to somehow weigh the age into the rankings.

What's wrong with just providing the month/year?

Would it matter to a college coach if he was recruiting two blue chips that were 1.5 years apart?

[jht32]

Originally Posted by CoachDad

Scout.com provides the birth dates on their paid service. But its apples and oranges because its a team sport and tennis is one on one.

Why would it matter if it's a team sport or individual sport?

If I'm trying to recruit the best tennis player or the best quarterback, the recruit's grade would matter. Also, the recruit's actual age either matters or not based on one's viewpoint. But the fact that it's a team sport or individual sport, how does that affect if knowing the actual age matters or not?

[jht32]

Originally Posted by Misterbill

This is from the TRN FAQ section:

What is so important about ranking by graduating class?

Rankings by graduation year are important to college coaches. Colleges recruit based on graduation year, and age-based rankings - particularly two-year rankings like 18 & Under and 16 & Under - are too coarse for college coaches.

Yes, TRN is for college recruiting, and the graduation year ranking would be more valuable than age-based rankings.

College coaches, if they knew the kids age, might factor that into the decision (or not). Some college coaches might give younger kids bonus points for being younger, some college coaches might give olders kids bonus points for being more mature, some college coaches may not care about the age at all. The age would be a nice to know. But for TRN to factor age into the graduation year ranking, whatever algorithm is used would not be universally accepted.

[jht32]

Originally Posted by TennisFan2Day

There is no way to control this. Any parent can hold back their child if they want to. All they have to say is that they don't feel that their child is prepared for the next grade. This has been going on in football and basketball for decades.

This also goes on for academic reasons too. Some people can just afford to give their kids an extra year (or two) to give them a competitive advantage.

It's just the way it is. I know. I graduated high school at 17 years 1 month old and I remember thinking that I would have prefered not to have been pushed to skip a grade.

[Misterbill]

Originally Posted by jht32

Yes, TRN is for college recruiting, and the graduation year ranking would be more valuable than age-based rankings.

College coaches, if they knew the kids age, might factor that into the decision (or not). Some college coaches might give younger kids bonus points for being younger, some college coaches might give olders kids bonus points for being more mature, some college coaches may not care about the age at all. The age would be a nice to know. But for TRN to factor age into the graduation year ranking, whatever algorithm is used would not be universally accepted.

Agreed (oh-oh!!!)

In addition,

Memo to parents out there:

You can put your child's age on TRN in the Player Bio section under Update/ "Private Information", if you are a TRN subscriber. Only coaches (and you) are able to see this private information. It surprises me that anyone who is/has been through the system does not know this!

Age might be relevant (or not) for a coach, as jht described in his post. But as for rankings, and the suggestion that it be broken down by "month, year" as I think I read earlier............well I don't know how many coaches would care who is #1-50 for those born in October 1996 or Sept 1995

[TennisFan2Day]

Originally Posted by Tennishacker

Would it matter to a college coach if he was recruiting two blue chips that were 1.5 years apart?

I doubt it. Just look at the class of 2009.

Evan King didn't turn 18 until the dual season of his Freshman year. I doubt if there was a single school in the country that wouldn't have taken him.

Devin Britton is almost exactly a year older than Evan.

Jarmere Jenkins is a year and a half older than Evan.

[andfor]

Originally Posted by Misterbill

Agreed (oh-oh!!!)

In addition,

Memo to parents out there:

You can put your child's age on TRN in the Player Bio section under Update/ "Private Information", if you are a TRN subscriber. Only coaches (and you) are able to see this private information. It surprises me that anyone who is/has been through the system does not know this!

Age might be relevant (or not) for a coach, as jht described in his post. But as for rankings, and the suggestion that it be broken down by "month, year" as I think I read earlier............well I don't know how many coaches would care who is #1-50 for those born in October 1996 or Sept 1995

The birthday can be entered so I don't know what the problem is. If Dallas gives in then folks will move on to asking him to rank or sort by birthdate etc.

Stand your ground Dallas. TRN is class based, not age. It's for college recruiting not for ego verification.

[Tennishacker]

Originally Posted by andfor

The birthday can be entered so I don't know what the problem is. If Dallas gives in then folks will move on to asking him to rank or sort by birthdate etc.

Stand your ground Dallas. TRN is class based, not age. It's for college recruiting not for ego verification.

Problem is that there are kids that are held back in school, graduating at age 19,20.

This issue was discussed in another thread.

[tball2day]

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