Only 1 singles for Nationals 40+ :(
- Thread starter OnTheLine
- Start date
How do you have nationals with 4 courts when they don't do weighted courts? That makes no sense at all.
tennis_tater
Semi-Pro
Is the 3 doubles a typo? I thought the proposed change was 1 singles to 4 doubles.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
Here is the letter from the LLC .... it also illustrates how the tie breaker works if teams are 2-2
Captains,
This message is concerning the USTA 40 & Over League which begins play the first Saturday in January 2020. USTA Nationals just announced that they will be adopting a new format for this league which will now be 1 singles and 3 doubles. The Intermountain Section is having a meeting very soon to discuss the format for Sectionals. In the past the Intermountain Section has followed what the National program does. That being said, USTA NV would like to follow the National program so unless something different happens at the Section meeting please be prepared that the 2020 local league season for the USTA NV 40 & Over League will be 1 singles and 3 doubles. The procedure in case of a tie will also change, it will now be:
ONE TEAM POINT WILL BE AWARDED FOR:
3 individual matches won
If tied 2-2, the tie shall be broken by the following methods to do so:
a) Sets: Loser of the fewest number of sets
b) Games: Loser of the fewest number of games
c) Game Winning Percentage: Total games won divided by total games played
The team numbers for this league will be released pending the publication of the Year End Ratings.
I realize many of you have already started to look at your team composition for the 2020 season so I wanted you to get this news as soon as it was announced.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Captains,
This message is concerning the USTA 40 & Over League which begins play the first Saturday in January 2020. USTA Nationals just announced that they will be adopting a new format for this league which will now be 1 singles and 3 doubles. The Intermountain Section is having a meeting very soon to discuss the format for Sectionals. In the past the Intermountain Section has followed what the National program does. That being said, USTA NV would like to follow the National program so unless something different happens at the Section meeting please be prepared that the 2020 local league season for the USTA NV 40 & Over League will be 1 singles and 3 doubles. The procedure in case of a tie will also change, it will now be:
ONE TEAM POINT WILL BE AWARDED FOR:
3 individual matches won
If tied 2-2, the tie shall be broken by the following methods to do so:
a) Sets: Loser of the fewest number of sets
b) Games: Loser of the fewest number of games
c) Game Winning Percentage: Total games won divided by total games played
The team numbers for this league will be released pending the publication of the Year End Ratings.
I realize many of you have already started to look at your team composition for the 2020 season so I wanted you to get this news as soon as it was announced.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
I totally agree with you.
For the regular player there are so few opportunities to play league singles. Being over 40 I like the chances of playing against others in the age group and at level. Why eliminate that 2nd line?
And tournaments are not a viable opportunity .... and will now become even less so. So little participation ... and if those over 40 have fewer league opportunities they will feel less capable of playing in a tournament due to lack of match experience.
travlerajm
Talk Tennis Guru
What is the next tiebreaker after that? For a single 2-2 tie of 4 matches, tying on all three of those tiebreakers would not be that uncommon.
Weird, the 2020 regulations for USTA still say 2 singles and 3 doubles for 40+ leagues...
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
I guess that is the draft from April .... it is marked with the word DRAFT .... perhaps this is the new final version? I don't have a copy, just the information from the LLC.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
In ladies' league ... the team with the best matching uniforms. For men, the team that brought the most beer.
In Mid-Atlantic there's a Mens and Womens singles only league going on at the moment. 18+ though.
ChaelAZ
G.O.A.T.
Wish we had that is the Southwest. Flex...just isn't working in the realm.
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
schmke
Legend
If you are referring to USTA President, count me in for a yea vote, but we lost our chance. Patrick Galbraith replaced her at the start of this year. @OnTheLine will have to campaign for 2023.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
There was a survey that went out earlier in the year .... of course we have no idea what the actual results of that survey were. No transparency there. Perhaps there were lots of people who said they wanted to eliminate a line of singles.
There was also a thread a few months back where some of the discussion was about the pressure of court availability in some regions ... could also have something to do with it.
I would be curious if they also looked at the number of defaults of one of the two singles lines. If the national trend is that there are a higher number of defaulted courts in league play at 40+ than at 18+ then it creates a good rationale for the change.
@schmke is that something that you could relatively easily look up?
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
Dang, I had better start working on my bonafides ....
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
Well, this sucks for me. I have not played USTA for a few years but am back to playing and was looking forward to the 40+ season. I prefer singles and this means far fewer playing opportunities, especially in 4.5+ since many of the teams will be putting a 5.0 in the singles line.
I guess there's just not much USTA leagues have to offer for an older singles player. Wish I preferred dubs. Well, not really
I guess there's just not much USTA leagues have to offer for an older singles player. Wish I preferred dubs. Well, not really
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
Well, this sucks for me. I have not played USTA for a few years but am back to playing and was looking forward to the 40+ season. I prefer singles and this means far fewer playing opportunities, especially in 4.5+ since many of the teams will be putting a 5.0 in the singles line.
I guess there's just not much USTA leagues have to offer for an older singles player. Wish I preferred dubs. Well, not really
Exactly, so many 4.5s get hedged out of singles and have a resurgence at 40. Also having a money 4.5 to play that #2 singles spot is a huge cog in a winning team.
J
I would guess the USTA President doesn't even know adult leagues are a thing. They're in their role for the pros and the money they generate.
travlerajm
Talk Tennis Guru
My favorite slot getting axed.
schmke
Legend
Here are some quick stats, all for 2018 champ year teams.
18 & Over, 6.35% of individual matches were defaults. Of these, the distribution by court was (note some leagues use 4:
- 1S - 14%
- 2S - 38%
- 1D - 4%
- 2D - 10%
- 3D - 33%
- 4D - 1%
- 1S - 18%
- 2S - 36%
- 1D - 4%
- 2D - 7%
- 3D - 30%
- 4D - 5%
Also, while 2S is the highest percentage, you'd actually expect that as in a normal 5 court match, if you are missing one player 2S is the court that must be defaulted. Defaulting 3D (or 4D in those leagues that use it) requires missing 2 players (or missing one player and electing to sit someone that is available to play). And in fact, if you add 3D and 4D together in 40+, it is 35% compared with the 36% for 2S so very nearly the same anyway.
I will have to research more and perhaps write on my blog, but from these stats, it doesn't appear the change was (or should have been) made as a result of a 2S defaulting epidemic in 40+.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
Good stuff ... I knew you would come through!
And yes the rationale behind why that would be the highest is on point ... the rules almost dictate that it is the most often defaulted court.
schmke
Legend
Correct, defaulting must be done from the lowest (highest numbered) court(s) first.
kylebarendrick
Professional
Defaulting line 1 is easy:
"Hey, my 1S player is stuck in traffic. She'll be here in 5 minutes. I just talked to her. Should we go ahead and start the other lines?"
"I guess that's OK, sure"
Player never shows up. Likely never planned to. Suckered again...
"Hey, my 1S player is stuck in traffic. She'll be here in 5 minutes. I just talked to her. Should we go ahead and start the other lines?"
"I guess that's OK, sure"
Player never shows up. Likely never planned to. Suckered again...
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
J011yroger
Talk Tennis Guru
Silly me, I thought the idea was to get more people to play...
J
J
Yes, you are completely correct. Imagine this result:
Team A wins 1S 6-3 6-3 and wins 1D 6-3 6-2. Team B wins 2D 6-2 6-4 and wins 3D 6-2 6-3.
In this scenario (and numerous other common results you could come up with), the teams tie 2-2 and tie on all tiebreakers.
This whole idea seems stupid. Why intentionally decrease the number of players who can participate in each match?
It wouldn't surprise me if the USTA came out with some rationale like: On our survey, respondents were equally split between "2 singles lines, 3 doubles lines" and "1 singles line, 4 doubles lines" so we decided to compromise with "1 singles line, 3 doubles lines". Just dumb...
Maybe they think all of those 40+ dubs only players will suddenly come out to play ?
Certainly not the case here.
Year Registered players
2015 1355
2016 1256
2017 1253
2018 1166
2019 1202
2017 was the year they eliminated singles from 40+ here.
schmke
Legend
To me, that is really the only viable reason. Facilities with 4 courts can now host a team match all at the same time rather than having to do split courts/start times.
But it means fewer playing opportunities in general (7 players per team match rather than 8) and definitely fewer opportunities for singles players. As noted above, the greater chance of ties also becomes an issue and more team matches may really be decided by one point because of it.
More to come on my blog.
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
Well do the facilities suddenly sprout extra courts for 18+ ?
schmke
Legend
No, but some facilities (or rather their members) may complain about too many courts being used for leagues and not available for members, so there may be pressure on facilities to use fewer courts. If the USTA does a survey opening the door to a 1/3 format, the facilities may have weighed in and voice their support. And given that 55+ uses 3 courts and 18+ uses 5, someone had the bright idea that 40+ should use 4 ...
Also, some areas may run 40+ overlapping with other leagues which may compete for courts, while 18+ doesn't have the same competition.
And if the USTA thinks this new format works, who knows, 18+ may shrink to 4 courts in the future ...
For Northern VA, 40+ starts in January so all matches have to be indoors. 18+ starts April therefore you can schedule some matches outdoors. Hey at least its not 1S, 2D which is what we have to do here.
tpro2000
Rookie
The 40+ leagues by me (3.0w, 3.5w, 4.0w) decided to do 1 singles, 3 doubles because, and I quote, "there's not enough singles players over 40", which is ridiculous.
With that said, it works out great at my club because we have 8 outdoor starting usually mid March, and 6 indoor. We usually have 2 matches outside at 6pm, and one inside at 8pm on the 40+ nights. or two matches (1 in, 1 out) if 18+. Luckily for us it works out. Other clubs don't have the luxury obviously.
With that said, it works out great at my club because we have 8 outdoor starting usually mid March, and 6 indoor. We usually have 2 matches outside at 6pm, and one inside at 8pm on the 40+ nights. or two matches (1 in, 1 out) if 18+. Luckily for us it works out. Other clubs don't have the luxury obviously.
S&V-not_dead_yet
Talk Tennis Guru
The majority of my singles occurs outside of league: plenty of opponents to choose from.
penpal
Semi-Pro
I believe schmke is prohibited from posting the link himself, so here's the link to his latest blog post: https://computerratings.blogspot.com/2019/09/another-rule-change-for-2020-usta.html
OnTheLine
Hall of Fame
I am playing non-league matches ... particularly in singles. But when it doesn't "count" it is not the same in my brain.
S&V-not_dead_yet
Talk Tennis Guru
You could use the self-reporting feature in UTR.
My non-USTA matches tend to be of more consistent quality than my USTA matches, mainly because USTA is a mixed bag, especially in league: since I'm in the upper end of my NTRP, I'll get occasional easy matches. When I set up my own matches outside of USTA, they are usually against a competitive opponent.
schmke
Legend
2020
S&V-not_dead_yet
Talk Tennis Guru
Congratulations to everyone for whom this is relevant [ie those who made it to Nationals]!
As for me and my team, let's just say it's of purely academic interest.
schmke
Legend
Unless your section/district/area elects to adopt the Nationals format for your local league for 2020 ...Congratulations to everyone for whom this is relevant [ie those who made it to Nationals]!
As for me and my team, let's just say it's of purely academic interest.
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