chris in japan,
I agree with your overall premise, especially with the clay court "season" running all year. I think many fans miss the point as to how that can create an enormous skewing of not only seedings but rankings as well. Enough clay courters accumulating points on their favorite surface year round puts an inordinate number of clay courters in the top 100. With direct entries of those rankings they suddenly dominate majors and MS draws in terms of numbers. That means that a clay court can end up in the late rounds of a non-claycourt big event having only played other clay courters.
Like I said I like your basic idea, BUT.
My suggestion is that since the Aussie has been the second slowest playing conditions of the slams let it switch to har-tru. It won't be AS slow as it could be in the NE USA simply because the heat of the Aussie summer will dry the court quickly.
Leave the RG and its preceding events as well as Wimbledon the way it is, but return the speed of Wimbledon to nearer pre-2001 speeds. Sticking with the "adjustments" made since or creating a greater gap between the RG and W, IMO, cheapens the accomplishments of Budge, Laver and Borg in a historical sense.
Then add a MS grass event either pre- or post- Wimbledon.
Leave the US Open and the "series" a hardcourt event as that is what its homegrown fan base is familiar with and plays on.
Return the end of the year to carpet, slow the carpet to a medium speed but get the players off hardcourts. There were far fewer year end injuries when the players finished up on carpet than now.
Changing the end of the year to carpet and then transitioning to har-tru at the beginning of the next will alleviate the pounding the players take in their 11 month schedule. Players will have a much better chance to finish the year they started.
Also no matter how many events are scattered throughout the year, if those events want to be sanctioned and have rankings and race points awarded they have to be held on the "surface of the season", i.e. har-tru in the beginning of the year, hard courts after that, then red clay, grass, the faster hardcourts of the US summer, and then carpet. Don't award ranking/race points to players retreating to clay during the grass and fast hardcourt season or vice versa. If someone wants to support such events financially and players see that as a way to "make a living" fine, just don't reward such one-dimensional specialization with points that will impact the biggest ATP recognized events.
Otherwise leave the point structure and "mandatory" events as is, it will encourage everyone to play a major and an MS on har-tru, red-clay, hardcourts and grass, then a MS or two on a more forgiving surface at the end of the year when players will be scrambling to qualify for the YEC.
Forcing everyone to play almost equal amounts on the varied surfaces will "adjust" the rankings and tourney seedings by natural selection and not force some arbitrary surface rankings rewarding out of the blue hot streaks, or last year's results, to tinker with seeds. You're the best, well rounded 8, 16, or 32 players overall, or you're not. If you're not pull an upset and ride that seed's draw to the late rounds.
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