by Ted Gross
Yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer story on the US Open bought into the company line that's been used for the last 25 years to excuse away poor results on the part of American players.
"The subsequent transition, slow and costly, helps explain why at this week's 2014 U.S. Open, being contested at Drexel University's Daskalakis Athletic Center, no U.S. men or women reached the round of 16."
Yes. No American men or women survived the first round of their own national tournament.
No. There are many reasons why American pros as a group continue to perform at a sub-world-class standard, but a 'slow and costly transition' is not one of them.
If that's how US Squash sees it, the American game is in the wrong hands.
Ted,
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely right. At the same time blaming the national association for a lack of athletes at the top level in an individual sport is like blaming the President for the price at the pump. Perhaps he can have some remote influence, but most of the factors are out of his control.
People have been arguing that hardball held back U.S. squash for years, and it is indeed a silliness. If you took the top 9 U.S. players from a quarter of a century ago,1989, and played a college style match against the top 9 of today in SOFTBALL, there is not much doubt who would win.
What produces top players is simple.
1. A large number of players. More people playing means better chances of producing stars.
2. Passion, seriousness and ambition of players, and opportunities for competitive court time with other passionate serious and ambitious players.
3. (This is key when you're talking about world class players.) The "quality" of the best athletes involved. This may include genetic attributes or intangible aspects of "character", but whatever it is, as Potter Stewart said about obscenity, "I know it when I see it."
Under certain circumstances number 3 trumps all. A sufficiently gifted and ambitious player can sometimes make do with very few practice opponents if he or she has the right one. Mark Talbott had Dave Talbott, who had the energy and fire of any five ordinary sparring partners. (Did the Black brothers become world class tennis players because of the magnificent tennis association of Zimbabwe?)
There ain't no way for a national association to "create" a Mark and give him a Dave. The Boys From Brazil, anyone?
There was tons of nonsense about the lack of "softball" coaching in the U.S. 25 years ago. Coaches have been pouring into the U.S. for that whole period (and well before) because the pay for lessons is so high- has anything changed? The games just aren't that different anyway. I remember a clinic at a college coaches meeting around 1993 at which an international coach of comically evangelical mien inducted us into the mysteries of taking the ball early and moving the opponent around the court as though these weren't central to hardball.
How do we know it's not about coaching and the mysteries of softball? The women have had far more individual success. Alicia, Demer, Ellie and Amanda made greater inroads on the women's tour than the men have. (Of course in the '80s the top American men were making a living off a hardball tour.) Were brilliant softball coaches sneaking into the States and giving girls lessons that were unavailable to boys? The number, ambition and quality of female athletes in squash in other countries are not quite as disparate from the U.S. as they are for the men, so the chances of a "world class" talent emerging in the States was always greater.
ReplyDeleteIt's just like soccer. Were U.S. women getting better coaching than the men? No, it's simply that opportunities in women's sports in other countries have not been as good, and top U.S. women athletes have gone into soccer in the absence of the major professional sports the men choose.. The U.S., for all it's failures in equal opportunity and treatment, has done better than many other countries in encouraging women's sports. The first year the U.S. women won the Cup I remember reading about European women's teams who had to wash their own uniforms and give each other physical therapy because of the absence of support staff and trainers.
Around the same time or a bit later I read an article about U.S. basketball coaches looking at European prospects and marvelling at their fundamentals. The players in Europe played organized ball from early ages. The players would come over here though, and find themselves helpless against kids who had spent thousands of hours developing moves on the playground. (I think this has changed since, as the popularity of basketball has grown in Europe.) A few years later I read a piece by a foreign squash coach who wrote that American kids hit the ball fundamentally well, but didn't set traps,use creativity, or read their opponents well enough. The problem, he wrote, was that they didn't play enough - too much coaching- not enough playing for fun. The clinics and tournaments approach leaves little time for experimentation.
ReplyDeleteWhat's needed is passion and hours. I used to go run intervals on a track in Queens in the morning and then take my son back to the same park to play in the afternoon. Same damn kids on the basketball court six hours later still screaming about every foul or failure of a team-mate to defend as if the world depended on it. The boys on the sideline cheered for whoever was ahead beacause they wanted back on the court. I'd go give a junior clinic at a squash club and walk in to find kids chatting behind an empty court waiting for the organized session to begin.
U.S. tennis is currently experiencing a drought of top men. Not enough support from the national association? Absence of good coaches? Please. As McEnroe says, the best athletes are not choosing tennis.
The best women's player in the world? Serena. Massive talent, grew up with access to public courts, had a father who imbued her with passion and competitiveness and had an equally talented and passionate sister to practice against. End of story. While the cases are obviously not remotely parallel, one can see some similar threads in Amanda and Sabrina.
I remember playing softball one day (can it really be 25 years ago?) with Dave Talbott and Cyrus Mehta. I am an average athlete. Cyrus is a very good athlete. Dave?
Just as he did with hardball, Dave was running the two of us ragged in winner-stay-on set 5s. He took the ball so early and changed the pace so constantly that it felt like utter chaos to us. While Dave controlled the mayhem casually, we were battered by it. Cyrus was one of the best college hardball players of the time but had, of course, grown up with the softball. During a break I said to him, "I didn't think Dave would be able to do this with the softball." I can still hear Cyrus laughing and saying in his elegant Indian-Anglo voice, "Are you joking? Dave could do that with a stone."
Cheers, Sasha
I agree with Ted Gross. The association is barking up the wrong tree if it is still blaming the transition from hardball to softball. Not only that, a national association shouldn't make excuses. Totally counterproductive. Identify your current problems and move forward, don't dwell on the past.
ReplyDeleteWhy try to play pro squash and struggle when you can play baseball , basketball, football or hockey and make a pile? Further, why choose pro squash as a professional when you can play good amateur squash at a great college, get a great education, and then to go work on Wall Street and make double what James Willstrop earns without having to take the night flight to Yokahama and train four hours a day or more? And then when James's knees are worn out you're buying your first vacation home in Southampton and enjoying the doubles circuit with pretty girls in evening gowns at the black tie dinners on Saturday night.
ReplyDeleteThis is the funniest thing I've ever heard!
Delete637 you can't blame us squash if our players aren't hungry enough.
ReplyDelete