Tennis Forever

[JamesDap]

Well, we wouldn't accuse ATP of "fixing" the draw as "you know who" is not playing this year! However, there are others who think ATP, USTA and other vested interests have been manipulating the major tournaments for many many years!

The following reports are three years old, but probably still relevant:

U.S. Open random draw questioned

http://espn.go.com/espn/otl/story/_/...tically-likely


How 'Outside the Lines' analyzed the U.S. Open tennis tournament draw

http://espn.go.com/espn/otl/story/_/...t%E2%80%90draw


Here is an analysis by EU and sports law academic Ms. Katarina Pijetlovic:

Facts and statistics indicate fixing at the very top of men’s tennis

(Please google the above title and click on the link for this PDF document.

All very interesting to read. I would not be surprised by draw-fixing at all. TV viewership is the major source of revenue for the tournaments and it is in their interest to do whatever they can to help top players find easy passage to the semis. In spite of their efforts, Fed goes and loses to Gulbis and Nadal to Kyrgios so the great game of tennis keeps trumping their attempts to get eyeballs. But it is indeed getting more and more programmed and predictable...because that's what the viewers want. Viewers have become lazy, they want the same match ups over and over. Tennis is not the cinema box office, it is a sport with in built unpredictability. When seeds toppled last year at Wimbledon, I noticed a lot of people were upset as they would be denied the chance to watch Rafa/Fed (esp since most don't even tune in during the early rounds). That's not the way to enjoy tennis but then the casual fans are much, much greater in number than serious fans so such a situation can't be avoided.

It's interesting that the numbers are much better for RG and Aus Open and these two tournaments have traditionally been relatively less predictable (though no longer the case in Aus Open). Of course RG of now is nothing like what it was in 90s when it was near impossible to predict the winner from among a big clutch of specialists but at least the chances of all of the big four reaching the semis or seem to be less bright in it and Wimb. In fact, RG is the only slam in which there was at least one instance between 2008-2013 of only one of the big four getting to the semis (Fed in 2009). And Wimb the only one where all four have never reached the semis in the same tournament.

It is perhaps also why RG and Aus are treated as lesser siblings in the media and it's Wimb and USO that have traditionally attracted all the glamour and hype (and the numbers from 2008 onwards suggest there has been an 'adjustment' in Aus Open?). The way tennis is sought to be marketed as well as what people want to see in pro tennis are, as in many other big moneyed pro sports, at odds with the true essence of the game. Can't be helped. But I'll watch as long as at least a few players play good shots. Count me out if it ever gets total bashball.