Talk About Tennis 2.0

Anna Wintour, Jon Bon Jovi, Rick Astley, Jerry Seinfeld...

ti-amie wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 7:10 pm Marketing has become the driver behind almost every media contact made by a player. When your agent sits down to negotiate with Nike, Adidas, Yonex, Fila or New Balance the first question the corporate reps are going to ask is why they should sign your player to a multi million dollar contract. The agent will then present metrics of Player X's presence on social media, Twitter, IG and (sadly) TikTok to show that X million people click on their profiles and then send them out to the people on their TL's and they in turn resend them to their friends/family or whoever and the pattern gets repeated. It's not dehumanizing to post the Twitter, IG, or TikTok handle of a player who has just won a Major. It's money in the bank for all involved, including the Slam that gets publicity and maybe a person who sees the pic of a player says "maybe I'll watch next year to see if Player X is playing".

The above is true for every pro athlete in the modern world not just tennis players. It's okay to hate the game but right now it's the only game in town.

Yes, it is certainly dehumanizing to reduce a player to their 'twitter handle' - which often doesn't include their actual name, and people are left to figure out who in hell it is.
They include the twitter handle only, not including their actual name at all. It's totally dehumanizing.

This is not even to mention the fact that any 'social media' is not representative of the real person 99% of the time: only the pretty stuff - or marketable stuff in the case of 'famous' people - is displayed in 'social media', giving a very false representation of most people, be they 'famous athletes', 'celebrities', or lay people. It omits the person's negative elements and faults, creating the illusion of a degree of 'perfection'.
More and more psychologists and sociologists are saying that the effects of 'social media' are far more negative than positive. To me, this was extremely predictable.

It's quite interesting that some people here still don't see that the mind controls the body.
To those people, try this experiment: Take a basic 2x4 piece of wood, about 10 feet long... lay it on the ground - indoors or outdoors - it doesn't matter. Then run back and forth on it, and dance on it, etc. Easy to do.

Then take that very same 2x4 and elevate it 10 feet or more, making sure that it's stable. Use scaffolding or some such. It must be such that there is nothing underneath the main part of the 2x4 to catch you if you fall off of it. Now run back & forth on it and dance on it.
Of course, you will not be running and dancing on it as freely and confidently when it is 10 feet in the air as when it is laying on the ground. Your physical ability to run and dance on it will be significantly restricted. Because the consequence of falling off the 2x4 is much greater 10 feet in the air than on stable ground.

You have not suddenly lost the physical ability to dance or run on the 2x4 when it is 10 feet in the air - it is totally the pressure of the potential consequence which has limited your physical ability.

The exact same phenomenon is active in every tennis match. The mind controls what the body can do. How players handle pressure, distractions, bad calls, the crowd, the sun, the wind - all of these psychological factors manifest themselves in what one can do physically.

If you still don't believe that the psychological factor is hugely important in tennis, that is your right.
If you paid more attention to what the players and former players say about the absolute importance and influence of psychological elements in a tennis match, perhaps then you'd begin to understand - or at least, to believe.
(Chris Evert even talked for 20 seconds or so about the 'sports psychologist' who has been helping Swiatek, and that Jabeur has been working with a 'sports psychologist' since she was 12 years old...)

Then, of course, there is Nick Kyrgios - probably the most blatant example of the huge importance of the mind in tennis. Kyrgios has more natural physical talent/ability for tennis than any other pro player. Yet, until recently, his results were not good. Because he couldn't handle the various pressures of tennis. This squashes the theory that physical talent is all that matters, of course.
I'll take mediocre physical ability with a strong psychological approach over high physical ability but a weak psychological approach every single time.

ti-amie wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 7:10 pm maybe a person who sees the pic of a player says "maybe I'll watch next year to see if Player X is playing".

Or decides maybe that's the sport for me, or that's the sport for my kids. We never have Venus & Serena if Richard Williams didn't see tennis as opportunity for his daughters.

There was no social media (and barely any internet) when Venus and Serena began playing tennis, of course. Yet they still were drawn to it.
Hmmm....

Deuce wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 10:26 pm There was no social media (and barely any internet) when Venus and Serena began playing tennis, of course. Yet they still were drawn to it.
Hmmm....

It's almost like the way that fans are engaged in the sport has changed 40 years later. The average person under 30 doesn't have a television cable subscription, and antenna TV is a thing of the past, so to engage fans the sport has to go where people are which is on social media.

The only people I know in this montage are Questlove and Christie Brinkley with who I guess is one of her sons.

skatingfan wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 10:38 pm

Deuce wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 10:26 pm There was no social media (and barely any internet) when Venus and Serena began playing tennis, of course. Yet they still were drawn to it.
Hmmm....

It's almost like the way that fans are engaged in the sport has changed 40 years later. The average person under 30 doesn't have a television cable subscription, and antenna TV is a thing of the past, so to engage fans the sport has to go where people are which is on social media.

And 'social media' is blatantly less genuine than is real life (which more and more people will hopefully realize). And so this is a problem, as style is valued well above true substance and everything becomes more and more superficial - because it's so easy to create the illusion of 'perfection' in 'social media' (and - incredibly and embarrassingly - the majority of people believe the garbage that is posted).

Getting back to players being identified by their 'twitter handles' only when tournaments congratulate the winners... It is the player - the human being - who won the tournament, not their 'twitter persona'. They should have enough respect for the winners to identify them properly using their full names, and not just a cryptic 'twitter handle' which often does not actually identify the player/person.
If they wish to include the silly 'twitter handle' for those who buy into the 'social media' illusion, then fine - but their ACTUAL REAL NAMES should definitely be written as the primary source of identifying and congratulating them.

ti-amie wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 10:47 pm The only people I know in this montage are Questlove and Christie Brinkley with who I guess is one of her sons.

Anne Hathaway.