Talk About Tennis 2.0

Nishikori is having hip surgery

JTContinental wrote: ↑Wed Jan 26, 2022 6:23 pm Nishikori is having hip surgery

Hope he has Murray's doctor

Anyone know if Hyeon Chung is still out injured? Almost 4 years to the day he made the semis here

Liamvalid wrote: ↑Wed Jan 26, 2022 8:05 pm Anyone know if Hyeon Chung is still out injured? Almost 4 years to the day he made the semis here

Oh man, what a reversal of fate. He hasn't played since late 2020 - I looked it up - and it wasn't pretty, with a bunch of consecutive R1 losses in challengers. At the 2019 USO, he beat Verdasco in a five-set thriller on an outer court, late at night. I had to watch from the adjacent court because the house was full. And it was rocking - the police were even called to break up something in the stands. One of those lost-to-time matches .... I really liked Chung. He's 25 now.

meganfernandez wrote: ↑Wed Jan 26, 2022 8:50 pm

Liamvalid wrote: ↑Wed Jan 26, 2022 8:05 pm Anyone know if Hyeon Chung is still out injured? Almost 4 years to the day he made the semis here

Oh man, what a reversal of fate. He hasn't played since late 2020 - I looked it up - and it wasn't pretty, with a bunch of consecutive R1 losses in challengers. At the 2019 USO, he beat Verdasco in a five-set thriller on an outer court, late at night. I had to watch from the adjacent court because the house was full. And it was rocking - the police were even called to break up something in the stands. One of those lost-to-time matches .... I really liked Chung. He's 25 now.

Yeah I liked him too, thought he was going to be a top player

Dumb thought of the day:
You don't want to get injured. BUT, if you get injured, DON'T get injured on grass! Delpo, Roger and Serena had injuries on grass and it has taken this long to even think they might come back.
And it is supposedly the "easiest" surface.

But it's so awkward, slippery if there is even a touch of moisture and too dry, almost like dirt if it's warn down too much. I never understood the logic on it being easier or better in this respect. I've never played tennis on grass, but have played many other sports on it, mostly softball, but also soccer. There is a reason when you play other sports on grass you wear cleats, because without them, you're gonna slip and it's gonna be awkward at best, dangerous at worst. I've asked before why there isn't a specific tennis shoe for grass tournaments where there is some slight cleat, wondered if it was ever tested out as a possibility. There's nothing to plant on without them, you basically almost stumble in an awkward way with any wrong step. Not in the way it seems like it is on clay where you can glide or slide into it way more and either stop or catch yourself at least somewhat before it all goes wrong. I'm not sure of the injuries everyone is dealing with, but for damn sure, a moderate slip, let alone a bad one, on grass is a great way to f*** up your knee or ankle.

No idea why you think this is a dumb thought, seems like a good one to me.

JazzNU wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 9:02 pm But it's so awkward, slippery if there is even a touch of moisture and too dry, almost like dirt if it's warn down too much. I never understood the logic on it being easier or better in this respect. I've never played tennis on grass, but have played many other sports on it, mostly softball, but also soccer. There is a reason when you play other sports on grass you wear cleats, because without them, you're gonna slip and it's gonna be awkward at best, dangerous at worst. I've asked before why there isn't a specific tennis shoe for grass tournaments where there is some slight cleat, wondered if it was ever tested out as a possibility. There's nothing to plant on without them, you basically almost stumble in an awkward way with any wrong step. Not in the way it seems like it is on clay where you can glide or slide into it way more and either stop or catch yourself at least somewhat before it all goes wrong. I'm not sure of the injuries everyone is dealing with, but for damn sure, a moderate slip, let alone a bad one, on grass is a great way to f*** up your knee or ankle.

No idea why you think this is a dumb thought, seems like a good one to me.

I thought they use shoes with special soles for the grass courts that have some type of dimples on the soles to help with traction.

atlpam wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 9:20 pm
I thought they use shoes with special soles for the grass courts that have some type of dimples on the soles to help with traction.

I think I've seen what you're talking about and they didn't seem enough like actual cleats that would provide a way to plant and not fall if you hit a slippery spot to me. More like better traction, but always on top of the grass so still probably can't stop yourself from slipping. Maybe I haven't seen enough of them and there are deeper dimples that are like low cleats?

atlpam wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 9:20 pm I thought they use shoes with special soles for the grass courts that have some type of dimples on the soles to help with traction.

They do - but it only helps to a degree.
They obviously can't use spikes like in golf or cleats like in baseball/football/soccer, as, though it would offer much better footing, it would also rip up the grass with all the running, etc.
And players wouldn't be able to slide with more aggressive spikes. That could be dangerous, as many players in today's game slide into their groundstrokes on all surfaces, not just on clay anymore. With aggressive spikes, they could easily get caught and rip up a knee.
So the soles of grass court shoes pretty much have to be a balance - they need to provide grip and traction, but not too much.

Also, when the grass is wet (not necessarily just with rain, but also with humidity-caused dew), I think the dimples are virtually useless.

ti-amie wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 8:25 pm

JazzNU wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 9:02 pm But it's so awkward, slippery if there is even a touch of moisture and too dry, almost like dirt if it's warn down too much. I never understood the logic on it being easier or better in this respect. I've never played tennis on grass, but have played many other sports on it, mostly softball, but also soccer. There is a reason when you play other sports on grass you wear cleats, because without them, you're gonna slip and it's gonna be awkward at best, dangerous at worst. I've asked before why there isn't a specific tennis shoe for grass tournaments where there is some slight cleat, wondered if it was ever tested out as a possibility. There's nothing to plant on without them, you basically almost stumble in an awkward way with any wrong step. Not in the way it seems like it is on clay where you can glide or slide into it way more and either stop or catch yourself at least somewhat before it all goes wrong. I'm not sure of the injuries everyone is dealing with, but for damn sure, a moderate slip, let alone a bad one, on grass is a great way to f*** up your knee or ankle.

No idea why you think this is a dumb thought, seems like a good one to me.

My idea is this. With the demise of serve and volley tennis, players are roaming the backcourt and are moving sideways. One of today's best ploys is to wrong foot the opponent, and the drop shot has become a more frequent go to stroke. So, when players run forward to get to a DS, they need to slam on the breaks and that can lead to their knees locking and bucking (the Delpo injury). When they are running sideways and get wrong footed, the same can happen.
Unless they find a way to have players play shorter points, these injuries are potentially there. And as said above: shoes with better traction will destroy the court. Shoes with no traction will not help at all. Is the surface outdated?

I don't know the solution, but I think it needs to be looked into. Looking at what soccer players and wide receivers in football use and coming up with something tennis specific for grass courts would seem the best approach to me. Soccer players typically use regular cleats still I think and there are some movements, but wide receivers, they typically need to stop and cut around a defender, they use low cleats many times, which is closer to what I'm thinking for tennis, like a bit lower than that. The low cleats are better for quick movements and obviously speed. But I don't know what they do for stopping.

But I'm really curious if it's even been looked into at all, or whether it's just, here's a shoe with more traction, when other sports are like, yeah, we need more than just traction on grass.

I think it's definitely an outdated surface, but I also don't think it's going anywhere at Wimbledon so you've got to try to come up solutions. Because it's not just the major injuries, every year it seems recently there are a decent number of near misses and minor injuries too. Feels like it's much more than we see at the other GS, I can't tell if it gets more focus or it happens more often. Sloane is a near miss I remember last year that looked awful but lucky wasn't serious, and though he's already back from it, Matteo injured himself at Wimbledon as well and it led to him missing the Olympics. There were several others like both of them.

The Wimbledon courts were particularly slippery last year. I remember seeing quite a few falls that looked like trouble.