tennis, life and a few things in between

一个和尚挑水喝，两个和尚抬水喝，三个和尚没水喝
To drink water one should carry it by himself, to drink water two would carry it together. Unfortunately, there would have no water if there are three people.
This saying implies when there are too many people involved in one task without clear definition as who is doing what, the matter ends up unaccomplished.

At USTA league, the rule says that the captions should confirm match few days prior and should enter the score within 24 hours upon the conclusion. Well, most captains were really good, always do it but there are few who don’t. And I think some time one captain might think the other is doing it hence s/he isn’t doing it .. To eliminate the confusion or expectation, the league should just make it clear which team is doing what. Make the loser entering the score seems compounding the sorrow .. so let the winning captain to relive the joy once more 🙂

Being new and fresh, here are few of my thoughts ..

1. Make the language straightforward
2. Auto fills the Q16
3. 4.5 plays as 4.0 due to year end rating
4. You can’t really search me on the site because my last name has only 3 letters – 4 letters is the min
5. Be a hardened computer-rated veteran to go onto the Championship level
6. 3 strikes you’re out .. make putting up an illegal pairing a strike
7. The home team captain to confirm the court and winning team captain enter the score

Due to unavailability of our de facto chauffeur yesterday ( 赶场 .. did I tell you that all my players are super hot and in demand??), so I offered to drive. But my teammates politely told me no because, well, my car isn’t posh enough for them.
Sight.
One of the couples even bought a mini van – their kids are all grew, mind you. Guess my little diggy car isn’t really up to their standard.
So that’s an embarrassment #1.
The embarrassment 2: my ancient tennis racket. After I broken this one in the autumn, they breathed a relief thinking finally I’ll buy a new one. Ha .. I have two, inherited from my kids. To appease them, I forced Pumpkin let me use hers. High five, good Mom.
(The embarrassment 3 .. had been fixed.)

The embarrassment 4 .. ok, I shall stop here. The list is long.

Having just lost badly last Tuesday with only 3 more matches to go in the regular season, we were under pressure heading into our 8th match on Friday night. I don’t really recall anyone on the team, except: they’re the #1 team at the moment in our division with 59 points; I vaguely remembered they have a giant man player who’s really really good. And .. I was told that they were the team who filed complaint against us that resulting four bump ups last season. (The complaint did not disclose the identity of the team/individual instead the coordinator filed.)

Kai and I played the second string on Court 9. The guy aced me on his second serve to start the game. Then Kai lost his serve. Within a few minutes, we were down to 0-2.
2-2
..
5-3
5-6
Then we found ourselves down 0:2 in the tie break .. finally we won the first set tie break. It was a very exciting set. We both had our chances and misfortunes. I had two bad line call on his serve (too fast for my aging eyes!!) and Kai corrected me. Glad he did. (.. actually the second one wasn’t an out call but my grunt!!)
We started the second set down 0-2, again. Errrrrrrr… Then the guy came over to our side questioning his first serve, which was clearly out. He pointed to a mark that’s closer to the net when his ball landed actually closer to the service line. I even gone as far to ask the girl, who replied that she didn’t see it. In any case, the match was well played. And he never once hit hard at me, which I appreciated very much.

During the second set, their guy on Court 8 had the cramps and my girl was on the floor giving him medical treatment. Glad she did. Good sportsmanship should always come first.

Court 10 was the last one to finish. They were down 1:4 in the third set tie break but came back to win at 10:8. Lum has cold so she wasn’t moving well. She said she was extremely tired during the second set.

..

About our 7th match on Jan 14.

This email started on a total different subject but then my teammate replied with the following ..

.. .. Opponents were kind of tricky and did a lot of talking so after they won the first set, they kept talking so we ended up in second set at 5/5. At one point I had to say let’s play.
..

“Oh no ..” As I was reading it because I had exact experience when I played them on Nov 7, the first match of the season. The girl was teamed with a different partner. After they won the first set, they began talking excessively on their own serve and on ours when they would turn their backs to the net. We just had to wait. At one time, I called out.. “please let us play ..” The girl held up her hand, “just a second.”
Tennis is really being played in good faith. I really don’t appreciate such conduct.
I said nothing after the match, because I was new to the timed match format and we finished just as time was up. I probably should have.

City View
43-34 32nd Place
Long Island City NY 11101
(718) 389-6252

Feb 15, 2011:
The Club is near the LaGuardia Community College in Long Island City, inside of a warehouse with large and slow elevator. The surrounding area is very crabby and dirty, and the parking is difficult. The club itself is pretty new, nicely done but somehow, I felt the craftsmanship (bathroom, etc.) is subpar. The little wooden chests that hold hand towels, tissue boxes, etc. between courts are bit comical. Why don’t they invest more in the chairs/seatings? The white plastic lawn chairs were out of place there and cheap.

By Subway:
7 train to 33rd Street/Rawson. Walk down to the street and cross Queens Blvd. Walk back to 32nd Place and make a right. The entrance is on your left.

By Car:
Manhattan:
Queensboro Bridge (59th Street Bridge), Upper level. Keep to the left for Queens Blvd. and make a left at the light onto Thompson. At the next light, make a left onto Skillman Avenue and then a right onto 32nd Place. The entrance is on your right.
Queens/Long Island:
Long Island Expressway to Van Dam Street. Make a right onto Van Dam and cross over Queens Blvd. At the end of the block, make a right onto Skillman and a right onto 32nd Place.

Tuesday evening started out unsuspiciously normal and peace. I picked up my racket that was being restrung for $20, did my round of grocery shopping in Flushing. Picked out dishes for the dinner and I even managed to sneak in a few dumplings – my favored dill.
Then we boarded the chauffeured luxury bus headed to our 7th match at Roosevelt Island.
The forecast said snow was coming but there was very little by 9pm.
The standing of our division as of last Friday was as follow (matches played) points earned:

1. Team 1 Eng (6) 53.5
2. Team 4 McConway (6) 50
3. Team 6 Rosenberg (6) 45.5
4. Team 2 Kende/Vogy (5) 42.5
5. Team 5 Kim/Seto (7) 42.5
6. Team 3 Cuthbert (8) 13

Kai and I played first doubles. One light was out on our corner court so we had to move to another court to start the match. We won the toss so I opted to serve then promptly lost it. 兵败如山倒 defeated army retreat like a mountain collapsing, we lost first set in a few minutes. The guy was just too good with his huge serve and strong forehand. What’s more? I kept on doing the wrong thing, feeding him one point after another… to a point that the bald eagle offered to buy me a dinner …. JK. Our second D wasn’t doing well either. The only winning pair was our third D. They were leading 8:1 in the final set super tie break. Then they allowed the opponents to catch up to 8:6 ..
Golfer asked me where I was and Pumpkin kept on sending I love you note and get home safely .. I was musing on the way back: were we all nuts or what, on a stormy evening, so late into the night … couldn’t we just stay home and have a drink?

As of today, all teams in our division have played 7 matches except Team 3 who had 9. The new world raking is ..

1. T2 – 57.5
2. T1 – 56.5
3. T4 – 54
4. T6 – 53.5
5. T5 – 42.5
6. T3 – 22

So, it’s going to be a close race, very exciting! I had my swim in early this morning. I had the pool to myself really. The only two other swimmers were at the free swim side (shallow pool). So I did 40 laps without a single interruption (errrrr … in 25 minutes – I’m getting old and slow). So I’m ready to take on the world.

Tomorrow is another day anyway.

USTA Eastern section held a webinar this afternoon talking about the ratings.

In the past, mixed doubles result doesn’t count but everything counts now. As for medical appeal: last year the league had only granted 6-8 nation wide: very difficult to win. IF you played against someone who made to the Nationals .. how they do in the Nationals will affect your rating ..

Key to Type of Rating

A – Appeal
B – Benchmark – advanced to playoff or championship round
C – Computer
D – Dynamic
E – Early Start League dynamic
M – Mixed Exclusive Year-end Rating
S – Self-rate or Medical Appeal
T – Tournament Exclusive Year End Rating

Self-rated and computer rated players holding a classification of “M”, “T”, or “A” are subject to disqualification through Sectional Championships. Players granted a Medical Appeal are classified as self rated and are subject to disqualification.

_____________________

We played our 6th match. Four opponents were bit late. When it was 8:15, time to start match, the lady didn’t want to claiming she had practiced served yet. So we let her served up few .. she wasn’t charmed. I felt that a player should watch the time and pace out her/his thing within allotted time. Oh well ..

The light accidentally went out at 9:20 when second and third doubles were already concluded but first doubles was in a battle for life: down a set but on serve in the second at 5:5. They had to move to another court to won two consecutive games to split the match. Reportedly they played an exciting match, facing the set point (hence the match pt) when the opponents had them running from left to right.

The door wasn’t working after the lighting accident either so we had to exit from the emergency door.  Wow .. it was like extreme sport because we could hardly stand up due to hurricane force from bubble decompressing.   ok .. think you were exiting the space craft and immediately sucked into dark orbit.  Not good enough?  The please come up with your own imagination.  We almost got blown away into the darkness, foreign terrain where we’ve never been to that part of the club. That must be the highlight of the night -:).

Or bad manner?
Few weeks ago at the NTC, we got onto the court when its our time. The previous groups, about 8 men and 1 woman did not leave immediately. They gathered on the alley between our court and the adjacent court and talked.

Five minutes passed. There wasn’t a sign of leaving. Because of their large number of people, it was kind of dangerous for all of us.
I went over asked them to leave. The sole lady gave me a dirty look.
10 minutes elapsed and the talk was still going strong.
I went over again, asking them please leave. She looked at me and asking
“What’s the big deal ??”
I called the USTA ..
Finally they left at 16 minutes pass the hour. One lone guy would remain bit longer to change flaunt his awesome bod with extra 50 pounds.
IF the lady said something like, “oh .. just one more second and we’re leaving .. ” when I first asked, I won’t get up set. I’d picture myself probably telling her “oh .. go ahead and finish your business .. ” but instead she and her group completely ignored us.

As it happened, I ran into the woman yesterday at the Eastern year end holiday party, when new skipper was inaugurated and where grants were handed out. So she must be an active member of the local tennis community .. hence she should know the etiquette of the game? Or might not? Even if she doesn’t, don’t we all have decency and common sense? No? Am I asking for too much?

The fifth match of the season had completed and my team walked away with 9 points, barely enough to keep us in the first place, for the time being.

I checked 6 teams’ total number of player vs self rated players, as of today:
1 … 12/5
2 … 18/1
3 … 16/6
4 … 21/2
5 … 18/0
6 … 13/6

The 2010 year end ratings are now available! Please be patient when using the ‘Find a Rating’ area as everyone is interested in their new rating.

The warning message at the tennis link on usta. Ha, the long awaited result of year long hard work .. who gets bumped up and who got dumped down. Joys and tears, I reckon? On Monday night when it first became available, the traffic was so heavy that it took minutes to load up. We’re a crazy group of people, not only wildly passionate about playing, that isn’t simply enough, we also care fanatically about how we measure up in our peers’ eyes.
My team of 12 payers has only one bump up: Simon, from 4.0 to 4.5. He’ll be ok to play on our Manhattan team as 4.0 but we’d have to forge ahead without him on our Queens team.

One of our ex-teammates, Anna was bumped up to 4.0 in fm 3.5 in Sept, the early rating. She won all her Women’s 3.5 and 4.0 in the summer (after our mixed season). Then surprisingly she got bumped back down to 3.5 at year end.

Kai did only mixed doubles as I did, but his rating type is M (Mixed exclusive Year-end Rating) while I got B (Benchmark – advanced to playoff or championship round), 同命不同运 or what?

Dan last played on usta league in 2001 as a 4.0 but this time around, he used the questionnaire and got a 4.5 rating. Hmmmmmm …. he hasn’t played for a decade and is over certain age limit .. .. Somehow, I felt the ranking system is bit crap shoot.

Our fourth match was against the team we played last during previous season Lillian. She came to the court with a glass of wine and showed me her new tattoo: her 5th on her right shoulder.

“It is real?” or watermarked..
“It’s real.” She replied with a pride. Apparently she’s a mountaineer and had conquered five out of the 7 hills in the world.
That’s some impressive record.

While playing, I recalled her comment about couples as partners would end up arguing; sometimes had nothing to do with tennis – would allow the domestic matters escalated into court like who left the toilet seat on (or off).

As matter of fact, I have three couples on my team this time – half are related. Don’t you feel a little incestuous 🙂 ..? Well, maybe the league is bit on the incestuous side, year in and year out, the veterans are far more out numbers than the newbies. (And the newbies like me … will soon become a vet too .. till pallbears carry me out ..)

So far, they all proclaim undying love, no argument PDA, just yet.

With last night win, our team is in the first place.. keep going kids!