Dave and Tom are back with us talking about additional “Annoying Situations on the Tennis Court – Part Two”.
Carolyn came up with a list of things that are annoying to her when playing. She asked Dave and Tom if they annoy them as well. Here’s her list:
1. Hitting winners during warm-ups
Annoying! We all agreed hitting winners during warm-ups is annoying but Tom thinks “baby tennis” is even more annoying. He would rather see someone hit their best shot (a winner) then play baby tennis. He thinks he’ll never see those types of shots in a match. Tom said that when an opponents hit drop shots during warm-ups that that annoys him though.
2. Throwing a racquet
Carolyn and Erin think when women throw their racquets in tennis matches it’s not only an annoying situation on the court but also awkward. In men’s matches, however, it’s commonplace. Tom and Dave said it doesn’t bother them at all. Tom said he’s seen a few guys destroy their racquets out of frustration which he finds silly. Someone who breaks their tennis racquet just wasted several hundred dollars.
3. Yelling at oneself out of frustration
Carolyn has played many singles and had opponents yell at themselves out of frustration. She finds it awkward because sometimes she can’t tell if they are yelling at themselves or trying to say something to her. Carolyn played a woman (we’ll say her name is Sarah) and she kept calling herself stupid. Now, when we talk about Sarah, we call her “Stupid Sarah.”
4. Throwing the balls over to the other side of the court vs. handing them over
We all agreed that throwing the balls to the other side of the court without handing them to an opponent is annoying. But… things have changed in the age of the pandemic. Tom and Erin said they used to think it was rude for players to leave the tennis balls on the ground for opponents to pick up when changing sides. Now thing think it’s better. If balls are left on the ground, there’s no physical contact with your opponents. The thing we all agreed was, however, was when an opponent throws the balls over to your side of the court when you’re not looking.
5. When an opponent goes to retrieve a ball slowly and you feel like it’s strategy
This definitely falls under the category “annoying situations on the court”! Sometimes people are slow by nature but often they are slow to retrieve a ball as a strategy to delay a game or match. This is frustrating! Tom thinks if you have two balls to play with, don’t take the time to get the third ball if it slows the game down.
6. Taking too long to serve
While Carolyn is annoyed at people that take too long to serve, Dave is more annoyed at someone that serves fast. All tennis players have their serving routine but being way too fast or way too slow is probably annoying to most rec tennis players.
7. Cheering when someone gets hit with a tennis ball. A new low!
Carolyn has been hit with a ball in a match and could hear people on the sidelines cheering for the team that won the point because she got hit. That’s a new low in adult recreational tennis. Most players apologize when they hit someone but occasionally there’s a match where someone doesn’t understand good manners in adult recreational tennis.
Thank you for listening to “Annoying Situations on the Tennis Court – Part Two”. We talked about several other annoying things, but you’ll have to listen to the whole episode to hear them! We hope you enjoy it and will send us things that annoy you as well. We’re sure we could record endless episodes about this topic!
Some situations could be avoided if more tennis players understand the rules. Some weird things — not necessarily annoying — that happen on the court can be found in Rebel Good’s column called “Stump the Ump“. We think you’ll enjoy reading it!