GoTennis! has partnered with T2 Tennis for a new High School Flex League and parents and coaches are going to LOVE IT!

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- Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

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and anyone else we find interesting.

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We wanna have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.

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- Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,

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powered by GoTennis!

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Check out our calendar of Metro Atlanta Tennis events

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In this episode, we talked to Jason Steele,

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State Champion High School Tennis Coach,

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currently coaching at South Forsyth High School.

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And with the new Go Tennis and T2 High School Tennis League

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starting soon, he shares his appreciation

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for the flexible League format as a parent

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and receiving the League match data as a coach.

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Have a listen and let us know what you think.

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(gentle music)

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- Jason Steele, I've got some questions for you

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because I wanna find out and I appreciate you making time

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as a high school tennis coach.

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I got a couple of questions for you

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and then I've got a couple of questions for you

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as a parent as a real person, not just high school coach.

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But in this case, my first question is

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talking about this T2 High School Tennis League

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that comes out next month.

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Go Tennis and T2 have come together to create

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a high school tennis league with no pressure.

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There's no ranking points right now, there's no UTR

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rating system, none of that matters, there's just extra matches.

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And that is really my first question.

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So as a parent of a high school player, Jason,

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you know the pressure added by points and rankings

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and ratings, all those other matches and the tournaments

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and everything else.

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And now there's a league where your kids can play

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without any external pressure.

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As a parent, not necessarily as a coach,

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as a parent, how much can you appreciate that?

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- Well, I really appreciate that because

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it's a league for all sorts of skill levels

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to where if you have a child who just wants to start

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playing tennis, this will give them a chance

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to learn and grow.

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And if you have a more experienced or intermediate player,

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they rank the leagues so they'll be playing against players

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in their competition, but they can go out there

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and play without the pressure to where they're not worried

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about, like you said, rankings or points or UTR,

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they can just go out there and mainly work on their game

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and have fun and get the experience they need.

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So I think a lot of players, one of their fears

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and being a parent is just going out there with that pressure.

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And so they don't enjoy that pressure

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and they have this fear of losing and losing points

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or letting team down this way, you just go out there

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and it's a match or keeping score,

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but it's more, let me practice, let me improve my game.

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And you said have fun and that really is the point.

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That's one of the things a parent wants.

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That's one of the reasons we want our kids

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to get into something like tennis

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or whether it's another sport that's fun,

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but we want them to have fun.

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And it shouldn't always be pressure.

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And as a parent, even those UTR and USDA,

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those tournaments, those events, aside from the pressure,

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there's a time commitment.

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You got to drive across town.

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If you're lucky, there's one nearby,

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but it's also either a full day on Saturday

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or if it's a UTR event, it could be a full day,

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you get a bunch of matches in and that's good,

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maybe even better than a full weekend.

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Sneaking at a school early on a Friday,

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which was always fun for us to get to a tournament match

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within your whole weekends newt.

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I mean, it's just you're doing that the whole time.

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And families don't always want to spend

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every weekend playing tennis.

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That's got to be appreciated as well.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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And the flexibility is key.

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My daughter can't stand tournaments where you don't know how

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many matches you're going to play exactly.

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And you get there.

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And then if it's raining, you got to spend the whole day,

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the whole week in there.

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And as almost to the point where sometimes she's like,

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"Man, if I keep winning, I got to keep playing.

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I got to stay here all day long."

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And it really takes the joy out of it

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and it ruins the whole weekend.

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And kids these days want to do things on the weekends

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and not use the whole weekend for a tennis tournament to where

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now you have the flexibility to play weekend during the week

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exactly when you're going to play.

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And who you're going to play, where you go play the match,

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and you get that match experience without sitting around

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all weekend waiting for the tournament schedule come out.

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Yeah, are driving across town,

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hoping wondering if you're going to play all weekend

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and losing the first match and going home.

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Correct.

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That's the other thing is you plan a whole weekend around tennis

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and now all of a sudden you've got nothing to do.

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Yes.

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So now I want to switch to your coach,

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if you put on your coaching hat,

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and why is it important that this league offers players

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the matches in the fall?

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Is September, sorry, is October and November matches

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that should be relevant going into January, right?

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Yeah, absolutely.

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So the tennis season, high school tennis season,

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doesn't start until January.

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So they need players need an off season

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to where they can get matches in and get that,

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like experience.

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So having the season starts and late fall,

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they are ready for trials in January.

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So they're not, especially if there's high school players,

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they might not have played another meaningful match

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since last high school season.

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So this way, this gets them ready and prepared

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because the tennis season is short and intense.

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So there's not a lot of practice time

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before the matches start.

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So we'd love to have our players already playing matches

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in, quote, in match, in form, not being

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right for a play matches middle to end of February.

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I mean, it's too late because matches

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usually start early February.

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Yeah, and how many of your players not use specifically?

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But how many of your players as a high school coach

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don't play other than high school?

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Because there are plenty of players out there

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that just, hey, I like playing high school,

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maybe I play, maybe I drill a little bit in the summer.

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But they're not necessarily five day

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of week, or it's like we were back in the day.

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They're playing every once in a while.

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And this really gets them five matches at least,

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and then maybe playoffs, get some so much more available

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and ready, available is probably the wrong word,

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ready to go when January comes around.

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Yeah, no, absolutely.

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I would say on my team, I would say,

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like, out of every 10 players, I've had a high school team,

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maybe for the most five or playing tournaments year-round.

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But at least half of them.

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That's probably a high.

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Your teams are good.

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Imagine you say that.

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They don't have those.

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Yeah, and so, yeah, low other teams might not have any.

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But yeah, they even like a top state team,

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like the South for size, if the most half the team

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are going to be tournament players with the other half,

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don't play tournaments.

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And they literally, like I said, just play high school matches.

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So they come in to try out, so they get in the season,

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where the last time they played a match was their last high school

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match, the season before.

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Yeah, and you as a coach, do you not go to the Booster Club

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right now?

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And do you not text all your players

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and all the potential players?

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And after your interest meeting, which probably has already

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happened this year, to say, who's interested in tennis?

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Go play this league.

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Go find a doubles partner.

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You're not going to play singles.

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Get over it.

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We all know that they're trying out for a doubles spot.

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Go get some practice.

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I can only imagine myself as a high school tennis coach,

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just telling everybody, go.

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And that leaves my last question, because for you,

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you've got a personal reason to want them to play,

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because the league also sends you data

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from this league, from the match results, they can send you that.

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So you know who's putting in the work, especially if they're not--

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you know the Academy kids are putting in their work.

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You know they're already playing.

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Tournament players are already playing.

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But the kids that haven't picked up a racket since April,

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you really want them to play it?

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Absolutely.

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So the data shows me, like you said,

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that these who's serious, who wants to get better,

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who's playing, who is stepping up to become a better player.

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And the other thing is about this league

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that I think is very, very important is the whole doubles aspect.

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Like if you're trying out for a high school team,

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there's three lines of singles, two lines of doubles.

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So you have three singles players and four doubles players.

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So you have more doubles players that are going to make the team

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in play, and I tell my players that being improving or getting better

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in doubles is the best way to make a team

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or to get into the starting line of the play matches.

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And so finding a doubles partner, joining this type of league,

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playing those doubles and getting that experience is going to be huge.

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And as a coach, I see these teams are players who play in this league

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and get that experience.

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That's going to show me their improvements

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and how serious they take wanting to play high school teams.

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And even some of those players I mentioned earlier

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before we started talking here, I mentioned that I've got two girls

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that are going to try out for the team at their local high school.

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They've never played a match.

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So in this case, at least you have a name that says,

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this kid went out and played some tennis.

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And maybe they didn't win a game.

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Maybe they didn't win a match.

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Who knows how well they did?

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But you know what?

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They went out and did everything they could to get prepared to join your team.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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As a coach, that's the kind of effort that we're looking for.

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Yeah, and aside from whether or not they're good,

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they're going to be that teammate that you're going to want.

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I would definitely think.

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Yes, yes.

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So like, as definitely, like I said,

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the attitude and effort they were looking for,

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and that is a good way for them to show the coach,

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that they're doing that because a lot of players can say this and say that.

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But this way, like you said, there's actual data.

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And as a coach, you can look and see what they're saying is true.

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Yeah, that's awesome.

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All right, Jason, I got one more question.

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And it's my favorite question because I get to ask everybody we talk to

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if they were king of tennis, what would they do?

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And it's really a lot of fun because we like to hear those great ideas.

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If somebody says, ah, if I could make it more affordable or make it more,

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you know, some of those things of, I really want to do good for tennis.

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If I could do some good, or at least looking at something and say,

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these changes need to be made within my niche or just looking out,

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I know you've been in the high school tennis world for a while.

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So I want to ask you specifically in the high school world,

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if you can keep it to that, if Jason Steele was king of tennis,

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king of high school tennis, and I'll even just say,

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Georgia, it doesn't matter.

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King of high school tennis, is there anything you would do or change?

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Yeah, I mean, for Georgia high school tennis,

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I, if I could make a couple of changes, that doesn't sound like a big deal.

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But one, I would like to change the lineup format.

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It's more of a USDA maybe out of formats,

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to where I would like to make it more like a college format where you have

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six singles players in three doubles lines to where players can play both doubles

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and singles if they want to instead of kind of like, you know, where they have it now.

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And I guess the other thing I would do is I would like to maybe,

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if I could change the season to start maybe, you know,

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right when school starts in August.

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So we're not starting in January and February, we're in it, so, you know, below 30.

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This is true, the January trials are always miserable,

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but I think the good thing about playing in the spring is you're not competing with football

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and high school football is kind of a big deal here in Georgia.

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It's never been my thing personally, but I don't know that,

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that I want to be the one that says, do I want to go to the football game or the tennis match?

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We have a feeling probably what most people in Georgia would choose.

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But right around my birthday is the best weather in Georgia.

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My birthday is at the end of September.

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So I always take the top down on the triumph mid September to Thanksgiving really.

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I think it's phenomenal weather and we've started this league to where we're going to start the second week of October.

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And we're going to end right before around Thanksgiving.

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And then we're going to have a huge city finals event at the end.

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So we're pretty excited about it.

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I wanted to remind you, I think you and I have talked about some other things

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that we highlight in this where we talked about the no points.

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And no rankings, no ratings.

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There are going to be plenty of people that are going to say,

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hey, why don't you report to UTR now that the Georgia High School Association has announced UTR is the official rating system?

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And we will definitely take a look at that.

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But the flexibility is really important and the data going to the coaches.

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If you're a high school coach, I can only imagine how much I would call me and thank me.

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It's not just me doing this, but I would call up T2 and say,

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hey, Mr. T2, I'd like to say thank you because you're getting the kids the matches that they need.

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And you're telling me about it and that's going to help me with tryouts,

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which might be the most stressful time for a lot of coaches.

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It's actually the first year coaches that may not know how to do that.

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You're going to see players that have never seen before, they have no data.

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They have no way to do it.

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And this league, all that data helps as well quite a bit.

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So I've reached out to a lot of my other fellow high school coaches about the league.

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And they're all very excited because like you said, that they get their players,

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there aren't playing tournaments, especially those players, extra matches before the season starts.

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And because they want to see their players getting that experience and they can use the data,

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but again, out there, and playing to where, when we start in January,

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they're not, quote, rusty, starting almost seems like we're starting over.

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They're ready to go.

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And so by that time, the season starts, we can get the best performance from them.

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Yeah, I think that's one of the things that the coaches are going to like.

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And we've got plenty on it.

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It just seems like a giant win-win to me.

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Yes.

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Jason Steele, thank you so much.

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I really appreciate your time.

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We will be in touch.

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No problem. Thank you.

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Thanks Jason.

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Well, there you have it.

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We want to thank Rejovenate.com for use of the studio.

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And with that, we're out.

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See you next time.

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