The Backboard: How Do Isner, Mónaco, Almagro and Rhyne Williams Use Video And Stats?
By Juan José on April 17, 2013
Welcome to The Backboard, the new home for some of my tennis thoughts and musings. This column will appear every Monday here at The Changeover (this week is an exception). You can find past editions of The Backboard here.
How Do the Houston Semifinalists Use Video and Stats?
As you know, I’m more than a little fixated on the use of statistics and video in sports. I wondered in this same space whether tennis was in the dark ages in terms of using such contemporary tools. Well, last week I had a chance to go gather some information from the players themselves.
While I was covering the Houston ATP 250, also known as the US Men’s Clay Court Championship, I took the opportunity to ask the four men who made the semifinals of the event the same question regarding stats and video. It was simple:
“Do you and/or your team look at statistics or video (of you or your opponents) for scouting, or your own development?”
The answers, unsurprisingly, were quite different. The four men, in case you forgot, were:
- Nicolás Almagro
- Juan Mónaco
- John Isner, and
- Rhyne Williams
A Spaniard, an Argentine, and two Americans. Their respective ages? 27, 29, 27 and 22 (though Isner will turn 28 in less than two weeks).......
.....Rhyne Williams Houston SFs
“Oh, absolutely. Not so much opponents, but my coach videos just about every match I play. A lot of practices, too. So we constantly are looking at video of me to work on things and notice patterns and stuff like that. But, as for opponents, you just gotta ask around. I mean, I’ve seen Almagro play on TV several times, so I kinda know – everyone kinda knows everybody. You can always get some tips from a couple players here and there. But the videoing of my own stuff has been huge for me.”
This was a fascinating answer, and something that had a familiar ring to me. Just days before, I had seen how Craig O’Shannessy (who writes his Brain Game columns for the ATP site as well as for the New York Times Straights Sets blog) unmounted a video camera from the back fence of the court that had just seen his pupil Connor Curry (a high-school junior from Texas) lose his first round qualifying match at the Houston event. Given the equipment Craig had there, it didn’t seem like it was the first time he was taping a tennis match.
Maybe this is the new trend of American coaching: watching a lot of video of the player in question and figuring out where things are problematic, and using all the visual information to fine tune a young person’s game.
Regardless, it was interesting to hear how in Isner and Williams’ case, both players seemed quite engaged with (and happy to acknowledge the positive effect of) their use of video. It also seemed like their relationship with their teams wasn’t as role-defined as in the case of Almagro and Mónaco......