It's the End of the Year

00:00:03
Speaker 1: Cool, happy holidays, Renee. It's nearly the end of the year. We have so much ground to cover, so little time to cover it in. You and I are busy women. We fly around, we go to parties, we have daily streaming shows. So really just catching our breath, finding a moment to look into each other's eyes via zoom talk about some of the best, worst, and most important stories of the day. It's only time our fan have been requesting it. We've tried to find time, and here we are on a Friday, a rainy, rainy Friday, ahead of the holidays about to kick off. Where should we even start? It's our year end wrap up. We could start in so many different places. First of all, why don't you tell me since the last time we spoke when you were launching this is.

00:01:04
Speaker 2: The longest intro of your life with me right now?

00:01:06
Speaker 1: But I know the people who listen to this, No, I have lugger ea. Yeah, when we were recording last episode. It was in the launch pheuse of your new show, How's It Going Now? Power Hour thro NAW stubs on Amazon Sports Network is available both live four to five est and on demand. How's It Going?

00:01:25
Speaker 2: First of all, you got to listen. If you're going to promote my show, you got to get the times right. Okay, it's The Power Hour at five pm Eastern, five to six pm Eastern. Now, for all of you out there, I've been getting tweets and messages from people they're sort of semi abusing me that they can't find the show. I don't know what to tell you. I don't do the algorithm algorithms. So what I'm going to say is you go to Prime Video, okay, and you just type in search if you really get lost, and type in the Power Hour and put my name in there stubs and it will come up for you, and it is all on demand. Now you will even get to see an interview I did with this chucklehead that I'm looking at right now on my zoom, Caitlin Thompson. There's a great interview with Mary Carillo talking about the life and legacy and sadly the passing away of Nick Bolea Terry, which was last week that we did not talk about on our pod. But so that was a really great interview. So I really hope people will tune in just to see that interview in and of itself. But the show's going great, Caitlin. I'm talking about everything other than tennis right now because there's no tennis on. What we will get into talking about today is some of the things I've been talking about with tennis, which is the ATP and WTA wards. Oh, there's been some vitriol on the old tweets.

00:02:42
Speaker 1: When hasn't there been vitriol in the old tweets?

00:02:45
Speaker 2: I mean, people are just nuts. But anyway, yes, we get into that that the show is great. I'm really enjoying it. Amana Lei is my producer and he and I have become good friends, and it's a great show. I really enjoy it. We're talking a lot of World Cup, We're talking a lot of know everything that I'm sort of interested in as well, which we're going to talk about skiing a little more and give you know, the Mikaela Shifferns of the world even more love. So yeah, it's been really fun.

00:03:09
Speaker 1: It's fun for me to hear how much you know and follow and are curious about other sports. I mean, I think a lot of people who follow tennis, it's one of many many sports they follow. And I also appreciate that the lens that makes your tennis coverage so good, which is that you're not afraid to ask hard questions and you like the sort of hidden narrative stories is really coming out in all of these other sports now and giving me, in the case of things I know more about, a cool lens and in the things I know less about, like I love to ski, I love ski racing, I don't know all that much about it, and so getting an entry point into the sport has been really, really wonderful. So anybody who has not done so. Amazon Sports five to six pm, Power Hour, eest and on demand, and it's really cool. You had our friend Andrea Petkovic on, We've had Mary Carillo on talking about Nick Terry. You've gotten.

00:04:03
Speaker 2: Listen. Yesterday I talked to a woman that was the professor at the University of Texas about Russian jails and the penal colony that Britney Griner was located in, and her insight into that was really fascinating. So we get some really sort of random cool people on there talking about various things in sports. So, you know, one of my favorite shows in the world is Real Sports on HBO, which Mary Carillo is a part of, and I just love that we can tie in sports to everyday life as well, so we get to talk about that. I'm going to talk about women's volleyball today, so it's really pretty cool. It's fun. I'm enjoying it. Well, anyway, let's go too.

00:04:41
Speaker 1: Now, let's talk to the mean sport that everyone who listens to the show is the most keen to discuss, because God knows, we have to talk about another dumb sport at the event at very end of this and we might not make it with the anger. So let's talk about something we love, which is tennis, which has just released its WTA and ATP awards, which is great because not only does it give us a chance to celebrate the people who won big tournaments, which is kind of the way that the tennis establishment already dedicates a lot of coverage, a lot of noise, a lot of attention to, but also some of the players who do a lot in the human humanitarian realms, a lot of the players who are considered sort of you know, great sports by their peers, a lot of the players who you know, commit acts of service, et cetera. So for me, it's really fun to see a little bit of an insight into the world, voted on by categories that include the players themselves, so you really get a sense of how this place works as a workplace essentially. So let's get into it. Atp we have the number one, not a surprise to anybody who's following the last couple of years as colors Algoraz the men's Doubles, Wesley Kohath and Neil Skupsky, Comeback Player of the Year Born at Korich, Newcomer of the Year, Whole Garuna, the Stefan Edberg Sportsmanship Award, our favorite Oatmeal Stallion. Very very excited about that because I think in this category the players have voted for Roger Fetter or Rafinadal for what the better part of twenty years.

00:06:10
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:06:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, they've had a lock on that category. And now Casper Rude, who was obviously had a great year coming into the finals of the French Open in the US Open, is joining their ranks. And let's talk a little bit about one of your favorite players, Andy Murray the Arthur ash Humanitarian Award. I did not know, because we have not done a good job of telling this story in the tennis world, that he gave his prize money full Stop twenty twenty two prize money more than six hundred and thirty thousand dollars starting in March with Indian Wells two people affected by the invasion of Ukraine. What a cool, low key, flex thing to do.

00:06:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, look, obviously the guy has a lot of money, and he clearly has made a lot of money from the sport of tennis. But it's still well over half a million dollars to give away. He's pretty phenomenal. That is his money he earned. Look, he's just one of the great guys. And I said, I actually talked about this on my show. He gets a bad rap. Look he's not. He's a little tough to watch. Sometimes he carry on. He carries on at times on the court like a pork chop. We know that give him a crap about it, you know, he's a bit whiny, complains, he carries on like, as I said, a pork chop. But off of the tennis court, there's no better guy. There's no nicer guy. There's no funnier guy. And I mean I can say that because I was the same way. I was a bit of a pork chop on the court as well, But I would say that I'm pretty good person off the court. I like to, you know, help out whenever I can. I'd give back to charities. If I had his money, I'd be handing out dough all the time as well, you know. So he's just one of those guys that were just so happy to have him in tennis, because I mean, the guy had Emily Moresmo as his coach, you know, one of the first really big stars of the game that employed a woman as a coach and gave her that opportunity to be in this player box. I just just I just don't There's not many that I like more than Andy Murray as a human being. So for him to get this award is no surprise to.

00:08:08
Speaker 1: Me, no surprise, and I think, again, what a cool flex to be able to realize that as an athlete, as important as you are to your ecosystem and to the fans around the globe, there are things that are more important than sport, and that is you know, human rights and safety and all that stuff. So that was really cool. The rest of the ATPs are pretty straightforward fan favorite singles, RAFA fan favorite doubles, Tanasi and Nick I don't know if you want to take a second here and shout out your Fellowassis Coach of the Year one Carlos Ferrero who's been working with Carlos Acres, and then we have some props for different tournaments, X, Y and Z. Moving joice to the women.

00:08:48
Speaker 2: The men's was all pretty straight up, straightforward. Even Comeback Player of the Year. You know, I was incredible with Chorich and the you know what a great year he had by winning Cincinnati and improving his king the amount of time he did, and he was completely off the tour all of last year, so he literally came back of March of this year and was able to win an ATP one thousand, so that was an incredible thing. Most Improved Player was given to our Crez no surprise, getting to another one in the world so quickly, you know, and Renee was given Newcomer of the Year. He could have almost gotten both of those. One of those guys could have gotten both of those awards. But the women, on the other hand, I'm not quite sure who's voting on these because I get my email as a former player and as a coach on tour, and you know, it goes to players and it goes to coaches. So I'm not quite sure about some of the awards that were given out.

00:09:44
Speaker 1: You thought they were controversial. Okay, let me read them first and then we'll start and discuss. And let's not.

00:09:48
Speaker 2: Read them all of this. Let's read them one and then discuss.

00:09:50
Speaker 1: How about Well, I don't want to wed for you to wein in on every single one because Renee Stubbs has never knowingly withheld an opinion. So why don't you just start me when it feels like you have something actually important to say? That Player of the Year sante not doubles. Team of the Year, Barbara, did you give a Katerina Sinacoa the checks?

00:10:09
Speaker 2: Good?

00:10:09
Speaker 1: Okay, so far, so good? So I watched like everything right, most improved player of your Beatrice Hadad Maya Brazilian. Fine with that?

00:10:19
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, what what about Jess Pula?

00:10:22
Speaker 1: Great point, Yeah, Jess, she had a much better year than Beatrice had A Maya.

00:10:27
Speaker 2: I mean, Beatrice had Do Maya had an incredible year.

00:10:30
Speaker 1: She did, but Jess Pegoula's ceiling was top like three in the world. Yes, she made wt A Tour finals. She's skinned. They want to agree with you?

00:10:39
Speaker 2: Want to she won a wt A one thousand event, you know, leading into the championships, and made not only did she make the singles, but also made the doubles. Right with Coco Go, I mean, come on, number three blood, Well what else she gotta do?

00:10:55
Speaker 1: What else does she have to do? Maybe the Bills have to win a Super Bowl?

00:10:59
Speaker 2: Maybe she was no night of a Player of the Year I believe, and didn't get that because she was my sing price fly. I'm not the best player. I mean the best player was Eiontek.

00:11:07
Speaker 1: But yeah, nobody could argue with Ega. But yeah, okay, well we see you, Jess Bogula. Justice will be done. Newcomer of the Year Chin Win Jung are issue number twenty one cover star that drops today, the young Chinese player who I think two hundred places in the rankings.

00:11:25
Speaker 2: Not controversial. Everybody would have made that right, broadly fine with that, Yes, total explosive game.

00:11:30
Speaker 1: Cool as hell. The pictures of the portfolio that Sue Quan legendary nightlife hip hop photographer Suquon shot of her for the issue are tight. Check it out rack atmag dot com. Okay, back to the list. Comeback Player of the Year, Touchiana Maria that feels right. That's cool now, smarking crack? Maybe? Why? Why? What's wrong with that? She used a mother, she got on a couple of deep runs under bag, she won a couple of big tournaments.

00:11:55
Speaker 2: You gonna let me play my my pod in this go ahead. Daria Avelova was ranked almost five hundred in the world to start the year because she had an entire year of twenty twenty one off due to another surgery on her foot. Okay, and did not play it all last year, because this award is for twenty twenty two, not twenty one and plus twenty two. And as much as I love Tatiana Maria and she could not be a nicer human being, and her run at Wimbledon was unbelievable and all of the stuff. Okay, I granted she had an incredible year, But she played for six months last year. Caitlin, she played from July until January of this year. She played a full six months. Now if she had come back in let's say October, November, December, maybe playing a couple of small challenger events or whatever after having her second child, I'm okay with that. But she played a half a year last year. Now is that just a little unlucky maybe, but also she had six months of playing under her belt. Varrio Gavrilova started playing her first match back in a year, was playing one match at fed Cup, which was at the very end of last year, or it might have been at the start of this year, and then started playing on the Pro Tour against this January and got to top fifty in the world.

00:13:29
Speaker 1: Maybe, Okay, that counterpoint. The counterpoints she didn't play a whole season because she got injured during a Velma.

00:13:37
Speaker 2: Wait a second, you can't stay because she didn't play November.

00:13:41
Speaker 1: I think that you can. I think you can see that she didn't play the whole year. I mean again, I'm not I don't disagree with the stats, but I feel like maybe she wasn't on everyone's consciousness because she didn't play the whole year.

00:13:52
Speaker 2: Dude, she got injured in Asia well after the US Open, Like, what more of the fricking year does she have to pl she played every Grand Slam she played. I'm going to try and find how many tournaments she played At this point in time. It was something like, let's see, here we go, Darriott seve she played nineteen tournaments Caitlin.

00:14:13
Speaker 1: All right, that's pretty good.

00:14:15
Speaker 2: Nineteen O.

00:14:16
Speaker 1: Listen, I'm a Duria Gablova Seville fan, So this is not meant to be like I'm just saying thinking, maybe that's why people overlooked her, like she hasn't been top of mind. Maybe because she's been off, because she's been injured. I don't know, I don't know, no, No, that's look. She played basically ten months this year.

00:14:33
Speaker 2: That's four years. Some people stop after the USA.

00:14:35
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, let's keep a moving. Karen Kransky's Person of the Sugar Award ostiber Okine, I've done, easy decision. P. G. Colmeyer Player Service Award Gabby Dabowski from Canada. Fine with that, as Maria Zakari Coach of the Year David wit No.

00:14:50
Speaker 2: Now listen. I love David and the job that he's done with Jessica Pola, particularly this year has been it's normal circumstances, appl lutely what he's done in the improvement on her, and he knows how I feel about him. Jessica knows how I feel about her and what she's done. But come on, man, you cannot not give that award to Thomas Witzgarowski. He took a player that was top ten has made her one of the best players over the last twenty years. She had a thirty seven match win streak okay when she was announced that she would take over the number one ranking with in and of itself is the nerves and the pressure to deal with that. I see what he has to deal with with her. Listen, Eager looks like a robot on the court, but she is very emotional off the court. The stuff that he had to deal with her game keeping her in a positive frame of mind. She won two Grand Slams this year, and that thirty seven match win streak and the umptyen other tournaments that she won. You cannot not give Coach of the Year to the guy who had the most dominant player all year. I just, I just I'm sorry.

00:16:01
Speaker 1: Maybe, isn't it, because like and I think this maybe speaks to the coaching not being the most visible part of the game, which is like, if everyone expected you get to win, then is it as dramatic as somebody who was like Jess Pegoula maybe not on everyone's mind and then made tremendous, tremendous you know, season half and with the w TA Finals, appearances in both doubles and sickles just counterpoint, I don't I don't really have a dig in this, waight. I'm just sort of saying, is that.

00:16:30
Speaker 2: Maybe whynd percent? It's one of the reasons. And I have talked about this. I talked about it on my show actually, where I said I can see how people saying getting Jess Pagoula to three in the world from where she started the year, it's a tremendous coaching job, and David has you know, he really does need to be given a lot of kudos for getting her to that place. But that's all well and good. I'm not as upset about this one as I am about Gavrilova. But I do really believe that Thomas he didn't get it last year and this year he should have got it. That is one of the best years we've ever seen on the women's tour in a long, long time. The dominance that we saw from Egust found tech this year, and that you have to credit him with a lot of that, keeping her shit together, getting to her to prove her game on hard court, getting her to the place of actually winning the US Open. Because believe me Caitlin at the beginning of the US Open. She was not playing well, she was not feeling good, she was complaining about the balls. And let me tell you something, as a coach, that's on you to get your player to get their shit together, you know. So I'm going to give him a lot of credit there. And so, David, love you, but that award should have gone to Thomas wid Growski. And it's not David's. He does a bloody vote. He probably didn't even look at the email, probably didn't even vote for himself. Knowing David, he's such a nice guy. But sorry, that award needed to go to Thomas Widgroowski.

00:17:56
Speaker 1: Should we have a Most Important Guest Coach Award and give it to Rene Stubbs? Well, I mean I think so, rightat I mean, at least that's not controversial. At least that's not cover. Now let's move into something that is more controversial, which is Renee Stubbs on Twitter. Oh god, when isn't Twitter controversial? I mean, what complete and utter garbage fire.

00:18:36
Speaker 2: It's especially now it's getting worse.

00:18:38
Speaker 1: It's getting worse, I know. So there have been a number of high profile off season news items about the world of tennis. The first one that I think almost everyone's pretty excited about is the trailer for the Netflix documentary has now dropped. We have a sense of who the first couple sort of the focus of the first couple episodes that are coming in January. This is from the producers of Drive to Survive, which really changed the fortunes of F one in in terms of fanship and like mainstream success. Now the same production company, Box to Box, has taken a year in the professional tennis world and has come out with the series called Breakpoint. I know from the point of view of a lot of the Slam countries and a lot of the governing bodies, they're kind of looking to this documentary series to do a lot of the pr and sort of like tennis promotion that they themselves should probably be doing and are really bad at, if I can be honest. So I don't know that putting all their eggs in a basket of somebody else's destiny is a good idea, but you know what, for me, it's more like more is more when it comes to tennis and storytelling. Any initial reactions based on seeing the trailer, Andrea pekovicher a very good friend had a lot to say about how we're ready she is to stop seeing tennis themed things called freak point match, point gem set match, you know, ready play advantage. But you know that aside, it looks pretty good. I don't. I mean, we haven't seen it, but looks it doesn't seem bad.

00:20:13
Speaker 2: I'm so I'm excited about it because you know, I've you and I have talked about this for years, but I have really felt like this for a number of years. Is that, you know, one of the things that I love about the Olympics, for example, is you know NBC's coverage of it when they do the personal stories and they get to know an athlete that's in blue or you know, is a biathlete or is a kayaker or something, you know, some random sport that you would never know a person right, and they do these great profiles on them, and you go, oh, man, that's an amazing story. That person's so cool. Oh I'm going to check it out. I'm going to actually turn on my TV and watch the you know, the the bo and Arrow contest or something at the Olympics, you know what I mean. So you because you feel like you get to know the person and you start rooting for them right, you start pulling for them, you start hoping for them right, and you get to know them as people. So I just think that's the way you bring fans and people into a sport or into a movie. You know, people love watching real life stories brought to the big screen, right the Whitney Houston doc. You know the movie then whatever, Oh yeah, I want to go and see that because they want to get a behind the scenes look at what really happened, you know what I mean. And so I think with tennis we've lacked that for so long. I think we've been great at covering the sport, watching the x's and o's, ESPN, Tennis Channel, whatever, you know, getting our cameras out there and watching your sport. But we've done a horrific job. And I blame this on the ATP and WTA and the IF and the Grand Slams and that all of the others. Is that we've never gotten to know all the players better. And so you know, fans of the game, no Roger and Rapha and Serena because we've seen them on TV time, but we don't know everybody else. And the stories that you could tell of those people and get more people to support the sport of tennis and watch it. So for me, this is great because you're going to get to know a little bit more of the insights and backstories of some players that you might not know as much about. So I mean, look, honestly, I think they could have picked some other random tennis players, not ones that you necessarily know, like someone ranked like sixty in the world, to see the trials and tribulations of someone like that, as opposed to just FAA and Taylor and Ajuburn players that kind of we've seen on our TV and know a little bit more about. So I would suggest for like season two because so hopefully it's successful enough that they just like drive to Survive they want to do two and three and four is they go and find a kid that's ranked one hundred and fifty in the world and show their life as well and how they, you know, climb up the tennis ladder to get into a Grand Slam and then blah blah blah after that and what it means to them, you know. So I'm looking forward to seeing it. I don't want to. I don't know anything about what we're going to see. I clearly know some of the storylines because I saw the cameras around. I mean, I still came cameras around all the time. I went into a shot a couple of times and like, oh, we need you to sign this, you know, release form. We're from Netflix. I'm like, oh, okay, whatever, So you know they're everywhere. So I'm really pumped to see and I hope that gives exposure to tennis in a way that drives a supply ass because look, you and I are Formula one fans, and I didn't even I couldn't tell you two drivers.

00:23:28
Speaker 1: In the F one series, same Sam, and I think the power of storytelling is really paramount and amazing. And I think when they probably set out to start the season and filmed on Stubber for example, that probably wasn't a gimme that she was going to end up into Grandsome Finals. So I think they did kind of get lucky. I'm just relieved, honestly, to like not see Roger vetderck Er again. Like I know that you know he's going to make appearances and respectfully and all that stuff, but it's just like I get bored, really easily. So like the fact that I would much rather sit down with an episode centered on you know, Bertini or I don't actually know very much about fa because he's kind of, you know, sort of internal, Like there's there's I think a lot there. Let's talk about.

00:24:05
Speaker 2: What's You got to admit the story that Roger told.

00:24:08
Speaker 1: It was so stupid. Don't even with that he couldn't get into the All England Club like it was it was not even funny. It was like, oh, they didn't recognize them, and then they did and they were like, oh, it's Roger Petter. You're really famous, don't. I'm just so over Roger Petter, like I can't. I can't.

00:24:21
Speaker 2: So you could turn around and look at your Netflix little TV right now, because what you people can't see that I can see is we're on a zoom call. Is that Caitlin has this new fancy thing on It's called Netflix's Fireplace, and you can go to Netflix and you can put a fireplace on your TV to pretend that you have a fireplace.

00:24:40
Speaker 1: Well, you know why it's.

00:24:44
Speaker 2: Aggressive towards Roger.

00:24:46
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm just sorrided of him, dumb boat shoes till this appear I'm done with him. I uh, I'm watching this fireplace because I can't watch tennis because normally during the day time at home, when I'm working between calls whatever, I like. It calms my blood pressure to hear the sound of squeaking shoes and tennis balls being hit.

00:25:07
Speaker 2: I love it.

00:25:08
Speaker 1: And there's no tennis on right now, with the exception of like some exos and things like that. But you know what the Tennis channel is showing, which we talked about before, and I've given the Tennis Channel, as have you, so much shit for being Vicky France and siding with the enemy here that I can't repeat myself. But it might be time to have chapter two of Renee and Caitlin discuss the world's biggest dumb pretend thing worse than Crypto, worse than NFTs is a pretend sport that somehow you have found yourself in a Twitter dust up like this morning, Melee, I like that word. What's happening, Renee?

00:25:51
Speaker 2: Well, I just put out last night because I started seeing more tennis players investing their money or somebody else's money in pickleball and buying pickleball, and that they had the pickleball draft last night? Did I it was it on Tennis channel?

00:26:10
Speaker 1: I am once I.

00:26:12
Speaker 2: Heard it was on Tennis channel, but I'm not sure if it was or not. But and I just put out on Twitter because you know, me in the late hours on a little board, sitting at home by myself, and I said, just to let everyone know, I will not in orcats, be investing in a pickleball franchise, and will never turn a TV on to watch pickleball. I would rather watch paint to dry. Actually spelt pain dry because I actually didn't put the tea on it pain dry. Why all these tennis players think pickaball is worth investing in and not the game that made them all the dough is beyond me. Great point, okay, because I'm like, why can't you put your money or you suppose the money. I'm fairly certain a lot of these tennis players are not putting their own money in. They're like literally getting paid to promote this shit. And if they are putting their own money in, it's even worse because that money, I think could be invested in kids programs. Go into your wherever you're from, go and donate some money, some cash.

00:27:15
Speaker 1: New buildness, startups, new brands. Tennis court, Yeah, build a tennis court exactly, build a tennis center named in your in your honor.

00:27:23
Speaker 2: You know, it's what is the cost of build a tennis court ten grand?

00:27:26
Speaker 1: Fifteen to twenty depending.

00:27:28
Speaker 2: On fifteen twenty, that's probably what these people are paying to be part of the NFT of sports.

00:27:35
Speaker 1: If that, if that, it's not even their own money. I've talked to some of these players financial advisors because they are very keen to invest quote unquote in other things. And then all of a sudden you ask them, okay, well what does that mean, and they say, oh, well, you'll be giving part of your company to them for free in addition for their endorsement. So not only are these players in a lot of cases getting a fee for an endorsement to endorse some of these things, which is just the most off brand embarrassing thing I can possibly imagine, worse than putting your name next to crypto or NFTs, although those are not very palatable either, But in a lot of cases they're getting paid in equity, and so listen as a business model to not invest a dime of your own money instead of getting paid as an endorser and the company does really well, but you don't see the upside. Why not take a piece of the company along with it. Sure, I'll get it. But it's also why Namiosaka is currently getting sued for promoting FTX, as well as all of those other athletes who put their names next to a giant crypto currency exchange that then went tits up and took has taken most of the crypto world with it. So we'll see how well those investments quote unquote play out in the next year. But yeah, you have the best point of all, which is what amazing things, especially because we know pickleball from a recreational standpoint is an eMac played by some white boomers and retirement communities. But here in the city, lines for tennis courts, over subscription for tennis clubs waiting lists the actual desire to play it. We know pickleball's total participation is somewhere around four to five million. That's less than the total people who started playing tennis during the pandemic alone. Tennis is a real sport and you can play it for your whole life in a way that's actually it requires some athleticism and actually gets your pulse racing. So for me, it's if they hadn't taken all this crypto money to promote this pretend thing and then therefore needed to come after tennis audiences.

00:29:33
Speaker 2: I wouldn't care.

00:29:34
Speaker 1: But the fact that it has identified tennis as sort of its enemy and done it with a sport that's sort of like colonialist and its vibes like no thanks, get the fuck out of here. And if I were a tennis player looking to invest in things, invest in my community, support something like King's County Tennis League, which puts rackets and tennis courts in public housing to build the next generations of stars or even participants or college scholarship recipients. Like you said, that's a great investment. That's something that I would actually be proud of instead of putting my name next to the most tragic dumb. It's like you see Donald Trump's NFT collection last night coming out where he's like dressed up like a you know, country western, like sharp shoe, whole bag, and it's like, I would buy that before I bought whoa pickleball?

00:30:21
Speaker 2: Whoa? That's a staining of Setitlan Thompson, Look, I put that tweet out and then, of course today because one of the people investing in a piperball franchise apparently is Nick Kurios. So he took umbrage with my comment and wrote, lol, I think in all caps, by the way, lol small caps. I think large caps. Lebron James and Kevin Durant back both in big caps, and then small caps have a bit more of an idea f what to invest in. I think he meant of what to invest in funny smiley face, and I was like my reaction to that, I said, well, I said, not sure. I mentioned Lebron and KD in my tweet, NK meaning I'm not talking about basketball players investing in fucking pickleball. I'm talking about tennis players investing in pickleball, okay. And then I said, also let me know how that ROI and for those that don't know what that means, return on investment is in a year and prove me wrong, mate, or are they paying you in all caps? Question mark exclamation point. And then I said, just because I forgot to add this part about his investment, you know people that he thinks are brilliant. I also said, also let's ask Tom Brady and Naomi, etc. About FTX but okay with my okay sign. Okay, so it's like, wait a second, you think, because Lebron and KD invested, then holy shit, we should all be jumping on board. No, dude, they've got play money. Okay, those guys have play money or somebody with a shipload of money, way more than Lebron and KD is giving them money to invest in a pickleball association.

00:32:22
Speaker 1: Listen, now, I have nothing to add to that except the call is coming from inside the house. Maybe after all these dumb athletes get sued for representing stuff that's pretend like crypto and NFTs and start losing their lawsuits and they'll be a little more thoughtful about investing in things. But you know, now, listen, I'm gonna believe it or not.

00:32:39
Speaker 2: I'm actually gonna flip flip it over to the other side because Kim Kleister is also invested.

00:32:44
Speaker 1: Okay, we love Kim Ceiser's this is and I've been killing me.

00:32:47
Speaker 2: Everybody knows how much I love Kim, and Kim and I are very good friends. And she texted me and she goes, what's the problem with pickle poll? She just wanted to know what my grite was, you know, and I just said, look, she said, her take is if we can get kids out on a tennis court and just be active, then we're doing a good service. And I said, and that's all well and good, and I understand that. And just people in general, if they want to get if they sit on their couch all day and don't do anything and then they play or they play pickleball, I'm all for it. That's fine, Like, that's no problem. But I said to Kim, but why not promote I mean, Kim listen, Kim had a tennis academy, so she has put her money where she's where her mouth is, and a lot of that money for her academy was from her. She did a lot of work, and she picked up a lot of shitty slack and had to do a lot of work to make that academy work. And I think it's since almost closed down because of the fact that it's really hard to provide the money. So my question to people in the tennis world is invest in stuff like that, you know, don't invest in pickleball. Invest in the Kim Cleister's academies of the world, right instead of letting Kim Cleisters write a check every single week for her own academy. And but you know, the issue is that I said to Kim Wish, you know people like you. She's a bad example because she's invested in her in her own sport. But you know, and she's right, we want people to be active. But I said, you can get them on a tennis court, mate, you can get them a shitty.

00:34:13
Speaker 1: F play phone ball, get a phone ball, get a short court going, get a.

00:34:17
Speaker 2: Short clut going. It's the same thing.

00:34:19
Speaker 1: But you're not and you're actually learning how to play tennis, and you're actually getting your heart rate up because I think if the answer is you doing nothing, are you taking several steps around a pickleball court? I guess that's something. But the study that there's no actual increase in your cardiovascular exertion was pretty damning. Listen. I'm not here to hate on anybody. It's just when you make your sport, pretend and tell people that your investment is going to pay off because it's going to knock tennis out of the way. No, not on my watch. Tennis has so much more growth to realize so that we can actually make this sport of a lifetime be the popular, incredible, welcoming, diverse place that it deserves to be, the one that I think you and I see very clearly. And so to me, if pickleball wasn't positioning itself as a threat to that, I wouldn't care. I'd be like, yeah, sure, go do your tic tac too somewhere, but just don't bother me, right problem, Yeah, go do darts. Do you want to be on a loose league, great, you want to go bowling, knock yourself out, just don't do it on my tennis court. And for me, that's this issue. And so that's why I would love for all these athletes, as you said, to figure out how to support their own sport, especially one that's as awesome as tennis.

00:35:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I actually one of the things that I also said was it's unwatchable on television. And you I'm sorry, no sport, no sport is going to survive and do well if it's not on television. And it is unwatchable on TV.

00:35:39
Speaker 1: Tough. Okay, it's really tough, but you know it is on television. Uh is It's going to be tennis in the new year, So listen, Renee. We have to wrap this up because I have to post this so that we can get an episode out before the next year. We have incredible sponsors for the next year, we have incredible guests for the next year. We have an incredible studio for the next year. So there are so many things for us to look forward to in twenty twenty three. And I just want to say, in addition to your amazing show, in addition to our amazing magazine, it was so nice to spend time with you for Racket House Los Angeles in the flesh this past weekend. You and I have been in the same city but not seeing so much of each other. It took us going to LA to hang out. And if you're somebody who's been following along our journeys Renees Instagram, tweets, our world, etc. And want to get invited to a future Racket House event, join our newsletter on our website racketmag dot com for the chance to be invited to one of them, because we'd love to have you.

00:36:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, though, it was super fun, and yes I did fly out on a Friday afternoon after work. Yes, I have a job Monday to Friday, and I flew in at midnight. We went to the party on Saturday, and I flew back to New York on Sunday, so thirty six hours in LA. But it was bloody worth it. The house was amazing. Thank you, Luke. Thank you to Liz Cully, our unofficial official tennis influencer. All the works she did New Kitlin awesome. And yeah, if you want to be part of the cool kids, then you've got to be get the Racket newsletter and you'll know exactly where our next savantage. So many people were like, why I want to be invited to that kind of a party. I was like, well, you know, you got to be got to be with the cool kids and not pickaball exactly.

00:37:12
Speaker 1: We'll leave you with that until twenty twenty three. Renee Power Hour is on Amazon Sports Network five to six pm.

00:37:20
Speaker 2: Every year. We're really not doing are we really? Just you and me? We're not going to do another one till twenty twenty three.

00:37:25
Speaker 1: Do you want to promise anything? Maybe we'll do a bonus just in case. But I I'm going to be out, you're going to be I.

00:37:30
Speaker 2: Have to cook dinner. You know, it's people's tree trimming, people just people out there. You want us to do some more before the end of the year, just let me know.

00:37:40
Speaker 1: I'll like you all right.

00:37:42
Speaker 2: Moving back to Manhattan soon, So finally I'm not going to be doing this shit on Zoom anymore. Okay, everybody, thank you for joining us today. Catch me on the Power Hour every day five or six. I talk about a lot of this sort of stuff, including my hate of pickleball on the show. So thanks for joining us again everyone, and we'll see you light up.

00:38:03
Speaker 1: Bye.