Howdy. The long slog is almost done, and TW should be back up and running purr-fectly within the next day or two, on a PC platform (not Politically Correct, but IBM-PC based) after a couple of hectic weeks of computer blues and other distractions—the chief of which was having had to write a Robert Lansdorp profile.
This story was the first lengthy one I’ve done since we took the plunge and launched TennisWorld as a full-time blog, although over the years I’ve written hundreds of profiles and long features for the mother ship, TENNIS. It seemed weird, at first, to be writing a classic magazine piece, and it made me aware of the profound differences both in the respective media and the writer’s/blogger’s mission.
Anyway, so here I sit, with a ton of leftover notes and material, some of it very interesting, from my Lansdorp interviews and research. I'm wondering how I can write a post that you can read in 10 minutes without stealing thunder from the story that will probably run in the March issue of TENNIS.
Trust me, this is a weird dilemma.
In the story I filed, I never did get the chance to go into great detail on what seems to me a truly big- ticket issue when it comes to how the pro game works: The bizarre nature of high-level coaching.
A lot of fans—perhaps you included—would be amazed to know how little some household coaching names like Lansdorp, Nick Bollettieri, or Rick Macci have actually earned from top players. These are, after all, the champion makers that the TV cameras and newspaper reporters seek out. You would think they're on some kind of retainer, or have contracts.
Guess again.
That someone like Maria Sharapova doesn’t keep Lansdorp (who's listed as her co-coach — with dad Yuri Sharapov — in the recent WTA media guide) on, say, a $250,000 per annum retainer, strikes me as inexplicable. The same goes for Nick and some of his protégés over the years, from Monica Seles on up to Tommy Haas. If you’re making a few million a year, isn’t it worth paying your coach a reasonable sum? Especially if you keep going back to that mentor, long after he shaped your basic character as a player?
I did a lot of research on this recently (and not just for the Lansdorp story), and while there are business-like, contract-demanding coaches out there (Brad Gilbert and Bob Brett come to mind), coaches who develop talent are notorious suckers. I tried to find out how many of Lansdorp or Bollettieri's high-profile protegés ever ponied up, either out of appreciation for times past or present-day services, and could find just one. Boris Becker, at the height of his fame, hired Nick as his coach and paid him, fair and square.
Another typical case is that of Rick Macci, who will tell anyone willing and interested in listening about how little credit—or remuneration—he's received for shaping the games of players as different as Jennifer Capriati and Venus and Serena Williams. The basic storyline goes like this: "I trusted these kids and their parents, I plowed tons of time and money into the kids. When they made the big time, they forgot that I ever existed."
It’s an open secret that the majority of Bollettieri’s top players were at his famed academy on scholarship, leaving the spectacularly untalented daughter of Dr. Goldberg (and a legion of other pay-as-you go academicians) to underwrite Nick’s operation. At some level, of course, it makes sense. Dr. Goldberg’s daughter is at Nick’s precisely because of the renown Nick earned through Monica Seles, Andre Agassi, and Jim Courier. But that Bollettieri benefits so tangentially from his greatest successes is, at best, odd.
Part of this is that top tennis players are incredible skinflints—or become so, once they've made it. They think it’s an honor for someone to be affiliated with them, so why should they pay a coach? After they break through and become stars, they never have to pay for anything else—why should they write checks to a coach?
This is understandable. It’s also incredibly short-sighted. Imagine what a Rick Macci could—and would be willing—to do for a pro if he or she would offer what ordinary schmoes like you and I presumably have: An attractive salary and job security (well, you, anyway).
The players not only seem indisposed to do this, they often seem downright cagey about covering their backs when it comes to the potential demands—or legal actions—of disillusioned or outcast coaches. That's why so many of them alway cite a parent as a primary coach; that's why some of them are reluctant to publicly acknowledge a debt to a coach. When Sharapova won Wimbledon, Lansdorp says, she became the first of his champions to thank him in her acceptance speech at the world's most prestigious tournament ("She forgot to say my last name," he says, "But that's OK. . .")
As Bollettieri told me:
Even then, it wouldn't be easy, because of the nature of today's game. If you want to see a good example of the kind of controversy that can ensue when minors and their parents and/or managers enter into contracts, whether it’s with coaches or promoters, check out this report from the current trial of the lawsuit brought against Richard Williams and his daughters, Venus and Serena, by an aggrieved promoter.
I guess that if the sisters were either under 18, or can show that their father had no authority to represent them, the plaintiff’s case (against the sisters, if not Richard) falls apart. That explains some of Venus’ remarks near the end of the story, particularly her obvious attempt to describe herself as having been independent and autonomous at the time that Richard allegedly made the deal to feature the girls in a Battle of the Sexes extravagenza.
Coaches, of course, not only fall in love with talent, they frequently feel that the investment they make up front in developing a top player is bound to pay off at the back end. Thus, they aren’t likely to press parents or agents for contracts, for fear that the talent will walk away and go to some other coach. Yet it’s downright amazing how often the back end fails to pay off.
Lansdorp, who says he is “not a contract kind of guy,” told me that while Yuri Sharapov paid for the lessons he gave Maria, Lansdorp gave them a break and put a lot of extra time—and money—into his protégé’s development. After Maria won Wimbledon and emerged as a superstar, Lansdorp’s neighbor in Rolling Hills, Calif., kidded him one morning: “Hey, I see she won Wimbledon. Where’s the new Mercedes?”
Lansdorp said he laughed. Yet, months later, he said he brought up the subject of a car with Maria, kidding her (sort of) about how she “owed” him one. Apparently, she didn’t get the message, for when Christmas rolled around, she presented him an unexpected gift. “I don’t know if it was a bonus, or just Christmas,” Lansdorp told me, “but I got hand lotion and face lotion. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy to receive something but . . . . These people, they make so much they become greedy, they want to hold onto every nickel.”
But this anecdote, and post, is not really about either Sharapova or Lansdorp's venality (you can argue it either way). They are really about the murky, unsavory way coaching sometimes works in the most high-profile, lucrative, international of sports—a sport that cleaves to the transparency and dignity afforded by its prize-money–based structure.
And, of course, we have to distinguish between the kinds of coaches who exist out there. There are the developmental coaches—the teachers—like Lansdorp, Bollettieri, Macci et al., and the "This Gun For Hire" pro coaches who take on the job of helping mature players; these include mentors like Heinz Gunthardt (Steffi Graf), Paul Annacone (Pete Sampras), or Brad Gilbert (Andre Agassi, Andy Roddick).They are almost all utterly professional. They live in an environment with better light and air. Usually, TGFH coaches have contracts and unambiguous relationships with their charges.
This raises an interesting point. It’s legitimate to ask if developmental coaches really “deserve” anything, if they were paid fair and square during the time when they worked with the protégés in question. After all, champions are born, not just made. Lansdorp himself acknowledges this:
Clearly, some of this comes down to the conscience—what debt a player feels he or she owes the coach who laid the foundation. But can anyone quantify how much, say, Tony Palofox did for John McEnroe, or Lansdorp for Sharapova? By the same token, are we sure McEnroe and Sharapova would have been as successful if they were coached by someone else?
It seems to me an impossible question to answer. But if you've made it as a player, taking care of those who shaped your game seems like the least you could do. I'm not sure I trust the conscience of most players to do that, but it's not like it's impossible. We've had the rebuke of certain model relationships right in front of our eyes—most notably, these days, in the partnership of Justine Henin-Hardenne and her longtime coach, Carlos Rodriguez.
It’s amazing how amateurish tennis can be, given its status among world sports.