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Tag: MIB

  • Big news out of Brisbane: My buddy Stew is club champ at Kawana Tennis Club!

    Let me back up.

    Yeah, I know. Stew looks a little intense here. But stay with me while I fill in the blanks. A year or so ago I was hitting serves at The Rose Bowl Tennis courts right here in Pasadena. Suddenly I hear a voice over the ANC of my Apple AirPod Pro.

    “Hey mate, you wanna have a little hit?”

    Now remember I was beginner at the time (I still am, when you get right down to it). That was the first time anyone had ever asked to hit with me. Truth be told, I didn’t want to. Of course, I said, “You Bet!” In my ears rang the words of the MIB. “Paulie, you’re going to have to put yourself out there to meet people to play tennis with!”

    First time and last time, hitting balls with Stew was an adventure. He hit the ball great and moved lots better than me being a couple years younger and much fitter. But, there weren’t untold miles between us and I never felt like Stew was bored by hitting with me, at least that’s how I want to remember it. After our hit, I asked Stew what his deal was and he told me he flew the Qantas route from Brisbane to LAX. That put him in Pasadena from time to time, usually for three or four days.

    So, every now and then I’d get a text or email from Stew and we’d meet up at the Rose Bowl and give the ball the old what for, or what Stew called, the full treatment. We rallied a lot and played some. I was overjoyed to have held my first serve but over time Stew would grind me into dust. But, the grinding process was fun and educational. Stew plays a lot of doubles so whenever the opportunity arose, he’d come in. After this happened a few times I noticed he was waiting to play a forehand volley at a sharp angle. Once I grasped this pattern I tried to make sure never to give him a shot he could hit with his forehand when he was approaching the net. So was born my earliest awareness of tennis tactics en situ.

    We had some good chats. I liked to ask him about where he lived and how he came to be a pilot. He told me about his club and how he liked to work on his diesel Jeep. Stew was like me. For us, it was never too hot or windy or cold to play. When it was time for me to go, Stew would scan the courts looking for someone else to hit with. Looking back, I wish I had freed up more time to play when Stew was in town. I was especially sorry to have missed Stew when he wandered his way to the San Marino Tennis Club looking for a hit. The guy was ready to hit anywhere and with anyone.

    The end came, as it always does. A few weeks ago I reached out to Stew, asking when he’d be in Pasadena. He sent a message that said his route had changed planes to the Boeing 787 and absent a very unlikely development, he wouldn’t be flying the Brisbane to LAX route anytime soon. Sigh.

    Then, a few days ago, I got this photo from Stew. He had won his club’s, The Kawana Tennis Club, Over-50 Men’s Singles Championship (I told you he was good!). Of course, I’m happy for Stew and he told me he was chuffed. Still, I miss Stew and miss playing with him (in that order). I don’t know how it could happen but I hope our paths cross again. Stew’s a great guy to play tennis with and he taught me a lot without even trying.

  • Academic tennis: A Tennis thing meditation.

    As those of you who have read Tennis thing know, I owe my tennis to my brother, MIB. He was the one who told me, before even meeting me in person, “Paulie, you would love tennis.” MIB was right, as he so often is. What I doubt, though, was that MIB would have expected how long I would take my twice-a-week lessons with my coach, Caesar Schwarz. It’s been a bit over two years since I started studying tennis with Caesar. I didn’t start out studying the game, I think it became a study gradually, but it is what tennis remains for me.

    What’s the diff, you might be asking? Think back to playing dodge ball when you were a kid. How long was it between your first hearing of the word dodge and the moment when someone was chucking a ball at your head? Most games are learned as they are played. Many people, most people, likely, learn terms by playing it.

    But, I have not. I have learned to play tennis while studying it. I like to watch tennis played whether I am watching a WTA or ATP pro or a little kid with marvelous footwork.

    And, I love to hit the ball.

    What I have not focused on is competition. This is true partly because at my age I am not especially competitive. I’m not even in a competition with myself, to be honest. I want to play tennis correctly out of a motivation to master something at once new and satisfying. That’s an intoxicating combination. But, the question is does the person on the other side of the net count and is anyone keeping score? When Caesar is the guy, he matters. It’s the precision and intentionality of his play that allows me the physical and mental opportunity to learn. He has raised me since I was a 60+ year old tennis newborn and has been instrumental to everything I’ve learned. If any elements of my game are AOK, it’s because of my coach.

    But, and this is something I mused about in Tennis thing, does one need to play tennis, keep score, enter tournaments, seek the humiliation of their opponents to really play tennis?

    There’s this old broad at Calabasas who seems only to hit with whichever pro is available. I have never seen her playing with anyone other than a coach. There’s no serving and each coach tends to hit the ball directly toward the old broad. But, the old broad bashes the ball back with fierce effort and likes to collect winners. And, this brings me to this quote:

    “Some people, they keep on working with a coach, but the coach is just teeing the ball up for them. That’s no way to learn tennis. This is how you learn the game, right here.”

    The previous quote is from Brisbane Stew. He’s a Qantas pilot I met at Pasadena’s Rose Bowl tennis courts. Unlike me, he has scads of tennis experience and is quite fit for 60. Unfortunately, he just told me the Qantas Brizzy to Los Angeles route is now flown using the Boeing 787. Unless Stew changes aircrafts I won’t be seeing him soon. Bummer. Playing with him was always amusing and educational. Back to his quote. He’s not wrong. Playing with him or MIB is not as easy as playing with Caesar but there’s more to it than that.

    I have mentioned before that an example of Caesar‘s particular genius is the ability to hit shots that are consistently challenging for me, but only rarely beyond my capabilities. The other day, I was watching as he served to an elderly, but very fit student. Caesar had to abbreviate no fewer than three elements of his motion, that I could see, in order to hit a serve that was challenging to his student but not overwhelming. Now, can I imagine that I could get better faster if I consistently played with someone like Stew or MIB? I think the answer is undoubtedly, yes, especially if better is defined by advanced competitive ability. However, there’s a significant caveat. And that caveat involves the questions of form and balance. When the ball is coming too fast or bouncing too high or has been hit too wide or too shallow or too deep the kinds of corrections a beginning player like I have to make must ofetn be done in great haste. Not surprisingly, great haste, seldom results in a shot struck with good form or balance. And, there’s the rub, at least for me.

    It’s a great understatement to say that I’ve enjoyed the meditative aspects of tennis. You see, I am on the eve of cutting back on my lessons with Caesar. This change is driven solely by economics. If a small shitpile of cash were to drop onto my head, I would gladly spend it on more frequent and longer lessons with Caesar, but this does not seem likely.

    Early on, I remember Caesar saying that when he and his younger brother, Darius, were taking tennis lessons as kids their family could only afford one lesson each month. Caesar’s dad was a smart guy because he made sure that his sons actually practiced what they were taught during their lessons. That’s my plan and I will be similarly dedicated even though I will still be having four lessons a month. Still, I’m not going to be happy about it.

    When I go to sleep at night I am thinking about my footwork as I move toward a deep, high-bouncing back hand. I’m not thinking about how I can beat someone or keep them from beating me. It will be interesting to see how things differ and stay the same in 2026. Tt

  • The MIB Effect

    Yesterday, over a nice, crisp wheat ale (Rasenmäher-Bier [lawnmower beer]) at Enegren, I was waxing lyrical about how much my tennis game would improve if I was able to play with the MIB just once a week.

    My ale-sipping companion wondered if my coach, Caesar, wasn’t able to fill that roll. His question revealed the difference between playing for the sheer joy of trying to hang in there, rather like riding a bucking bronco, as opposed to the steady, incremental block-on -block approach of a tennis coach intending to help a player build a complete game.

    Outwardly, the best evidence of the kind of play that characterizes a lesson is preparation (anticipating and flowing toward the incoming ball) and executing the proper kind of stroke. It is simple, but simple is often not easy especially in tennis.

    Playing with MIB stresses my game to its limits and beyond, but is also just plain fun. A great deal can be learned just by watching him move around the court anticipating and revealing entertaining angles to create.

    Caesar would approve of the exercise but I think he’d want to both debrief and decontaminate afterward. I think I will always have the tendency to overhit in tennis, something I never did playing baseball and rarely did on the golf course. I can hear Caesar now, telling me to do all of the same things he has for the last two years. I will sometimes stop just to say that I hear him and that I appreciate what he’s saying and that I am trying my best to put his advice into effective action.

    But, the tennis racket and tennis ball contact is simply too enjoyable not to occasionally crank up to 11. Catch that ball in the middle of the racket especially when accompanied by some well-timed movement into the shot and you have an experience that’s hard for me to resist, though I usually do.

    Reading Anthony Verghese The Tennis Partner will always stand as a reminder of how rare the best tennis partners will always be. Enjoy it when you find yours.

  • A step closer to the right racket for me?

    I’ve only been playing tennis since late July 2023. But, since then I’ve owned a good number of rackets. Two of them came from the MIB (the 2013 Head Prestige Pro and more recently a Wilson Shift 99). The others I bought used, some on Ebay and a few on Craigslist.

    The first variable to be considered was grip size. My first racket was codenamed Battle Axe. It was a Wilson Six One 100 and I really liked it but its grip was 4 1/2 and everyone thought it was just too big. It was, but I enjoyed playing with that racket anyway. I still miss it.

    I made the move first to 4 1/4 and later to 4 1/8 to make it easier to use overgrips. Later I drifted back to 4 1/4 by way of a couple Tecnifibres (a TFight 300 and a 305). Overall, the racket that worked best and felt best was my 2018 Head Graphene Touch Prestige Tour. That’s the worst racket name I’ve come across but, all things considered, it’s the racket that has best fit my game and aesthetic.

    Then I tried MIB’s Wilson Shift 99 and I was surprised at how easy it was to swing while still feeling solid on impact. At first, I was under the mistaken idea it was a Wilson Shift 99L which weighs 10.1 ounces (286.3G) but once I got it home I realized that when MIB identified it as the lighter one, he meant it was the 10.6 ounce (300.5G) version. Strung, and with my usual Sampras dampener, El Shifto weighs 316G, fully ten grams less than my Head Graphene Touch Prestige Tour. Months earlier, MIB had told me how much difference five grams can matter and here I was finding that eleven grams obviously means even more.

    I do enjoy hitting with a heavier racket. It’s not unlike putting with a modern 350G putter as opposed to an 80s Ping putter that typically weighed less that 300G. Mass is your friend when you don’t need much absolute velocity or your don’t need to change directions quickly. I like to think my time playing tennis has made me stronger but I know it hasn’t. When I got started in tennis I was 62 and now I’m 64. I don’t want to deceive myself into thinking I’m defeating the effects of gravity or age.

    So, the Wilson Shift has been instructive though I’m not wild about the 16×20 string pattern, plus, its grip is 4 3/8 which is a bit large, even without an overgrip. So, I’ve spent a few days looking for a racket that aligns with the Shift’s basic specs before I found the Head 2022 Instinct MP. It’s very close in terms of weight (the Wilson is a little more head light) and flex though while the Instinct’s head measures 100 sq in as opposed to the Head’s 99 sq in.

    Once I get the Instinct, I will have the Head Prestige at 327G and the Head Instinct and the Wilson Shift at right around 315G. I’m pretty sure the 315G rackets will work better for my game. I’m not sure I’ll like them quite as much as the Head Prestige but I still feel a few steps closer to playing with the right racket for me,

  • Encountering MIB right in his Michigan Backyard

    The occasion of my family’s 2025 reunion presented an irresistible opportunity. With a little tweaking of flights, rental car and hotel we found ourselves in South Eastern Michigan with the Man in Black himself.

    Looking south from the roof top of Plaza La Reina.

    The last time the two of us shared a little time we found ourselves on the rooftop of Plaza la Reina in Westwood. The MIB had been generous enough to stay over an extra day so we could play tennis on my birthday. Plus, he got to have breakfast at Henri in Canoga Park, but that is a story for another day.

    I think the last time I was in Metro Detroit I was a little kid and my family was on its way to Windsor Ontario and points further east. This time the focus was on MIB’s and his home in Farmington Hills. After we got in town, MIB generously asked if we wanted to go to Ann Arbor.

    “Fuck no, brother. This trip is all about spending time with MIB in his native habitat.”

    Just when you thought it was safe to step onto a tennis court with a confident stride, you see the MIB looking over the net at you. He’s a great player to warm up with. He likes to start close to the net, refamiliarizing his racket and hands to the variety of shots he likes to play. Then we hit soft volleys back and forth. Then we worked our way back toward the baseline and started to rally. That’s when the MIB Effect starts to take hold. It often seems like his feet don’t interact with the ground with the full force of gravity, he moves with such great ease. His strokes are fine, especially on the angles, but it’s always his footwork that is so fun to watch and listen to. Even the squeek of his Nike Air Zoom Vapor Cage 4 occurs at a higher pitch and amplitude than normal. I especially enjoyed returning serve from MIB (a minor strength of my game). In the end, though, playing with MIB is a reminder of the harsh differential between our games. Still, it was a lot of fun.

    I thought about what it was like to play with MIB all the way home to Los Angeles. I knew there was no hope of reducing the differential to zero. Then again, that was never the goal. What I wanted to do was identify as many things as I could to improve in the specific areas that playing with MIB had exposed. So, I did what I always do. I asked my coach, Caesar, he with the unlimited answers to my limitless questions about tennis.

    The first thing he said was to focus my attention on the racket of my opponent rather than simply on the ball as it crossed over the net and onto my side of the court. Caesar told me that would help me to identify the kind and the pace of the shot that was likely to be coming my way. That awareness was the first step in preparing for the shot I would need to play very, very soon.

    Then he told me of the benefit to moving quickly early and slowing down into the shot. “Bad players are constantly running and stopping. Good players flow to the ball and flow toward their next shot,” he said. Of course, my coach had told me this many times before. But this time it was more urgency and relevant since I’d recently learned I was working too hard creating too little effective movement.

    It came as no surprise that three days hanging with the MIB was just not enough. No sooner than we touched down at DTW it felt like we were on our way home. Though time was far too short, I’m glad we made the trip and look forward to sharing a tennis court with MIB again. I will be a little better prepared when that day comes.

  • The Cancha BBB has landed!

    Ok, the BBB (Big Black Bag) is not really called the Big Black Bag. Man, you guys are sticklers. It’s called the Racquet Bag Pro and it’s on sale right now. I was excited to get the BBB, sorry, the Racquet Bag Pro to see how much progress Cancha has made since they made my bag, the now-discontinued Original Racquet Bag.

    The BBB and my beloved Original Cancha

    But, the problem is I am more of a small-bag kind of guy. Think of me as a tennis bag minimalist. Marie Kondo would approve, I’m sure. The good new is the Man in Black is a big-bag kind of guy, so I’ve seen the new Cancha to him. If I know the MIB, and I do, he’ll put the Racquet Bag Pro through its paces and then some.

    My own observations about the Racquet Bag Pro are that is a much-refined bag compared to my Original. Material quality seems of the same quality and maybe even a bit more substantial. Everything seems well considered. Note how the horizontal carrying strap is angled. That makes the bag naturally easier to carry and lift without the bag feeling unwieldy. It’s and smart and logical feature. Now ask yourself why more companies don’t think of making their bags like this.

    Interesting that even the BBB’s cross-section is larger than the Original’s

    I’ve made it a mission of mine to fully utilize the Cancha’s attachment points. The company refers to them as RF Bonded Hypalon Molle Patches for Add-on Accessories.

    Uh, yeah. Me? I’ve never used or even heard the term Molle Patch until after I purchased my Original Cancha. So, I started to research them. What I found were a lot of companies using the word Molle to describe a variety of very similar products, respective to their function. I have to admit I hoped Molle would be a more general ecosystem rather than one, primarly, suited to other products from the same company.

    In other words, I dig Molle conceptually but have yet to make them quite as useful as I hope to in the future. For a while, I saw my Original Cancha as a do anything-bag if I could utilize its Molle attachment points to add space for shoes and clothes, when needed. At the time, Cancha Wet-Dry Bag was on backorder and I was getting ready to take a trip. I fantasized about modifying a generic shoe bag with Molle but I hit a lot of road blocks. I know. I should just buy the Cancha Wet-Dry bag. But I thought I was so, so clever that I could find an effective work around.

    Anyway, I’m excited to get MIB’s take on the BBB and to see his video review. From where I sit, Cancha has another winner here. Will the other bag companies catch up? I’m not sure they’re even trying. Tt

  • From one-handed to two-handed and probably not back.

    Those of you who’ve read Tennis thing know I started out tennis with a two-handed backhand. My coach Caesar said, “I don’t care what you do after you’ve played for a year but I’d like you to start out hitting your backhand two-handed.”

    I was game but I soon found the two-hander less than pleasant. During my third or fourth lesson I asked if I could try to hit my backhands with one hand. Caesar patiently showed me the basics (he plays a one-hander) and I soon found the whole deal more intuitive and less physically challenging. The one-hander also helped to create a more effective shot. What’s not to like?

    “You hit a natural slice, mate. And, we’re going to build on it. We’ll add the topspin backhand when the time comes.”

    Justine Henin…accept no imitations.

    I was all in and began to informally curate a collection of the best one-handers I could find. My favorites, then and now, belong to Gregor Dimitrov, Stan Wawrinka, Roger Federer and the owner of the one-handed backhand of the gods, Justine Henin. If aesthetics matter, and they always do, there’s no comparison between the one and two-hander. As a wise person on the internet once said, “The two-hander has all the elegance of a monkey wrench.”

    Then, a couple things happened in a relatively close span of time. I managed to hurt my right wrist somehow. This happened about the same time as I began to learn and practice the topspin one-hander and exactly the same time I was hitting against the wall, a lot. The cherry on the sundae was Stew From Brisbane, my sometimes hitting partner whom I know from Brookside in Pasadena.

    To me, Federer’s backhand is second only to Henin’s.

    Stew’s 60, three years younger and leaner than me. He’s played for no less than 50 years and is a very solid player. Stew also likes to hit hard pretty much from the jump, which is not my style. He means no harm and I really like him. But, his shots to my backhand, especially the deep and high balls, ate my fledgling one-hander alive in addition to taxing my already-tender wrist.

    I did a little soul searching while I had a week off from my lessons with Caesar. By the time we were back at it I had decided to make the big switch to the two-hander.

    Before I did I conferred with the MIB himself back in Michigan. “Paulie,” MIB said. “I’ve tried going two-handed at least twice but I always go back.” Various internet gurus cautioned against making the switch especially for players who are older (40+, ha!) and who took up the game later in life.

    One guess who that describes…

    But, I did it anyway and it’s been fairly brutal. For me, the two-hander is an exceptionally difficult shot. Yes, high balls are somewhat easier but in total it’s a far harder shot from a purely physical standpoint. Sometimes, when I’m tired and the ball’s out wide, I will resort to my one-handed slice. Caesar always catches me and says the same thing. “Hitting your slice is Ok but start two-handed and go one-handed as your stroke begins going forward.”

    As if I have time to do all that.

    When my baseball career was on life support I made a last ditch effort to teach myself to hit left-handed. It wasn’t a bad idea. A lefty has a little bit of a head start to first and I thought it made me look like the kind of player who would try anything to be more versatile. It changed the way I saw the ball and I found power where I didn’t from the other side of the plate and lacked power where I had it as a right-handed hitter. It was weird, just like the two-handed backhand.

    Today is the first time I’ve put the sequence of the change and the factors that informed my switch together in my head. Don’t ask me why it’s taken me so long to see the threads. But, now that I have I think I will stick it out with the two-hander for now. I keep hoping for a breakthrough. Maybe next week or next month. Anything is possible.