Heart and Mind

Tennis Balls

If you're playing baseball, or even softball in the infield, it pays to wear a cup. Hockey, lacrosse, football... no doubt about it. Certainly in contact sports or games that involve a stick, it more than makes sense to protect yourself.

But what about tennis? A cup for tennis? Seems pretty daft, doesn't it?

I kind of assume most people would think so. Tennis sometimes has a reputation—at least among football-player types— as a "lightweight" sort of game. So, until today, I never have confessed that I religiously wear one when I play tennis. I figured people would think it's weird. You still might think it's weird, but read on...

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, I played tennis three times a week during the non-winter seasons. I had a partner who was good competition for me, and it made for great exercise and was fun. A whole lot more fun than running on a treadmill, to be sure. At some point, we fell out of it and stopped playing and went years without getting on the court. But we've picked up where we left off and have been playing three days a week again for the last month.

When you add it all up, I've probably played hundreds and hundreds of sets in my adult life and I've worn a jock and cup for virtually every one, never really thinking that I was being anything but over-cautious. If I were a betting man, despite my donning the goods, I would have bet that I never really would have needed one for tennis. So why do I wear one?

Well, while I'd never had an incident in a tennis game situation, I did have one in a tennis non-game situation. It happened way back in high school, during gym class of all things, where idiots with no intent of actually playing a game were just fucking around and hitting multiple tennis balls as hard as possible around the court in no semblance of a game. That was an awful experience that I will not relive here.

But that's not directly why I chose to wear a cup in these more competitive games I've played as an adult. I know what happened in high school happened largely because of random chicanery on the court; in a setting like I'm in now, there's never more than one ball flying around, only one other person on the court, and I'm paying attention all the time.

But it did indirectly have influence on my decision. The experience reminds me that it could happen—as unlikely as it seems—and, for me, tennis is an extremely mental game based on not only control of your physical play on the court, but on control of your head and retaining concentration, focus, and drive. I loaded up the jock for essentially one reason: I wanted to eliminate any unnecessary concern from my head. If I start concerning myself with anything that isn't related to returning the volley—whether it be the fact that it's getting late and I have to be home soon or something that happened at work or what have you—my game suffers. So if I could throw a piece of plastic in my shorts and eliminate that worry, it's a small price to pay. That's why I did it.

And, I think, in the back of my mind, I always kind of knew it was at worst not a bad idea.

After years of tennis, today was the day it paid off. In spades.

We were involved in an intense volley. He returned a reasonably good shot of mine by pushing it deep into the court, and I volleyed a few times defensively until I got an opportunity to push more. I knocked a well-placed shot towards his backhand and rushed the net aggressively thinking he wouldn't get much mustard on the return and that I'd stuff him for the point when I slammed the lollypop return in the air. But my strategy went awry when the spin lobbed the return more than anticipated and he managed to get around to his forehand and smoke the ball with an all out-swing directly at me, while I'm standing only a couple of feet from the net.

In an instance, it was over. Without even a fraction of a second to get my racquet around or to move aside, the ball whistled towards me and as I cringed it hit me right in the centermost part of my body. It buckled my body and knocked me down to the court where I went down like I'd been shot.

"Oh my God! Are you alright?" he gasped. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."

But I got up right away and, while I was a little shaken up by the play, I was also amazed by the fact that I felt nothing. It hit me so squarely in the cup that I didn't feel a thing. Often when your cup takes a hit, it still can be a little painful (though significant less) because things get shifted around a bit, but this hit so squarely and head-on that it absorbed all the impact directly and left me none the worse for wear. The ironic part is that if it had hit me in a far more desirable place, such as the stomach or thigh, it would have probably stung a little bit. I was completely unharmed.

"It's OK," I assured. "I'm wearing a cup."

"Really?" he said incredulously. It was pretty funny.

"I always have," I told him. Lest he didn't believe me, I yanked my shorts aside and showed off my loaded elastic "Bike" pouch. I suddenly felt very smart and like I should show off my preparedness.

The cat was now out of the bag. But who could argue with it now? All those years I was out there on the court, I used to wonder if he found it weird that I was always doing what looked like "playing with myself" before serves, when, in fact, I've always just been adjusting the support equipment.

I'm extremely glad that I chose to be cautious. I will continue to don the jock.

posted by Steve @ 10:23 PM