Calkins: It’s just what Memphis needed. A win for the city’s sports.
Geoff Calkins | Daily Memphian
Kyle Ross, who has been the director of the Women’s Tennis Association event in Cleveland for the last five years, remembers the first time he toured the Leftwich Tennis Center.
Ross was looking for a new home for the tournament.
Memphis had emerged as a leading candidate.
“It’s an incredible facility,” he said. “Jaws dropped.”
Pro women’s tennis tour brings Memphis Classic to Leftwich
Maybe that comes as a surprise to some of you.
Maybe you didn’t fully appreciate what we have in Memphis.
But that’s why there was a happy press conference at Leftwich on Monday to announce the arrival of the Memphis Classic — a WTA event that will be held in the city from July 25 to Aug. 2.
“This is a very exciting day,” said Memphis Mayor Paul Young. “This is a win for our city.”
Wait, did someone say a win for the city?
A sports win?
Really?
What a refreshing change!
The Tigers are losing, and the Grizzlies are losing even when they’re winning, but at least pro tennis is on the way back.
And here it might be time for a pro tennis refresher.
The very best tournaments — the Indian Wells Open, the Miami Open and the Cincinnati Open — are 1000-level tournaments.
The next best — the DC Open in Washington, D.C., and the Charleston Open — are 500-level tournaments.
“This is going to kick off the U.S. summer hardcourt swing,” tournament director Kyle Ross said. “From Memphis, they’ll be going to the 1000-level event in Canada. So you’ll have players who are looking for reps, looking for matches. This is going to be world-class.” (Mark Weber/The Daily Memphian)
The Memphis Classic (that’s the new name) is a 250-level tournament.
There are only two of those in the United States.
Who plays in 250-level tournaments?
Well, the ATX Tournament just wrapped up in Austin, Texas.
Venus Williams played in that one.
Indeed, in 2007, Williams won the 250-level WTA tournament that used to be held in Memphis. That was an electric week at the Racquet Club.
“These are the best players in the world,” Ross said.
No, there’s no guarantee that Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula are going to show up.
But Pegula — the fifth-ranked woman in the world — won the Austin tournament a year ago. She actually played doubles in Memphis back in 2013.
Maria Sharapova played in Memphis, too. As did Caroline Wozniacki and Lindsay Davenport.
“Wimbledon ends about two weeks before our event,” Ross said. “This is going to kick off the U.S. summer hardcourt swing. From Memphis, they’ll be going to the 1000-level event in Canada. So you’ll have players who are looking for reps, looking for matches. This is going to be world-class.”
No, it doesn’t exactly make up for losing the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame to Cleveland.
But at a bleak time in Memphis sports, it really is a win.
It’s one of the seven best WTA events in the country.
It’s also a throwback to the more than two decades when Memphis had one of the great tennis tournaments in the land.
There used to be photos of past champions hung along the hallway leading to the main court at The Racquet Club.
Among the photos: Bjorn Borg, Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, Stefan Edberg, Andre Agassi, Ivan Lendl, Jim Courier, Michael Chang, Pete Sampras and Andy Roddick.
The ATP ultimately forced that tournament to leave town. And this new tournament — as promising as it may be — is not going to replace that.
But it’s a nice little victory for the city. It showed how progress can work.
Jim Strickland was the mayor when Memphis decided to renovate Leftwich Tennis Center. While Strickland declined to join the group photos at Monday’s press conference — “I’m just the former mayor,” he said — he was instrumental in getting the project off the ground.
“The first goal was to create a great place for Memphis tennis players,” he said. “The second goal was a partnership with the University of Memphis for their tennis programs. But the third was trying to get a professional tournament back to Memphis.”
Now that’s been done.
But it only happened because Memphis decided to invest in a spectacular facility. It only happened because Leftwich is another thing this city did exceedingly well.
“It’s the best municipal tennis facility in the country without a pro tournament,” said Ross. “We were like, ‘Where do we sign?’”
The organization wound up signing a three-year deal. We’ll see how it turns out. Some of you might recall that it is blazing hot in this city in July. And the Memphis Classic will be outside.
But Monday was a good day.
Monday was a win.
“When we invest in our assets, we know that opportunities follow,” said Young.
Now let’s all remember how that works.