published on July 11, 2024 in Celeb Gist

U.S. Open will use a 25-second serve clock to speed up pace of play

After being docked a first serve for repeatedly violating the time limit between points during a Round of 16 victory at the 2017 French Open, Rafael Nadal voiced frustration over what he viewed as a capricious application of the rule.

“Theoretically, the umpires are here to analyze the match,” groused Nadal, who went to claim his record 10th French Open title. “They are not here to use the stopwatch, otherwise we should have a stopwatch on the court.”

What Nadal intended that day as hyperbole — the notion of an on-court “stopwatch” to police time between serves — becomes reality at this year’s U.S. Open, where officials are adopting a “serve clock” to enforce rules that chair umpires have struggled with for years.

It seems like an obvious solution. It works in the NBA; it works in college basketball, too.

But until tennis players get accustomed to the change, it may only add to the unique theatrics at the U.S. Open, where spectators are famed for cheering, jeering and beer-ing their way through featured matches at Arthur Ashe Stadium, particularly on late-summer nights when play extends past midnight.

Some tennis players embrace the U.S. Open’s party atmosphere; others, not so much.

What if this year’s crowd decides to count down the serve-clock en masse? How might Nadal — or any of the sport’s more deliberate players — fare, faced with launching their ball-toss amid a lusty chorus of 23,000 New Yorkers chanting “Five, four, three, two, one, SERVE!” rather than the near reverential hush they’re traditionally accorded at the start of each point?

Time will tell.

But from the point of view of the U.S. Tennis Association, which tested the idea of a serve-clock in U.S. Open qualifying matches last year, the time has come to use a clock for main-draw matches.

“We are concerned about the pace of play, as all sports are,” said Chris Widmaier, managing director of corporate communications for the U.S. Tennis Association, which owns and operates the U.S. Open. “We want to get ahead of this, so we will be instituting a serve-clock throughout the tournament this year, including the main draw, that will be visible on every court.”

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As Widmaier underscored, this isn’t a rule change but a tool for enforcing a rule that, to date, has been left to the chair umpire’s discretion. Under the time-limit rule, players are allotted 25 seconds between points. The variation in the rule’s application has come for a host of reasons: Chair umpires may start their countdown at different moments; others might add a little leeway after particularly long, grueling points on days with a withering heat index.

The hope is that a serve clock that’s visible to both competitors on court — as well as fans in the stands — will provide clarity and fair warning. The precise schedule of penalties — whether to give players one warning or two, then escalate to a loss of one serve, one point and one game — is still being worked out.

The U.S. Open, which gets underway Aug. 27, is the last of the sport’s four annual Grand Slam events (which include Wimbledon and the Australian and French opens) and the only one to announce plans for a serve clock. It’s not the first time the U.S. Open has introduced change to the tradition-laden sport. The tournament was first to offer equal prize money for men and women, in 1973. It was also first to employ the “Hawk-Eye” instant replay system, in 2006, which has become a popular, participatory element, with fans making loud, swooshing sounds as giant in-stadium replay monitors zoom in on the precise spot where the ball struck the court.

In addition to the 25-second serve clocks, the U.S. Open will have clocks monitoring the allotted seven minutes between the time competitors walk onto a court and play begins after the warmup.

Former U.S. Davis Cup captain Patrick McEnroe, a tennis analyst for ESPN, said he loves the shot-clock idea and has called for it for years.

“In no other sport do players have as much control to determine when they want to start play as in tennis,” McEnroe said in a text message. “Imagine getting ready to start an NFL game, a tee time at the Masters, or a World Cup soccer game, and the player says, ‘Hold on! I need to go to the bathroom!’ ”

Nadal, 31, who has won 16 Grand Slam singles titles, explained after being assessed the penalty at the 2017 French Open that he feels intense pressure when he steps up to serve, implying that extra time was essential to gather his thoughts.

“If you want to play well, you have to let players breathe a little,” Nadal said at the time. “We’re not machines. We’re not machines that cannot think. That’s my viewpoint.”

While Nadal is the most notorious flouter of the time-limit rule, plenty of other players, such as Marin Cilic and Andy Murray, have been cited for violations, too.

Mark Ein, a vice president of the USTA as well as owner of the Washington Kastles and primary owner of World TeamTennis, believes the serve clock idea is “a positive move,” noting that World TeamTennis has employed such a clock between points the last two seasons with good results.

“Like all sports, tennis wants to keep [up] the pace of play,” Ein said in a telephone interview. “The delay between points was getting long, and this is a good way to keep the sport on track. One of the things you learn in tennis, and in most sports, is that when you change rules or add something like a shot-clock, people adjust. Players who think they need more time will adjust and work within the rules.”