Season 24 Episode #73 Bobby Schindler and Shaun J Boyce

This episode with Eddie Gonzalez delves into his career and experiences as the director and chief business officer of the Atlanta Open, reflecting on his love for tennis and the tournament's growth. A few key points include his leadership journey, his passion for building the event over 10 years, and the challenges involved in running a high-level ATP Tour event.

Summary:

- **Eddie's Background**: Eddie grew up in Rome, Georgia, played high-level junior tennis, and competed for NC State University. His career in sports started at Athlon Sports before he returned to tennis, leading the Atlanta Open for a decade.

- **Career Highlights**: Eddie discussed how he elevated the Atlanta Open, making it an annual sports and entertainment event, bringing in crowds and enhancing the experience for fans. One of his proudest achievements was building the event from a temporary parking lot to a "party where a tennis match breaks out." 

- **Challenges**: Eddie highlighted the difficulties of hosting an outdoor event in the summer heat and dealing with unpredictable weather. For instance, the 2023 finals didn’t conclude until 3 a.m. due to rain delays. Despite these challenges, the event maintained strong attendance.

- **Impact on American Tennis**: Eddie is proud of the Atlanta Open’s role in giving rising American players like Taylor Fritz, Francis Tiafoe, and Christopher Eubanks their first big opportunities. He also emphasized the importance of fostering local tennis talent and creating future champions.

- **Legacy**: As the ATP's calendar restructuring led to the discontinuation of the Atlanta Open, Eddie expressed pride in leaving behind a successful, well-loved event, even though it was a casualty of the tour's evolution.

- **Personal Life**: Eddie shared personal insights, such as his daughter’s career as a social media influencer and his son being drafted into professional baseball. He enjoys supporting their careers and traveling with them.

Notable Quotes from Eddie Gonzalez:

1. **On building the Atlanta Open**: 

   - "You want to leave things better than you found them, and I'm very proud of the 10 years of building it every year to be bigger and better."

2. **On the tournament experience**: 

   - "Our philosophy was to create a party where a tennis match breaks out. We knew we weren’t going to get Federer, Nadal, or Djokovic, so we had to make it about the experience."

3. **On aging and tennis**: 

   - "You don’t stop playing tennis because you get old, you get old because you stop playing tennis."

4. **On fostering young American talent**: 

   - "It's rewarding to see young Americans like Taylor Fritz and Chris Eubanks who got their first shots in Atlanta. That’s the future of American tennis."

5. **On maintaining composure**: 

   - "We ran the tournament like ducks on a pond: calm on the surface but paddling furiously underneath."

These highlights and quotes encapsulate Eddie's passion for tennis, leadership, and making a lasting impact on the sport in America.

YouTube Replay: https://youtu.be/XVLUhdrlE8w

Shaun Boyce USPTA: shaun@tennisforchildren.com

https://tennisforchildren.com/ 🎾

Bobby Schindler USPTA: schindlerb@comcast.net

https://windermerecommunity.net/ 🎾

Geovanna Boyce: geovy@regeovinate.com

https://regeovinate.com/ 💪🏼🏋️

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(upbeat music)

Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

Every episode is titled,

It Starts with Tennis and Goes From There.

We talk with coaches, club managers,

industry business professionals,

technology experts, and anyone else we find interesting.

We wanna have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.

(upbeat music)

Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,

powered by GoTennis.

Check out our calendar of Metro Atlanta Tennis events

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and be sure to register for the GoTennis Fall Festival

on November 9th at James Creek Tennis Center.

It's gonna be awesome.

And now let's get into our recent conversation

with Eddie Gonzales.

Eddie was the tournament director

and chief business officer of the Atlanta Open.

And we talk about his leadership journey,

his passion for building the event over 10 years,

and the challenges involved in running an ATP tour level event.

Have a listen and let us know what you think.

(upbeat music)

Who are you and why do we care?

Good, that's a great question.

10 year tournament director,

chief business officer of the Atlanta Open.

So, ATP tour event that just ended its run here

in Atlanta this past week.

Okay, well that's what you do, but who are you?

You're a father, you got a couple of kids.

What's, what are, what are you?

- Yeah, grew up in Rome, Georgia, high level junior player,

and I've gone to NC State University

on a tennis scholarship.

So, played for the Wolfpack in the ACC.

Was fortunate enough to make a career.

Then in tennis worked for the USDA Southern section

for about eight years out of college

and then got hired by sports media company

called Athlon Sports.

Did that for about 15 years

before the opportunity presented itself

to get back in tennis and lead the team

running the Atlanta Open ATP event here in Atlanta?

- And Athlon Sports, I've seen that before.

Is that, is that Darren Potke?

Is that name sound familiar?

I think, well, Darren's had a USDA Georgia.

So, he's the executive director for the USDA.

But Athlon Sports, it was always that preseason

preview magazines.

So, baseball, baseball, basketball, and basketball,

and no tennis.

But it's kind of that first look that you,

kind of pre-internet, you know,

you can only get at the news stand.

And, you know, you wanted to get that magazine

and then we expanded into social.

But I was VP of sales for Athlon

and loved every minute of that.

But, okay, at the end of the day,

my heart and my passion is tennis

and only 10 ATP events in the US.

So, a chance to lead that team for 10 years

from 2013 to 23.

- And that's something you say yes to.

Hey, would you like to do this?

And I think the answer is yes.

There's not a lot of hesitation there.

And you just want, I say, just won this year being 2024

as a tennis player, you're still playing.

So, you won the senior invitational, is that, is that right?

- Yeah, I'm actually had a good run now

that I stepped away from the tournament last year.

I've actually had more time to play than watching,

you know, promote tennis.

But, won the Atlanta Senior Invitational and the 50 doubles.

Also gotten invited to represent Georgia in the Calend Cup

in which each of the nine Southern states

puts their best adult male and female players together.

And, it's on a 55 team with Steven Anix and Ryan Blake

and John Hanon me and we came home with the trophy there.

And then, there's another event called the Donop Cup

in which each of the 17 sections and puts their best teams together.

And so, I represented Team Southern

and we actually won the Donop Cup.

So, it's been a good run so far.

The body keeps holding up and still loved to compete.

- I'm excited.

I haven't seen Ryan Blake in forever.

So, Ryan was always one of my favorite people.

And he is a first class character.

And another perfect example, he plays tennis

and makes all his money in basketball.

- Exactly.

- Yeah, and he and I, I've known him since I was probably 12 years old.

He's probably one of the first guys ever played in junior tennis.

And it's fun to see where we all end up in life.

And now he's just a great guy and been a lifelong great friend.

- Yeah.

And that's good when we see those times.

We say, "Hey, oh my gosh, we met back when we were kids

and we get a chance to then whether we grew up together

or whether we'd get apart and come back

and we'd run into each other again as professionals,

as we're older.

I know with my wife, we ran into a couple of kids, I would say,

two that I coached 20 years ago

and got him into college tennis.

And we see him again and say, "Hey, how you doing?"

And it's great, we've got kids now

and it's all kind of an exciting scenario to be able to say

we knew each other back then.

But even more so with you Eddie, with somebody,

with those guys like Blake and Hannah to be able to say,

"We've been doing this together for maybe more than 20 years."

- Definitely in Ryan's case for sure,

John's right there in Stephen A.N.X as well.

So we're all aging gracefully together.

- One thing is, it's still being able to play at a high level

is uncommon.

Bobby, what was the statement you made recently

and something that was about most people, 70%,

whatever the number is of Division 1, tennis players

never play again, is that right?

- You'd never pick up a racket again, yeah.

- Wow, I did not know that and that's disappointing.

That's really disappointing.

- I mean, I play tennis, yeah, look,

I still love to go play tournament here and there,

but it's really for the health and wellness.

I mean, you can get such a great singles workout

and an hour that's both such a great cardio

and aerobic and anaerobic.

So I just, I'd love to still get a great workout.

- Yeah, and I think those of us that know the health benefits

and we had go tennis, we promote that kind of thing

'cause we want more people in the sport.

And it's one thing from your point of view,

and I wanna ask about some of your experiences

at the ATP tournament level to be able to see

as much as you have, because we promote the health benefits

and we want people to get into it.

Let's age well, let's, you know,

tennis players live what, seven to 10 years longer

on average than other players.

And I don't know if that's actual causal

or just relational, but still it says something

and it means a lot.

And what do you see when we've got the players

that are in our 50s, in our 60s,

and as we get older and we can still play,

those seem to be the healthier people in our world here.

Now, is that just because we're biased toward tennis, Eddie?

- You know, I think so.

I mean, I think I heard somebody say,

you don't stop playing tennis 'cause you get old.

You get old 'cause you stop playing tennis.

So there you go.

So I choose to play tennis not to get old.

- That's a great statement.

I like that a lot.

And that's encouraging to get people to keep playing.

And even if many as we get older,

maybe transitioning into pickleball

or finding something a little less difficult on the body,

fighting through injuries, whatever that is,

the health benefits are still important

because maybe we take some of these younger people

that are coming into pickleball and then say,

hey, maybe tennis is even an even better workout

and that can be a good entry level.

But I do want to ask about your time,

specifically at the ATP event here in Atlanta

because there's good response, there's negative,

it's in town, it's hot, it's rainy.

I mean, recently the most recent Atlanta open,

they didn't finish their finals matches

till three o'clock in the morning, the next day,

whether it happens, right?

It's an outdoor event.

But for you, Eddie, could I ask, could I presume to ask

the rewarding, what's the most rewarding thing

that you could consider?

Or anything rewarding that says,

you spent 10 years experiencing this,

what did you get out of it?

What did you learn rather than just spending your time

working to make sure the players and the sponsors

are taking care of?

- You know, I think the most rewarding thing

for anybody that has a leadership opportunity,

whatever that is, any sort of company,

you want to leave things better than you find it.

And so I'm very proud of the 10 years of building it

every year to be bigger and better.

And of course, you guys know that was an empty parking lot.

And so we bring a world class tennis tournament every year

and we build it and everything there is temporary.

And it was very satisfying to get bigger and better

every year, but also when you would have fans there

that wouldn't know that it was temporary.

And the other thing that we really tried to abide by

is we kind of had a team motto that we wanted

to be a party in a tennis match, Roque House.

So that was kind of our philosophy

'cause we didn't want people to have to,

we weren't gonna get fed in the Dull joke of it.

So I mean, we were never gonna get those guys.

And so we had to make sure it was that sports event

on an annual basis of people who wanted to be a part of

whether you're a sports fan or not.

We knew we were gonna get the passion of fans

like the three of us.

We're gonna go.

But how do you get those casual fans to go?

And it's the easy parking.

It's the restaurants, it's the shops.

And I also will tell people part of my motivation

when I started was that I was fortunate in my career

at 10 Super Bowls and Pondle Boards and Masters and Pro Bowls.

And but the greatest annual sports event is the US Open

tennis.

And it's because there's New York City,

it's night matches, it's people watching, it's restaurants,

it's shops, it's great world class tennis.

So we really want to be that many US Open there

at Atlantic Station with unbelievable Midtown Skyline views

and easy parking and restaurants and shops

and great world class tennis.

And you don't care who's playing.

I mean, yes, you want your marquee players to win,

but that's a bonus.

You can control the weather.

So you control what you can control.

What's Atlanta is July, it's hot.

So we would strategically play all of our marquee matches

at night.

So that way it's the evenings down there very pleasant.

I mean, even with humidity, if you're from the south,

you know, it's very pleasant down there.

And we found with our research that people that had come

to the tournament, the survey showed that it was never

an issue about getting there or parking.

Because there's 7,000 covered parking spaces at Atlantic

Station, I think it was $12 or $14 a day, which is--

you go to any other sporting event,

that parking is going to cost you $40, $50.

So the parking was not an issue.

And there's seven different ways

to get into that parking at Atlantic Station.

So it was really our goal to try to get the people that had never

been there before.

Because once they came, we felt like that we had a really good shot

of them coming back.

I like that ending, where if we can get them here once.

And I think that's a-- that's kind of a tennis coach expectation.

If I come from my point of view with Bobby,

is if I could just get you on court,

then I know you're going to come back,

because you're going to like the product.

And I think a lot of the people that

might complain about the Atlanta open

or the Atlanta people that aren't going unless it's Roger,

which is not going to show up.

And they're potentially-- they don't like the drive.

It's not about parking.

I mean, Bobby lives over an hour away,

and that's just getting to the city, getting down there.

So you can get Bobby all the parking you want.

He's still got a drive power, and that's a commitment.

And there's a lot more of those complaints,

where once I go down for the first time,

and I see that party where the tennis match broke out.

And I see-- sometimes there empty seats up there.

But that doesn't mean the place is empty.

The rest of that facility is packed.

And people are--

the tents, and they got drinks, and the fans,

and not the fans, the people, but the fans,

to keep themselves cool.

And it really is a great place to hang out.

And we went down there three times just this past--

in the last episode of it.

And we watched very little tennis.

Very little tennis.

And we were meeting people and talking,

and really enjoying the atmosphere.

So I think that's probably it.

It's if we can get you down here the first time,

is that the hardest part, though?

Because if you're going to say, come down to our event.

We've got great parking.

It's kind of a strange offer, right?

Yeah, but it's more than just the parking.

When you come through those front gates,

and you get that music stage going,

and partnering with the Giving Kitchen,

it was one of our charity partners

that helped bring some of Atlanta's top restaurants

and chefs.

I mean, Atlanta's a foodie community.

So being able to have Ford Fry and some of his restaurants

over the years featured there.

I mean, all of those were kind of the secret sauce for us.

And then I mentioned the mini-US Open earlier.

So the US Open is men and women.

We're a men's only event.

So I'm also very proud of some of the entrepreneurial things

we did, such as kicking off the only men's term in the world

that kicked off with a women's exhibition.

And that sold out every year.

And Atlanta has a very affluent African-American community

and bringing Venus Williams that first year

to play Jeannie Bouchard, sell out, bringing Sloan Stevens

and the play Madison Keys, sell out, bringing Coco Gawd,

right as her breakout year, and actually

play two different sessions, sell out, sell out.

So then getting folks to come that it had never come before,

that then wanted to come back and see the men play later

on in the week was just another piece

to the whole equation that we were trying to create.

Yeah, I think we've been trying for years

to make sure we help push that idea of,

you don't come down for whatever you want,

stay for the tennis to where it isn't necessarily--

we weren't worried about who was playing.

Now, it's nice to see the big guys play.

And it's nice to see those big names.

But it really has been a fantastic event,

despite some of the complaints.

And again, like you said, Atlanta is hot.

It's-- you can't control the weather.

There's only so much you can do.

And the one thing I learned going to ATP meetings

over the 10 years is that every event has a complaint

about its date on the calendar.

I mean, you can talk about Miami and Indian Wells.

And even this past year, we talked about the weather at Lannagot,

while Rome, the Italian opening and Madrid both were just downpours.

And then even the French and Wembleden

had to deal with weather issues.

So every event has issues with their date.

July, the end of July for Atlanta,

the way the calendar is to help have the guys start

their US Open Preparation on the Hard Corts,

who is really the best date for us.

Because then you start getting to August.

Well, guess what?

A lot of school systems go back to school.

I mean, it's starting August.

And so then your volunteer basis is good.

And that was something our volunteers were second to none.

Our ball person team.

And again, I watch matches on TV or live.

And I'm looking at things that most fans aren't looking at,

just because of the operational promoter nature of me.

Our ball person team fabulous.

Our ushers, our drivers, our ticket takers, just so much passion,

so much knowledge.

And he talked about the finals, any at 3 AM.

They were there to the end.

And just kudos to our volunteer team that really helped

it get to where it was.

And again, people need to understand

that Atlanta Open wasn't leaving, isn't going away

because of the lack of success.

It's simply a casualty of the ATP Tour Calendar

with the 1,000s all going from nine days to 12.

So when you add three days to Cincinnati

and three days to Canada, that's six days in the summer.

That's a week.

So the summer got squeezed a week.

And as a result, unfortunately, even more

of a history at Newport Rhode Island,

where that international tennis hall of fame

losing its event.

And so we can bow out gracefully

or other heads high knowing that we

left creating a very positive event.

That's good.

I appreciate that explanation because we'll end up

getting that question for years to come.

What happened?

Oh, I bet they ended it because it wasn't

well attended.

We put an article last year that said,

don't let the empty seats fool you about the Atlanta event

because that place is a party.

And there's also a tennis match going on in the big space.

But in this case, it's a good explanation

to be able to say the ATP level decisions

are why the calendar changes.

It's not like some other tournament got chosen instead

of this one.

And so GF Sports specifically was able to bid on creating

new events.

Can you describe that for me?

Do you know how that played out?

Yeah, I mean, very simply, if any tournament owner owned 2,

250s, they had the opportunity to retire those 2, 250s.

Or in essence, give them back to the tour who

would then stun set them.

In exchange for that, they would be rewarded with a 500.

So that's why GF with Dallas being a 250 in Atlanta being

a 250, those two events are now gone.

But in exchange for that, GF now has 1,500 that will remain

in Dallas in that same kind of February indoor time slot.

But there's other events and owners

that have 2,5, 2, more than 1,2, 50 that decided to keep them.

Buenos Aires and Antorpor, for an example.

But there wasn't-- it was just again the way Atlanta fell

on the calendar that was really the only scenario that would work.

Sure.

Yeah, that makes sense.

And I appreciate that explanation, because it's

difficult for some people to understand those business

level decisions if we don't know.

And most people aren't paid.

We still have on our social media.

We've got people saying, oh, I wonder what

happened when they're commenting on the explanation

of what happened.

So clearly, people aren't actually paying attention

in trying to learn these want to complain.

What you'll notice is next year in 2025,

when those summer 1,000s got to 12 days,

DC that is now always historically followed Atlanta

is moving up a week.

So DC will now take the Atlanta week on the calendar

moving up, because again, they got squeezed to move forward

a week because of the change.

And Cincinnati, right?

Got it.

That makes sense.

OK, Bobby, I learned what I needed to learn.

I really wanted to hear that turn of the explanation again.

Do you got anything for Eddie?

Well, I think speaking to just to take it one step further,

I'd love to see him five years what Atlanta station

has to say with the loss of the tournament.

Because I'm like, you, I've been in Atlanta 32 years now.

And a lot of things we take for granted.

And I've said it a thousand times.

I grew up in New York, approximately the same 35 miles

from New York City as I am now from Atlanta.

And I visited Atlanta far more than I ever did New York City.

And I went to the tournament last Wednesday.

And it rained.

But what it really did for me was recreate a lot of memories

of just silly things that my daughter and I

had done at Atlanta station and said, you know,

I'm going to have to make an effort to get to Atlanta station.

There's not something yearly that is going to bring me there.

So, you know, I'll be curious to see how the storm

will make out your five years.

So now the long term business legacy of losing something

that I just said, I think far too many people

took for granted because of a thousand excuses.

And you know, once you get there, you sit there and go.

And of course, you know, I love the whole idea of making a party.

You know, I screened that from the towers

when I was involved with the senior tour to a lot of deaf ears.

And it was very frustrating because, you know, Atlanta

is a tier one city.

And as Eddie said, I was disappointed last Wednesday

because I couldn't get into the stadium because of the rain.

So I had to get to eat the food.

You know, I want the food trucks.

You know, that's part of the experience.

And I didn't get to enjoy that.

So, you know, I think that's going to be interesting.

Five years from now when we realize, you know,

you always miss it more when it's gone, unfortunately.

Well, I'll say just to add in echo,

which was saying Bobby by Atlantic Station, fabulous partner.

Having them as a site partner where Atlanta is a tier one.

It's a major DMA, just like Dallas, New York,

Houston, LA, Chicago.

Atlanta was the only market in the US for an ATP event

that took place right in the heart of the major DMA.

I mean, even New York is in Queens.

You know, it's in the bird.

Even with our GF sports, our Dallas event,

it's going to be out in Frisco.

And so, you know, Indian Wells and Miami, you know,

Miami's out at Miami Gardens where the, you know,

where the football stadium is.

So Atlantic Station was such a great partner.

Having a hotel right there on site.

Most ATP events around the world, you've got to get in your car

and drive 15 minutes as a player to get to the practice courts.

Another 15 minutes to get to the venue.

We had guys playing their match and walking back to the hotel

after their match didn't even, you know,

water need a ride and you could go to your house

or Atlantic Grill or Publix and you'd see him there.

And Atlantic Station told us that outside of the Christmas

holiday week and December that our Atlanta Open

was their second best week of the year in terms of business

for their retailers, the restaurants and all the retailers

there.

So it was a win-win.

They were fabulous partners and that was part of our success.

Having that stadium right off the interstate, you know,

there's 675,000 cars a day that go by the intersection.

So that was basically a billboard for the tennis

tournament in Atlantic Station one and the same

during our nine day run every year.

>> Yeah, the truest did pretty well, right?

They built a building there.

>> It was supposed to be.

>> It was BB&T.

Yeah, BB&T is as a newer bank in the Atlanta market really

wanted to own something and the ability to own and, you know,

title with us with their Georgia headquarters being right

back there and every backdrop shot of the stadium had the BB&T

building and then when BB&T acquired

some trust, then they created the truest brand and

then ran for two years before that ran its course.

>> And that's, we were driving past the other night and my wife

looked at me and we're driving by.

>> It's so cool to see because it's in the same place that they would put,

they put the Cirque du Soleil there when, you know,

when there's time and space and they're in, in town and driving by

I'm like, why don't we, why don't they have a big billboard

saying, you know, the Atlanta open.

I think that pretty much is the billboard.

I mean, you drive by and you see a giant tennis stadium.

I think you pretty much figure out what's going on there.

>> Well, we would, I don't think they did it this year but it probably

because this was the last year but in years past, yeah,

we had a big billboard on the back of the stadium that had our

web address and dates so that way people would know what was going on.

Hey, what is that thing over there?

So you kind of knew what it was.

>> Well, you mentioned, you mentioned about getting there and I remember

multiple times trying to get to the US open and it's,

it just felt like the whole morning was just getting there.

The train and whatever it was, it was just, it wasn't easy and we were

driving down recently and you go down and we come from the north.

So we go down, we take it right, we take it right, we park,

we walk across street, we're in.

It's fantastic.

>> And you, and that's part of it.

You don't, all of us are human nature's.

You don't want to be stressed out getting to a location and be stressed out

standing in line to get into wherever you're going or it's a movie or a concert or

whatever.

So again, we just wanted to, we tried to run a tennis tournament the way we'd

want to go to it by ourselves.

>> That's a good way to look at it.

I think Bobby and I have a lot of conversations with people in the tennis world

and a lot of those solutions, a lot of those decisions that become good for

others are when someone does something that they would want.

How would I want to experience this thing?

Whether we're creating a magic ball machine or whatever it is that we're doing for

tennis, we solve a problem for ourselves which is all right, when I go to a event,

I want to be able to get there easily.

I want to be able to afford it, I want good food.

You just go down the list and say this is what I want.

Well, how hard is it to do these things?

And as we've said before, even just now, oh yeah, and there's a tennis match going on

over there.

>> Exactly.

>> So I will presume again to ask another question that puts you on the spot a little bit.

Do you have, when you think back over 10 years of doing this in Atlanta,

do you have a story that would be something kind of, I don't know, it doesn't have to be funny,

doesn't even have to be witty.

But something interesting that happened that somebody else might not have experienced

because we see the tennis and we can see that on TV and when we go, we can experience

the food and the bands and the excitement and the court side.

But from your point of view, is there anything you've experienced, I'm sure you've got a

thousand stories, but is there maybe a favorite that you can share with us?

>> Yeah, I do, but I'd also like to go back to your, also just your question about the

rewarding, the fulfillment side.

And I talked about wanting to leave it better and you found it.

It's also very rewarding to see all these young Americans who had their first shot in Atlanta

and where they are now.

Taylor Fritz needed two different wild cards from us early on in his career.

And now he spent part of last year, top 10.

Seeing what Chris U-Banks did last year, getting to the quarter finals, a Wimbledon, and

our commitment to college and having a college night and giving him that opportunity and

seeing where he is now.

Francis Chiapo's first win ever as a professional tennis player was in Atlanta in the qualifying,

because of a wild card that we gave to him.

I'll never forget Riley O'Pelka's father, George, crying in the stands when Riley made

the semifinals of his first event on a wild card.

Tommy Paul, same thing.

And last but not least, Ben Schell.

So Ben got his first chance to experience pro tennis in Atlanta my last year in 2022.

You know, we had some Atlanta connections with his dad Brian Ben from, you know, having

at the living in Atlanta and being the coach at Georgia Tech where we went to Florida.

Ben had just won the NCAAs and he was very pleasantly persistent with me, Ben, to his credit

on wanting a wild card.

And I finally said, Ben, you've earned it.

Congratulations.

You're going to get to experience playing an ATP tour level.

And my only ask is you always think fondly of Atlanta whenever you, you know, and so I think

that helped him come back the last two years to play because of that opportunity there.

So just, you know, I'm a, I'm a American home or, you know, I love the Americans to do well.

It's great to be a small part of the success that they've had and where they are now.

But your question about what kind of what's one funny story memory?

And it kind of goes right in line with talking about being a party and a tennis match breaks

out.

Well, one year we had the Commodore play on our music stage and we did it on Saturday night

of the qualifying.

So we actually played matches and then we actually cramed a stage and over the stadium to put

it down onto the court because we didn't have room to fit it through the opening on the temporary

stadium.

And then we put down a protective surface on the court and the, there was no damage to

the stadium where the stage was.

But where we screwed up was all the tables that we had kind of champagne tables that we put

on the court and they left little indensions on the stadium court.

And so when we pulled up our protective turf, we saw all these little, that mean circles

on the court at Saturday night at midnight and we're supposed to have qualifying matches

in the next morning.

And this is where the tennis guys look so favorably upon us as well as having the right partners

and Mike Embernone and signature tennis.

I told him if I have another child, I was going to name it after him because they came, they

drove down probably 45 minutes at night from the barbs to look at the court and Sunday

morning there they were.

And again, the weather cooperated.

They were able to put two coach down on the stadium to have the courts then drive right

to go by Monday to start the main draw.

So we had to move that.

Luckily it's only two matches on stadium for that Sunday qualifying so we could move that.

But that's a funny story of us.

Wanted to be music promoters and William King is one of the founding members of the Commodore

who's a great tennis player, a dear friend.

We still laugh about that William and the Commodore is played.

But we had to resurface the court quickly the next morning.

So there's a little fun inside story.

Bobby I can just see Mike's face right now.

I have to call him on that one.

Yeah, but yeah, I'd love to hear his side on that.

I have to call him on that one.

Tomorrow we'll call him Mike.

The story.

The offer still stands if I have another child as you may name after him.

First name signature last name tennis.

I'm going to Arkansas.

That's good.

And those are just things that I say we go through but that directors and leaders and

somebody like yourself, you're running a tournament like that and every, every time there

is something to fix.

There is some fire to put out, hopefully not literally.

But there is something that's going to happen that you've got to figure it out and just make

it work.

It's a nine day event.

So you have to make decisions quickly and move on.

You have to try to process the information that you need to make a decision quickly and

move on right or wrong.

But yes, it's every day was problem solving quickly, whatever that might be.

Some things mine or some things major.

I'm giving it a little bit of tidbits of my management style, but we, you know, I just

told everybody, hey, look, ducks on a pond.

You know, what does that mean?

Ducks on a pond.

I said, well, when you see a duck on a pond, they look calm, cool and collected.

But underneath the water, there's a lot of little paddling going on.

And so we're going to be calm on the surface and underneath the surface.

If we have to know that we're problem solving, but we're going to just be calm, cool,

and collected because we're running a tennis tournament.

We're not curing cancer.

You know, we're not trying to save a life.

People are coming here to get away from the issues that they're having and their normal

life to have some good entertainment value here.

And so we just wanted to be calm, cool, and collected, make decisions quickly and move

on.

Bobby, I'm trying to decide if that's like your management style.

Oh, I'm a lot more mellow than you would think.

And it comes to important decisions.

Yes, I can fly off a handle, but no, I'm a firm believer.

As I tell everybody, crisis management, you do not go faster.

You go slower.

You know, bring it down and find its core.

I'm excited.

I've learned two things today that disco not only killed Kamiski Park and you're too young,

Sean, but any might remember that when they had a disco night at Kamiski Park, a baseball

field and destroyed the place.

And ducks on a pond also has a baseball.

That was when there's runners on base.

You want you to get it knocked and ducks in the pond.

So you know, baseball tennis.

Why I'm here.

It's true.

And we're having to have you from baseball because baseball is some dessert.

So Eddie, what's next for you?

What do you got coming up?

Anything?

You just being retired and hanging out with the family?

You know, it's been a great year.

You know, this, the tennis is so all encompassing.

It's like, once the tournament ends, you're already in the midst for the following year.

You got to do all your sponsor recaps in the fall.

Then you've got your year in ATP meetings, where other is at the US Open or in November at

the tour finals.

So the next thing you know, it's the holidays.

And then you're going on sale right after that.

And then you're trying to finalize players.

And then you go on sale in March and your media day and then boom, there's the tournament

again.

And so I always thought responding people asked me, well, Eddie, what do you do the rest

of the year?

You know, when you're running the tournament, I said, well, it's a year round job.

You know, and then oh, by the way, then guess what?

You can't have a tournament without sponsors and ticket sales.

So in sponsor, you know, corporate development, that is that's what you're doing on a year

round basis.

Loved every minute of it, but with all that being said, I've just had a lot of time this

year to play more tennis as we talked about, travel, get to go to some really cool places

that I've been wanting to go to.

And you know, I don't say that, you know, no to people and they approach me.

I just say maybe not right now.

And I'll always listen.

But as of right now, look, it's been a great year.

It's been fun to be a fan again and not have the responsibilities, but still, you know,

it's so gratifying to go back and Peter was gracious to invite me back on Monday night

for the Legends exhibition to see what I call my tennis family out there.

Volunteers and the sponsors and the ticket holders and the vendors and ATP staff.

So it was very, you know, reminiscing.

That was fun.

Good. And you've got a couple of kids that are athletes.

Your daughter plays some tennis, your son's playing some baseball if I can go personal.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thanks for asking.

My daughter played, uh, junior tennis and went to UNC Charlotte and played for two years.

And then there was a coaching change.

So she actually transferred to Georgia Tech and played there and graduated.

Uh, and she's now, yes, if I put in a plug, it would be for her because she's found a way

to be a full time content creator, social media influencer with almost 60,000 Instagram followers.

Uh, Gabela's Gabs that started her name is Gabriella and she started during COVID making

fun of herself learning how to play golf.

And it's turned into golf food, fashion and travel.

And so I'm very proud of her being entrepreneurial and having an agent and some great clients that

are paying her to help promote their brands.

But she said recently, dad, why don't we go back and play the father, daughter, grass court

championships and Boston at Longwood cricket club and Longwood is one of those.

Uh, just unique tennis places on earth at any tennis fan has to go see along with Newport

over in Newport, Rhode Island.

The other one I'll put up there is La Jolla Beach and tennis club over outside of San Diego.

Those are to me or the, but we're going to go do that.

And then my son also went to Georgia Tech play baseball and he got drafted by the pirates

in the fifth round of the 22 draft.

So he's in a second full year.

He's now at the double A level playing in Al tuna, Pennsylvania and Western PA for the

Al tuna curve.

And so it's been fun being there to support him and nothing will make me happier than

to have his goals and dreams come true of making it to the major leagues one year.

He's a fast lefty center field lead off guy.

So he's a high on base guy fast and then let those big boppers behind him, you know, bring

him in.

So yeah, it's been very fun to travel and then support my kids.

I'm sure Bobby's going to want to look for the invitation to just go see some baseball.

Because I think Bobby's got more of a baseball niche than I do.

More of the merrier.

Let's do it.

I love it.

And so Bobby got anything else for Eddie because I'll hit him with King of tennis that we

think we've got everything covered and because I want to hear this too.

So this is I'm very I'm anxious to hear what he has to say about King of tennis.

So I don't know about the King of tennis questions.

So Eddie, I appreciate your time and it's fun to get you know, get to know you a little

bit better and also share with our audience kind of what it looks like to run an event

like that.

It's like the Atlanta open.

It's got to be a unique job and maybe sometimes many of us think we have unique jobs or our job

is difficult or interesting.

But that's one of those situations that is got to be got to be fulfilling and I appreciate

you sharing some of that with us and sharing a little bit about yourself personally.

That's great.

But I will ask and I'm going to put you on the spot and I'm going to look for something

great.

But that's that's just our high expectations.

And that's just how much we think of you of course.

But Eddie, if you were King of tennis, whether it's Atlanta, the world, any scale, whether it's

professional or social at any level, is there anything in tennis that you would do or

change?

Well, let me just say thank you for having me.

Really appreciate what you guys are doing.

So keep it up and just remembering me when you guys are hanging there with Portanoi and

everyone.

So keep doing your thing.

I really appreciate it.

It's part of the ecosystem we need you guys.

So but if I'm King of tennis, as I said earlier, I'm such passionate about American tennis.

And when you look at Shera Pobo when she came on the scene and what an influx of young Russian

female players that were still experiencing, when you see what Venus and Serena did and

Alcoco is doing for the female African American community.

It's just a shame we haven't had a male Grand Slam champion since 2003 with Andy Rodic.

So if I was King of tennis, I would love to have an American male win a Grand Slam event

preferably the US Open because I think that just the global appeal of the Grand Slam,

I think we'd see another influx of great young male athletes choose tennis.

Well right now they may not be choosing.

I don't think our best male athletes are playing tennis.

I think they're going to soccer, they're going to basketball, baseball and other sports.

And I would love to, if I were King of tennis, have one of our male American players win

the US Open and I think that would help us see a big boom for years to come.

So Bobby evidently he agrees with you more than he agrees with me in fact the famous tennis

player is the thing that drives new players into the sport.

So it looks like he's leaning toward that but I will ask Eddie as King of tennis, that seems

more like grand wizard of tennis that you get to kind of snap your fingers and say

America and you are tournament directors you could probably rig it to work out that way

but is there a way we accomplish that because in this case how do we get the Americans ready

for that.

So if we come more from my point of view and saying I think volume and quality of player

will create the next American Grand Slam champion.

I kind of view it from the other direction.

And you have as King what are your what are your words?

What are you going to tell us to do to help make that happen?

Well, you know, that's the chicken and the egg question.

So it's like, all right, do we get more players and one of them is going to end up being a

Grand Slam champion or if we were somehow to get a Grand Slam champion do we all of a sudden

have this huge swell of new players.

So to look at a perfect world would be both.

But that's kind of why I said what I said I would love to see in one of our young American

men.

And I think Ben is capable.

I think Francis is capable.

I think Taylor's capable because Nadal is, I mean, he's at the finish line now and Roger's

done in Jokovic, you know, what does he have maybe 18 months left.

Andy Murray just retired.

So there's this window of opportunity and we're seeing Alka Rasmussen center now come to

the forefront.

The Yannick center played in Atlanta in 2021 and lost first round.

He lost first round.

Now he ended up winning the doubles with Riley O'Pelka and Riley, it's the only title centers

ever won in doubles, the only title that Riley's won.

But I think our American guys are right there with them.

I think they're capable and so if we could just have that happen and then to answer your

question to Sean, I think we got to make sure that the USDA has the proper infrastructure

with the junior competitive pathway.

And I'm not the right person to probably get in the weeds on that.

But that is, I mean, we need that infrastructure because I mean, when I was growing up playing

junior tennis, I said, what would you TR?

What is you T, you know, so now you TR is something that's totally come and now you have this

ITF global tennis number.

Again, I'm probably getting into some other topics of things for another day for maybe

the other guests, but those are the things we just have to make sure we have the right pathway

because even with the Atlanta open, even though it's gone, pro tennis at that level is so important

in the ecosystem because you want those kids to come to those tournaments and dream to

play in it one day and we need pro tennis in the US.

You know, I hate to see some of these events go away and I think there's a direct correlation

to having pro tennis tournaments, having successful players and having world champions.

Well there you have it.

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And with that, we're out.

See you next time.

Bye.

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