Now this friend is a little deaf on the whole subject of competitive sports (I think of his sports highlight being once taken for Jerry Garcia when he took his son to a Yankees game, but thinking about it I recall that he was once a decent ping-pong player), but I was surprised by his linking of the two sports, which I think of as being different in every way.
Then, yesterday, at the awesome Miami-Dade Library book sale (a big event for me each winter), I, as always, bought all the tennis books I didn't already own. As I was a checking out, a woman about my age saw the book Extraordinary Tennis For The Ordinary Player. She said something like, "as if ordinary people can afford to play tennis".
Wow! Tons of public parks in almost any city have free tennis courts. A decent racquet can cost under $25. Balls are cheap. End of expense. You need shorts and sneakers, but that's it. In both Miami and Asheville I see lots of very "ordinary" people playing, many of whom have the appearance of not being at all well-off.
I believe a round of golf at a cheap public course costs $25-50, and in more exclusive settings can easily cost $200. Clubs and the other accoutrements are expensive as well.
Never mind the athleticism and exercise differences between the two.
So where is this weird "expensive and exclusive" reputation coming from? I guess from its roots. The Wikipedia article on tennis says:
After its creation, tennis spread throughout the upper-class English-speaking population before spreading around the world.[1] Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all ages. The sport can be played by anyone who can hold a racket, including people in wheelchairs.
And it is true that tennis hasn't been as popular in the inner cities as other sports, though based on the kids I see playing in Miami, that's changing fast. It's all very odd, and probably not good for tennis, that people believe this thing that is so contrary to the truth.
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