The Tennis Channel

Bag Checks.. humanize the players. It is nothing more then a clever concept which affords players the opportunity to give the veiwer a glimpse (15 sec) of their personality.  Of course, most every player carries the same items, but the presentation is always different. And that is the "compelling" component of bag check.   

Because it's fun.  People need to lighten up....this isn't chess...it isn't medicine. It's a game. A game that infinitely more people can participate in recreationally and personally than 99% of the other sports on T.V.  We hear endlessly about other sports' "stars" trivia and personal habits.  If you're not a frequent traveler...the "bag check" concept is a play on the airport "bag check"...but with a fun twist.

I posted a previous suggestion about Live coverage of matches ...but another thing I'm tired of ....stop playing the dayam Andy Roddick Lacoste commercial every 5 minutes!!!!! Surely Tennis Channel has enough money to at least have some interesting, up to date, and not so annoying commercials. Roddick is not even all of that any way to give him sooo much play. He only has a wicked serve, other than that, even with Connor's help, he has no game.

I've been looking through these posts and have been reading peoples comments from all the various threads and almost everything comes back to showing more matches without interruptions. And ideally live! That should be the number one priority. At the moment TC subscribers are paying extra to specifically get the TC. At least in my area TC is not part of any other package. So it seems viewers are exclusively serious tennis fans. So might as well cater to our tastes. Cut the fluff and the human interest stories and show more matches from coin toss to hand shake without skipping any sections. Or maybe spend some of your budget on getting rights to classic matches. I'm sure people wouldn't mind seeing some old Agassi-Sampras or Becker-Edberg finals. And if you feel compelled to do human interest pieces. Then please do relevant and up to date ones. I have seen every possible side of Lleyton Hewitt. The repetitive programming is really killing the channel. So please put your efforts into coming up with some clever ways to have economical original programming. My personal pet peeve is commentators talking during play. I know you can turn off the sound but is just not the same without the sound of the ball being struck. Aside from a few of the disastrous analysts I actually don't mind too much listening to most of the announcers. But please make it a general guideline to not talk during the points. I'm surprised and disappointed at ex pros who end up being just as guilty. I expect more from them. Take a lesson from BBC and other European announcers as they are very good about this. Audiences in the stadium are quiet during play, why not strive to recreate the same experience for your home viewers.