WHAT SEPARATES GOOD PLAYERS FROM GREAT ONES
After years on court with juniors in Europe, Asia, and now in Boca Raton - South Florida, I’ve realized something parents don’t always expect:
Good players are everywhere.
Great players are rare, and the difference has very little to do with strokes.
At 10, 12, or 14 years old, many players can hit a heavy ball, move well, and win matches. From the outside, everything looks the same. But underneath the forehands and results, there is a gap unfolding: one that becomes obvious only as the pressure rises and the pathway gets more demanding.
If you listen to ATP and WTA players talk about their development, the pattern is unmistakable:
Greatness is not a talent problem. It is a mindset problem.
A decision-making problem.
A consistency-of-identity problem.
The separation begins quietly, and then becomes impossible to ignore.
Good Players Live in Results. Great Players Live in Trajectory.
Good players measure their progress by last weekend's score. If they win, everything feels right. If they lose, something must be wrong: the coach, the strategy, the racquet, the confidence.
I see this every Monday. A family arrives and the first thing out of their mouth is the result. "He lost first round." The implication: something needs to change.
Great players think differently.
They ask: Is my level more stable than it was a month ago? Can I repeat my game on a bad day? Am I making clearer decisions under pressure? Am I becoming a tougher competitor?
Great players zoom out. They see their development as a timeline, not a weekend report.
I coached a girl in Asia who lost in the second round of the same tournament three months in a row. Her mother was getting anxious. "Maybe we need to change something."
I showed her the video from month one versus month three. Same opponent, same round. But in month three, her daughter's footwork was sharper, her spacing more consistent, her decisions clearer. She lost 6-4, 7-5 instead of 6-2, 6-1. She was closer.
Two months later, she won that tournament.
Nothing magical happened that week. The trajectory simply reached its destination.
The Real Difference | A Sharp Contrast
Here is the truth families rarely hear:
GOOD PLAYERS:
depend on confidence
try to "feel good" before they compete
train strokes
react emotionally
search for intensity
want perfect conditions
play well on good days
GREAT PLAYERS:
depend on clarity
compete even when they don't "feel good"
train decisions
regulate emotion
search for structure
problem-solve through adversity
play well especially on bad days
Great players aren't necessarily more talented. They are more stable. More intentional. More rooted in who they are when the match becomes uncomfortable.
A Story From the Court | The Player Who Was "Almost There"
Back to Max, the semifinal specialist.
In those semifinals, he would start strong. Confident, fluid, taking the ball early. Then around 4-3 in the second set, something shifted. His court position crept back a step. His ball rotation flattened. His breathing got shallow. By 5-4, he was playing reactive tennis, hoping his opponent would miss instead of making them uncomfortable.
After his fourth straight semifinal loss, I asked him a question: "Who are you when you're uncomfortable?"
He looked confused.
"When the score is tight, when you're nervous, when your legs are heavy: who shows up? What's your identity?"
He couldn't answer. Because he didn't have one yet.
The issue wasn't talent. It was that Max had an identity for practice and an identity for pressure, and they were different people.
So we rebuilt his game around one principle: "Who are you when you're uncomfortable?"
We stopped training power. We trained decisions under fatigue. Every drill ended with him physically tired, emotionally frustrated, and forced to execute his pattern anyway. No excuses. No "I'm not feeling it today."
I'd run him through 20 minutes of high-intensity rallies, then make him play out a tiebreaker with legs burning and lungs screaming. The point wasn't the tiebreaker: it was learning that his identity could survive discomfort.
Six weeks later, he made another semifinal. Same kid across the net who'd beaten him before.
This time, at 4-3 in the second, I didn't see the shift. His court position held. His patterns stayed clear. He kept building points the same way he'd built them at 2-0.
He won the match 6-3, 7-5. Then won the final the next day.
His dad asked what changed.
"Nothing," I said. "He just brought the same person to every score."
That is what greatness looks like.
A delayed explosion, not a sudden miracle.
How Great Players Train (Where Good Players Get Stuck)
Good players love training hard. They enjoy sweat, speed, and the feeling of power.
But intensity without intention produces chaos: unpredictable spacing, inconsistent contact points, unnecessary risk-taking, emotional instability, panic when the score tightens.
Great players also work hard, but their intensity is organized.
I watch juniors all the time who hit 100 mph forehands in practice and can't tell me why they chose that shot. "It felt good," they say. That's not a reason. That's a guess.
Great players ask: Why am I choosing this pattern? How do I want to start the point? What is my identity here: attacker, counter-puncher, builder? What decision do I trust under pressure?
Great players don't just hit balls. They build a way of playing. A way of competing. A way of responding.
Their training is not random repetition. It is identity rehearsal.
Great Players Handle Messy Seasons Differently
Every junior goes through phases where development becomes complicated: injuries, school stress, confidence drops, growth spurts, emotional turbulence, tough tournament periods.
Good players (and anxious parents) often treat these phases as crisis. They abandon structure, switch coaches, or chase new methods.
Great players (and great families) understand: Messy seasons are not signs of failure. They are the doorway to the next level.
The players who keep their identity intact during these phases gain a maturity others never reach. They develop resilience that stays with them for life.
Good Players Touch Fundamentals. Great Players Live Inside Them.
Many good juniors think being "advanced" means moving away from basics. They want new drills, more complexity, more excitement.
I once had a 15-year-old tell me, "I already know how to split-step, you do not need to repeat it over an over again."
I asked him to show me. He took one lazy hop.
"Now show me at the end of a three-hour match when your legs are dead and you're down a break in the third."
Different story.
Great players don't get bored with fundamentals, they get better at them.
At the highest levels of the sport, development is still: spacing, footwork structure, clean contact, serve plus first-ball clarity, return position, breathing and reset routines, emotional neutrality.
This is why great players improve year after year: they never graduate from the basics, they master them.
Image vs. Identity | The Line That Exposes Every Player
In the modern tennis world, image is easy.
A good player can post a powerful rally and look impressive. Parents can feel confident when their child wins a few matches.
But image is fragile. It collapses the moment results dip.
I see this constantly on Instagram. Highlight reels of winners, celebrations, powerful shots. It all looks great. Then you watch those same players in a tournament and they fall apart at 4-4 in the third.
Great players build something deeper: Identity.
Identity is how you behave when you're behind. How you compete on a bad day. How you reset after frustration. How you choose patterns under pressure. How you speak to yourself internally. How you carry yourself in adversity.
Identity travels with you everywhere. Image only lasts as long as the winning streak.
The Real Separation
What separates good players from great ones is not talent, luck, or perfect days.
It is:
the relationship they have with time,
the clarity in their decisions,
the depth of their fundamentals,
and the identity they bring to pressure.
Good players give you great moments. Great players give you a standard: again, and again, and again.
This difference is not reserved for a chosen few. It is built, choice by choice, season by season, inside environments that value clarity, structure, and competitive maturity.
Look at your child this week. Not at the result, but at who they're becoming. When the match gets tight, do they bring the same person? Or does someone else show up?
That answer tells you everything about the trajectory you're on.
