Daniil Medvedev, considered by many to be a tennis savant, grapples with the meaning of the ubiquitous term.
“I think it’s very vague,” he said. “Because I feel like tennis IQ is very close to mental strength, but at the same time it’s completely different things.”
The concept has several components, and it’s a personal term. Everybody has their own definition. But what are the components?
At its heart, it’s about competing, says Joel Drucker, well-known tennis journalist and executive editor of Tennisplayer.net.
“Most of all, I think it’s understanding how to compete,” he said. “Seeing that winning is the desired outcome that you can’t control, competing is a process you can always control. It’s how you compete, and how you engage, and how you study the opponent.”
We’ve all heard pundits gush about someone’s tennis IQ — players who can use the court as a canvas, directing their opponents through a series of traps before swooping in to make the kill.
But have we really ever fully comprehended the meaning of the term?
Gemini, by Google, has.
“Tennis IQ refers to a player’s strategic intelligence and their ability to make the right decisions under pressure,” it said.
Is the bot correct?
No offense to artificial intelligence, but when you have 24-time major champion Novak Djokovic at your disposal, wouldn’t it be better to just query him?
“I think it’s like a diligent, holistic, multi-disciplinary approach that really defines the IQ in the end,” he said. “You know, when you have a lot of shots in the arsenal on the court, then you feel more comfortable finding solutions.”
Now we’re talking.