Jean-Yves Aubone on Intense Tennis and the Push to Modernize Professional Tennis

Alvin Owusu (00:01.118)
And welcome to another edition of the best three podcasts. I'm Alvin that's Tori and we are joined by J.Y. Abone who is the director of player and coach relations for the intense tennis league and upstart year two I believe tennis league that is taking I would say taking the internet and taking a tennis two dot o by storm. So J.Y. one welcome and how are you doing.

Jean-Yves Aubone (00:28.553)
Thank you guys for having me on. You know, I've been following you guys since you first got started. You had one of our original players back then, Trent Brighton. And so nice to follow him on. You guys are doing a great job covering the sport and just all the topics. And look, I mean, we're getting ready for our draft. I mean, we're nine days away at this point when we're recording. And.

Alvin Owusu (00:37.528)
Yep.

Jean-Yves Aubone (00:49.621)
If you every month you can ask me and it's just gonna be the same thing where I'm like I just can't believe how far we've come in the next month I'll say the same thing and it's just been It's been an amazing ride and it's only been a year for me I started about a year ago and it just feels like just just so many things we've been able to learn and experience. It's been really cool

Alvin Owusu (01:09.006)
Nice, nice, well I appreciate you coming on and we've been trying to do this for a couple months now and we finally found some time so this is good time to do it. A little bit of back, you'll think the...

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:18.869)
I'll take the blame there. take the I appreciate your patience. You got everybody should know you guys reached out to me a while ago and it's just been one of the things I'm trying to do is just time management and just accept things like hey man don't do this like you're going to burn yourself out pretty quick. So I'm trying to get better though if you ask anyone around me they think I still fail at it but I think I'm getting better.

Torrey Hawkins (01:20.976)
No.

Alvin Owusu (01:45.484)
Hey, all we can do is, all we can do is try to improve, try to improve. and I would get a little bit of background about yourself, right? And then we'll kind of get into the, the intense tennis and then professional tennis and come up some of these, I'll call them existential, things that we volley abouts in the tennis community. I'm not sure if everyone knows this, but you were quite the player yourself, former top 10 junior here in the U S, played four years at FSU. you've coached at all the levels, junior level, online tennis coach.

Torrey Hawkins (01:47.772)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (02:14.846)
Touring coach with Raleigh Opelka. You've kind of you've kind of done it all you've seen you've seen a lot of a lot of different angles from this From this from the coaching perspective and the playing perspective and now the seat that you're in with intense tennis I think gives you a really unique perspective at how How to frame this conversation? So if I if I am not familiar with intense tennis, how would you? Explain it to someone who's never who is a tennis fan, but has never seen or heard of this new league

new-ish league.

Jean-Yves Aubone (02:45.928)
Yeah, we like to use the term we're modern take on the sport of tennis. I tried to tell people we look we're very different. We might have the same lines, we have a net racquetball, we hit serve four hands backhand, but just the rules and everything that goes on is just a vastly different experience. And it even requires very different skill sets from the players.

And then for the fans, it's just a completely different experience. And so we've tried to bring into what does the sport need today? I think that the sport has been beautiful for a long time, but fans now with the accessibility to so many other things to watch in sports, it's what can we bring in that these fans are enjoying in other sports? And also when we think down the road, long term fans, which are to be the kids that are 10, 15, 18 years old, 10, 15 years from now, what are they going to be wanting to

consume, they're going to be the ones that are either still playing in the sport, spending money in the sport or having their kids in the sport. And so we have to think what can we do for them to get them engaged with us now. And so we're just very different. And so that's the simplest way I can try to put it. So anyone tries to if you try to compare as they we get it a lot. And in a way, I take it as a huge compliment because of what they've done. It is fantastic. The savannah bananas. You know, I would say they're a little

Alvin Owusu (04:01.985)
Yep. Yep.

Jean-Yves Aubone (04:05.918)
farther along on the entertainment side. So we're trying to find the balance between entertainment but serious competition at the same time.

Alvin Owusu (04:07.085)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (04:14.509)
Gotcha, gotcha. if you could kind of take me back a little bit. this is, we're getting, I guess I'm coming up on the second season of Intense Tennis. So if you could take me back to almost the beginning, you said, you know, we're trying to present tennis in a different way. What was the, who raised their hand and said, hey, we need to do something, we actually need to do something different.

Jean-Yves Aubone (04:39.892)
think all of us have been wanting to do something different. mean, as with Tori and you in the past, we've talked with tennis has been waiting for something. But what got me so excited and this is a credit to the original people that started intense, you know, Charles Allen, Andrew Sadanoff, Yannick Yoshizawa, Tom Bada. When they got together a long time ago, you know, this was years already in the making with conversations. I came in a couple of years down the road. all everybody knew tennis needed to change. Like there's so many

players that play tennis in the United States, but viewership is struggling. You see it with the attendance at some of these smaller tournaments that are not so heavily, you know, like Indian Wells and US Open, it's like an influencer celebrity thing right now, right? It's not even about the sport itself. But these smaller events where it's more about the sport itself, it's viewership is not the same. And so, you know, when they got together, they finally said, look, we're actually going to do something about it.

And that's what was so exciting for me. How many people do we all know that have ideas and talk about stuff? And why doesn't someone do this? Why doesn't someone do that? And then you come across, we came across a group of people that they're actually doing it. And then when I sat down with Charles Allen, the summer of 2024, and he presented to me like what they were willing now, they're ready, they're already going to roll it out, testing everything. I mean, they were were like, hey, we're having an event in two months and everything. When he presented it to me, I was like,

Wow, you're actually doing this. Okay, cool. Great. You know, I'm traveling with Riley. I'll follow along. Not right now. Let's stay in touch. And then they actually did the event, right? And then they actually did another event. And then they put on another one. And so I'm just watching these people. like, no, wait, they're they're really doing this thing. They're serious about it.

Alvin Owusu (06:23.383)
Right, yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (06:29.237)
And that's what was so cool to see, because so many of us have talked about it for so long. And we see the complaints from players on tour, the PTA and what they're trying to do. And so often now I just like we're trying to throw our hands up and say, hey, hey, we're we're already doing it over here at Intense. Like we're doing those rules. We're paying the players equally. We're taking care of them first. Predictable schedules. Right. And so when Charles and Andrew and Janik, when they, you know, just

hearing the talk about it was just so inspiring. I just couldn't help but want to be a part of it.

Alvin Owusu (06:59.885)
And it's all, it's always interesting. Like the tennis world is so small. I played on a men's league team with Andrew's son Ari. So it's a, it's a very, very, very small tennis bubble. I don't know that we've talked about it before here, but okay. So intense is team based and there are teams and we can kind of get into the structure a little bit. But, Tori, you are, what is your, how, would you like to, describe your involvement with intense tennis? I know you don't just, part-time podcast,

as your only other venture. Full time podcaster.

Torrey Hawkins (07:28.2)
Full time, full time podcast, full time podcast and part time coach these days. Thank you very much. I am one of the coaches for the 2026 season.

There's a very, very solid group of coaches that I'm happy to be coaching alongside of. We'll be going to Fort Lauderdale in about a week and have our draft at the Racquet X Conference. And I'm looking forward to that. How I would explain my involvement, I would say to be determined. I'm looking forward to all of it. I mean, I went to three or four of the intense matches last year. One was at the Electric Owl. I believe we are moving, if I'm not mistaken, J.Y., to the Assembly.

which is a little closer to where I'm at here in Atlanta. I say right in the...

more the new heart of Atlanta. say downtown, those of you that know Atlanta is downtown and Electric Isle was definitely downtown and I think the assembly is gonna be a lot more, I'm gonna say fan friendly in terms of a lot of your tennis playing population that's on the perimeter and north of the perimeter we'll find it little easier to get to. I'm looking forward Alvin not only to being involved courtside, I'm also looking...

forward to being a part of intense as it continues to grow. He mentioned the guys and the girls. mean, there's not only is it very, is it solid with the quality, very diverse group. I was looking at the coaches. mean, you've got.

Torrey Hawkins (08:56.456)
three or four very solid coaches, several that I know. There are several, many different backgrounds and countries represented. mean, I was looking at the coaching group and I was like, wow, that's solid. It's a very solid, I'm gonna say a scatterplot of everybody around the world. And so it was really neat to see that as well. The format's fun. I find that, I find that,

Intense has, and they have this big tagline, know, tennis amped up, right? And that's kind of their tagline, at it was last year. What, I've always had this concept and I've heard this saying all my life, show me how I'm measured and I'll show you how good I am, right? And in tennis, in a lot of ways, we measure you off of lack of errors, being consistent, stay deep. And I remember as a kid, Alvin, and J.Y.,

Back in the, I'm gonna say in the early 80s, just after Mack and Borgs, obviously Borg had that crazy quick retirement out of nowhere, tennis kind of died for a little bit. Matt's V-Londer had the game on lockdown, but it might've been the most boring brand of tennis you'd ever seen. Matt's did miss a ball. He would literally just play two sets of tennis and make maybe two mistakes. Ivan Lindell.

the Iron Curtain himself was bashing forehands and hitting backhands. And it was almost like if you watched one point, you saw all 10 points. And it was almost this style of, it was a war of attrition, right? It was just, these guys were just absolute, just automatons out there hitting the ball. Now, as you get better at tennis, you realize how hard it is to be that good. But at the same time as a viewer on TV, I saw Yannick Noah come through in, you know, in 83 with the dreads and doing.

tweeners and hopping over the net after he ran on the drop shot. And I'm watching, I'm like, that's the kind of I like to see. And now you see the 90s came and you got the Bryant, you got the Bryant, sorry, you got the Jensen brothers doing chest bumps and all the rock and roll thing that they had bringing to the tennis. That was at least, it brought something to tennis that brought a little bit of life to it. So when I see in tennis now in 2026, kind of picking up that torch and carrying it much further down the road, I like what I see. Show me how I measure.

Torrey Hawkins (11:16.35)
and show you how good I am. What I could really anticipate Alvin is intense really carving out its own solid niche in the market of people that like to see something little different. People that don't want to just see the war with Trisha. They don't want to just see the grinders. They don't want to just see the number one seed versus the field.

you're starting to see people that it's a little more strategy involved, different types of games I feel and people that aren't as risk averse will do a little bit better from time to time. At the same time you gotta be, it'll just bring a lot of different things to the mix and I like the team aspect, I like the coaching aspect and quite frankly I like that it's another alternative to Jay-Wise Point that we haven't had before and for that alone I like it.

Alvin Owusu (11:58.935)
So let's talk about the structure of Intense in us a little bit here. So we've got teams, right? You mentioned, you know, drafting players, different teams. So we've got teams that are, you know, geo located in different places. They come together to play matches against each other. Teams are mixed gender. You have men, you have women, they're playing singles, they're playing doubles, they're playing mixed, they're doing everything. They've got these bolts. You're playing with a shot clock and you're counting points.

I just throw a lot at you there, but JY, unpack that for me and kind of give the readers, the readers, there's nothing to read here, the listeners, the kind of nitty gritty about intents and then we'll kind of move into the, you know, where it fits in the tennis and media sports landscape.

Jean-Yves Aubone (12:45.543)
I to sum it up to not get I don't want to overwhelm people right because it can be a lot especially when we talk about intent so to keep it simple more rallies more points shot clock music going on you can make as much noise as you want and it's a true team format because men and women well men and women play together on the same team but you can have substitutions literally in middle of match so imagine all three of us together I'm not playing well

Alvin Owusu (12:49.388)
Yeah, sure.

Jean-Yves Aubone (13:12.327)
Alvin, you're the coach, you get a sub-tour, and for me, and I sit on the bench, you know, until you think it's appropriate for me to go back in. And so you can see a lot more matchups in one evening than you can. And so then you just see a lot more different stuff. And then when you add in the music, and then you add in women coming in as well, we finish with mixed doubles, you get to see everything packaged together. But then with more action and music, it's just a lot more fun for the fan to watch.

And then the scoring is simple. You win one point, it counts as one. You hit a clean winner, counts as two. Total points won at the end of the day wins. That's it. That's it. That's all you really need to know. And then so yeah, it's, you know, I think even if you don't know the rules, and I got this feedback from some players, some former tennis players that went to go see it the first time, they couldn't understand some of the rules at first.

still thought it was fun. And because of that, they know, because it's scheduled, you know, in two hours, you're done, you're gone, you're home. All right, 70 minutes of play. So you commit an hour and a half really, right? And you want to be in and out fine, 90 minutes, you got to experience this and you're done. Whereas you go to a traditional tennis tournament, you could be there all day, it could be hot, you have to be there silent. And look, we've all been in tennis a long time.

When a match is great, it's a beautiful sport. Janik Sinner versus Djokovic, semifinals of Australia, man, that was fun. Even, even I don't want a crazy amount of tennis with how busy I am, but I made sure to watch that, right? But you don't always get that, right? There are matches that are boring, right? And then it's hot and then it's expensive. And then it's just all day.

So it's not for everybody. That's you know, and so what we want to do is try to provide a different form of tennis that is more engaging, more fun, more predictable. You know when it starts, you know when it finishes, lot more going on. And then, you know, from the broadcast side too, we're doing that very different. We can get to the broadcast side because at the end of the day, there's gonna be more people watching it through their TVs and online that there will be in person. We have a small arena. So that's also very important for them to understand that different experience is coming there. But yeah, and then so, you

Jean-Yves Aubone (15:25.782)
for the ultimate thing is at the end of the day, if you're a family and you want to bring your kids to something, you don't want to have to plan out an entire day. You don't want to have to say like, you're be there eight hours at the Miami Open. I got the Miami coming up and I got to figure out how I'm gonna take my son. When I'm gonna take him, there's no shade, it's gonna be hot. How do I figure this out? You don't have to do that with us, right? You come, also parents, great news for you.

All the matches we call them arcs, but we'll call matches for the podcast. Keep it simple. After 5 p.m. You don't have to skip work. You don't need to take time off. You can go to work. Your child can go to school. You can pick them up. You can go. Whereas right now, I mean, you go to the US Open. First of all, you're buying tickets early. And I told you, by way, I told you guys ahead of time, I could really rant on this stuff. you know, you go to the US Open, you want to buy tickets on, you know, first day. They're expensive. You're to be there all day. And guess what? You have to skip work.

Alvin Owusu (16:01.248)
Right.

Jean-Yves Aubone (16:22.282)
You got to figure out like are you going to do with your child? Do you bring them? Do you not? And you have no idea who's going to play when you buy those tickets. Imagine that. Imagine a sport that you do not know who you're going to watch. I don't know. Like I'm a dolphin. Or if it's going to rain and then it rains, but they get there. What is the rule? They play like a couple of points. They don't have to refund you there. It's like the rule is something like that. Right. And so there's a lot in traditional tennis.

Torrey Hawkins (16:36.094)
Or if it's gonna rain. Yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (16:51.476)
which look, I love traditional tennis, I still watch it, but there is a lot that goes against getting new fans to come in and build the sport. And we see it in our viewership. know, people would get mad at, why is ESPN putting this behind a paywall? Why don't they put it like front and center so we can all watch it? Like I shouldn't have to, ESPN Unlimited and ESPN three with all that Australian open stuff, right? Well, if it was so profitable, cause so many people were watching, do you think they would do that?

NBA finals in the Super Bowl are not behind a paywall like three paywalls. There's a reason people in the US aren't watching. Well, we're trying to change that.

Alvin Owusu (17:28.364)
I'll, I'll lay out, I'll skip the details for the why paywalls exist and all those different things for early rounds versus later. That's not really important here. But what is important is the part you talked about with the fans, right? You said, you mentioned new fans. Is the goal for Intense Tennis to bring new fans into tennis? Or is this, the venture aimed at existing tennis fans who maybe aren't being properly served?

by the way that tennis is sold to them now.

Jean-Yves Aubone (18:02.944)
They're both. I truthfully, both our primary audience is the tennis fans now. Right. But also at the same time, we think a lot of people don't watch tennis or play tennis for certain reasons. And that's they just weren't attracted to that version of the sport. And so we think we can provide something that is more interesting to them and can potentially get some of these fans back because that's what they get in other sports. If you like other sports.

you like football, basketball, and what's going on in some of these other sports and what they're trying to do, well, give us a try. And I think also for kids as well, right? Those kids are going to be our long-term viewers and our long-term fans. Well, they easier if they play the sport, right? Usually if you play the sport, you probably watch it as well, but you probably want to be a fan of that sport and you want to take part of it. And most kids don't because they want to play in team sports. And so we've found a way to

provide something where they truly feel like they're part of a team. And so we think we can keep them in the sport longer and develop that passion for it.

Alvin Owusu (19:06.987)
That's fair, that's fair. Wanted talk a little bit about the players, kind of move from the fans to the players. So you mentioned that there is a draft coming up. That's exciting. Like tennis and drafts don't normally go hand in hand, but now they are. Like this is a pretty... Yeah, I mean, yeah. You move out of the school ranks, high school, college, they're very, very seldom, like does it happen in juniors as well? So like, I think yeah, tennis teams that we've tried, we've seen World Team Tennis try to do it over the years.

Torrey Hawkins (19:21.416)
Tennis and teams don't go hand in hand that often. Let's be honest with that.

Alvin Owusu (19:35.532)
to varying levels of success, kind of depending on, you know, a lot of different things and where we are in the world and landscape. But here we've got teams. And so you've got players. Tell me a little bit more about the players and how that pool of players has changed. Because I went last year, and you know, as an acute tennis fan, I know that anyone who's played Division I tennis or has ever earned an ATP or WTA point is damn good at tennis.

And you can see it, these are highly skilled players. But they are not players that you would necessarily see on TV at the US Open. So there is a range within professional tennis. How would you pocket the range of intense players? And then how is that, maybe that level changing? Because I think Tori kind of spoke to it a little bit earlier.

Jean-Yves Aubone (20:26.304)
Yeah, so a couple of different thoughts come to mind. The first one I think is maybe not a direct answer to your question. if I veer too far, bring me back. everybody asked me the question, who's playing it intense. And a lot of that is because that's what they've learned they need to follow in tennis, right? They follow the stars. But then I bring back this

I say this a lot and if you're a fan of team sports, then you're gonna know it, you're gonna truly understand this example. Okay, I'm a Miami guy, I'm a Dwayne Wade guy, Wade County, left the Chicago. I didn't stop being a Miami Heat fan. Now I didn't like Pat Riley for a long time and he's still not my favorite person right now, but I didn't stop being a Miami Heat fan. I kept watching, kept coming back, still wanted to go to games. Okay, because it's team identity. Sure, we have our stars, sure we have our favorites.

but we identify ourselves with the Miami Heat community. And that's what we need to bring into sports because I know a lot of people, the moment that Nadal and Federer retired, they watched significantly less tennis. They are less interested because they were so attached to those two people, they didn't watch anything else. And then the way tennis is presented, they had the ability to only watch Federer and Nadal all the time. Every tournament, they put them front and center.

Nobody else is coming up behind them, right? At least that was shown in a way that made people want to care. And so in a way, I want to answer that part where everybody asks us, who are your players? Like one, first, we're trying to build a community around the team. Okay, that's why we want to eventually have teams in cities and build the communities around them. First, we're going to start with 10 teams in Atlanta and build the local clubs around those teams and those communities, Tori's team.

how the Tori's club, his community and build that connection to their team. Eventually we want to deal with cities. And so, cause that's how you get long term fans. If not, you're too dependent on stars. When you're too dependent on stars, that that's a big effort. And not all of these players. And we see it now with like Yannick Sinner isn't the most favorite person in the world because he just wants to keep to himself, play tennis and have a great time. And people, you know, so then it's, it's a little bit of luck.

Alvin Owusu (22:23.9)
Interesting, interesting, okay.

Jean-Yves Aubone (22:47.967)
Right, we see in the UFC, Conor McGregor left and it's like things just haven't been the same because it's hard to build those stars. So we really want to build the communities around those teams so that they feel really connected to the team. So even if we lose some players, okay, maybe you're sad, maybe don't love it, but that's your team, that's your community. That's why we're building junior teams that are need the pro teams. So then, you know, those juniors are still, they feel like they're a part of that team and the parents want to support it.

again, me ranting long and long, but I'm gonna bring it back here. On the other side of it, okay, we do need you do need some stars, you do have to build some players up to get people to care even more, right? And that's where our marketing and content team, they're gonna do what traditional tennis just hasn't done very well of which is not just build one star, not just two, not just three, but try to build everybody up.

and give everybody the best chance. And that way there's a lot of players and each team has their stars. I always find it very interesting, like you ask that, like tennis fans right now, they can probably name 10 players, maybe. But you ask an NBA or NFL fan, they can name the star on every single team. Probably the one or two best players. And they can even identify with the coaches. They probably know the coaches for all 30 teams in the NFL. And so the tennis,

No one knows the coaches. But the coaches are actually around the longest, right? How long Mike Tomlin has been coaching so many players are retiring, but these coaches are staying. But tennis doesn't build that connection to these tennis coaches, right? And so, you know, our coaches are miked up for a reason, you know, coaches like Tori, like they're going to be front and center. And so coaches are also going to be, you know, loved by fans and have that opportunity to build that relationship. And then we're going to build their own players.

Torrey Hawkins (24:19.08)
you

Jean-Yves Aubone (24:39.777)
from the ground up and build these organic stories. So many players have these fun stories. And so I say all that and I think now finally circle out to the final point you said. So these players from season one, they've been mostly former college players that have been coming in and pro players that have not made it to Grand Slams just yet. right now I don't think we're going to get players that are still in Grand Slam qualifiers or anything like that. You make good money when you're there.

Alvin Owusu (25:00.843)
Mm-hmm.

Jean-Yves Aubone (25:09.599)
And you don't want to pass up that opportunity. And I tell players, I'm like, look, if you really think you can make a grand slam in the next year or two, don't take two months and play in our league. It doesn't doesn't make sense for you. But what I was really surprised that for this season that fast was, you know, the level of players and how now we're starting to get some players actually three, 400 in the world, like very interested. I thought those players were probably out of reach for a little while longer.

Alvin Owusu (25:18.516)
Right.

Jean-Yves Aubone (25:35.948)
But I think our marketing team, social media team have presented it in such a fun way and they've seen the matches and they've seen the word amounted. And that's what we want to create the FOMO. Like, my gosh, I want to be a part of that. That's so much fun. mean, Tori, how for me, it's just so great to be able to use the word fun around tennis again. I mean,

Torrey Hawkins (25:57.212)
Yeah, and fun to be a part of, fun to coach, fun to play. mean, our team, we had a little expo team in Florida, Alvin. It was fun to be a part of. It was fun to see, much as I hated to see the team that beat us celebrate, it was fun to watch them celebrate, you know what mean? Because you realize three days earlier, these people were perfect strangers, you know? And now to Jay White's point, they were actually teammates. I wanna...

Piggy back on one of your points, Jay, why you mentioned about being two player heavy. If I had one, one of many, but one of the top three points I hate about pro tennis is how pro heavy and how top player centric the commentators and everyone else is. And.

You've seen it, Alvin, I know you've seen it. We've talked about it at length at different times. And I know, Jay-Y, you've probably seen this and have understood intense relevance on this one note. If that top player goes out of the tournament, everything from the branding to the tournament marketing to everything else, when that player gets out, it's almost like the air in that balloon has deflated so bad, you'll almost wonder, well, why should I even watch the rest of the tournament with so-and-so now gone?

And so it's one of those things where we get so focused in on that top player. And don't get me wrong, I can't wait for the next version, the next iteration of Alcara as a center. At the same time, I know there's a lot of good tennis.

Until then and I feel like at times in our culture and our drive-through fast food kind of culture We're so used to okay. Okay, who's who's the best player in the tournament? And then we're already looking to the final, know I mean even in our draw parties out and then and other podcasts out there who could get to the file Here's my projected draft We're doing it now with final four coming up with the we're always looking to the end instead of looking at celebrating the teams that made it so I feel That one of the problems with tennis is we're so player

Torrey Hawkins (27:58.086)
heavy, player-centric, that if that player's not a part of it...

that at some point that means it's devalued when they're not there. Not that the player that beat them is as good or could beat them on a given day. And I think that also does the league a bit of a disservice. So I feel the tennis has done a phenomenal job at making tennis fun for the consumer. But at some point we started getting into the prime time of things and we started focusing a little too much on that player. And at that point we kind of our mind's eye, we kind of,

had this hierarchy of Alcares. Great. Next guy, pretty good. Number three guy, not too bad. Number five guy, he's okay. And then you go down to the top 20 and you're like, that guy there, he's a journeyman. you're like, have you seen this guy?

Alvin Owusu (28:45.118)
Well, you know-

Alvin Owusu (28:49.61)
I'll agree with you in that like, yeah, I don't think that US, so when we have a global sport, right? This tennis is a global sport. And so the way that we consume tennis is very much so from the standpoint of we are American sports consumers, right? And so when you look at football and look at basketball and you look at baseball, right? That is the lens from which we watch pretty much all sports, right? It's star driven. It is brand driven.

With football, have people, you're in cities, you have colors, you're cheering for laundry, effectively, right? It doesn't really matter in football who's necessarily on your team. Everyone has such an affinity for that team that just J.Y., like you mentioned, D.Y. left, you're like, the hell with it, I'm still ride or die, you know, 305, it's fine. Next man up, I'm still a Heat fan. But in tennis, we are, the structure of tennis itself, it starts with this many players, and it ends with one player ending.

Every single tennis event starts with some ends with one. And so, and we have numbers next to our name, right? It's pretty easy to tell who is the best and then who is maybe not the best, but us as tennis players and coaches, we understand that all of these guys are good. I think the real nuance, and this is the nuance about tennis is it's hard for casual fan to understand why. Why is Alcara's

Torrey Hawkins (29:47.71)
Every single time.

Alvin Owusu (30:16.988)
a little bit better than Taylor fritz. Why is Taylor fritz a little bit better than insert number 30 ranked American? Why is that 30 ranked American a little bit better than the guy who's trying to crack, know, he's in qualities trying to crack the main draw of the US Open because they're all doing more or less the same thing. It's really hard to tell why one player is doing it better than the other player. If you're not.

in our game. I'll push that back to you.

Jean-Yves Aubone (30:50.038)
Yeah, look, I think again, think this tennis is still a wonderful sport the way it is right now. And there's going to be people that are always going to be diehard traditional tennis fans. And I'll never stop being a traditional tennis fan. Right. But there are a lot of people who are put off by it or love to play it. We'll never go watch it.

Atlanta is the biggest tennis capital, more tennis players per capita in Atlanta than anywhere else in the United States. I think Atlanta still has that record.

Alvin Owusu (31:22.718)
Alta is the second largest tennis organization in the world.

Jean-Yves Aubone (31:26.676)
Unbelievable. Go to the Atlanta Open at Wednesday at 3pm.

Alvin Owusu (31:29.354)
No, don't it's hot. Well, you can't now it doesn't exist anymore and to

Jean-Yves Aubone (31:32.857)
But there you go. You just said it's summertime. Kids are not in school, but it's a little hot so they won't go. But OK, OK, OK. Go to the night session. There are still empty seats. We there are the most tennis players in Atlanta than anywhere else, and they still can't sell out a small little stadium. And I know Peter and Eddie, they work so hard to fill that up. They did an amazing job. But and they tried so many things outside the box to bring people in. But

Alvin Owusu (31:45.076)
Yep, that's true.

Jean-Yves Aubone (32:03.128)
The people are showing you they love to play it. There's something about going to view it in person that is keeping them away from going. And it's not like tickets for the Atlanta Open were like crazy expensive either. And in the setup at the Atlantic Station, I thought it was so cool. You have to park right there. You got free parking, two hours free parking. It's unbelievable. So but there's a reason for it. And so what we're trying to do and here's the thing, we'll say it off the bat. I don't think we're perfect.

Alvin Owusu (32:18.366)
It was very cool. Very cool.

Very cool.

Torrey Hawkins (32:24.382)
Thank

Jean-Yves Aubone (32:30.348)
We're still got some things to figure out with intents. We'll probably make some rule adjustments over the coming years and we'll figure it out. But something needs to be done. We need to try. And that's why I love working with a group of people that we're working with. They come from different sports backgrounds. Sure, a lot of tennis, but a lot of different sports backgrounds. But they're all bought into the idea of it's OK to figure this out as we go. We just have to get started and we'll get better each way. And I think the fans are starting to respond.

Alvin Owusu (33:00.218)
you know, I, I love ideas. love ideas. And I, I did attend an intense arc last summer. I went to one, I went with Tori. I think you and, you and Jonathan Soki were both commentating. It was a, it was a good time. And I was walking around and getting a, getting a feel for it. And I was like, this reminds me of something. And it reminded me of. And one mixtapes. Do you remember the and one mixtapes?

And when it makes tapes for us listeners, know, the basketball street basketball effectively, uh, that was made popular through mixtapes that were circulated in the, in the nineties and caught fire ended up on TV. They've turned, they turn these street ball players and street ball legends into stars. Right. And I think if you, if you look at the kind of the comparison between professional television tennis, we'll call that professional television tennis and intense tennis 2.0.

There's an opportunity to create, I think, something different here around these teams and them having, potentially having identities, right? Because the cool thing about these N1 players was we knew they weren't the best players in the world, but it was okay because they were doing really cool stuff. And it didn't even matter who won the games. We just enjoyed watching them do cool stuff. And that in itself was entertaining. DJ on the court, like entertaining. It wasn't about the basketball. It was about...

Torrey Hawkins (34:23.838)
with entertainment.

Jean-Yves Aubone (34:25.228)
See

Alvin Owusu (34:30.313)
This is just fun to be at. I just assume that you guys have covered A1 mixtapes before, that this is like, yes, obviously Alvin, you're right on target.

Jean-Yves Aubone (34:39.382)
No. Yeah, but. Yeah, you're hidden right there. I think tennis for a long time forgot that at the end of the day. Sports is entertainment.

Torrey Hawkins (34:40.706)
You come around the end.

Alvin Owusu (34:52.455)
Yeah baby, there it is.

Jean-Yves Aubone (34:53.868)
Fans are coming to you for an experience. They want to leave their daily jobs or daily roles and experience something different and have fun and be entertained.

And tennis for too long has made it solely about the two people or four people if they're playing doubles on the court and nothing else. And you can see it with what the US Open did in mixed doubles. You can see it with what Australian Open did this year with their one point slam. They are buying into the fact and they are just they're really coming around to sports are entertainment, the product itself is not enough, we have to do different things. And then you can bring it back to the

the sport itself, but to engage fans and bring new people in, they're not there for a reason. So you got to try something different to bring them in and get attention. And the problem with tennis tours is because all these tournaments are individually owned.

Alvin Owusu (35:47.741)
Yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (35:48.233)
you know, one person can do one thing and the next person just say, like, I don't really care. I'm to keep doing what I want. As long as I sell my sponsorship, it's my one week. Like I'm good to go. I don't care. And so it just becomes harder for the way tennis is traditional tennis is set up to move faster. And so you can have individual tournaments move a little faster on their own. Indian Wells had their mixed doubles thing going on. We can move fast one because we're smaller, but all the teams are still owned by the league. So when we can just come together as a group and say, we're going to try this, everybody's doing it done.

And so we can move faster.

Alvin Owusu (36:20.445)
Gotcha.

Torrey Hawkins (36:21.086)
I wanna push back slash review, two points I've mentioned here. And I think as the elder statesman of both of you, I am old enough and young enough to remember when the NFL, which I think has done the best job of all sports of really harnessing the media and really, I'm gonna say dominating our attention, right? The Knights, I mean, I remember.

when Sunday Night Football was beginning as a big deal. I remember when Monday Night Football was kind of only thing, now we got Thursday Night Football. I mean, it's crazy. My wife always asks me, which night is not a football night? I mean, she's there every time I go in, it's always a football night. Like, is there a Wednesday Night Football? And I laugh at it, but that's how much they diversified it. And they may have Wednesday Night Football for next year, right? So I say it to say, the sports...

Alvin Owusu (37:08.625)
Eventually

Torrey Hawkins (37:17.33)
have continued to morph and have met the need of the fan. They've met the need of the consumer. I feel like football's done a pretty good job of it in terms of cornering that part of the market and making the entertainment not only consumable, regular, you know what it's gonna be, you're looking forward to it, even if it's two, three hours every day. And gentlemen, as you both know, there are so many things fighting for our attention these days, so many things. Now, if...

How often do I watch preseason games? Hardly at all. That matter, didn't really count. So why am I watching, right? And then I go to basketball. I'm one of those guys that play college basketball. I love basketball. I love good basketball. I watch the teams that I like during the season, very few others. watch the whole, I watch, I take off work to watch March Madness. I only watch the NBA playoffs. Why?

because the NBA is boring to me. Most games that are blowouts could care less about the NBA. And quite frankly, I think the NBA is rushing to a problem. Free agency has gotten out of control. I won't speak to all the things, that's my personal opinion, but the NBA model.

has had some issues that they haven't gotten a hold of and they have hurt their own product in a lot of ways to where the average games get a little bit, they get lost in the sauce. I think baseball's right there behind them in a very close second. There's just something that each of the games don't necessarily matter. Soccer's figured this out. They've started to put the tables. They help you appreciate, hey, win this game by this many scores or tie. That's where you are on the table. That's how it ends up. There's no playoffs. And I think there's some things there.

on a macro level from a 60,000 feet view that sports have to continue to evolve to make sure they can continue to hold that market share of the viewership. And that's a high level. Now we come back to intense and we talk about the tennis. There's a lot of tennis players and I find tennis to pickle balls, other sports like it, you'd rather play it than watch it. So to get a person off their sofa, you know, and choose to watch versus play.

Torrey Hawkins (39:27.802)
is hard in itself. Atlanta is the hotbed for every Saturday at some park, at some club, at some area somewhere. You will have more traffic on a Saturday morning than you'll have going to work on a Monday. People are, it is crazy getting somewhere because everyone's out doing something.

And that's also the problem with sports in Atlanta, because everybody's out doing the sport more than they are watching the sport. So I come back to the more than 10,000 feet view of how do we make it so fun, so engaging that I would rather watch this than play or watch this after I play, because that's also my choice. And this is high enough my priority list to view it as something worth

not doing something else because you have a lot of opportunities. So I wanted to kind of bring those two things there. And the other thing I to talk about Atlanta.

Alvin Owusu (40:23.154)
Well, hold on second, hold on second. That's actually a really good question for Jay. Why I wanted to actually answer that. Like how is intense going about taking that person on a Saturday morning who's played Alta here in Atlanta, right? And then getting them to come like take a quick shower, grab their family, come down 400, pop up at Enduroville and come watch some other tennis.

Jean-Yves Aubone (40:46.765)
Marketing. Big shout out to our marketing team right there. Obviously for last year, it's more difficult, you know, and so it's usually the closest friends that are coming because they trust you. And so if you say something's fun, then they'll come, but other people still a little bit harder to go.

But now I just think with the videos that we're putting out that are really just highlighting something that is one very different so they know like, okay, I've never been there. It's like the new restaurant that has the new menu that you've never eaten. You can't say like, I don't want to go watch it. It's just a matter of when are you going to go?

And so by presenting something very different, we're going to have that one shot, right? And so then with the videos that we're putting out, then we add all these little things like you can bring your child know like they can run around, they can make make all the noise they want. yeah, you can make noise. You can talk all you want. Guess what we got music going on. You know, high tech state of the art arena, just the way it's built with new seating, everybody's got a front row seat. They do every it's just built straight up.

Right? There's no so everyone has a great seat ticket prices are low. Guess what? It's also predictable. So if you don't like it, you know, and you're finished, it didn't take up most of your day. So come just give it a try. Right. And so there's a lot that makes it easier to at least just give us a shot. And I do think that's where we're going to try to how can we do it on the broadcast? But we can definitely say it our success rate when someone comes inside the arena and experiences it in person is like, Whoa,

And then it's just word of mouth. But when you are in there, you know, whoa, this is cool. This is fun. This is different.

Jean-Yves Aubone (42:23.467)
And so but it takes time and then building up that word of mouth. And so I think the hardest part for us when you experience it in person is the patience that we need for that word of mouth to spread and for the marketing to really build. Man, you say I was just losing. I am not a very patient person. I mean, I buy into long term process and all of this, but like I'm always about action, action, action, you know, like take care of what you control. Right. And so all of last year, especially since when we started, like I wanted

people to experience what I felt out there. I wanted them to see it. So I'm like, but we got to tell more people, we got to more people, but things just take time.

Alvin Owusu (43:02.801)
or the

Jean-Yves Aubone (43:02.837)
you know, and then it just starts to build and then the chain reaction effect. And I think ever since our event in December at the Atlanta Cup, the Port St. Lucie event that Tori really took on and the announcements that we've had with the Bryan brothers, Diego Schwartzman, Carousell, Emma Birgik, and the videos that we're putting out and the great job our social media team is doing our press team, things are really just snowballing now, right, but it's just taking time.

Torrey Hawkins (43:18.078)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (43:30.793)
wanna tap into that kind of what I'll call the creator variable, right? Tennis players, tennis now online, whether it be on Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, whatever, is a way that a lot of players are able to generate revenue that allows them to make some pursuits within tennis, right? Earn some type of living not off of wins and losses on the tennis court, right?

in our sport that's unheard of, right? If you're not winning at the highest level, you're not getting the sponsorship deals and all that kind of stuff. it's been very hard for anyone, professional tennis players and then tennis coaches. That's who makes money in tennis, right? But now with the creator economy, you're starting to see players who are able to support themselves and they come with a bit of an audience.

Right? So this is the, the Carousell of things. I did see that he is going to be participating, this year, which is, Carousell actually is a very interesting point because he is very good. He is like, you mentioned some of the players that the level of player that you guys are able to attract now, he actually fits that, fits that category, but he also brings in a quarter of million followers with him. So when you, as the brass of the league are evaluating, you know,

players, how does that, know, word of mouth is great, but bringing your own following is maybe better. How do you evaluate that and balance that when you're looking at players and other people to join the league?

Jean-Yves Aubone (45:12.877)
Yeah, I mean, it's something that we looked at. think when you look at our draft, we took a look at a lot more than just playing level. know, playing level is one thing, but we want to see how badly do you want to be a part of this? We looked at their personality, their character. Are they somebody that buys into what we're trying to do? And is that somebody that we want in our league? At the end of the day, mean, sports is a business.

we need to grow and so we need the right personalities to present to fans. And so then that way the fans can get more attached to intense and that's how we'll grow. I think it's one of the things that UFC is, everybody says what a magnificent job Dana White has done, whereas they've removed the need to put up undefeated versus undefeated and they've just said, who do fans want to watch fight? Let's just put on a great show.

And that's enough. There are better fighters. There are some fighters that are better than some of the UFC fighters fighting in other leagues, but they're not in the UFC. But yet the UFC is the biggest MMA league that there is in the world because of the way they present the show and the people that they bring in and their willingness to put up great matchups. And so I think with Intense, that's what we're trying to do. So we are trying to find the right balance between not just playing level, but who's perfect for what we're trying to present to the

to fans because if we ignore the way we're presenting ourselves to fans, well now we're ignoring our community and our biggest supporters, it's gonna be very hard to have long-term growth. And so we have to buy into that and there are fans, there are players that we looked at that we said, you're a perfect fit for us. You got the right level, you have the right personality, you can help us grow and guess what? We can help you grow.

So it's a win-win. We want our players to grow as well. We want them to earn their money off the court away from us. So it's a win-win for both. And that's when I think we can get a real connection between league and player that the fan feels and that they want to be a part of and watch as well.

Alvin Owusu (47:26.066)
Gotcha. Yeah, so recently college, I guess it was announced that college tennis players who earn money playing at professional tournaments will be able to keep that money, right? I think this came down like maybe four or five days ago, which is a really big deal, right? You see players, this happens actually fairly regularly now. A player makes a quick run, Michael Zhang at the Australian Open wins a couple rounds, he's pocketed some money, and it's like, whoa, NCAA's just can't keep it, right?

and you can't directly keep it. But we're past that now, players can keep their money. As someone who is heavily involved in, I'll call it an upstart tennis league, when you saw that information, we were like, whoa, we need to get DK down here quickly. I think like somebody like DK Shresh from Wake Forest is like, big player, big game, big energy. Are those the kind of players who are already playing in a team format?

who are used to playing in front of a crowd and working a crowd and doing those kinds of things, is that something that you guys look at when you're evaluating how to separate yourself from the tennis norm?

Jean-Yves Aubone (48:35.116)
We look at everything.

Torrey Hawkins (48:35.358)
Jay has talked to about 20 compliance officers. By the way, in the last, I wanted to put that caveat in for you, Jay, just to make sure Alvin knows it was on our call last week. So go ahead, Jay. I'll let you speak to it. I want to throw that part in there. Not all colleges perhaps have got said memo.

Alvin Owusu (48:38.887)
There it is. There it is.

Alvin Owusu (48:50.599)
You

Jean-Yves Aubone (48:56.44)
Yeah, so and the ones that got the original memo are now coming back to me with that response. so look, you know, this is a great time to advocate for this right now. you know, yes, players can now get paid. Well, let's see. We know that they're approving it. They still need to change the rules so that it becomes a mass. So we'll see where they land. They're moving in the right direction. And so obviously with us, you know, we.

Torrey Hawkins (49:00.656)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (49:01.799)
You

Jean-Yves Aubone (49:23.938)
still ran into the issue where we still needed college seniors to take part because if not, we're actually paying players and it's a salary. you know, that would actually, according to some rules that wouldn't work in NCAA right now. So this was a big first step to at least eliminating one of the barriers. There's still another barrier that we need to work with. And that's the fact that players are not allowed to take part in drafts while they're in college. And so that's a barrier that we learned.

It was, look, when you're in a startup, you're gonna miss some stuff. And that was a rule that coming from the tennis world that we never dealt with drafts that there was a very important rule that said you're just not allowed to enter in a draft and get drafted in the middle of your college eligibility whenever it is. So if you sign up for the draft and you wanna get drafted and you do get drafted, you're ineligible on the spot.

Alvin Owusu (50:19.047)
Is the same thing true for, I'm trying to think about the other college sports, like all their drafts, all the drafts are in the summer, or football is in, it's soon, it's gotta be soon, they just had the combine, so they're in April, right, maybe? Outside of their season.

Jean-Yves Aubone (50:22.306)
All sports.

Torrey Hawkins (50:23.066)
All sports, baseball, basketball, football.

Jean-Yves Aubone (50:26.863)
Yep.

Jean-Yves Aubone (50:30.692)
They're, yeah, it's outside of their season, so it doesn't impact them. And so volleyball had an issue where in pro volleyball, it was like very close to when their season finished. So they had to figure that out. And now we're gonna have to figure that out as well. But at the same time, like our season takes place after their eligibility is done. So no one's getting paid or having to do anything until their college season is done. So.

Alvin Owusu (50:42.96)
Right.

Jean-Yves Aubone (50:57.454)
Thanks to NCAA rule 12.2.2.9.867, like, which is like, yeah, there's a lot of numbers behind it. It's a legit rule, but it wasn't made for tennis, right? I mean, it was made to protect basketball, football, and stuff like that. So there's, we already have a lot of ideas on how to work around that for next year. Or NCAA can come back and revisit this and say, look, for tennis, it's not like this is gonna impact your eligibility.

So we see a lot of positive steps moving in the right direction. Again, it's all about just when. I don't think it's a matter of if, but when. And yes, these college players, they're perfect fits for us. They understand what happens in a team sport. Colleges, coaches, they take their players out. They do stuff in the community. They help do a lot of things to engage the community so they know what we're trying to do as well. So it's a great fit. And I think

over 90 % of our applicants for this season, if not over 98 % participated in college tennis at some point. So, you know, they're a perfect fit for us. And so the interesting part is for a lot of people that didn't play in college tennis, and then they did take part in some of our preseason events, they've never felt what they felt before. Because they're like, my gosh, like, this was so much fun. I've never been a part of a team. And so I think we're just winning from all angles right now.

Alvin Owusu (52:11.687)
Bye.

Alvin Owusu (52:19.783)
TH, let me kick it over to you from a coaching standpoint, right? You've coached all the levels. You've coached court side at the US Open. You've coached high level juniors. You've coached quick start. You've coached three, five, doubles. You've coached it all. You've coached it all. So from all of your coaching experience, I don't think you've ever coached anything quite like this. So how do you approach it from a coaching standpoint?

Torrey Hawkins (52:34.884)
Ladies, yeah, 100%.

Torrey Hawkins (52:48.542)
It's a great question. I hope I'm gonna get better each match. I think the thing that's funny about this, Alvin, is I coach college and I've coached pro. This is something else. It's just something different entirely. While it's team, and each player, there's some monetary incentives for everybody. There's also that match, and you're trying to coach against the other coach. You're trying to coach against momentum. You've got subs. You've got...

You've got a player that you know is a bad matchup against that player over there, even though the player you have out there is your best player. So you've got to kind of work that in there in the mix. And then of course, one thing I learned from the match there, Jay Wynn in Florida, the points that Lucy was, manage your time outs well. So even that, there's a lot of things to it. What I am looking forward to, Alvin, is...

as I coach anything, it's just getting better at it. Figuring out how to let that player play through a mistake or two at the same time, let him get through it, or sub him out and get him out of there because the substitutions change everything. You've got three other players that could.

jump in on that spot and take that person's spot for whatever time that is left on the clock. So it's a pretty cool dynamic that I have found that is not very, know, in the college match, can't, my guys struggle the last four games, I can't sub him out. He's gotta take, I gotta coach him through it. I can't, I can't go, hey, hey, you over there, number seven, come over here and take number five spot. He's killing me right now. And we're having played basketball in college and played tennis.

It's a very basketball like move at the same time. It's in tennis which and know and Here to four has never been possible before so it's a really cool experience to kind of see these things Match up. I'm hoping I'll get better each match. I owe Marcelo a Little a little bit of humble pie and same with Claudio who won our little event down there at Port St. Lucie But I'm looking forward to shout out to both coaches by the way, but I'm looking forward to that whole style

Torrey Hawkins (55:00.81)
I am looking forward to Alvin. kind of mentioned this earlier before. Intense to me is feeling a spot that I feel hasn't been there before. While you kind of thought it was missing something, you didn't know what it was missing, right? you, is filling up this nice void of excitement, team, and tennis. What's still.

some things that aren't that you didn't necessarily know were possible and especially with the scoring format the way it is I feel it really is kind of a neat thing that for coaches and players obviously in the fans you're still kind of figuring it out each time you get out there it's still it gets it gets more and more a dynamic the more that you're that you're involved so that's the thing that I don't think people really understand you go you go to one intense match you're like okay wow that was different you go to two and you're like okay

You go to three and you're like, ah, I'm getting the hang of this. Well, it's the same thing for the players and it's the same thing for us coaches and it's the same thing for the fans. So every match, and so by, because it's new, right? Because it's new, you get to match number seven and you're like, okay, I'm down with it now. I got this, I got this, I understand. And now you're understanding this whole thing. So we're still, the league is still so new.

Alvin Owusu (55:51.431)
You

Alvin Owusu (55:56.612)
Right, right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (56:14.246)
that even the pieces, the moving pieces that are put in place are, you're just now, you're in a moving jet trying to understand what all the controls do. You know what I mean? And I think that's what's really cool to me is this whole thing. And so I'm really looking forward to that challenge. I had two questions for you, J.Y. Number one, please. Yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (56:32.123)
Before we get there, I want to say one thing that Torrey doesn't know this quite yet, but there's one thing I'm looking forward to hear his experience about. And that is the fact that we, the sport, the way it's built, the rules, the structure brings freedom and power back into the coach's hands. Right now in traditional tennis, players for the most part hold the power. They wake up in a bad mood, don't like what you say.

They have the power to fire you on the spot. And there are a lot of coaches that, and even me, I was on tour, you find yourself in certain moments being afraid to speak up when it's a job you're afraid to lose. And that won't be like that anymore for coaches like Tori, because if they don't like the player, not personally, but they don't like the way they're playing, acting, they're immature, or they just feel like somebody else is a better fit, they can sit them. They can put somebody else in.

and they can literally just do what's best for the team, which is how it should be. The coach is the one that has the experience. You hired the coach because they know more than you. You are a young player. The coach has been there and been through so much more. They have the experience, the knowledge, but if they threaten with fire on you and you know you're on the edge of the seat, well, that's your income and you feel that. Not anymore. Torrey can coach freely. He can literally do what's best for the team.

and he can be comfortable with, you know what, it doesn't work with that player, the player goes, not necessarily the coach.

Alvin Owusu (58:05.67)
Is there a bullpen?

Jean-Yves Aubone (58:07.781)
There's, well, in a way, yeah. mean, there's a place where they're be sitting behind them. And then also, there's always a player that there's four men, four women on each team, but only three men and three women are gonna be on the roster for the night. So there's always somebody else sitting like, all you're in street clothes. You're on the bench back there. You're you're not a part of the show tonight.

Alvin Owusu (58:28.518)
No, I mean like is there a place where players can just keep the rocket warm and then when their teammate gets back on server, bring in the closer and the closer just comes in, boom, and just hammers for like 45 seconds and run the clock out. Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (58:33.56)
Yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (58:44.165)
There's space for them to be able to warm up and stay loose back there. We had bikes on the court, jump ropes. So there's space for you to stay warm. It's not like being able to just hit balls, though we will have a second court inside the arena this time. But yeah, it's not like a full bullpen, but it's enough to stay warm.

Alvin Owusu (58:49.657)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (59:01.734)
It's just hammering.

Torrey Hawkins (59:01.788)
And don't forget, Alvin, one serve. So you better come out lacing that first one, buddy.

Alvin Owusu (59:04.314)
Yeah. Hey, if it's one serve, I want the guy who looks like Torrey Hawkins out there. I want that six-sixer just coming off the bench with the shoulder nice and warmed up. I don't want him cold. TH, you had another question for JY.

Torrey Hawkins (59:10.352)
Hey, just coming in and down. Boom.

Yeah.

I did and J.Y. I appreciate what you're saying there and that's long been necessary. I've seen so many good coaches that had and seen good coaches that have been in a tough spot with a player that was, let's face it, young, maybe even immature, not understanding. I think my mind goes up when you made that comment to Alvin's, when Alvin's former favorites, Marcelo Rios who fired Savanke, yeah, fired Alair Savanke right before his final match at the Australian Open.

Alvin Owusu (59:40.134)
that's my guy, the poster's right there.

Torrey Hawkins (59:47.12)
I'll take it from here. Never to be heard from again. You know what I mean? And so I say that to say, and again, maybe an error in judgment, maybe he was just feeling himself that day, who knows? But bottom line, it was one of those things where there's been so many, at some point, you'd like to see the coach have a little bit more say in the, and help the player get through those moments, right? The coach isn't there to tell you, do something wrong. It hurts him too, right, when you lose. So that's a great point. My two questions were gonna kind of, we kind of came from,

Again, the 6,000 feet with sports in general, right? We're talking about now closer to 10,000 feet, Atlanta in particular being a big sports town, perhaps with varied levels of involvement and engagement in the pro sports, right? Obviously even our tournament, you know, for whatever reason. And there's some part of the Middle East that was a part of Atlanta Open as well as some part of the ATP Tour that it may be to blame. But you're talking now to me about tennis now and tennis in the future.

Tell me in your mind where you see, where the tennis fan will continue, what they'll continue to look for, what they're looking for now, what they'll continue to look for, in terms of value, in terms of return on, not even on the price of the ticket, but on their time, right? Because that's really what we're talking about. And then the second question I have for that was, as we're going down this road, what works on the tour, especially in singles, may not be the same type of

player you want in doubles. On the tour currently, I'm old enough to remember when McEnroe was playing with Peter Fleming and he was winning singles and doubles, right? I remember when it started to shift a little bit and I know Mike and Bob are both good tennis players. They started focusing more on doubles and didn't play as much singles, right? So that's when it kind of started to shift a little bit. I remember Flack and Sagusa, I knew Ken Flack and then obviously his brother Doug and coach.

Doug's kids, I know a lot of this from when Atlanta Thunder even hit Atlanta, you know, some 20 some years ago. So I'm fairly well versed on when these shifts have happened. The question is, in intents, do you foresee a time when, because of the format, that it will even, I wanna say advertise or cater to a certain style of player who is a little bit less

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:11.196)
risk averse, who does have a little more of an all around transition game. He's not just a grinder, and yet maybe you may want to get a grinder and a slasher, right? So the question I have is, do you foresee the intense catering to a certain style of player or certain styles of players that maybe their style wasn't as, I'm gonna say, they couldn't monetize it as much on the tour because that style takes a lot of risk.

But maybe with intents it might just work better. So those are my two questions. Tennis fans now and future, what are they looking for? What's the value? What are they gonna be looking for in the future, in your opinion? And then of course styles, player types, certain strata of tennis players that may work better with intents than they did on the tour as far as in the grand scheme of things, as far as rankings and levels and able to make some money.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:03:05.926)
So with tennis fans, think for them, they're looking to not have their time wasted because they have access to so many more different things. So they don't want bad experiences. They want great experiences. If not, they're just not coming back. they're looking for, you know, they just don't want their time wasted. And then I think they're looking for authenticity and connection to a community more than ever. And I think that's just something to a larger scale as

in just community in general, whether you're a tennis fan or a normal human being, I think we've reached a point where people are tired of cookie cutter, fake talk, curated stuff. They want real authenticity and connection to the people they're watching. They love reality shows for a reason because they can relate to it. So they want that connection. They want to feel the importance of the moment. And so the more that they can connect,

the more they'll be a part of it. And the more they can be a part of the community, because I think in today's world, as connected as we are digitally, we are disconnected in reality and how we connect with other human beings. And we don't have deep connections in communities in our sports anymore. Sports is the one thing that really still has a great pull that brings people together.

Outside of that, think people live in this fake world with messages and FaceTime helps and stuff. There's great benefits to it, but they're looking to engage and be a part of something and share it with somebody else. That is, it's just a human need. And I think the sports that embrace that and bring people together, it makes them want to be a part of something that's more than just a sport. And that's how you get your lifelong fans. So they don't want their time wasted.

They wanna be connected and they want authenticity. I think that's what fans are looking for now already and in the future. And then when you talk about playing style for intents, it definitely caters a little bit more to the aggressive player because with winners you get plus two.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:05:27.184)
So I think that's number one. We can just definitely put it out there. And definitely aggressive players who can volley well and move well at the net because then if you can bring some of that from singles but really into doubles. think Kevin King, Sam Nicholson did an incredible job last year in singles but didn't play doubles. And there was a big argument on should Kevin King have been the MVP because of how well he did in doubles and how many points.

It's good this year, we're going to do a much better job of keeping track of statistics and the impact. We did feel what Sam did from a fitness side and how much he played in singles was just so tremendous that nobody was able to replicate it. Other players had some good runs in doubles. So you're like, well, somebody else might be able to kind of do this. But what Sam did was just nobody else was keeping up with him. Right. But I do think a good offensive player that can also play well at the net and play some good doubles. Boom.

I think that's your primary number one player. then number two, think it's just players who are just can play extremely well in chaos, right? Who are just can just not be faced. You you have music going on, you don't know when you're gonna be playing, subbed in and out, fans can scream while you toss the serve. Can you just stay calm? And we saw some players, you could really see the pressure kind of getting to them, the noise.

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:26.566)
Oops.

Alvin Owusu (01:06:39.904)
Ahem.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:06:51.568)
They lose four or five points in a row and then it just builds and builds and they can't handle it and they need to pull them out. And it's who's the emotionally steady player that can just at least, all right, I lost three points in a row, but I'll win the next two. Because they're the ones at least you keep them close. There are some players that sometimes when they're playing bad, it becomes a 12 point deficit pretty fast. And you can't have that. So I think those two players are gonna be the most important ones.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:11.902)
Mm.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:17.797)
So basically if you're good at approach shot pass with like five and two scoring or the wave you're in. I've got one more question slash idea for you and then we'll probably let you get out of here because we're taking up a lot of your time. When I went to see Intense I was like, okay, I think this is pretty cool and if people got a chance to see it, it would be something that they would be interested in. Have you guys considered or been in talks with any

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:22.274)
man.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:47.618)
existing professional tennis tournaments to bring intents to, let's say, Miami Open, Buchholz courts, you know? Like you're out there on that smaller stadium court when, you know, the night match is going on, but there's still people lingering around for the day session. I feel like intents is one of those things that could draw a crowd pretty easily. Like you already have tennis fans who are walking around. You got some music playing. You got these people yelling, cheering. There's a scoreboard. What the hell's going on over there? Boom. Now you have people who already get it.

who would, I think, be into it very quickly or very similar to your mixed doubles at the US Open. Not necessarily with paying players millions of dollars to participate in the Mix Open, but I feel like on an outside court right next to the juniors, that's, you've got people who are very interested in tennis, have tennis, you have would-be audience who is there already, why not show it to them?

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:08:40.87)
There's an argument for it. There's arguments for it and there's arguments against it.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:44.879)
I wanna hear the arguments against it.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:08:47.676)
from the tour side or from our side? Because I can argue both.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:49.51)
Mm-hmm

Alvin Owusu (01:08:49.925)
I would love to hear both. I would love to hear both.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:52.83)
Thank

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:08:55.354)
So on the tour side, you have to come to the conclusion, are we a competitor to you or can we live alongside you? So if we're coming in, then are we bringing in our own players? If so, like, look, I don't think we're a competitor. I just think we're very different. There's no reason why people can't love both and support both and watch both. At the same time,

Alvin Owusu (01:09:08.207)
Sure, yeah.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:09:22.542)
I think the players that are currently on tour are gonna continue to play on tour. don't think we're out of place, especially our season's only two months, so they have to keep playing. They're not gonna leave the tour to play intense for two months anyway. So we're not even trying to take their players. But, you know, on the lower side of players, maybe are we a competitor trying to say, don't watch the tour, watch us? That's something that they need to come to the decision on, right? Because then...

Everyone is fighting for the attention of fans. And so if we come in and we present something else on a different channel that is not ATP Tennis TV or WTA Tennis in their channel, then are we taking their fans away? I don't think so. I think both worlds can coincide. And I think it's actually better if we all operate together because we can grow together. think pickleball has done a great thing. And I forget the line Matt Manassi always uses where it just, oh, what is it? A rising tide lifts all boats.

I think it's the same thing. I think we can make it work. The thing for us becomes we just want to make sure that we're taking care of the players that are not being taken care of by the tour right now. And so for us, a conversation we always have is, okay, we're building this not just for fans, but also to support the players that are not getting enough support right now. So we try to mesh those two. if we cannot say we're helping fans and we're helping the players that deserve the help.

then it's not something that we really want to go do. And so that's the battle that we always just try to figure out. So I think there's a place for it. It just needs to be done for the right reasons at the right time. And, but we're not opposed to it. If we can do something at a big, a big tour event, I think there's the right place. It's just, we need to have a lot of open-minded people that understand that, look, at the end of the day, we're all just trying to do one thing. We're just trying to entertain fans and give people a happy experience. Why can't we do it together?

Why does it have to be you or only me? And if we can just realize we're all in this big tennis community trying to help people enjoy their lives through this sport, then I think we can get it done.

Alvin Owusu (01:11:29.752)
Amen. Amen. That's a good one. I feel good about that. Let's go ahead and put a pin in it. We've had a pretty good run here. JY, thank you again for coming on. let the people know how can we learn more about Intents, how can we watch it, where can we buy tickets.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:11:47.422)
Well, start with draft March 13th, Fort Lauderdale at Racquet X. A lot of people are already going to be there. But if you're not, think about it, follow it. It's not going to be live streamed live. It will be post produced and then put on YouTube. But all the draft picks follow our Instagram and social medias. Intense tennis on Instagram. That's where we're spending the most amount of time right now. And then as you get ready for the season, it's going to be all in Atlanta. So if you're in the Atlanta area,

You got to go there all of June and July every week except for July 4th week where we're going to have events Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. In the evening time, you can make it. Go to our website to get tickets IntenseTennis.com. Remember, Intense is with two N's. So that's just the only difference. Make sure you put that second N in there. And yeah, I mean, you can get tickets on there. Follow Tori online if you go to all the local clubs in Atlanta and then our YouTube channels, Intense Tennis. Again, Intense with two N's.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:40.498)
Mm-hmm.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:12:46.173)
We'll be having stuff on our YouTube channels. And I really encourage people, we have our duels and our arcs matches. We're still, I to be mindful that people are still learning our language, but you go on YouTube, we have all of our matches from last season. And so if you actually want to get a taste of it and just experience it, go check it out even for five, 10 minutes and you can see what it's all about. think June 28th, if I'm not mistaken, June 29th, Atlanta, Jacksonville, that was a heck of a match in the summer of 2025. That's a good one to watch.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:16.036)
And it's indoor. I think that's a caveat to that you have to add. It is indoor.

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:13:20.921)
Indoor and then this is this is my one little thing. We didn't cover this, but I'll do it really quick what we're trying to do for the broadcast experience to create something very different as well in case you're not in Atlanta or you want to watch it from your house. Okay, we have a live chat stream. You can talk to me. I'm one of the main play-by-play people calling the matches. You can talk to me. You can send me messages and my co-hosts we can answer them. We can talk to you on air. You can be as connected as ever coaches like Tor. You're gonna be mic'd up.

you're going to hear real live coaching because Torrey doesn't know when we're tuning in. He doesn't know. So he might get in trouble if he says something that he might not want to say, but we're going to catch him because we want that real authenticity. And when these coaches are in the heat of the moment and they're in the competition, that's when their true selves come out. But then that's when fans get to hear, how does it, what does the coach really say in this moment? And so that's what's going to be so cool about the broadcast that they can experience it. They can directly talk to us.

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:54.994)
Thank

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:58.706)
You

Jean-Yves Aubone (01:14:19.495)
that can be a part of it. We're gonna have live guests like the Brian's calling in and talking. Diego Schwartzen is gonna be calling in and we have a lot of other fun stuff. So it's a very different experience. Give us a chance, follow us, YouTube, Instagram, Intense Tennis, two N's.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:34.926)
Fantastic, fantastic. Well, J.Y., thanks again. I'm Alvin. That's Tory. Best of three. We are.