Ben Shelton: ‘Football and basketball and baseball were the cooler sports to play in America. But here we are’
“I“I would say if I was given a grade for playing, I’ve played B or C tennis so far this year,” Ben Shelton said. “I don’t think I’ve played my best tennis this season. I don’t think we’ve seen my peak this year.”
Shelton has just come from Wimbledon when he tells me this. The same Grand Slam where he played three gruelling five-setters and two doubles matches in one week before losing in the round of 16 to world No. 1 Jannik Sinner. He also started the tournament with a bruised knee from a nasty fall during training. “I actually wasn’t sure if I would play,” he says.
Last year he lost in the second round and two years ago he stepped on grass for the first time. Still, Shelton is unhappy. “I’m fortunate with what I’ve been able to do in my career so far, but I’m obviously not happy with where I’m at,” he says.
This is Shelton’s second full year on tour. The 6-foot-3 American was about to start his junior year playing tennis at the University of Florida, where his father was a coach, when he decided to turn pro. His serve—left-handed and capable of speeds of up to 150 mph—has left-footers on the baseline on edge, fearful of catching a stray ball. With a rocket-like serve, a towering forehand and Come on! tailor-made for noisy tennis stadiums, he made a surprising run to the quarterfinals of last year’s Australian Open, then the semifinals of last year’s US Open.
This year, he briefly became the No. 1 American man on tour. Ahead of the US Open, which begins Monday in Flushing Meadows, he is ranked 13th in the world. With a long Grand Slam drought in American men’s tennis, some commentators have been watching Ben’s game and wondering: Is he the next great hope for American men?
Certainly, the competitor in him is fit to be the next great – and the certainty that he is far from his peak. “The mental side, the competitive side is what has gotten me through this year so far, even though I didn’t feel perfect on the court,” he says. “How much I am willing to stay out there and fight has been a kind of a deciding factor that has helped me in a lot of my matches at Wimbledon, even though I wouldn’t be playing at my best.”
TThe harsh assessment of his play is a far cry from that of the 21-year-old I speak to a week later at the Mubadala Citi DC Open in Washington, DC. Shelton laughs with his team as he steps off the doubles court to attend to media obligations. It’s been a long day: Two rain delays pushed his match into the evening before it ended in a loss. We’re sitting catty on benches in the players’ area in a corner, and he takes a minute to tell me about the joke that got them so upset. It’s crude, but he doubles over with laughter again, and I can’t help but laugh along with him.
“Sorry, we’re kids,” he says, throwing his friend under the bus with him. “I apologize,” he says, flashing a dimpled smile. He drapes a towel over his broad shoulders, takes his second post-match protein shake from his coach, and gets ready to talk tennis.
Shelton came to tennis late in life, a sport where most kids specialize early on—and all too often burn out. Early on, he rebelled against the legacy of his father Bryan Shelton, a former professional, and his mother, a highly regarded junior.
“I thought tennis was a boring sport. Football, basketball and baseball were the coolest sports to play in America. So those were the sports I was obsessed with when I was little. But here we are,” he says, laughing.
When he saw his little sister skipping school to play tournaments, his opinion changed. He was 13. But instead of playing the junior grand slams, Shelton stayed closer to home, and when it came to choosing a college, he chose the University of Florida, in his backyard and where his father was the coach.
“I was pretty underdeveloped when I got to college. I had a lot of holes in my game,” he says. “I was a bit of a mental case on the field, I got angry pretty easily. But you know, if you don’t do the right things on a college team, when your dad is the coach, the punishment is a lot harsher than it is for other guys on the team. I learned pretty quickly how to make things right and figure out how to be a good teammate, fly under the radar when I needed to, and have less of those outbursts or bad practices or miss practices because I slept in.”
What were those punishments? “He would just attack me and yell at me more than the other guys, but I understand because you can’t show favoritism. Or I would have to run sprints for everyone else if I was late, but if someone else was late and I was late, I would run a lot more sprints than them.”
But he does credit the team for keeping him in check. “I think tennis can be a selfish sport, and a lot of people think that the world revolves around the fact that they’re a professional tennis player, because your team focuses on you, and the tournament focuses on you and everything.”
“But I had the opportunity to play on a team and support my teammates, sometimes even sit on the bench and give credit to other guys. I think it’s something that’s helped me a lot as a person, and it makes it tough sometimes on the tennis tour because you’re out here by yourself and competing by yourself, and I really miss the team aspect that I had in college and other team sports.”
Shelton toured for a year before his father joined him. Shelton says his father has mellowed out, and the elder Shelton is the picture of serenity in games, unlike the younger’s exuberant celebration after the point. But it’s clear they speak the same language: Bryan offers a word or two of advice and Ben nods, ready to play the next point.
“His adaptability is what makes him a great coach,” Shelton says. “He doesn’t have to talk in my ear all the time or just sit back and watch. He actually does both. He reads me and understands what I need at that moment, he gives me the information when he thinks I’ll use it. He backs off when he thinks I have it myself.”
There was also an advantage to starting late, despite the holes in the game: Shelton was always looking for better players.
“It gave me a chaser or hunter mentality,” he says. “I was never the best in my age group. There were always guys to chase, and I always had room to improve, and there were always people doing things better than me. So I don’t feel like I ever got complacent or thought I was too good to keep working hard.”
Today, Shelton still chases better competitors, but he trusts the process. “I’m not the complete player I want to be yet, so I’m okay with taking what some would call a step back to keep improving,” he says.
He ticks off the parts of the game he’s currently working on: movement, return of serve, service and overall shot tolerance. “When I move really well, I usually play really well, and that’s something that’s not there 100 percent of the time for me,” he says. The return of serve has been “a burden in the past,” he acknowledges. And his game wouldn’t be what it is without the serve — “a weapon that has to keep improving.”
His points are longer and he’s winning more. He’s worked on getting to the net more, using his weapons and playing doubles to get reps.
He credits the mental side for how deep he’s been able to get into tournaments this year. “Once the physical side, the real tennis, gets going, I think I’ll be in a really good place.”
SHelton stayed in the U.S. for the Olympics, where he began the hard-court season, while others went to Paris to play on clay. It’s a choice some players make for money or for points: Because many of the best players at the Olympics represent their countries, those who play on the circuit have better chances of advancing in tournaments. I ask him why he stayed.
“I’m not really motivated to play tennis for the points or the prize money. I love playing in front of a big crowd. I love playing against the biggest or in the biggest events, against the best players. The Olympics are definitely an attractive event, something I would really like to play. But for me it was purely – I didn’t want to go back to Europe. I had had enough at this point,” he said, laughing. “The season is long enough.”
It’s hard to imagine that the competitor is still new to the tour. “I never left the country until last year,” he says.
Instead, Shelton stayed in the U.S. for the U.S. Open to find his best game. He acknowledges that he is the type of player who needs a few weeks to find his feet on a new surface. “I hardly won any matches in the four tournaments leading up to the Open last year,” he said. “Everyone was talking about me not winning two matches in a row in the middle of the year.”
This year, he improved his hardcourt record in the run-up to the US Open. At the DC Open, he reached the semifinals. At the Cincinnati Open, he reached the quarterfinals. But the first match of this hardcourt swing got off to a rocky start. Shelton lost his first match at the Atlanta Open to a player ranked 89th in the world. It was a disappointment; the foundation had been laid for him to do well as a top seed. But Shelton is unfazed.
“It takes a lot for me to panic, and I’m 21 years old. I don’t have that much to worry about.” Tennis, he says, lasts about 52 weeks — not a single match.
“I want consistency in my effort, my competitiveness. I want my game to continually improve. But that doesn’t mean the results come every week,” he said. “The greats learn how to do it every week, regardless of how they feel, and that’s something I’m working towards, but I think it takes a lot of experience.”