The Name of the Game
by: Jeff Sikes
By any other name, would Tennis Hayes’ serve be as sweet? Maybe. Maybe not.
But regardless of his interesting moniker, Tennis Lee Hayes is a tennis-crazy guy who serves notice wherever he goes.
“It was my father’s name, it’s my given name,” says this 53-year-old Overland Park, Kan., native who has been playing and loving his sport since he was 5. “I’m very passionate about the game and even more passionate about the way I feel about it.”
Hayes grew up in the small Western Kentucky town of Henderson, where he took up the sport, like it was ever an option not to. A gentleman named Doc Hosback taught Hayes the sport, and Hayes hasn’t been able to escape either his name or the game ever since. Hayes has been a fixture at courts and in tournaments wherever he’s lived, whether that’s been Henderson, Chicago, or, now in Overland Park.
“I work real hard at my game,” said Tennis, who can still blast his serve upwards of 100 miles per hour, and who plays a couple of times a week. “When you’re as bad as I am, you have to. The name “Tennis” used to put a lot of fear in guys, but not anymore. Now they just look at it, and go, ‘I don’t have to worry about playing a consolation match right away’.”
What’s the best part of having your name be a sport loved and played by millions?
“It’s a conversation piece, that’s for sure,” said Hayes. “It’s also nice to have so many places named after you, because every court I go to has my name on it. Tennis really is the greatest sport. Once you start playing tennis, you play forever. It’s in your blood.”
It’s also on Tennis Hayes’ birth certificate, driver’s license, and USTA membership card.
