Ben needs to slow down and stop mumbling.

Ben talks way too much. He asks a question of his “co-host” then proceeds to expound on his own opinion for multiple minutes, leaving no room for anything but “yes, you covered it”. He needs a coach to help him stop talking.

I love Ben Rothenberg’s written coverage of tennis, but his podcast is predictable. In the past year, it doesn’t feel like he really watches a lot of tennis so his insights aren’t deep. And since he started writing his book, it seems like he only does the podcast to promote the book. His contributors, specifically Tumaini, do bring the knowledge but Ben is not a practiced enough host to extract enough to make a great podcast. I am 100% supportive of his renewed focus on Zverev - please continue to shine a light on this even though the ATP clears wants to sweep it under the rug.

No matter where I fast forwarded to in this pod, I always heard Ben’s super speedy delivery first—and more extensively—when compared to Tumaini’s smooth baritone. Would enjoy a pod with a more equitable percentage of his insights next time for the next one…

I enjoyed this podcast for a while, and I appreciate the insights of both Ben and Tumaini. However, it’s really difficult to understand Tumaini because his microphone/recording setup is clearly lower quality. So many people multi task or have background noise while listening, and it’s just a bummer that I have to tune Tumaini out for long stretches because I’ve, like, turned on the faucet. Otherwise it’s a good tennis podcast! Just wish I could hear one of the more frequent guests/cohosts.

Sorry but there’s just no chemistry between Ben and Tumaini, so these long episodes are now tedious to get through. It was so much more enjoyable and witty with Courtney as co-host.

Really proud to see how far this show has come. Really great eps as of recent.

Ben I agree with your take on the show. I’m a newer tennis fanatic over the past two years and I was extremely disappointed they didn’t focus on the winners and the bigger story lines. It’s what drew me in on its own. The fact that they didn’t show Alcaraz barley at all is extremely disappointing especially with what he did in Madrid. He’s the future of the sport and incredibly talented that even someone who doesn’t follow tennis can understand. I found it boring expect for the bits you talked about. Very disappointed. I don’t think it’ll bring new fans to the sport.

Love the podcast, although I had to laugh when Ben mocked Wayne’s pronunciations of players’ names. To be fair, my issue is with Ben’s insistence on emphasizing the “OVA” on 99 percent of the Eastern European women’s names. Imagine if every name that ended in “berg” was accented in the same way…. RothenBERG, EdBERG, RosenBERG…..it’s essentially the same concept, sorry to nit pic, foreign names are hard and your podcast still rocks, as do you!

I know Rothenberg is a well known tennis journalist, but one wouldn’t believe it after listening to the jibberish he offers here. Aside from his mumbling presentation, there were zero insights or notable moments in this rambling and undisciplined recap of a very exciting US Open. He and his additionally rambling co-host were just not of interest to even a casual tennis fan…not to mention a genuine student of the game. I won’t be listening again.

Ben talks fast enough already. But Courtney talks fast as well and most annoyingly talks over Ben constantly and makes it harder to follow the conversation. Courtney also applies nicknames to many players arbitrarily in a way I would find disrespectful if I were one of those people getting tagged by the press with a nickname I might not want. I am a woman and play tennis and love women’s tennis. But calm down and slow down Courtney, please. Or Ben, find someone else to talk about women’s tennis on your great podcast.

I refer you to an early chapter in The Hobbit.

I like Ben and Courtney but I’m sorry, the audio quality of the podcast has gone downhill. Especially the podcasts done at the AO this year. Are there no good places to host without HORRIBLE background noise? Tumainyi is already difficult enough to hear/understand in the best case scenario, idk why Ben doesn’t make more of an effort to have minimal background noise.

His voice, his style, his delivery. It’s all bad. If you thought his being a competent writer made him a good conversationalist, you’d be mistaken. I suppose even his journalism is a bit yellow, but he takes his pettiness to a another level here. Gossipy and political. The worst combination.

If you don’t know that Ugo Humbert beat Medvedev at the recent ATP Cup, then you shouldn’t have a tennis podcast. Even worse if you barely know who Humbert is, like one of the hosts. There are too many good tennis podcasts to waste your time with this.

Love the NCR. Don’t always agree (five sets forever!) but always get thoughtful and well reasoned discussions on tennis tours. Always like effort put into getting an international cast of journalists to co-host. On court or off court NCR keeps me up to date with the soap operas of the atp and wta!

Great to get back to tennis after the Novak craziness. Thanks for keeping us informed through that nightmare, Ben

Grand Slam draw shows are fun, interviews with players are interesting. Highlights aspects of the tennis world I wouldn’t know about otherwise. They sometimes complain about dysfunctional aspects of the tennis industry too much for my tastes.

Thanks Ben.

The host legit does not shut up and let his guests speak. He asks a question and then repeats and rephrases it over and over

Do yourself a favor and find a more substantive podcast, preferably one not hosted by libelous corporate media operatives.

This show is awful. Comes off big time as amateur hour. Also way too much political and social garbage. Sports are an escape for most and this is anything but

When Ben and Courtney are co-hosting, they have a natural rapport and similar pop culture tastes that it makes for a fun listen. I always like hearing their takes on the tour as a pair because they clearly respect each other enough to intelligently disagree and present compelling counter arguments. Unfortunately a lot of times the show is Ben and a guest, which doesn’t always work as well because he has a tendency to talk over the guest. He’ll ask a question then proceed to answer it himself. Let the guest speak, Benjamin! It’s less of an issue when Courtney is the co-host. 5 out of 5 for the Ben/Courtney episodes, 3.5 out of 5 for the guest eps which can be hit (Mary Carillo, Reem, Tumaini) or miss (Ricky Dimon, Alex Gruskin).

Possibly the worst podcast on the internet

I don’t know what tournament your looking at but the matches are great I know your a ray of sunshine but this is too much even for you. I have been watching the matches and it’s been great especially the Women the men are not supporting the event even during a pandemic but the woman have brought it on.

This guy has already lost its credibility as a decent reporter. His view so blatantly biased. This podcast is just another misinformation spreading machine.

He sounds like a sick and jealous man. What an unpleasant man.

Typically, my go to tennis related pod is ‘Tennis Podcast’. However, once in a while, especially during grand slam season I would be looking for more podcasts to catch up on the matches that I would have missed and came across this one during RG 2020. I could barely survive this. There are multiple hosts, but most common is Ben R. His main objective is to make irrational comments, call names, pull down players and make some rubbish predications – and he is most consistent in putting down Rafa Nadal. Rafa’s most recent RG triumph was not only a blow in face for the DJoker but also the critters like Ben. His comments on during prefinal pod against Rafa were utter nonsensical. However less said is better about this dude’s tennis acumen. Another common host on this podcase is Courtney who typically enjoys using cuss words sparingly every opportunity she would get. She also seems to be in a constant race (not sure with whom?) in demonstrating how smart and wise she is... and how much special she is. On the good side, she has a better command over spoken English and a slightly better tennis knowledge (general and not the technical or tactical one, as I doubt if she has ever played a tennis in her life) There are couple of other folks, one of them is Tumani Carayol. This dude does not have any opinion of his own.. he’ll read out what others have written or opined and worst, he cannot complete a sentence without saying ‘I don’t know’ at least once. Dude if you don’t know or don’t have the opinion of your own why you are waiting your time here. Overall save your time and give this one a pass.

This is by far my favorite podcast being a huge tennis fan. New podcasts and the back log are all great , Ben and Courtney you guys kick ass . Thank you for what you do. They are smart , funny, on the scene on tour, know the players , know the gossip, and are just overall a real treat to listen to. I highly recommend this to any and every tennis fan out there .

I’m new to podcasts in general and recently found this one to help kill time during the Covid-19 pandemic. It’s been a lifesaver. I’ve enjoyed all the episodes I’ve listened to so far and the easy rapport between Ben and Courtney. (Listening to the episodes on the Australian Open 2020 is a bit insane, as everything has changed in 3 short months, but weirdly fascinating from this hindsight point of view.).

Love this podcast! Could listen to it everyday, Ben and Courtney have so much fun and always keeping the listeners interested!

Been a listener for 3+ years, Ben and Courtney are both extremely knowledgeable as well as invested—they give attention to both the ATP and WTA and are just fun/funny to listen to. My favorite tennis podcast (even though I never got my post card!)

I like it but too much WTA talk. If I listen to an NBA podcast they don’t force the WNBA on me. When I listen to my baseball podcasts they don’t beat me over the head about women’s softball. Most tennis fans don’t care about girls playing and don’t wanna waste time with that nonsense.

Love this one, always a must listen. Great chemistry between Ben and Courtney. Keep up the great work!

Generally not your biggest fan. But your decade top 10 episode is easily the best tennis podcast of this decade. And I listen to a bunch of tennis podcasts.

I really love this podcast, especially the emphasis on women’s tennis. The hosts have such great chemistry. I highly recommend it.

There are a lot of tennis podcast out there and most of them don’t include Ben Rothenburg who’s gotta be the pettiest, most poorly prepared tennis journalist in the game today. This podcast is a perfect example of what happens when tennis riders all live in the same silo together.

The guy has the most irritating voice in radio

Have listened to podcast off and on and really enjoyed some episodes (Kyrgios interview was great) but the recent interview with Tim Smyczk has forced me to unsubscribe and leave this review. The fact that a podcast that claims to love the WTA would invite someone who’s outspokenly supported abortion bans is reprehensible. I’m mostly disappointed by Courtney, who I thought would stand up for women’s rights to choose. Until the media actual holds these moronic men accountable for the trash that they spew, nothing will change and this interview is a shining example of the status quo. I’ll stick to The Tennis Podcast (who have had their faults but at least acknowledged and swore to be better) and Tennish

If you want to listen to two swarmy millenials talk about tennis here's your podcast. They might not know very much about tennis, but they have important writing jobs in the sport, so they are considered worth listening to. They are insiders, but only in a very gossipy, ill-informed way. While they both have annoying voices, the female is particuarly grating. I came to the podcast because of the Nick Kygrious interview. That was interesting, but Ben (the host) came across as a total fanboy, and seemed like he was pining for Nick and his badboy behavior. Pretty sad all around, but worth listening to once.

I've been listening to NCR for more than a year now and have come to regard it as essential for my tennis fandom. I appreciate that Ben and Courtney have opinions about players and the game, e.g. Ben's positions against best-of-five sets and for underhand serves or Courtney's preference for tour parity over domination by a few greats. As someone who grew up only watching the slams and mostly men's tennis, NCR has deepened my appreciation of the overall tours, but especially the WTA and its cast of characters. I don't always agree with their takes -- Ben says Sampras was boring to watch, but I think he misses the beauty and pitcher's-duel-ish excitement that came from a good serve-and-volley match. Nevertheless, the conversations are always thoughtful and entertaining. Keep up the good work!

I listen because of the depth of off-court color. Ben speaks too quickly and does not enunciate well. My guess is he won't change. Courtney's arguments could use conclusions once in a while. A few specifics on the post-French Open show. There wasn't much on the actual matches or tactics, just a lot of poorly articulated meh about the feel of the tournament. The Williams-Thiem conference room tiff was revealing. It sounds like Williams was right there and could see that there were no rooms available, including room 2. This is consistent with Thiem having to wait to resume his press conference after he filed out past her. Thus, her supposed offer to go into room 2 seems less genuine in retrospect. Thiem came off looking better than she did, whatever Ben thinks based on the Serena-diva-echo-chamber filled with Whoopi Goldberg's voice. And don't waste time on women's world cup soccer--I don't need any challenges remaining to call that out of bounds for a tennis podcast.

Really liked the Kyrgios interview. Felt like I was actually there.

Questions were lay-ups. Nothing really interesting interviewer just went along. Kyrgios has serious self confidence issues. Everyone else has problems except him. He is immature and doesn’t like the sport. Spare the paying public and find another occupation.

Why is the audio speeded up. How do you fix?

They are boring and if you want a good tennis podcast listen to the tennis podcast

I enjoy the analysis and content. May sound prudish, but I took off a star because I can’t listen with my kids in the car. 3 F-words in 3 minutes might be a bit blue for a tennis podcast in my humble opinion.

I look forward to getting Ben and Courtney’s take on tournaments almost as much as I enjoy watching the tournaments themselves. Always wish these came out more frequently, but I’ll take quality over quantity any day.

It’s a good podcast

Contrary to a number of the other podcasts out there, this one isn’t daily or weekly. It isn’t your cup of tea if what you’re looking for is simply results and some unnecessary weekly recap. That’s what makes this the best of them all. Although I speak from the cultural background of an American, I believe Courtney and Ben run the podcast the way any good sports podcast should be run: Casual conversation with a general agenda. While these two insightful journalists do get off on long-yet enjoyable- tangents, they do give very analytic commentary on the relevant issues and moments in tennis that should be duly addressed. I have been listening to this podcast for almost two years now, and never has there been a single episode that I will let myself skip. More than that, these are characters that look like they are doing a podcast for their own enjoyment and not for sponsorships or any ulterior motive. Keep it up Ben and Courtney!!!!!!