Misha on developing Frances Tiafoe

francis's father had two kids Francis and Franklin and then he was divorced so they stayed and lived at the tennis center they were living in um a massage room it's all it's it's it's all over Google it's all over national television networks so when I got hired the kids were already living in the tennis center so you have two kids are living in tennis center with the father and then you had a coach like me coming in that basically creates a situation where two people are in the same place for a long period of time I met Francis on October 23rd 2006 and all the other players in the program at Tennis Center College Park were taken so you got to go all the way to the bottom and find a kid I basically start coaching him started talking to him after about couple couple of weeks I came to his father and I said look can I be his coach I want to make him a champion I would like to take him to tournaments um I'll be all in I'll do a lot of extra work the father said yeah do whatever you want with him he's yours when I met him he was 8 years old um he was not that good he was like Ethan regular regular technically he just had a drop shot no forehand no backhand no surf you know so I just started to teach yeah ret keeps moving rack it back through the top couple more so I started to teach the back end I started to you know he just had a slice so from slice I went to regular back and regular forehand I started to teach fast fast and I started with technique fundamentals grips and then we started to hit a lot of balls we did angles for about 3 4 years almost every day then for two years we did weapons then another two years we served we served every single day at 7 in the morning I picked him up early we went to the tennis court before everybody got there at 8 we were already serving for an hour then we did Clinic then we did mash play then we did Fitness we did about 5 hours of tennis a day about 7 days a week for 9 and 1 half years straight on weekends with the tournaments during a week we worked on technique and we competed in the afternoons and then he's starting to improve really really quick because we're doing so much tennis by the time he was 10 he was one of the best players in 12's end of 11 number one in America but we're talking each week counts you're talking about 10,000 of hours to get really good at something we wa a th hours by like six months just put in hours hours hours hours hours the kid got to want it it comes with the ability of a player to love the game and the player wants it himself it's not done for me it's not done for his parents he knows that's what's going to take him to the top and that's what's going to make his life better eventually whether he goes to college or he goes professional basically it's how much you want it it has to come from your heart I coach Francis TIAA for 10 years and there were a lot of days and times when he was lazy and he wasn't pushing himself but I was pushing him to get the most out of him what he had was a hunger and a desire to compete and he wanted it badly so when we went to tournaments that transitioned me feeding balls me pushing him that transition I was able to give him a tools forehand back hands ground strokes weapons and those tools in a combination with Hunger desire and work ethic that's what took him to the top hunger is important because not having something and your parents not having something and then the parents cannot give it to you and they might never get that and then you see that I came from Russia in 98 to America all by myself I couldn't speak English and then my D gave me $60 and that's it and that's it and I went on the plane I came to Miami I land in Miami and in Miami my brother was supposed to meet me he he lives in California so thank God he was already in America but he flew over to meet me but his flight was late or he got dropped off a different gate so I got out and I was there and I was sitting there with my luggage crying and I was 15 I couldn't speak everybody spoke Spanish I didn't speak English I just spoke Russian I just sat there and waited back then there was no cell phones I couldn't call so uh I just sat there and waited he gave me some phone number with friend to call he didn't pick up I did I did not know what to do with myself and then eventually like I think three hours later he came in then he put me in the Tennis Academy back then I had a partial scholarship there Rick Macy and even at that point that was still 1998 it was 1,600 a month so that's a lot six so we're talking about $1,600 a month in 1998 and that was after scholarship a lot of kids here even now the parents don't want to even pay thousand a month you know a lot of Americans are in death and basically most of them are about you know 95% of them only 5% doing well and then if you asking them to pay for lessons and you got to pay for travel you got to pay for everything even here it's close to Impossible and this is number one economy in the world if you're talking about the guys in Brazil or guys in Italy it makes it extremely difficult so what we had to do in our situation we first had to get there in terms of tennis and start winning and we both had the same dream my dream I was short so I came I played Academy I got a full scholarship and I went to University of Maryland on the scholarship I play tennis and as soon as I was done with college I went into coaching and my dream was to go to Grand Slams I wanted to be in a locker room with Pros you know Agy SAS those were my favorite and then the only way I would get to a locker room is if I'm coaching professional tennis so I needed to make somebody to that level so I can go to US Open so I could have a credential I never had a credential I wanted one I would go to Miami open and then try to sneak into the back and then be in a locer room with players and then in Russia we went to a tournament and they had free food and back in during communis Russia in the 90s there was no food in supermarkets no food on the street I stood in the Brad line on Saturday for two hours to get a loaf of bread and then I turned around and stood another two hours to get milk so that's four hours okay and then the shoes that my dad got me were used and that's basically how hungry I was I never had anything so then you come here you give an opportunity which is even coming here which is extremely difficult but you got to take it one step at a time and you got to build on that so then I met Princess the only thing I looked at parents were tall parents were tall and the kid is there all the time was the kid more talented everybody asked me every newspaper every TV station asked me was the kid talented no the kid was not talented there were another four five kids like that that he had a twin brother that actually had a life arm and looked even better right you know twin brother didn't do much because he got in trouble you know his dad set him out he did all kinds of things okay Francis didn't want to get in trouble he didn't want his dad to give him belt okay you get belt if you get in trouble okay he's dead was from Africa his dad was living in a closet in a maintenance room he's sleeping on a massage table I'm living at night he's getting in trouble the kids are screaming I'm like well the guy's disciplin him the guy's poor he just came from Africa mom lived somewhere else parents were divorced no money mom put the food on the table she put um rice African rice is um plain rice and then some sauce on that's it no chicken in order to get chicken you need money so there you go so so the kid wants it okay so now I come in now what do I want I want to make it to Grand Slams I don't have any kids to coach I have a dream then I'm met a lady that coached a Russian player before veras vanar overa to top 10 in the world I went to lunch and ran into her she said look you want to make some money you want to make something of yourself you make a professional tennis player you got to grab somebody at the bottom take him all the way to the top she said find a player go to work make him Pro so I figured what I need this boy's already there parents are tall so he's was going to be athletic then I ran into all kinds of problems he didn't want to run he was all the kids were doing Fitness they running he's the only kid walking jump rope for six months he could not do two jumps he make one jump he cannot get the second jump I got goosebumps right now talking about it because that's how crazy it was from there to top 10 in the world could not do a jump rope we're talking about push-ups push-ups were like this and then people say talent talent is everything there's a book Talent is overrated book Talent Code there's no Talent there's T Talent that's but you got to nurture it it's got to come out you got to work you got to do specific things as deliberate practice and everything you see now we're running into problems of money you have an African-American kid 99% of them or so I mean they cannot possibly afford private tennis lessons or travel to tournaments then you have to travel um I mean back and forth you got to eat you got P anies you got shoes you know I was able I had a salary at the Tennis Center Tennis Center paid me salary I put a lot of time myself my wife was working some We Were Young in our 20s but we had we had enough so we were able to provide basic stuff in the beginning his parents had nothing so we just took it one day at a time and we practiced during the day on weekends we play tournaments and we stuck to the plan slowly the rankings started to improve he started we started to travel we started to eat a little bit better we started to go places then he started to work a little harder then he's doing two jumps then he's doing three push-ups okay then he's jogging and then he's walking before he was just walking when you learn to work hard and you learn to like Fitness and then when you good things start to happen to you you slowly from being lazy you slowly start to work harder harder harder so there way more good things can happen to you you can go on a trip you can go to a nice restaurant you can go on the jet ski with Misha you know in Miami you know you can see nice nice things so we can rent a nice car you don't want to come back here and live in the ghetto in the Hyattsville Maryland okay with six people in a one-bedroom apartment you know you don't want to do that so you're learning you're learning about life you have common sense this is bad this is poor this is medium oh wow we're on a trip so we want to go on a trip again again in two weeks Mish is taking me on jet ski I better get on that jet ski so I'm going to work so hard for the next 3 4 weeks so I can get to Florida so if we're losing here CU we're not working if he's not competing enough in tournaments he's not winning you winning I can go to management and say look he's winning we go again he's winning we go again they pay I said this is the ranking this is the boy we're going to make something he's going to attract other players business is going to make money children from New York are coming children coming from California they're coming because he is attracting the best players in America because he is winning nobody listen to this nobody believed in him there were guys there directors all the people in charge you'll see on TV oh now they're happy no no no somebody needed to be there from day one when somebody's lazy somebody's not working somebody needs to be there to believe into the person believe that the person can do it and somebody has to put the groundwork in and those years when nobody cares everybody cares about making money salary steady stability somebody has a vision like I did is a long-term vision of becoming something for myself and for him so our dreams matched when our dreams matched we went to work but between you have to have vision and you have to have a dream and then you visualize like Kobe Bryan said and then you're going to become what your dream hopefully is and usually it happens but you have to go for very very long period of time you're going to lose you're going to have bad days he was behind in school he couldn't read he couldn't write it was terrible he was behind one or two years in school then they said we can't travel they said we're not going to p and fly we're not going to pay for this you're not going to do this we're going to put him in the back office he is not allowed to train so you know what we did my ex-wife uh father came he was a school teacher every day after summer camp we did School workor schoolwork for free was the kid he drove the he wrote we did stuff myself my wife father he had the wife then um four six people teaching this guy math reading history so that way two months from now they would let us go to the tournament they said no he's not allowed mom said only School mom s yesterday send me a text message said Thank You Misha I said that's very nice back in the day I used to drive a $ hundred dollar I drove a$1 dollar give it to the mom she says oh now he can go I said what you need I need food I take $100 out of ATM I did all I had was $100 so that way she would let him go to the tournament now we got four houses we're printing they're making good money but back in the day in order to get you I had to get those people to believe I had to get those people to believe in me to let me take him to tournaments the father was easy father said do whatever you want with him do whatever you want train him drive him do whatever he can stay at your house you got food drink whatever I had to figure out the shoes the entry fee the gas the food and then we go then hopefully he wins then we train say he loses we got to go again you got to be willing to grind you got to be willing to do things that nobody else does you got to get up early I had to get up early I had to drive to highville so many times I couldn't get up early it was 6:00 in the morning I got to get up at 6:00 in the morning drive to ghetto pick up African-American kid and Coach him tennis for free and then do this Saturday and Sunday all other coaches they were sleeping they were resting they were partying or directors they were making money teaching private lessons I was taking this kid for free on weekends and early mornings so many times I got up I was like why am I doing this but you got to have a vision it's not about making money early on or in the the process you got to be willing to take a risk you take a risk you persevere you grind long enough you're going to be successful in the end so you got to persevere and you got to do it for a long period of time then he get good people put interest in you look at the uh private coach in France Patrick morogo right okay that's good great coach however did he develop Bagdad from beginning he wasn't there first 10 years or CPAs you got Serena number one first 10 years in my opinion is when nobody cares you have to build a person from a ground up how many cases like that the only people that do it is either the Father Figure Father Figure or Strong coach Mentor very few um parents are like that very few coaches are like that because you pretty much have to work for free for a long-term result and that's you know not many people are going willing to do that so what we did was we believed in it and we stuck with the plan a lot of coaches come in Brad Gilbert and even LEL they were at Orange ball they were interested they were interested after the guy wins orange ball is number one in the world the contracts came in later yeah but who was there from the beginning from day one because you got a feed balls he's having a bad practice he's not moving his feet later on we got a sponsor of course that's a very important part that was a billionaire that came from the tennis center when he won the orange ball he helped us pay for for the travel oh if you're poor you have to look for a sponsor that's what the answer is but there's no chance there are no sponsors out there there are no sponsors out there you have to win something to get a sponsor and then when you get a sponsor then you got to pay him 20% back so how did Francis did oh he won orange ball and then through the tennis center we knew the guy that knew the honor and then we got him a billionaire sponsor which is Bill lman so then we TR started travel travel travel the guy was worth $16 billion so then I then that's something that nobody knows that's a secret that I usually don't give away I'll give you away the secret so when we became 15 we got a sponsor and I had unlimited American Express so I'm traveling with American Express for 2 three years yeah we stay in nice hotels we driving nice cars yes so we had a sponsor but before we got a sponsor we myself and my wife we we paid for everything Tennis Center provided housing and food and paid me salary for the clinics so that way I'm able to make ANS meat right so tennis center it's a huge deal at least I was able to pay rent or mortgage or whatever right he help us pay for the travel and of course I give credit to the facility because they let us use the facility and for the clinics that I coached not the private coaching they paid me for the clinics but the clinic had four to six kids eight kids is in it you know so he was one of them when you already have a person that lives on a tennis court 7 days a week 24/7 that's it so then all you all I had to and that's my job so I'm already there six days a week too 45 50 hours a week so you combine two people living in the tennis court for 10 years something good is going to happen to be a coach you need to have long-term vision and you need to put some work into somebody early on and you have to have desire drive like I said passion dream and you have to be willing to put a lot of work early on for free or close to free until you develop somebody and then from them from that point on you go to the next step but you got to be willing to grind you got to be willing to do things that nobody else does