Behind the Racquet with Noah Rubin

Summary

Noah Rubin — ATP professional (US, Stanford alumni who also played on the ATP circuit), currently preparing for Indian Wells qualifying when recorded — joins Lisa Stone to discuss his viral Instagram project “Behind the Racquet,” launched approximately one month prior to recording and already attracting significant attention. The project: Rubin conducts in-person conversations with professional tennis players at all levels of the tour (men and women, American and international, Grand Slam winners and qualifiers), records their answers, transcribes and edits them himself, sends the final text to each player for approval, and posts photograph-and-text profiles on Instagram. The stories are unguarded — money struggles in families, parental divorce, terminal illness, learning disabilities, depression — precisely because Rubin is one of them: “I’m a tennis player first, I’m a part of their world.” The episode’s most significant argument: tennis cannot grow its fan base by showing forehand and backhand; it must give people players to root for, and human stories are the mechanism by which strangers become fans.

Guest Background

Noah Rubin is an American ATP professional who played college tennis and built a profile as an outspoken voice on the circuit. He describes himself as someone who “always had this thought that we need to bring the human interest story back to the world of tennis” — and Behind the Racquet is his operationalization of that conviction. He mentions being at the Atlanta Open, implying he has competed there. He conducts the profiles himself: in-person recordings on his phone, personal transcription, self-editing, player approval before posting. He credits his sister as a social media advisor (she is “one who knows the Twitter Instagram world very well”). He mentions Francis Tiafoe as a player who is more outspoken than most Americans; references Ernesto Escobedo’s stutter as an example of a story that converts someone’s personal connection into a tennis fan; and names players like Nicole Gibbs and Chris Eubanks as the mid-tour range who need storytelling infrastructure.

Key Findings

1. Tennis Cannot Grow Fans Through Forehands and Backhands

Rubin’s foundational argument: “We as Americans don’t truly love the sport of tennis — we’re probably fifth on the totem pole, rivaling against soccer and football and basketball and baseball, and we’re losing. We need to bring the human interest story back to the world of tennis.” The mechanism he proposes: “If you don’t love the sport, you can love the people apart of it — and then grow to love the sport itself.” He cites a direct example: a fan who shares that Ernesto Escobedo has a stutter, and whose son also has a stutter, now has a reason to watch Ernesto. The personal-to-fan pathway is: story → connection → player → sport.

2. Instagram as the Right Platform — Not a Blog, Not a Podcast

Rubin’s explanation for the Instagram format: it enables organic spread (a post goes to Instagram Stories, then to Facebook), it is a format he personally understands and controls, and it lowers the guard of the subject. “Podcasts are not easy — and I wanted something where they didn’t have to feel a camera in front of their face. It’s very tough for someone who’s not open about certain troubled past or family experiences to have a camera in front of them and go straight-guarded, answering questions very PC.” Instagram text, collected in a phone conversation and edited into prose, produces authenticity that camera-based formats do not.

3. The Stories Are Raw Because Rubin Is One of Them

The technical reason Behind the Racquet works: “I’m a tennis player first, I’m a part of their world — and I think they saw that I had no ulterior motive. I’m not saying anything else, I’m not doing anything else, I’m just giving them the platform they needed to share their story.” Player trust comes from insider status, not journalism credentials. Players who would not open up to a media outlet or a broadcast crew will talk to a fellow tour player who wants nothing except the story. Rubin: “I’ve had many people hug me, and come up to me and say thank you, and they’ve cried during the conversation, saying they’ve never shared these stories before.”

4. Normalizing Mental Health Is the Explicit Mission

Rubin names his objective directly: “I’m really trying to normalize the stigma around mental health — and especially in tennis, such a unique sport in how individual it is. Everybody has this concern that they have to put on this tough mental face, because we’re all competing against each other. But there’s so many mental barriers you have to break down each and every day — people have no idea.” He identifies this as a gendered problem (men and women both) and a structural sport problem (individual competition creates isolation). The next post at time of recording: Bradley Klahn, on the “tough face” dynamic in professional tennis.

5. Player Platforms Are Being Wasted — And It Hinders the Sport

Rubin is direct about the systemic failure: “The top American guys — they’re quiet guys, not really out in the open making moves to try to get the word out. That’s their personal preference. But then you’re almost hindering the sport. You’re 9 in the world, you’re 20 in the world, you have the platform to reach millions of people — and your interviews are like, ‘yeah, okay, that’s fine.’ That doesn’t do anything.” He contrasts with Francis Tiafoe as an example of visible personality, but argues the actual growth mechanism is personal stories, not personality performance. A player 50th in the world who shares their father’s death story converts fans in ways a top-10 quiet player’s baseline highlight never does.

6. Tangerin’s Story — Why the Format Is Necessary

Rubin shares a specific example: Tangerin (phonetic; a player ranked approximately 50 in the world) came to him “basically in tears” after sharing his story about his father dying. “He’s 50 in the world and he’s thanking me for this opportunity. I mean, the fact that this hasn’t been done before is almost bad.” The player had never shared that story with anyone before. The thank-you from a ranked professional to a peer for simply providing the platform — for making it safe and available — is Rubin’s evidence that the gap he is filling is structural, not incidental.

7. Tennis Channel’s Approach Is Good But Guarded

Rubin distinguishes his project from Tennis Channel’s long-form player profiles (which at time of recording included Coco Gauff and Mackie McDonald). The Tennis Channel version is “fun, good” — but “it’s guarded. It’s PC. You watch it and take it with a grain of salt.” By contrast, Behind the Racquet produces responses where people say “I couldn’t stop thinking about that story for a week.” The difference is medium (controlled broadcast vs. player-to-player conversation) and format (edited narrative prose that the subject approved vs. produced video segments that the network controls). Authenticity in Behind the Racquet comes from the absence of production mediation.

8. The Olympics Model — Deep Athlete Access as Fan Conversion

Lisa identifies the model that works at scale: “One of the things I love so much about the Olympics is when they dive deep into the athletes — take you into their homes, show you their daily training routine, show you what they look like when they wake up and come to the breakfast table. That’s how you build fans for any sport.” Rubin agrees and positions Behind the Racquet as the tennis equivalent at the non-Olympic level — the mechanism that the sport’s existing media infrastructure has failed to build for the players who are not Federer and Nadal.

Actionable Advice for Families

• Help your junior player understand that professional tennis requires more than competitive excellence — it requires the ability to share a story, connect with audiences, and build a personal following that sustains a career beyond ranking
• Follow Behind the Racquet on Instagram — the stories give junior players and families a realistic window into what professional tennis life actually involves, far removed from the highlight-reel image
• Understand that the most watched, most followed players at the non-top-10 level are often those who use their platforms — player personality and storytelling are legitimate competitive assets in a sport trying to grow its audience

INTENNSE Relevance

• Behind the Racquet is the template for INTENNSE broadcast storytelling: Rubin’s core insight — that human stories convert strangers into fans, and that fans create athletes to root for before they care about the sport itself — is the precise argument for INTENNSE’s player-story broadcast strategy. Every INTENNSE player should have a Behind the Racquet equivalent as part of the league’s content infrastructure: not a produced interview, but a raw, player-sourced story that audiences can connect to before they understand the 7-bolt arc
• Noah Rubin as a potential INTENNSE player or content partner: Rubin is exactly the kind of player INTENNSE targets — a college-tennis-trained American professional building a career at the mid-tier of the ATP, outspoken about tennis’s growth failures, and already building media infrastructure that proves the concept. His Behind the Racquet audience is a pre-built INTENNSE audience. His recruitment or partnership would bring an existing fan community and a proven storytelling framework
• Mental health normalization as a league differentiator: Rubin’s explicit mental health mission — normalizing the conversation in a sport where individualism and competitive isolation make it structurally difficult — is directly applicable to INTENNSE’s player support infrastructure. A league that publicly supports mental health resources and creates space for players to share struggles is differentiated from any existing tennis structure
• The “guarded media” problem as INTENNSE’s competitive advantage: Rubin’s critique of Tennis Channel profiles — fun, but guarded and PC — is the exact failure INTENNSE’s mic’d-coach, unedited-competition-broadcast format is designed to address. INTENNSE’s broadcast authenticity (coaches on mic in real time, no pre-approved talking points) is the production version of what Behind the Racquet does in written form
• Platform responsibility as a league value: Rubin’s observation that top American players are “hindering the sport” by not using their platforms is a direct argument for INTENNSE’s community engagement requirements. INTENNSE players should be expected — not just encouraged — to build public profiles, share personal stories, and use their platform to convert tennis-curious viewers into fans. This is not optional media work; it is part of the professional obligation

Notable Quotes

“We need to bring the human interest story back to the world of tennis — if you don’t love the sport, you can love the people apart of it, and then grow to love the sport itself.” — Noah Rubin

“I’m a tennis player first, I’m a part of their world — they saw I had no ulterior motive, just giving them the platform they needed to share the story.” — Noah Rubin

“I’m really trying to normalize the stigma around mental health. Tennis is such a unique sport in how individual it is — there’s so many mental barriers you have to break down each and every day, and people have no idea.” — Noah Rubin

“You’re 9 in the world, you’re 20 in the world, you have the platform to reach millions of people — and your interviews are like, ‘yeah, okay, that’s fine.’ That doesn’t do anything. You’re almost hindering the sport.” — Noah Rubin