l-r, Bluewater Bay Director of Tennis Bryce Cunningham, Michal Malcek, Adriana Solarova, Greg Bennet, Andrea Jaeger
This writer plays tennis, sells tennis equipment, writes about tennis and officiates at tennis events. Imagine my surprise when former World #2 player, Andrea Jaeger, was in the Open Mixed Doubles draw of the Bluewater Bay Tennis Center Spring Adult Championships where I was the referee.
Jaeger and her partner Greg Bennett from Crestview, Fla., lost to Andriana Solarova of Santa Rosa Beach and Michal Malcek of Ft. Walton Beach 7-5, 6-2 in the final.
But, the score for Jaeger wasn’t nearly as important as the shear fun of playing and not having pain in her oft-injured shoulder.
“I moved to Watercolor in Santa Rosa Beach last fall and having Adriana to hit with and all these beautiful clay courts around has revived the fun of playing tennis,” said Jaeger. “For 20 years they have been asking me to play The Legends tournament at Wimbledon and it’s been so much fun this past few months that I just might.”
Jaeger said she had moved to the Watercolor area to run her Little Star Foundation for kids with cancer in the winter season.
“The foundation’s ranch is in Hesperus, Colorado and it is just so hard to fly out for the kids events in the winter,” she said. “I take kids to events all over the United States and the world in the winter time and it’s just so beautiful at Watercolor, I can make the trips from there.”
Jaeger and I have mutual friends from Ft. Walton Beach and we immediately struck up a friendship. She hung out all day at the Bluewater Bay Tennis Center meeting, talking and taking pictures with everyone, and she was just so ebullient and effervescent that it was contagious.
Rumors have it that Jaeger and Bennett will play the Helen Drake Designated Adult at Tops’l in mid-April. With nearly 300 players entered at the “Drake” in each of the past 10 years, the interest and excitement will be high for players and their families who come each year and love to watch as well as play.
Andrea and The Little Star Foundation are a welcome addition to the tennis community of the Emerald Coast Section of Florida.
