Seasons in all sports can be very long (just ask Seattle Mariners or Philadelphia 76ers fans). As LeBron James said last June of the 82-game schedule that preceded the NBA's two-month postseason: "It's too long. There are too many games, too many road trips."
Yeah, well, try tennis, LeBron.
While the NBA joins other sports with particularly long seasons (including spring training, there's an eight-and-a half-month slog for the World Series teams in baseball and a September-to-June stretch for NHL Cup-winning teams), professional tennis schedules can span from January through November.
The first matches of the 2015 season were the first full week of January in Australia, India, China, New Zealand and Qatar.