YOU KNOW THE TENNIS WORLD HAS LOST ITS MIND WHEN...

...Henri Leconte is the bearer of advice and counsel on professionalism, among other kibbles and bits of wisdom.  This is apropos of nothing, but in case you missed it, in this clip, Leconte appears to put the squeeze on the current crop of underachieving French tennis professionals in their quest to right the wrongs of 2014 and win the Davis Cup that they seemed poised to do against the Swiss...on clay...in France.

Ironically, he was somewhat goaded into doing so by Gasquet (one of the said fruits of French tennis' labor) who tells Leconte, who was at first reticent to name names, to do just that.  I think it was an attempt to get him to shut up, but instead, Leconte being Leconte, he wound up goading him into calling out Monfils!  I mean with friends like that, who needs enemies?

This is also ironic on another level - Leconte was also considered to be way too talented not to win a major in his day, and wasn't exactly the fittest or most committed player in history.  Nobody got more out of their talent in the history of tennis than Leconte, because it sure serbert didn't come from time spent running the Swiss hills (where it seems so many french tennis players choose to live, but I digress).  But his insane performance in Lyon in 1991, defeating Sampras, then winning the doubles with Forget (giving France a 2-1 lead) has essentially washed away his "sins" at Roland Garros.

Of course, for some fans of his (myself included), there was Henri and...well everyone else....

He was even given a heroe's sending off at Roland Garros after having sustained one of the most humiliating losses of his career in the final there in 1988, where he famously hoped the French public now "understand, a bit, my game," which of course they did not and excoriated him (immediately) for entreating them to.  The tennis world, like the world in its entirety, is round, and it seems we've come all the way around to treating Leconte like a wiseman, rather than the "genius from the elbow down" he used to be.

  

So now he espouses the value of hard work and commitment in the Davis Cup context, when he himself was no gym rat.  Let's face it - in his best physical form, he still had saggy breasts pecs and legs that looked more like they belonged under an accountant's desk, than on a tennis court.  

Well, I mean, I shouldn't judge...bean counters play tennis too!  It's a mad mad world indeed...

CAN THE DJOKER CARRY TENNIS?

"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.", 

- Henry IV, Part 2 by William Shakespeare (Act III, Scene I)

First, it was the big story that wasn't - Serena Williams, poised to win her record tying 22nd major and the calendar slam, suffered a collosal case of nerves and lost a match that nobody thought she could.  ESPN did their best to turn the 2015 US Open into the Serena Show, but somebody forgot to tell Roberta Vinci, and instead of her coronation, we got a whole lot of very disappointed celebrities.

Then the Australian Open came with an attachment:  a story on BuzzFeed about the continuing problem of match-fixing and the (intentionally) dormant effort on the part of tennis authorities to address it.  There was no specific evidence, other than ill-defined, poorly explained statistical analysis that points to the likelihood of match-fixing, or compromised betting patterns.  But the stain is not easily removed, and in many ways, we're all still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Next Serena Williams lost the Australian Open final, and the Indian Wells finals - two tournaments that you probably couldn't have placed a bet on her losing if you wanted to.  One title lost to Angelique Kerber, who has since collapsed under the weight of expectation, and the other to Victoria Azarenka, who seems to have shed some of the excess baggage she'd picked up since winning the Australian Open in 2013.  Suddenly Serena doesn't seem so invincible, and the running story that isn't a story, makes another appearance at Roland Garros before genuine questions will start to be asked, which at the moment, everyone is too afraid to ask:  what's wrong with Serena?

Then Maria Sharapova, the most marketable female athlete in the world, a woman who is reviled and admired the world over, in equal measures, for looking like a prom queen who happens to play tennis, failed a drugs test?  There had been, for years, unjustified suspicion of Serena Williams, because...well..she looks like Serena Williams.  After all, it was Andy Roddick who joked that she was benching small dump trucks at age 11, so it shouldn't really come as any surprise that she looks like this today.  That's why it was all the more shocking that of these two racquet toting divas, the one snared in a drugs fiasco was Her Siberianess.  What the penalty will be for her failed drugs test, which she has neither disputed, nor satisfactorily explained to any and all, is as yet unknown.  But that has been a story that is just waiting in the wings to come back and haunt the game.  

Mark this space...

Rafa Nadal continues to struggle, despite making some progress in Indian Wells before losing tamely to his nemesis.  He has no titles in 2016, his last title was on clay in Hamburg after Wimbledon, and his spring clay court career victory lap around South America has elicited no silverware to bite, and little confidence on the part of his admirers around the world.  Most assume that his best bet to win his last another major will be at Roland Garros this year, but few would count on that given that somebody out there appears to be the best player in the world on the surface, and incredibly he is not from Spain.  If you're holding your breath for Nadal to add to his tally of 14 of the crowned jewels in the kingdom of tennis heaven, I would suggest you grab a canister of oxygen until you can find someone else to support.

Andy Murray and Stan Wawrinka are still in the mix; two-time winners at the two majors that the other has not won (together they make an "other slam"...as in someone other than the real big 3).  But neither of them has exactly been burning down the house lately.  To be fair to Wawrinka, he is still the holder of the title at Roland Garros, but we see how heavy was the crown in Australia last year when the third installment of his Aussie trilogy went the way of God's chosen one.  Does anyone get the feeling that Wawrinka's best chance to win a major is to surprise everyone - not the least of whom, himself - lest he crumble under the immeasurable pressure to prove himself anew to the history of the game?  Don't look now, but Murray hasn't won a major in almost 3 years - it doesn't sound like much, until you remember that the likes of John McEnroe, Mats Wilander didn't win any majors after the calendar ticked off it's 365th day from their last.  Lendl and Edberg, by far greater champions than His Irascibleness, didn't go more than 2 years before adding to their major tallies, once they'd figured out how to win a big one...any big one.

Finally, after doing his best Serbian disappearing act 4 times on the trot, Roger Federer, who hasn't won a major in 4 years (that's four years), just had...wait for it...surgery on his knee (cue the melodramatic gasp and clutching of the chest).  Now that doesn't seem like much to shake a stick at, but I can tell you that one of the reasons the tennis world has continued to delude itself into believing that what passes itself off as a rivalry still walks like a duck, is that we are yet to be convinced that what we're witnessing is anything other than the dominance of one at the expense of the other.  We've done so because the unique combination of Federer's athletic prowess appears to persist, but for one glaring exception.  Not so much anymore, following a surgery that for a younger man would be difficult to recover from - let alone a man old enough to be his drunk uncle who just doesn't know when to quit.

When Ray Moore fell on his sword (in more ways than one) I was of the opinion that his comment was not directed at women playing professional tennis, so much as it was a diatribe against the leadership (or the lack thereof) at the WTA.  And when he said that the women ought to be down on their knees thanking God that "Fedal" are still making a nuisance of themselves, I tended to agree with him, or at least accept the proposition as a disconcerting one.  But something just occurred to me that ought to be way more disconcerting for the whole game of tennis, let alone the WTA:  exactly who will be minding the store when the Roger & Rafa show takes a permanent hiatus?

That's where the really scary question comes:  can Novak Djokovic carry tennis?  

It's not a scary proposition because of anything he has done...well, not exactly.  But it's not as if the man isn't playing tennis at the highest level it's ever been played.  He has, after all, contested 5 major finals in a row, won 4 of them - actually he has gone around the world and basically won everything he's entered since January of 2015.  He still makes jokes, he's still the nicest guy you could ever hope to meet, the kind of guy that would help you change a tire in the snow...literally.  He'll do any talk show you can think of, in any language you can imagine, including a couple that you can't.  He's a young, handsome 28 year old newlywed father, his parents (with fleeting exceptions) have largely removed the target from his back, his coach has shockingly done a job that I didn't think he had in him, and there are even jokes being made about the inevitability of his victories on that bloody 36 by 72 foot rectangle with the funny lines?

So why can't he carry tennis?

Is it a conspiracy against him?  Are the grey men of tennis looking down their noses at him, like the jury on Krypton, passing judgment on General Zod?  Has the (not yet) dominant PR machine of Roger Federer, Tony Godsick and Team8 laid the groundwork for his denial from the kingdom of Mount Rush(the net)more?  Does his messianic father still get under people's skin with one idiotic proclamation after another - causing even his own son to distance himself from the craziest of the crazy things he says?  Does he himself put his foot in his mouth, when a more nuanced, more diplomatic, more neutral and...dare I say...more Swiss approach would serve him better? 

My theory is this:  no single star can carry tennis.  It has never been the case that one single player can carry the game of tennis to greater heights, nor bear the weight of the tennis world on his shoulders like a racquet wielding Atlas.  

Big Bill Tilden had little Bill Johnston, Budge had von Cramm, Gonzales had Hoad, Laver had Rosewall, Billie Jean had Margaret Court, Chrissie had Martina, Connors had Borg, Borg had McEnroe, Becker had Edberg, Agassi had Sampras, Federer had Nadal.

But who gapes for the crown of Novak Djokovic?  Competitively, he has in the past been the chaser, and he has had rivalries that are currently diluted where an unjust escape and one competitive set in two played constitutes a good week, but can he alone carry the sport as it appears he may have to?  There is a myth out there that pencil pushers, marketing mavens and sporting bureaucrats can steward the game to success.  That there's some magic formula out there of sex, jokes, celebrity friends and fireworks that can make the game something that it isn't in spite of what it is.  But I have my doubts...I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't a little like the way the real star of the Star Trek franchise isn't James T. Kirk, or Jean-Luc Picard, or Kathryn Janeway...the real star is the Starship Enterprise.  

It survived years of going where no man has gone before, several captains, battles with Klingons and the Borg, and everything in between, and even in another space/time continuum, it survives.  And the guys Ray Moore and the rest of us are looking for to steer the ship are a bit like the passengers on the Enterprise - they may know where all the buttons are, but their fate is really in her hands.

Well, the rivalries, not the players, are the enterprise.  Try as we may to heap all the credit and responsibility on those at the head of the table, it's the ones at the foot of the table that make the ship sail.  And as it stands today, Novak Djokovic is alone at the top of the pyramid competitively, and may also find himself alone figuratively as well.  The throne is an enchantress for the boy who would be king, but as the saying goes:  be careful what you wish for.  There is an old Czech joke about an old man chasing a beautiful and seductive young woman being like a dog chasing a mail truck - even if he catches it, he doesn't have the first damn clue how to drive.  

And with Djokovic's missteps at Indian Wells taking over the news cycle, and subsequent apology and brief PR campaign tour to make up for it, there have to be more than a few people in the halls of tennis' bureaucracy that are wondering if Ray Moore's comments about the WTA could just as well apply to the ATP?  The truth is, they are no more responsible for the success of the game than he is, but the welcome perception, and indeed the unjust expectation, that Novak Djokovic will be, now that he is by far the best player on the planet (male or female), could prove a crown too heavy for his head.

BUD COLLINS - ONE OF A KIND

They don't make 'em like Bud Collins anymore...they really don't.  I like to say, and often tell myself, that I love the game.  And then I think about Collins and the integral role he played in brining the US Open to television, the multiple and essential books on tennis history that he penned, and the thousands of hours he spent on television, over the last 50 years, putting the "color" in color commentary.

And he kind of makes me feel like I don't know what the meaning of love is.

I don't want to bore you with an obituary - the idea of attempting to sum up the life of a man, so varied, so mercurial, in so many words is as intimidating as it is useless.  That doesn't tell you who the man was.  I my opinion, the devil is in the details.  The way he spoke, the way he wrote, the way he pondered before asking questions of some of the greatest players in the history of the game, a history with which he was so intimately familiar.

To me that's what I remember and have always loved about Bud Collins.

I grew up with "Breakfast at Wimbledon" on NBC - the tradition of the tournament mirrored by the inviting familiarity of the format - the magisterial intro and the somber yet celebratory close - and I can honestly say that I enjoyed the idea of Collins interviewing first the runner-up, then the champion, every year as a perfect bookend to the overall experience of the tournament.  The reason I enjoyed his interviews was not for what he did, but for what he didn't do.

He didn't presume the answers in the question.

He didn't presume himself in the question.

He didn't patronize the runner-up.

He didn't gush over the champion (...well maybe just a little...).

The master interviewer is often confused with asking obvious question, but the question is only obvious if you presume the answer.  And Bud Collins never did.  Most interviewers (myself included)  are insecure, and feel compelled to justify their presence before a great player, and it is precisely that desire the elicits the worst questions and the most boring answers.

"How did you find the reserves of character and the mental strength to overcome losing such a close set?"

"How good does it feel to prove the naysayers wrong that said you couldn't win the big one?"

"We talk about all the things that make you who you are, but really, it's what's between the ears that makes a champion, right?"

"How great was the crowd support tonight?  Did you use their energy to spur you on to victory?"

These are all exactly the wrong ways of asking questions.  But notice the subtle and brilliant charm, the genuine humility and obvious admiration for, and love of, the players that make the game what it is, in this selection of interviews of Wimbledon champions and runners-up over the years.

Borg v McEnroe 1980

This interview is brilliant.  Following their titanic final in 1980, he got both McEnroe and Borg to admit that they were each certain that Borg would lose the 5th set.  And in so doing, revealed and buried the absurdity of the notion that one must believe they're going to win in order to win.

Note the simplicity of the question he asks Borg after he admitted he thought he would lose the match.  "Why did you win?"  Isn't that the question that should always be asked of the victor?  How often do you hear that asked, couched with qualifiers and presumptions, rather than stated plainly?  And Borg's answer revealed itself to be both elucidating and educational - for that matter McEnroe's as well.  In fact, McEnroe's answer, cathartically rational as it was, must have done much to help him deal with the pain of the loss.  After all, how can you win an advantage set without any break points - obviously Borg won because he shut the door with his serve, and McEnroe opened his.

Evert v Mandlikova 1981

In this interview with the women in 1981, he demonstrates his candor and his compassion in the simplest of questions to Hana Mandlikova, who clearly wasn't at her best on the day, and closed the interview just as soon as he realized she just couldn't take it anymore.  And as she parted, as was his way, Collins said goodbye to her in probably the worst Czech accent in the history of Czech accents, but I guarantee she didn't mind.

And while some (like Billie Jean King) cringed at his question to Evert about her becoming the first 4-time consecutive runner-up in history, her response demonstrated her grace and perspective, so effortlessly you almost forget the question.  King, on the other hand, as a tennis player and analyst, insisted on imposing her view of Chris' movement in her question, which was almost immediately dispelled.  And Collins' closer, "What did you do best today?" drew out the obvious, "I didn't choke." as well as the analytical, "...she's so unpredictable that I was determined to win in 2 sets, because if it had gone to a 3rd set, it would have been out of my control."

Navratilova v Evert 1982

Now this one I really love - I don't know whose idea it was to have them interviewed simultaneously, but, note the prescience of Navratilova insisting that Bud interview Evert first, and his gentlemanly acquiescence.  Hey, nobody's perfect, but he didn't shy away from asking a couple of doozies, nor did Evert shy away from answering them.  The look in her eye, when she refuted the notion that Navratilova lost the second set due to an attack of nerves, was all you need to know about her as a competitor.  "No, I didn't - you know I think I played exceptionally well in the second set and won it fair and square."  But his follow up allowed her to go into tactical details that gives insight into her state of mind - she came in more often, approaching on her backhand, because that's her weaker side, and the difference came when she lost her serve - from there she couldn't recover.

He started the interview with Martina by addressing the assumption that she would choke, after she lost 5 games in a row, and entreated an analysis and explanation from her of how she turned it around.  And Navratilova admitted that she tried to play it safe and it nearly cost her the match...in fact, she was choking by playing it safe, and it wasn't until she returned to the mind set that the match still had to be won that she returned to the form that delivered the victory.  Finally, knowing the woman as well as the player, he insisted on reminding her, and everyone watching, that this was her first title as a American, which would have been so important to her, and certainly was to him.

Connors v McEnroe 1982

Now, McEnroe was ungracious in escaping the obligatory interview, which isn't obligatory at all.  It should be pointed out that Borg did the exact same thing the year before, when he lost to McEnroe, but Collins handled it graciously on both occasions and moved on to the champion.  Here, Collins inserts the qualifier that Connors nearly lost the match serving double faults up to the fourth set, and Connors responded by pointing to his concentration on the toss as his solution.  Collins returned to the assumption that Connors was too stubborn to change to compete with McEnroe (where have we heard that before?) and Connors returned to the changes on his serve, and the previously rarely seen serve and volley, to refute that.  Finally, the simplest question, was my favorite, "What do you think is the single biggest reason you're here as champion?"

McEnroe v Connors 1984

Here it was Connors turn to eschew the scrutiny of the runner-up interview, but Collins really hit it out of the park on this one.  First, with a simple statement, he allowed McEnroe to expound on the the key to the match, which was the quality of his serve, where he accurately guessed that he had served 70-75% first serves in the match.  Collins then revealed to him that he had only made 2 unforced errors, in the entire match, which surprised him, and led him to analyze that Connors, on the other hand, was not feeling as comfortable and nimble as he was.  Collins returned to the ignominy of McEnroe's defeat at Roland Garros, from 2 sets down, simply asking what the loss did do him, rather than imposing the assumption that it was a crushing defeat that he had to overcome.  McEnroe proceeded to reveal that he didn't let things bother him along the way, and Collins followed up by asking if the calm demeanor he displayed on the day helps his tennis, which McEnroe dispelled - deciding not to allow things to bother you is more important than not expressing one's emotions:  the chicken before the egg.

Navratiolva v Evert 1985

The technical analysis from both players in this one is so complete that Collins has to interrupt them with follow-ups, but they are perfectly appropriate.  First to correct Evert's recollection of a point he thought was pivotal, but once he realized she didn't think enough of the point to even remember it, he didn't belabor it.  As for Navratilova, he let her know that she had come in on nearly every point of the match, which Navratilova noted was how the men do it, so why should she do it any differently (good point).  After Navratilova mentioned that Evert had been favored by many to win the match, Collins wanted to know if it surprised her, Navratilova explained that although she was playing well, every match is it's own self-contained entity, and Evert hadn't faced anyone like her.  He closed with a little history and a compliment to the champion.  What a gentleman.

Becker v Curren 1985

Here Collins interview of the vanquished really says something:  first he asks the simple question, "Not an easy afternoon for you, what will you remember about it?"  The next question really zeroes in on Curren's biggest issue, the failure of his serve, and Curren explains the difference between McEnroe and Connors return and Becker's - the topspin kept the ball down and compromised his first volley.  And the hilarity of Collins obsession with Becker's scuffed up knees is classic Collins.  Becker, for his part, is very analytical for a 17-year old, and his gracious showing of Becker's parent's reaction was so different, and so good.

Agassi v Ivanisevic 1992

Ivanisevic's interview consisted of two questions in 60 seconds - the first, the most obvious, what was the difference in the match, to which Ivanisevic proceed to give the keys to each set individually.  Collins interrupted once, for his second question of what happened at 4-5 in the 5th, where Agassi broke to win the title, and in his simplicity, Ivanisevic revealed that the wind kicked up, he was nervous and he choked, essentially.  But imagine if he had been asked if he had choked?  Brilliant.


Sampras v Courier 1993

Here Collins reveals some multi-tasking:  in the middle of his interview with Courier, he hears Sampras say that he was tired, which may have informed his question to Courier of whether he thought a fifth would favor him.  Sampras then reveals that his fatigue was due, in part, to feeling sorry for himself, from which he quickly recovered.  With his simple question about the difference in the match, Sampras revealed it was his second serve return.  He then revealed that he had seen the semi-final with Edberg where Courier was teeing off on his second serve returns, so he mixed up the second serves.  That also happened to be Courier's assessment:  that Sampras was hitting two first serves, while he was hitting only one.

Isn't it amazing how, with simple questions, both interviewees basically confirm each others' analyses?

Final Thoughts

In 2009, Andy Roddick lost a 6-hour, five set Wimbledon final to Roger Federer - his third final, all loses to the same player, but this one painfully ended with only his second break of serve throughout the grueling encounter, 14-16 in the final set.  Reporters packed the room to ask innumerable questions and Roddick, while gracious with his time (if not always his behavior on court) did what men do under the circumstances and answered every question honestly, analytically and completely.  By the end of the press conference it seemed he was more fatigued from talking about it that from the match.  Although he had suffered a debilitating hip injury during the match (which he never mentioned), Bud Collins had to know that he was hurting physically and in his heart, and that by the end, he he needed nothing more than for it to end.

The human in him insisted that his "question" be that last, in his own inimitable way, when he interrupted yet another question with this suggestion:

"Bud Collins:  Liberate this man.  Well done, Andy
Andy Roddick: Thank you."

I have a feeling that Roddick's "thank you" was directed at Collins for doing just that.

Speaking of the human in him, my father met Bud Collins once years ago at a book signing, where Collins addressed him as "Citoyen" which is the french word for Citizen.  Why would he do that?  Because Bud Collins was a man first, and a journalist second, and he knew that people from the Republic of Zaire (as the Democratic Republic of Congo was known then) addressed each other formally, as "Citizen".  He knew this, of course, because he had been to Congo to cover the Muhammad Ali heavyweight title fight in Kinshasa against George Foreman in 1974, and he would have known to say this to my father because...well, he asked him where he was from.

Book signings are a way to sell books for the author - nothing gets buyers in the store like a chance to breath the same air, so to speak.  But even though it may have cost him a minute and a dollar, he spent it finding out one simple thing about him before obliging him with an autograph.  And in that brief moment, he gave my father, a man who picked up the game of tennis at 30, and still plays it 3 times a week at age 74, a thrill that he still talks about today.

And I suspect that the reason Bud Collins was so good at what he did, at least in part, was because of how good of person he was.  I doubt anyone who had the pleasure of meeting or knowing him would disagree.

And there's nothing better you can say about a man on the occasion of his passing.

STAN WAWRINKA HAS LIBERATED US

There's something liberating about the destruction of myths in tennis - the blogosphere is replete with them, and to a person who plays as often as I do, it can be disheartening to read what others just take as the gospel, even if it makes absolutely no sense at all.  That's why I felt a sense of liberation from Stan Wawrinka's victory over Novak Djokovic in the French Open final yesterday.  Not that I was imprisoned by being his fan - I'm not - nor that I relished in the interruption of what everyone seemed to agree was Novak's procession to the only major he's never won.

The John McEnroe's of the world so personally identify with the pressures of being #1,  that he frequently seems to forget that there are two players involved in a match with the top dog.  To hear him commentate, the match (and his attention) are entirely dependent on the guy who's supposed to win.  And I just can't get over the obvious prepared side-bars (and often incoherent ramblings) of Mary Carillo who has replaced Dick Enberg as the greatest producer of broadcast cheese in the tennis world.  She's never short of a story of some grandmother or teacher in 3rd grade or friend who spent time in a Turkish prison - there's always some damn thing.  So it's all the more disappointing that a former player, who did actually win a mixed doubles major (with John McEnroe, no less) provides so little in the way of technical or tactical analysis.

But they are the purveyors of tennis mythology - it is their inane and endlessly narcissistic pseudo-analysis that drones on and on about any number of mythological hurdles to navigate, that convinces the tennis world that that the myths are fact.  The more they say it, the more it's repeated, and the more it's taken as truth.  They begin to suffocate us with their dogma, leaving no room for the possibility that something unexpected could happen...until, of course, it happens.

That's why Stan's victory at Roland Garros should liberate us all - particularly those who play tennis, but as well those who watch it.  Too often we've heard these myths, and if you listen to them often enough, it's hard to come to any conclusion other than the game of tennis (and all of it's many myths) decides for you what can and cannot be done, rather you determining for yourself, your own destiny.

So here, for the record, and for which we should all be very grateful, are some of the myths from which Stan has liberated us all:

The Insurmountable Head to Head Match Up

It is the most common statistic shown in tennis - the head to head matchup.  It appears to give you some insight into the match that's about to occur, and is as often cited as a hurdle that has to be overcome as anything technical.  But there's something very wrong with using the head-to-head match up as a harbinger:  first, the matches often go back many more years than is relevant to the match at hand.  For two players like say, Federer and Haas, that history could go back 14 years.  To me, that's as insightful as looking at results in the juniors. If you think about it, the head-to-head match up is only as informative as the overall games of the players involved have not evolved...and how exactly are you going to measure that?  Well, that requires technical analysis, and there's just no time for that on television, so it's much easier to cite the head-to-head record - because nothing else says so little, while appearing to say so much.  After all, a player could (theoretically) change his game in a month in such a way that the previous ten years of results are completely irrelevant.

Even so, the head-to-head record begins to take on such an undeserved importance that people no longer view it as a historical coincidence or happenstance, but rather as a hurdle that must be overcome in order to win the upcoming match. But the truth is that what happened 10 years ago has no more impact on the next match than what happened 10 minutes ago - the past is not prologue unless the conditions characterizing the past are the same.  And that being the case, the only thing you have to do to nullify years of futility in a head-to-head match up is...change.  Something, anything, sometimes it almost doesn't matter what, but change - and not something mental, because in the best case scenario, a mental change elicits a technical change, and as such, mental changes are really reaching around your ass to scratch your elbow.  You're much better off making technical changes, and the mental changes (by now irrelevant) will follow.

The One-Handed Backhand Disadvantage

This is the myth that the one-handed backhand is dead as a viable technique in modern tennis - the game has changed so much that no player with a one-handed backhanded could possibly ever beat [enter player here] or win [enter tournament here], under any circumstances.  Once again, leave it to John McEnroe, a player with a one-handed backhand, to self-inflicted this wound to his own legacy, who proclaimed confidently this year at the Italian Open (that's what I'm calling it, I don't care what it's actually called) that, "No player with a one-handed backhand will ever beat Rafael Nadal on clay".  And the tennis gods promptly melted the wax in his wings when Stan the Man canned Rafa in Rome in straight sets.  I guess McEnroe forgot that Nico Almagro, during one of the least productive seasons of his career, did the same in Barcelona the year before.  So how did he come to this conclusion in the first place?

Well, there is an underlying myth out there concerning the technical omnipotence of professional tennis players - the line goes like this:  these guys are the best players in the world, and as such, they must have every shot in the book at their disposal, therefore, if they can't find a solution to a problem, the problem must be mental, not technical, because they're technically omnipotent.  If you read carefully, and know anything about logic, you can see that you simply cannot use the same point in your premise as your conclusion - that's circular, and proves nothing.  But that's precisely what this theory does.  And worse than that, despite evidence to the contrary, that these players are not technically omnipotent, because some players are so technically superior to others - they use that in defense of the circular logic by the following:  Roger Federer is the most talented and complete player in tennis, so if he can't do something technical, nobody can - so if he can't beat Nadal on clay because of his one-handed backhand, nobody on earth could possibly have a better one that could.

Bloody dead wrong.

The truth is that Roger may indeed be more talented and resourceful than Stan, but Stan hits the ball harder than Roger - a lot harder - and that gives him opportunities against players that Roger does not have.  In fact, one could argue that Roger's game, which has evolved to compel him to stay on top of the baseline, puts him at a disadvantage because it is more difficult to hit with pace, which is the only way to consistently pressure Djokovic and Nadal, who defend exceptionally well.  Because Stan can hit so hard, he doesn't have to stand on top of the baseline to take his opponent's time away - he can do it from 6 feet further back.  And six feet further behind the baseline means Stan can more frequently hit the backhand in optimal comfort zone, making him even more likely to push his opponent back on clay, in a way that Roger cannot.

Of course the difference yesterday was not Stan's backhand (which has always been a fantastic shot) but his forehand, which suddenly is as powerful as any shot in tennis, but that's not to ignore the obvious - Stan's backhand is better than Roger's therefore Roger is not technically omnipotent, and most importantly Roger's technical limitations do not apply to everyone on earth who plays a similar game.

Myth blown.

The Tennis Career Archetype

If you don't win a major by your 23rd birthday, you never will.  That's the theory because all the major champions in the open era, won their first before their 23rd birthday.  So, try as they may, the Tomas Berdych's and David Ferrer's and Feliciano Lopez's of the world should really just retire, because their window has come and gone.

But hang on a minute - wasn't Stan 28 when he won the Oz Open last year and almost 30 when he won Roland Garros just now?  Are there other major champions that old?  Of course Federer and Nadal come to mind, and even Agassi and Sampras won majors long after their "best" years had gone by, but they had already won one, so they already had the "belief" right?  Well, let's put aside the stupidity of the "belief" argument for a second, and examine whether other first time major winners have been this old...ever?

Jan Kodes and Ivan Lendl were both 24 when they won their first majors.  Marin Cilic was 25...hmm those are well within the margin of credulity, since the vast majority of other major champions have done it long before then, like all the 80's major champions.  But what about Cilic's coach, Goran Ivanisevic?  Well, he was 30 when he won Wimbledon - but I think everyone in tennis viewed that as a fluke, ironically since he should have won it 2-3 other times he found himself in the final.  But how about Andy Murray?  He was 25 when he won the US Open, and 26 when he finally won Wimbledon.  No, this is looking more like the exception.

But here Stan Wawrinka - who in terms of professional tennis, may as well be a septuagenarian, winning, not one, but two majors since his 28th birthday.  How has he bucked the trend?  Well basically he did it the old fashioned way - he lost weight, changed racquets and improved his forehand.  It doesn't sound like much, but that was enough for him, which tells you how close he was all along.  Of course the results weren't there, they suggested nothing of the kind from him, and if you look at his 2011 victory in the Australian Open of Andy Roddick, that looked like an upset, when now, in retrospect, looks like the right result.  But clearly he was better than we thought back then...

...and so are a lot of guys floating around right now.

Somewhere out there is a guy who is about to turn 30 with all the tools in his kit to force his way into the conversation.  But if your myopia is restricted to the players that should win (as is always the case with say...John McEnroe, who couldn't resist alluding to Federer during his interview with Wawrinka)  you will miss those who gape to be their heirs.  So who are the diamonds in the rough?  Well that's for another post.

The point of this post is to say that there are a lot of myths about professional tennis that make us think we know what to expect, and seeps its way into every aspect of our experience with tennis, including the matches that we play.  But nothing could be more damaging to the game of an aspiring professional, or an aspiring weekend hacker (like me), than to insist on remaining chained to these pillars of absolute nothingness and meaninglessness that masquerades as tennis dogma that is in fact about as insightful and informative as the Iliad.

Let us all take a moment and thank Stan Wawrinka for liberating us from the shackles of our misguided, unproven and utterly useless tennis dogma.

LOOKING FOR THE LAST CHAMPION

We do it in all sports, but especially in tennis.  We're always looking for the last champion - a reboot of the last generation's greatest, just in a younger, better-looking package.  And we do this without taking into account changes in the game, and the very real prospect that the way to beat the best at one style of play, is to employ a different style of play.  

Those who have enjoyed Federer's reign as the greatest player in history, have pinned the latest hopes on Grigor Dimitrov, who reminds them of, and seeks to be, what they so loved about his predecessor, and what we all assumed would be the way forward.  And who among us have not assumed that because Serena Williams, when she is dominant, is so dominant that the only solution to her oppressive regime is to find a younger, stronger, faster version of herself (cue the clip of Sloane Stevens, Madison Keys et. al).  And not dissimilar to great military powers that are always fighting the last war, it is not uncommon for parents, coaches, players and pundits alike to be looking for Serena 2.0.

But has that ever been the case in the history of tennis?  Have the great champions been usurped by younger version of themselves?  Is Federer the modern version Sampras?  Aside from sharing a one-handed backhand, Federer couldn't have been more different than Sampras. Sure when Federer first came on tour he served and volleyed his way to his first Wimbledon, but never really since, and while Sampras' game was as much about raw athleticism and power, as it was about technique, Federer's game is about precision and ball control, and setting up winners with guile, rather than executing them with power.  

The courts got slower, the balls got fluffier, and suddenly the prospect of another dominant server and volleyer went the way of the do-do, and the name of the game was spin, transition from defense to offense, athleticism and stamina. Federer may have mastered this art first, but the development of the top 3 players of today, in Nadal, Djokovic and Murray, who have collectively passed him by, shows that the recipe for a successful coup is not in out-doing the best at his best, but rather to attack his technical flanks, and make the key to success something that you do better than him.

After all, did McEnroe bludgeon monotonously from the baseline to beat Borg, or did he kill him with a thousand cuts - a wide serve here, a drop volley there, and everything in between? Because Borg was so adept at moving from side to side and positioning himself so far behind the baseline, McEnroe's solution had the added advantage of using Borg's strengths against him.  When Borg ran out of solutions, he also ran out of the game. Coincidence?  Maybe.

Come to think of it, did Borg and Connors serve and volley their way past the archetypal big games of Stan Smith, John Newcombe and Arthur Ashe? Hardly.  In fact they exposed the big game for the untenable reliance on immediate domination and control of the points - so when it came time for them to build the points slowly but surely, they were hardly up to the standards of those disrespectful upstarts who simply refused to rush the net until they were good and ready.

Now, in watching the Fed Cup matches between Italy and the US this past weekend, I was surprised (but not really surprised) at how easily Madison Keys was beaten by the Argentinian (masquerading as an Italian) Camila Giorgi.  You've certainly heard of Madison Keys, tipped by many as the next best thing.  In fact Brad Gilbert went so far last year at the Australian Open as to say that she, more than any of the others, had #1 potential.  His reasoning?

1. A big first serve
2. A big forehand
3. An athletic presence
4. A steely focus

Sound familiar?  In fact, if you close your eyes and say that list three times, Serena Williams will pop into your mind like the Wicked Witch of the West.  But isn't that just fighting the last war? After all, in the last 10 years, which players have successfully challenged Serena?  Those who gape to be her heir, in every way possible, and in many ways impossible?  Or those who would attack her technical flanks and offer a different solution to the problem that so many of her paltry-by-comparison clones would present?

Justine Henin didn't attack the Williams sisters head on.  When pushed wide, she hit deep slice.  When served hard and heavy, she stepped in and took it on the rise, before the full force of their most potent stroke could do their damage.  And whereas they sought to beat her into oblivion from the baseline, she took anything short and attacked, forcing them to hit deeper, and subsequently either make more errors, or take something off of their most potent strokes, giving her just the opening she needed to put them under - again and again.

And lo and behold, we discovered that from time to time, the defense of Serena (and Venus) is not nearly as effective as their offense - good but, not great.  Of course it didn't always work - she may have lost as often as she won...maybe even more, but she managed to win 7 majors at a time when these two were seen as the two-headed dragons of tennis that would never be felled.

Now I'm not saying Camila Giorgi is necessarily the next Justine Henin - in fact Henin had far superior hand-eye coordination, more athletic ability, and greater tactical acumen than anything Giorgi has shown in her career.  But this spindly, sinewy little woman, surprisingly taller than she seems and fully adept at taking the ball early and belting the living daylights out of it, showed something this weekend that Keys has not yet in her young career.  Her sense of court positioning, whether innate (or as I suspect in her case) learned, shows us that one need not kamikaze one's way into yet another ass-whuppin' like so many of Serena's contemporaries do when faced with the quintessential big babe. There are tactical flanks to attack, without exposing one's own weaknesses.

In short, there is another way.

And this way, which I suspect is the way of the future, also exposed Madison Keys for the one thing that she currently lacks, which the Williams sisters have rarely had to, or been able to, fall back on:  a plan "B".  You see, it's all well and good to hit the ball like a ton of bricks, and as long as the only question being asked is, "How hard can you hit it", if the answer is, "harder" and harder works, you're gold.

But Keys didn't have the answer - not this weekend.  Keys is all about the power and depth of shot, and the fact that she was spinning first serve in was merely an alternate execution to the tactical directive to put her opponent under from the off.  Only Giorgi, by stepping in and taking the mickey out of the serve before it could take it out of her, asked a different question:  "What are you going to do when you can't over power me from the get-go?" Unfortunately Key's answer was to try to hit harder, and it didn't work. In fact it failed miserably. Some may put it down to a bad day - but bad days have a way of coalescing around players that challenge you technically.

Now lest you think that another player who defends better, would have easily handled Giorgi's oppressive aggression, I would remind you that she did nearly the same thing to a one-dimensional Caroline Wozniacki at the US Open last year.  Only Wozniacki's one dimension is not applying, but rather absorbing, pressure.  Her modus operandus is not to overpower you, but to let you overpower yourself, and in doing so, she also exposed the unanimity of so many big babe aspirants to the crown of biggest babe of all.  Lest we forget, with a tame first serve, and very little independent power, Wozniacki did manage to reach a major final and the #1 ranking - not too shabby. 

And do you know who happened to beat Giorgi in the next round? That's right, Roberta Vinci. Not some big babe ball bashing bafoon, but a real crafty veteran who, like Ken Rosewall, never saw a backhand she didn't want to slice, and a forehand that relies more on spin and placement than brute force. With guile, and movement, and tactics and a brain, she did to Giorgi what her younger more one-dimensional (albeit more talented) Danish forerunner could not.

Now, I don't want to get carried away, because it's just one match, and Keys presumably has a lot of miles left in the tank to get the balance right, but she does need balance.  And being one dimensional is hardly a solution when your one-dimension is the same one-dimension as every other girl on tour. It may have worked for Venus and Serena, Sharapova and Azarenka to some extent.  But if you're Madison Keys and your way forward is to be a technical and tactical clone of the Queens of this Comedy, you may also wind up joining the rest of us in looking for the next champion.

Instead of being it.

THE PRIVILEGE OF PRESSURE

Billie Jean King once said that, "Pressure is a privilege."

Aside from reading like catchy reverse psychology, intended to make players embrace pressure, rather than wilt under it, there may actually be a whole lot more truth to this.  In light of the fact that Roger Federer has, in the span of two weeks, accomplished everything in 2009 that seemed so far from his grasp in 2008, the question becomes two: will he play the remainder of his career without pressure, and more importantly, is that necessarily a good thing?

When he won his maiden French Open, Federer was quoted as saying that he could play the remainder of his career pressure free because nobody would be able to say that he never won the French Open. I had my doubts – I thought he could play the French Open pressure free…maybe...but until he reached that magical number 15, the one that ends his obligation to anyone who was withholding his place in tennis history, I felt there would always be huge pressure on him to go 7 and 0 over a fortnight just one more time. The plot thickened when his nemesis exited stage left before the curtain was raised – after all, if Darth Federer couldn’t dominate the tennis galaxy when his personal Luke Skywalker was off in the Dagova system, then when would he?  

Pressure indeed.

But what happens to a great champion when the pressure is off?  What happens when the peaks have been scaled, the quiet questions answered loudly, and his face on Mt. Rush-the-net-More has been sculpted? On this question, history is a murky water way of let downs.

When Pete Sampras won his 13th major at Wimbledon in 2000, he appeared to collapse emotionally under the weight of expectations and the knowledge of the struggle and sacrifice his success required.  For the first time that I can remember until then, Sampras cried at the victory ceremony.  And for a man who scarcely showed his emotions (and when he did, seemed to do so begrudgingly) it seemed the last finger in the dyke could no longer resist, and when it broke there was no turning back.  It would be another 2 years before Sampras won his 14th – along the way he showed some flashes of his former self – that 2001 US Open quarterfinal with Agassi comes to mind, only to then lose rather tamely to Lleyton Hewitt in the final. When he finally got to number 14, there had been questions for 2 years of whether he still had the game, but more tellingly, it had to be asked whether he still had the heart. He had both, apparently, because he won – so what was the difference?

That damn record, that’s what.

With his white whale slaughtered, his inner Ahab died right along with it. Sampras made no secret of his love of the history of the game, and never shied away from number 13. Having achieved it, he seemed less than enthusiastic about the daily slog that is the ATP tour, and with a wife and baby on the way, who could blame him. But most importantly – every question had been answered, and but for one moment of defiance when the press began to target his wife with their cynicism, Sampras had little to prove, and very little pressure...and his results showed it.  

Interestingly, 2002 was the first year that the US Open went to 32 seeds, and as a result the 17th ranked player in the world (which happened to be Pete Sampras) received a seeding at the US Open for the first time. Had seeds been capped at their traditional 16, he may have faced Lleyton Hewitt in the first round, rather than Albert Portas. Maybe he would have won anyway, but it's interesting to ponder.

In 1984 John McEnroe went 74-2. He reached 3 grand slam finals, including his only final in Paris, obliterated Connors at Wimbledon, and then ran through the field at the US Open.  With the exception of a late night semi-final, also against Connors, that ended Sunday morning, his path to the final was fraught with the potential for a Herculean collapse. In the end, he returned and promptly dispatched Ivan Lendl in the final, the only player who had beaten him that year, who himself had struggled to a 5-set win over Pat Cash on the last truly Super Saturday, and was in worse shape than McEnroe.  

He held the #1 ranking for another year until he lost the US Open final in 1985 (also to Lendl, starting a string of 3 victories out of 8 finals in a row at Flushing) but tellingly that would be McEnroe's last grand slam final – afterwards family put the pressure of a tennis match in its proper perspective and lo and behold, McEnroe was never the same.  He didn't turn 30 until 1989, and his run in the Australian Open in 1990 made it clear that he was still capable of brilliance, but when the pressure of expectation disappeared, so too did his best results.

Mats Wilander reached the #1 ranking in 1988 by winning 3 out of 4 slams that year – the only jewel missing from his crown was Wimbledon – an irony probably not lost on him given that he won 2 Australian Opens on grass. But after reaching the end of the rainbow that year, with his beacon obscured by the haze of success, his accomplishments did more than dwindle – he never won another tournament, let alone a slam, and only briefly ever moonlighted again in the top 10 after amassing a hefty tally of seven majors in the first 6 years of his professional career.

There is a huge psychological component to tennis – and players talk a lot about dealing with the pressure.  It’s fascinating because of all the factors involved in a tennis match, pressure is the only one that is totally intangible, and as such, only exists in the mind if the player allows it.  What’s even more fascinating is that pressure appears to be an essential element to keeping a player sufficiently sharp and motivated to succeed, and yet, it is most often cited as a reason a player fails.

In the Wimbledon final this year, it was clear that in a couple of key moments in the match Andy Roddick succumbed to the pressure – namely that backhand volley that floated wide at set point in the 2nd set tie-break. Both players would have been forgiven for feeling the pressure at the moment, and apparently Federer handled it better. It would seem to follow logically that a player playing without pressure would play more freely and presumably achieve more success.

But ask yourself this – when you’re playing tennis are you sharper and more accurate when you’re just hitting, or when you start keeping score? Sure you'll hit a couple of bombs that you wouldn't hit in a match, but you're probably just that little bit more precise when it counts - and it only counts in your head unless you're a pro, so imagine what they're feeling.

I certainly hope that Federer will prove me wrong – perhaps he will prove the anomaly that the absence of pressure makes a great champion even greater, but somehow it doesn’t seem intuitive to me. Now that he has his 15th grand slam, he will be without the privilege of pressure, but will he succeed?

It seems BJK, in this and many other ways, is onto something.

A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS

There can no longer be any doubt - he is the best player in the world today, he has been for the last 12 months, and it's likely that he will remain the best player in the world for the remainder of 2009. With his maiden victory at the Australian Open, Rafael Nadal has shown that he may very well be chasing history of his own this year, with a calendar year Grand Slam - and it is likely to overshadaow that which has now become something of a distraction to that, which is Federer's pursuit of Pete Sampras' record 14 grand slams. For my money, it's now time to put aside the scrutiny and speculation on that.

In winning the Australian Open for the first time in his career, Nadal has now won 3 out of 4 slams, with only the US Open lacking in his cabinet. He also happens to have won 3 out of the last 4 grand slams, and bettered his initial results from 2009 by one better than his likely closest competitor. In the past, this part of the season for Nadal has focused on preparation for the clay court season, and a defense of (seemingly eternal) French Open crown, with a brief interlude for the two events at Indian Wells and Miami, which make absolutely no sense at all, but to which all players are obliged to make an appearance. Recall that last year he nearly won Miami, losing a strangely lobsided final against Davydenko, while the week previous lost a semi-final to Djokovic, who curiously is the only man to have beaten Nadal twice in 2008 (he did it again in Cincinnati before losing the final the Andy Murray).

This year, he'll be the favorite in those tournaments because of his results in Melbourne, but frankly, Nadal seems to have built the right to be considered the favorite in every match he plays because there are no longer any weaknesses or any holes in his game that anyone can find. What strikes the most about his victory in Australia is the manner in which it was won. Initially, he appeared to be having his way with a sub-par level of opponents, right up until the quarterfinal with Gonzalez, but even when facing the best losing performance of the tournament - a 95-winner slamfest from compatriot Verdasco, Nadal showed that his indominatable spirit would not be denied, as he put in a superior performance and most importantly with fewer errors and fewer aces to pad his numbers.

The final appeared to only be as close as it was because of the fatigue he must have felt from the 5-hour epic in the previous round. Even as his legs became wobbly, Nadal simply dug deeper than anyone else in the world could have, and went for broke. The fact is that when he had the chance to mentally check out, with a ready made excuse for losing, he chose to pull his socks up and go for broke over and over again. Whereas Federer, with ample opportunities to close out the first set, and the third, wilted under the pressure in a way we're more accustomed to seeing his opponents do against him.

But this is no ordinary opponent.

In the end, it was the most correct result possible, for if Nadal had lost the final, there would be an asterisk next to the loss due to the incredibly disproportionate scheduling that saw him play 24 hours after a 5 hour match. Thankfully that didn't happen, and clearly the best man won.

Although he will evade the question until the US Open, as he has craftily avoided the question of favorites and scheduling and everything else that could have derailed him today, it is not too early to begin to ask ourselves if this is the year that Nadal wins the calendar year Grand Slam. Defending his title in France will not be easy, but the unusually long break between the Australian Open and the French gives him plenty of time to rest and prepare for that one month between June and July that will determine if he enters the US Open with the chance to become the first man in 40 years and only third man in history to win this coveted prize.

Based on his performance today, and indeed over the last 12 months, only a fool would bet against him. And if he wins the calendar year grand slam and adds 3 more slams to his career total of 6, he'd be at 9 - one shy of Bill Tilden, 2 shy of Laver and Borg, and 3 shy of Emerson, 4 of Federer and 5 short of the great Pete Sampras.

A year ago, a blogger on another site posed the question of whether in Nadal, in 2008, we were were witnessing the birth of the GOAT, and many, including this author, scoffed at the notion. But based on his technique, his physical power, his tactical acumen and his sheer dominance of will, I won't be making that mistake again. It is entirely possible, and at this point appears likely that Rafael Nadal will become the greatest player in the history of the game. He will win the US Open eventually, he will win more French Opens, and Wimbledons and since he's only 22, with absolutely no sign of satisfying his appetite, it appears is well on his way to eclipsing Sampras within the next 3-4 years.

I wonder if the bookies have odds on that?