Well, I’ve given up waiting for an answer to my e-mail regarding the champagne giveaway that will take place tomorrow at the WTA Antwerp event, the grandly-named Proximus Diamond Games (what are we supposed to make of that bombastic title, that this is some sort of Low Country Throwdown on par with the Olympic Games? The Pan-American Games? The X Games?).
You may remember that, on the heels of some spirited and sometimes antagonistic debate over the purity of Kim Clijsters' intentions (not to mention the substantiality of her "Good Girl Kim" image), I decided to try to get some straight answers on whether or not Clijsters really was, as reported, shelling out something like a quarter-of-a-million bucks to thank her fans by buying every ticketholder a bottle of Infini champagne tomorrow.
So I wrote a detailed e-mail containing six clear and simple questions to "Organising Director" Bob Verbeeck and his minions (see my previous post, “Housekeeping Day”) at the PDG.
I never did get an answer, which is understandable. The PDG folks have had a lot of work to do, since Clijsters apparently experienced a miracle cure for the ankle she injured during her Australian Open semifinal encounter with Amelie Mauresmo. The diagnosis at that time (the end of January) was that Clijsters was looking at two-months-plus on the sidelines.
Guess what? She’s playing in the Proximus Diamond Games (details here), just about, oh, six weeks ahead of schedule. In fact, just 10 days after suffering the injury, Clijsters announced on her website that she might be good to go for the PDG.
Wouldn’t want to miss anything truly big-time, anything ending in that regal Games now, would we?
Gut reaction? Rafael Nadal should go and see the same doctor who whipped Kim Clijsters into shape. Or perhaps Kim tapped into a less traditional cure. Lourdes, I understand, is a relatively short haul from Clijsters' home in Bree. How about this: Kim filled a tub with Infini champagne and soaked her foot for three days and—presto!—bye-bye injury! Just imagine what actually drinking this stuff might do for you, and all you have to do is buy a ticket to . . . the Games.
Lacking a reply from Herr Organising Direktor Verbeeck, I had to rely on some of my moles in Antwerp and other choice listening posts in the pastoral Belgian countryside. I came up with a few interesting dissident opinions about Clijsters and her MO. At least one of these has to do with the geopolitics of superstardom in a postage-stamp-sized nation like Belgium.
It’s downright amazing—and hugely impressive—that Belgium has produced a pair of world No. 1 players—and from the same generation, no less. We mean, of course, Clijsters and her rival, Fed Cup Soul Sister—NOT!—Justine Henin-Hardenne.
Anyway, the geopolitically savvy (or is it merely skeptical) suggest that Clijsters, stung by H2’s swifter maturation (not to mention her far more appealing game), ceded her the high ground occupied by players known as consummate warriors—the Steffi Grafs, Chris Everts, and Billie Jean Kings.
Clijsters, who was blessed with the sunny, happy-go-lucky demeanor (and physical attributes) of a Bavarian milkmaid, quite naturally and happily slipped into her role as "Good Girl Kim," otherwise known as "The Girl Next Door Kim," "That Nice Girl Kim," or "The Girl Who Your Mom Wants You to Marry Kim."
To this school, the Clijsters champagne giveaway represents a novel way to woo the hearts of her countrymen away from the feral and combative H2: by getting them plastered. Yep. Don’t you remember that time Clijsters stood fans in pubs all across Belgium (OK, it’s not that far, but still. . .) to beers, on her tab? Heck, it worked that time, why not try it again, this time with champagne!
What’s she trying to do, turn her tiny homeland into Boozer Nation? Is she on the take from Alcoholics Anonymous? Maybe she figures the whole nation will eventually have a blackout and forget all about H2, with her four Grand Slam titles (to Clijsters' one) and nauseatingly beautiful backhand.
Hmmmm . . .
Now here’s something else you need to know. Herr Organising Direktor Verbeeck has become a close family friend of the Clijsterses’—so much so that it’s an open secret in Belgium that H2 wants no part of the PDG. Oh, sure, they love Venus Williams there, too. But Kimmy is the Queen Bee of the diamond games and everybody knows it—including her in-country rival.
Unfortunately, though, ticket sales for the Games declined by some 20,000 between 2004 and 2005, partly because of the en masse, last-minute defection or withdrawal by many big-name players from the event in 2004. Fans who bought tickets to see, among others, Venus, Jennifer Capriati, and Amelie Mauresmo, simply got hosed. Of course, that means pretty much all fans, because as much as we love Francesca Schiavone . . .
So, in order to help boost ticket sales and hype, Verbeeck announced tomorrow's champagne giveaway in late December of last year. Then, when Clijsters suffered injuries in Sydney and Melbourne that made her questionable for the PDG, Verbeeck announced that the champagne giveaway was going to happen in any event, even if Kim wasn't entered in the event. She was going to show up to pass out the bubbly (and ask her beloved fans to sign her cast?).
Verbeeck found a further way to keep the hype by announcing, just hours after Clijsters went down in Melbourne, that she had called him from Melbourne shortly after her ankle buckled to say that she felt bad for her fans, and therefore insisted on paying for the champagne.
Hmmmm . . .
One of my moles got talking with a marketing guy from wine merchant Mamaey (Infini is one of their labels), who admitted that the champagne giveaway was a huge promotional stunt for his firm, but he refused to disclose any details of the deal. So the general feeling I get is that this champagne giveaway was a master stroke by Verbeeck in consort with Clijsters’ image-makers.
Here’s some more interesting backstory: Verbeeck apparently wants Clijsters to take over the PDG after she retires (she’s announced that she’s calling it quits in 2008), much like former Wimbledon champ Richard Krajicek has become the front-man for the ATP Rotterdam event.
And keep in mind that if Clijsters makes her comeback in Antwerp, it will be the third time in a row that she returns to competition at a Verbeeck managed event. She made a heavily hyped comeback at Hasselt in September of 2004 (after a serious wrist injury), only to quit in the semis with a new but related injury. Then she made another headline-generating comeback last year, launching her best year to date.
So Clijsters clearly has some good mojo cooking with injuries, booze, Verbeeck, adoring fans—the whole nine!
My bottom line: The quality that bugs me most is hypocrisy. That’s why I never had a problem in this context with, say, Jimmy “I do the crime, I do the time” Connors, or Steffi “I’m outta here!” Graf. It's the manipulation I hold in contempt—the overt, "for show" kindness or charitable act that fails to move me.
This whole excercise, this whole, orchestrated, ham-fisted tiresome self-promotion (Look at me! Look how nice, nice, nice I am!) and hollow pandering to the fan base in such a giant, corporate, self-serving, cross-promotional way makes my teeth ache.
Clijsters may not be phony, and I really mean that. Maybe she's just incredibly naive (I doubt it, but I guess we have to leave the option open), dewey-eyed and oblivious to the way she is being used and the message she is sending. Perhaps she's a child of Hamlin, following the Pied Piper, Verbeeck.
I don't really care. This stunt is plastic. It undermines Kim's credibility. It makes me want to puke (kind of like bad champagne) even though I would have no problem with it—whatsoever—if those who engineered it would be transparent about the details.