Year-End Plans

The season’s over, aren’t we supposed to be happy? I guess it’s another case of “be careful what you wish for,” because the only tennis news around right now is how Roger Federer was snubbed by Sports Illustrated in its Sportsman of the Year voting in favor of the Miami Heat's Dwyane Wade. Sad to say, but it never crossed my mind that Federer would get it, not because he wasn't the best choice (he was, and I think I any reasonable non-tennis fan would agree), but because SI, following SportsCenter’s lead, has long pushed the Big Three U.S. sports (baseball, basketball, and football) at the expense of all others because they deliver a captive audience of impressionable young men. Hard to believe now, but in the mid-70s, SI’s star writer, Frank DeFord, was assigned largely to tennis—he did four major features on the sport each year. As a kid, seeing Bjorn Borg on the cover of SI after he won Wimbledon wasn't just a nice bonus; it was part of the experience and just as thrilling as watching the tournament. That's how powerful the magazine was, and perhaps still is, to the young sports audience.

I know it’s a chicken-and-egg question, but I’ve always thought that if SportsCenter covered tennis even semi-prominently, and SI put the winner of each major on its cover, those two things alone would be enough to significantly boost the popularity of tennis in this country. An audience can only take what its given by the media, after all—witness poker. Or Dancing with the Damn Stars.

Still, SI has made some inspired choices for SOTY in the past (Arthur Ashe in 1992, for example), but this was not one of them. I could see Tiger Woods getting it for his resurgence and dominance, or, as Tony Kornheiser suggested on PTI, the New Orleans Saints for bringing some positive energy to their city. Or Jim Leyland for the same reason. I may have even voted for Lito Sheppard for his interception in Philly on Monday. But Wade? Love to watch him go to the hole, but the guy is a member of a team. With Shaquille O’Neil. Coached by Pat Riley. This was the perfect chance to make the U.S. sports audience at large take its first long look at Federer, a potentially historic figure.

But like I said, I wasn’t surprised. I can remember walking to the newsstand after Pete Sampras broke the major-title record at Wimbledon thinking SI would have to honor him with the cover this time. Instead I got a sweaty (and likely ’roided up) Jason Giambi staring at me under a headline about baseball’s new power game. Look how well that trend has aged.

OK, it’s behind us; it’s time to wrap up the 2006 season. I’ll do that next week with a special guest, Hank Moravec, better known as Dunlop Maxply here and at Tennis World, and famous for being pretty much dead-on about everything to do with the sport. We’ll discuss the year-that-was starting Monday.

The week after, I’ll finish the year with a weeklong tribute to one of my favorite players, Andre Agassi, in the form of the Book Club. Kamakshi and will be doing some literary criticism of The Agassi Story, by Andre’s father, Mike. I’m only a few pages in, but it looks like an entertaining read.