Frankenplayer

I had a good time cruising through the DIY Champion Comments, although I regret having not thought it through for a little longer before posting. This blogging certainly is a "Feed the Beast" enterprise, and I always feel like I'm behind when I can't just focus on the tennis in front of my eyes, as I do when posting from a tournament site. For instance, I should have had a lob category, and certainly service return, too.

I think MWC created the Frankenplayer most capable of beating Federer on the surface of TMF's choice. I admit this is partly because MWC's composite had a reasonable dose of old-school players. One of the cruelest things about tennis is how fast we forget. It's amazing, the degree to which today's icon is tomorrow's "Oh, him! Remind me again, what did he accomplish?" geezer. It's the payback, I suppose, in a sport so based on immediate results. It's not that there's anything wrong with the "who's great now?" approach; it's just that in an age - and sport - in which superlatives are distributed so freely, we tend to de-value the past in direct proportion to the degree to which we worship the present.

In my own time as a journalist, I've heard the GOAT label applied  - even if it was just as a question, as in, "Is so-and-so the Greatest of All-time?" -  to at least five  male players: Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, Bjorn Borg, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer. Every generation seems to have its GOAT candidate, but who thinks back to the 1970s (Rod Laver, Roy Emerson, et al), the 1960s (Pancho Gonzalez), the 1950s (Jack Kramer), etc.? So I like it when someone hat-tips players whom few, if any, TW readers have actually seen in action And on this subject, seeing truly is believing.

Here's my own composite, Frankenplayer, then, with commentary:

Legs, footwork - Bjorn Borg. The guy couldn't volley, but served-and-volleyed with astonishing success at Wimbledon. This is a tribute to his amazing nimbleness, because anyone who saw him volley on grass knows that it was strictly wing-and-a-prayer material. Oddly enough, the "dead" nature of grass actually made his feeble  volleys highly effective. Rafael Nadal, Lleyton Hewitt and Marcos Baghdatis show how much of a factor foot speed and court coverage can be, but Borg was the equal of any of them.

Mid-section, torso - Andre Agassi. Anybody who can get so much out his trunk when returning serve (he barely used a backswing) has got some amazing co-ordination. Runner-up: Miloslav Mecir, who had a long, long torso and used it exceptionally well.

Height- I'll take Marat Safin. In his U.S. Open win over Pete Sampras in 2000, he showed what the combination of height, shot placement and pace can achieve. It was the best example I've ever seen of tight, economical tennis - the ultimate marriage of form and function, considerably abetted by his height and reach.

Head - Mats Wilander. There are three components to having a good head in tennis. The first is confidence and eagerness (see "N" for Nadal). The second is mental toughness, expressed as courage( in Ernest Hemingway's famous construction, "the ability to show grace under fire"  (see "B" for Borg). The third is being tough-minded enough to adapt to the game you're facing, while you're facing it (look under "W' for Wilander).  Wilander gets my nod though, because, until his premature burnout, he combined those three qualities better than anyone else.

In 1988, Wilander went into the U.S. Open with a chance to become the first man to win three Grand Slam titles since Jimmy Connors in 1974 (anyone volunteer to fact check that?) and the challenge of wrenching the No. 1 ranking away from Ivan Lendl - In addition, he was under pressure to win either of the two titles he hadn't captured, the U.S. Open or Wimbledon (which he never did win), in order to solidify his reputation. Wilander rose to the call and played the most textured and intelligent match I've ever seen.

Serve - Goran Ivanisevic. Back in the days of old when knights were bold and all that, being a lefty with a big slice to the ad-court was a huge asset and weapon. Too bad those days are gone, because there's only so much that even a Federer can do against a wicked slice on a fast surface. As some baseball player once said after a Nolan Ryan no-hitter: "You can't hit what you can't see."

Forehand - Pete Sampras. It wasn't the biggest, it was merely the best - versatile and much, much heavier than it may have looked due to Sampras's laconic style.

Backhand - John McEnroe. Angles, anyone? He sliced with devastating effect when he wanted to get to net, rolled over the ball when he was playing defense or looking to put away a shot. This, BTW, is a recurring theme: lefties = backhand, righties = forehand. It kind of plays into the old taboos, too, doesn't it? (the Latin for left is "sinistra", from which we derive the word "sinister", and nobody talks about anyone rendering a "forehanded compliment.")  Runner-up: Jimmy Connors, the man with the most versatile, reliable, backhand rallying tool in the business.

Forehand Volley - John Newcombe. He's to the forehand volley what Sampras is to the forehand. Meat-and-potatoes, for sure, but man, did that ball come off the racquet with pop and sting! Runner-up: Boris Becker. It was never pretty, but it always got the job done.

Backhand Volley - Stefan Edberg. I don't know if it was his footwork (In the Edberg lexicon, "to run" is synonymous with "to glide"), or his racquet work, but Edberg's off-side volley was a thing of beauty, hit with deadly underspin.

Drop shot - Rod Laver. I remember seeing Laver hit a backhand drop shot from the baseline in the middle of a rally and danged if his opponent didn't just stop dead in his tracks, knowing he was beaten. Runner-up: McEnroe, in a horse race.

Overhead Smash - Ken Rosewall. It's an odd pick, I know, but Rosewall was such a control freak that he even hit the overhead with a signature dose of his touch. From anywhere on the court, he would backpedal a step or two and then hit an overhead that put paid to any notions his opponent may have had about getting into one of those theatrical scenarios: you smash, I run and lob, you smash, I run farther and lob, you smash and I run into the flower beds, the crowd goes Ohhhhhhhhh. .  .we feel like big stars! When  you lobbed Rosewall, unless you were perfect, he put the lob away. Runner-up: Sampras, for exactly the opposite reasons, as demonstrated by his show-stopping slam-dunk overhead.

Return of Serve - Jimmy Connors. Nobody attacked the serve the way that Connors did, reversing the conventional logic about who 's in charge of any given service game. Runner-up: Andre Agassi, who put the server on the defensive with less aggression but an equal -or greater - amount of control.

Lob - Ilie Nastase. Rod Laver is credited with popularizing the highly risky topspin lob, but Nastase perfected it. He hit the topspin lob on the run or from a standstill, from the backhand or forehand side. In Nasty's hands, the lob was every bit as much of a weapon as a crosscourt backhand or big serve, to the extent that it could almost be described as groundstroke, hit fat. Runners-up: Newcombe had a fantastic, sneaky, no-fills lob, and Connors (a Nastase protege) also hit a great offensive lob off either wing. Mourn the artful lob, another casualty of this minimalist era of the New World Game (all-court or baseline tennis, conducted with a forehand prejudice).

Tomorrow: red meat on Ion Tiriac, the original Dr. Frankenplayer.