Howdy. I’m back after a bit of R&R on the heels of a spectacular—and exhausting—French Open. I just spent a long weekend on the east end of Long Island, fly-fishing for striped bass and bluefish with a good buddy and fishing guide, David Blinken. My wife and our little boy Luke joined me for the weekend part. As a result, I missed New York’s famous Puerto Rican Day Parade. Shucks.
Theoretically, a blogger is a commentator who operates free of the usual journalistic constraints, which range from heavy editorial vetting to striving for some semblance of objectivity (a false goal, in my opinion; the grail in responsible journalism is nothing more—or less—than fairness). But TennisWorld isn’t a typical blog. Yes, it’s opinion-based (and it makes no bones about it). But TW is dedicated to bringing its readers news and timely analysis, and often before it’s available in the dead-tree configuration of newspapers and magazines, or even through the relatively speedy television news cycles. That’s a brand-new, nuclear-grade capacity, and it’s an especially valuable one for a sport that is too often either neglected or willfully undervalued by the mainstream media. Taking on the tennis-hostile elements in the mainstream media is definitely part of our TW mandate.
Think of it this way—TENNIS, a monthly magazine, can now go toe-to-toe with newspapers and video news. We can now serve as your primary source for what’s happening in tennis. Of course, competing with large mainstream news organizations (they have great resources; on the other hand, they often have no special insight into the subject they’re swarming all over) is a daunting mission. The pursuit of that goal at Grand Slam tournaments literally boiling over with news results in 14-hour workdays and some not-entirely-clean copy. After a while, you just go cross-eyed looking at this stuff. And after an 8- or 10- or 12-day stretch you’re ready to echo the once-legendary fighter Roberto Duran: No Mas!
Translation: I was whipped by the end of Roland Garros.
But I was also very gratified by the large numbers of readers TW has attracted. So this is both a thank you for reading and an attempt to explain in a little more detail what this blog is all about.
Now, over the next few days, I’ve got to find the rhythm again in the run-up to Wimbledon.
A week from today, I turn the reins over to Steve Tignor, TENNIS Magazine’s managing editor, who’ll be blogging the first week of Wimbledon for you live from London. Then, as in Paris, I’ll take over to cover Week Two of the third Grand Slam of 2005.