Tennis, as I wrote more than once last month, had a good February. But the winds went out of those sails on Monday, when Maria Sharapova announced that she had failed a drug test. Even the sight of Gael Monfils hotdogging his way across Madison Square Garden on Tuesday night couldn’t rescue World Tennis Day from the shadow of Maria and her meldonium.
That story isn’t going away, and it shouldn’t. But if anything can shake the game from its funk, it’s the sight of the Indian Wells Tennis Garden on a cloudless March day. The draws have been made, and the qualifying matches are underway at the year’s first ATP Masters 1000 and WTA Premier Mandatory event. Here’s a look at what we’ll see on the men’s side.