Shadow Dwellers

Unlike those of  you who were glued to the television over the weekend, I managed to catch only bits and pieces of the USA vs. Sweden Davis Cup tie, but one bit I caught appears to have been the most critical moment of the tie: Mike and Bob Bryan's clutch first-set tiebreaker performance at the Scandinavium. The Bryans won it, 13-11, and how about that volley Mike Bryan made off a whistling Jonas Bjorkman return, right to his feet, which would have given the Swedes the set?

Can you say: Set-saving miracle shoe-top, let-cord volley?

As the ancient Davis Cup prophet (that would be me) sayeth: Beware doubles. . .

If you have any doubts about that injunction, just look at what happened in Ramat Hasharon, Israel: Jonathan Erlich and Andy Ram beat the former Olympic Games gold medalists, Fernando Gonzalez and Nicholas Massu, to set the stage for Dudi Sela's Davis Cup Moment - a tie-clinching upset of Gonzalez. I posted some thoughts on the most interesting story of this latest NOW (Nationalism Orgy Weekend, aka Davis Cup) over at ESPN. And I'll be doing a chat there on Wednesday at 1 PM, so drop by with a question- on any subject -  if you're around then.

Back to Andy. The win over Sweden and, even more importantly, the upcoming final against Russia, gives Roddick a much-deserved reason to feel great about 2007. He's been able to get back inside the shadow cast by Roger Federer, which is a better place to be than outside of it (which is where everyone else but Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic exists, broiling in the hot sun). But given the kind of competitor Roddick is, he has to be the least satisfied of the shadow dwellers. Nadal bagged his major, and Djokovic made great strides in his quest for one. Roddick, though, hit the Federer wall - again.

You can be as cynical about this as you like, but I'm convinced that if the USA wins the Davis Cup (we host a deep, tough Russia squad at the end of the year), it will save Roddick's year. The main theme, in his own mind as well as those like mine, will not be "dude can't beat Federer" but "dude rocks the Davis Cup." This is partly because Roddick's clinching, fourth-rubber win on Sunday (and I don't care how old Yo-nas is), along with the high quality of his performance over the past few years, has been admirable and honorable.

Oh, the US wouldn't be where it is today without the Bryan brothers, but this is Andy's team. He's been playing to defend and advance a great tradition of something more than excellence - we have had excellence galore in Davis Cup. The main tradition he's advancing is that of dedication and commitment to Davis Cup - something that isn't a given in the US, for a host of reasons both within and without the players' control.

And bear in mind that we are in an era when the US is just another squad: it's Slovakia, or Argentina, or Serbia. Nothing more and nothing less. Just another in a group of nations that is only going to win by virtue of epic effort, nerve, a little luck, and passion. We are no longer the team that, should all other things be equal, prevails. This has been a great thing for DC in general, and I'm starting to think that maybe it's a great thing for Davis Cup in the US, too. Maybe going in as - at best - a pick 'em to win, after 14 years of frustration, will capture the imagination of American sports fans.

Nobody understands this better than Roddick, who has watched US supremacy in the competition decline in his own lifetime. That's why I believed him unequivocally when he said, "If I don’t win another match between now and the final but we win the final, I’ll take that.”

The humorous dimension of this situation came into high relief when he amplified by adding: “This is my No. 1 priority for the rest of the year, and I’ll be discussing my tournament schedule with Jimmy [Connors, his coach] and Patrick [McEnroe, his team captain] to make sure I look after my body and it’s right where it needs to be for the final.”

Jimmy Connors, part of a selfless Davis Cup effort - imagine that!

Now I am also enough of a realist to assume that Roddick, having pulled out of a host of fall European- tour indoor events, is not exactly going to be moping around when his colleagues send him those Wish You WereHere postcards from Vienna, Basel, Paris. But there will be a potential rankings hit if Roddick keeps his powder dry for Shanghai and the Davis Cup, so there is some cost involved in the strategy he seems to have embraced. The important thing is that Roddick, like the most hard-bitten of Davis Cup stalwarts, is going to cowboy up and win the Cup or die trying. If you're a Davis Cup junkie like me, you've got to tip your hat.

Two other notes on Davis Cup:

I was sorry to see the Swiss go down in flames to the Czech Republic after The Mighty Fed did everything humanly possible to advance the cause of The Big White Plus Sign. I'd love to see TMF carry Switzerland to the a Cup title, the way Bjorn Borg carried Sweden in 1975 [this correction of date appended; hat tip to Comment poster Paranoid Android] but, sheesh, Wawrinka, will you get with the friggin' program please? Even TMF needs a little help, at least in Davis Cup.

Federer has the makings of a great Davis Cup leader (the player part is a given; if this hombre ever knew what it was like to choke, he's forgotten) and I think he'd be deeply satisfied by the mission. The best you can say about the situation is that Davis Cup is one less worry for TMF for 2008 - unless he has to go and lay a beatdown on some poor schmoes from Monaco or Yemen in order to help get TBWPS back up to the World Group playoffs.

And lastly - how badly does Germany suck? I don't mean the current squad, which did a great job getting to the semifinals, only to lose in a decisive fifth rubber. But Germany, a nation that knows a thing or two about nationalism, group-think, teamwork, et al, just hasn't been able to pull its Davis Cup act together. What is this, some weird form of atonement? Tommy Haas, Nicolas Kiefer, a few doubles specialists here and there - these guys should be in the mix all the time (barring injury, which has admittedly been a factor in German fortunes).

It wasn't so long go that Boris Becker and his minions (semi-including that prominent dissenter from Becker-love, Michael Stich) were a Davis Cup force, and while Haas is no Becker, he's got the guns, enthusiasm and leadership qualities to make Germany a factor. I don't know if the tiresome rivalry between Haas and Kiefer rivalry is a factor in the current state of affairs (German readers?); if so , get over it, boys: It's Tommy's team, everybody else just shut-up and play. That's an order and you're supposed to be good at taking those, right?

On an even broader platform incorporating depth-of-field on the tour, Germany is in even more woeful shape. This nation has everything required to be a force in tennis: a prosperous society, a great tradition in the game, a host of tournaments including a Master Series event, a deep well of coaching talent and facilities. So where are the players?

Rant over; your turn.