When it comes to individual sports, there’s nothing like team play to bring out the best in America’s opponents. This weekend we got a good look at the phenomenon in both tennis and golf.
First, there was the Ryder Cup (it was easier to see, certainly, than the Davis Cup, which was broadcast on the Outdoor Life Network, a channel most tennis fans didn’t even know they had!). For the second straight time, a group of all-world U.S. golfers were outclassed by a relatively unsung team of Europeans. It wasn’t that the Americans cared about the event less, at least consciously. By all accounts they had left no stone unturned in their preparation, and everyone from Tiger Woods on down appeared to be treating it like a major championship. The Europeans were loose and relaxed by comparison, but they were also the ones who raised their level of play over the weekend. Sergio Garcia, the best player never to win a major and noted choker in big tournaments, again thrived on the one-on-one, match-play competition and went undefeated until Sunday. As with all his teammates, the importance of Ryder Cup is something Garcia long ago internalized—the whole thing comes naturally to him. Unlike the Americans, there’s no need for the Euros to build the competition up in their minds, so they don’t put extra pressure on themselves when they get out on the course.
The team concept doesn’t come as naturally to U.S. professional athletes, whether it’s golf, basketball, or tennis. In the Open era, top U.S. tennis players have only sporadically given Davis Cup any importance. Jimmy Connors couldn’t deal with anything that didn’t revolve around Jimmy Connors, and as they got older Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi left the competition behind. The Slams were what U.S. players were all about. Only John McEnroe, a team-sports lover and former soccer player (more on that connection later), was unconditionally dedicated to the Cup.
The current U.S. team—Roddick, Blake, and the Bryans—cares, conspicuously, about Davis Cup, and that’s literally a story in itself. On daviscup.com last week, there was an article about the Americans by Sandra Harwitt entitled “Friends Forever.” Echoing much of the press coverage of the U.S. Ryder Cup team, Harwitt told anyone who was still skeptical that the Americans “have embraced the team concept” and “become the best of buddies.” No doubt true, but it wasn’t a point that needed to be made about any of the other countries that were playing this weekend. They probably would have been sickened by the idea anyway. Can you imagine the reaction of Safin, Tursunov, or Shamil Tarpischev, the no-nonsense Russian captain, to an article about them called “Friends Forever”?
But, just as in Ryder Cup, while the U.S. team pledged its allegiance to team play, it was the Russians who spent the weekend raising their games. Here’s a quick match-by-match look at how both semifinal ties—Russia/USA and Argentina/Australia—unfolded.
Russia d. USA 3-2
I wonder if the Outdoor Life Network was unhappy about broadcasting a tie that was played indoors—“Dammit, is it too late to show Argentina-Australia instead?” They could have done better than keep Barry Mackay as an announcer. I know some of you like the guy, but perhaps it’s time for him to think about hanging up his mike. Mackay called Andy Roddick “Sampras” more than once, claimed that there was a lot of “tenseness in the air,” and made this stunning insight about two-time Grand Slam champion Marat Safin: “He’s got talent.”
Marat Safin d. Andy Roddick 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (5)
The talented Mr. Safin, who led Russia to its only Cup, in 2002, is more comfortable and focused in this setting. And that’s not a good thing for his opponents. There was no racquet tossing, no hung head, no lumbering angst from the Russian. This was no place for drama, just heavy serves and ground strokes, and a terrific touch lob that I haven’t seen him hit in years. It also helped that he was playing on slow red clay, because Roddick looked stuck in it. The American was on the defensive and off his game all day, hitting from his back foot, pulling forehands into the alley, shanking returns into the stands, floating drop shots too deep. Roddick kept turning his hat back and forth with each changeover, but he never got comfortable, with his game or with the divot-filled surface, which the Russians had laid down just a week before. Roddick finally lost it after about the 50th bad bounce, screaming “This court f----ing sucks!”
Mikhail Youzhny d. James Blake 7-5, 6-1, 1-6, 7-5
Youzhny didn’t raise his game so much as maintain the high level he had achieved at the U.S. Open two weeks ago. Like all the Russians, the guy is an explosive athlete, and he’d make an entertaining addition to the top of the game if he can stay there. He blistered Blake with his spectacular sliding, fully-open-stance forehand and a backhand that the American said was “hard to read.” Youzhny’s backhand is odd; it’s a one-hander, but he brings his other arm around with the stroke as if he’s still hitting a two-hander. I’m not sure if his contact point is different from most one-handers (it looks higher), but whatever he’s doing it’s working. Youzhny played upbeat tennis (particularly for a Russian) and hit winners from defensive positions all afternoon. Blake had no answers except to stay with the kind of low-percentage, first-strike tennis that doesn’t work on clay.
Bob and Mike Bryan d. Youzhny and Dmitry Tursunov 6-3, 6-4, 6-2
It’s always amazing how two mediocre singles players can come together on a court and make two top-class athletes look like they don’t know how to play tennis. Correct positioning and movement, as well as crisp volleys, were all the Bryans needed.
Tursunov d. Roddick 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6, 17-15
It was quite a luxury for Tarpischev to be able to keep the No. 5 player in the world, Nikolay Davydenko—who was apparently exhausted and out of favor with the captain after playing in China last week—on the bench and still bring out a Top 20 talent like Tursunov. That wasn't the end of the Russians' depth either. Cheering from the sidelines was a player in a knit cap who I vaguely recognized. When he took the cap off, I realized it was the long lost Igor Andreev, the last man to beat Rafael Nadal on clay. He wasn’t even on the Russians’ roster.
To say that Tursunov came out “firing on all cylinders” is a serious understatement. He was hitting so big that Roddick, who’s 6-foot-3, looked physically small across from him. That’s a strange description, I know, but I’d never seen Roddick look less intimidating on a tennis court. Tursunov was so dialed in that he was taking Roddick’s biggest first serves and hitting them well out in front of him, often for winners. Tursunov’s forehand was mind-boggling; his long crosscourt running winners had Roddick talking to himself. I can't find a stat for how many forehand winners the Russian had; let’s just put the number at “ungodly” for now.
Just as impressive was the way Roddick hung in. He stayed close with his serve in the third set and began playing an old-fashioned clay-court match, digging, scrambling, slicing, even sliding now and then. Tursunov, who should have finished it in three, tightened up. By the fourth set, Roddick was using his wide serve effectively and taking control of the rallies for the first time all afternoon.
Roddick, miraculously, fought well enough to serve for the match at 6-5 in the fifth. But Tursunov chose that game to start firing again. Roddick was broken when he mistimed a routine forehand and pulled it wide. As far as I could remember, it was the first bad shot he’d hit in three sets. Tragic. By the end, both players were like punched-out fighters who couldn’t finish each other. Or even move fast enough to return a serve: Tursunov hit 18 aces in the fifth set alone.
Credit Roddick: He may never play well on clay or win another major or hit a single pretty shot, but Sunday he showed that there’s at least one American athlete who understands what competing for a team is all about.
