Greetings, Tribe. This will be your Off-Off-Topic post for a weekend, just in case it rains and you need something to talk about. I returned from Los Angeles late yesterday, after Pete Sampras and I did another solid taping for his autobiography (eight hours worth)on Wednesday. I think Pete is enjoying this process, partly because, as he says, it keeps making him remember things he never even knew were there on the hard drive. It's always like that, when you're working on a book or some sort of memoir. It's amazing what a little concerted thinking will do for you. I will soon publish details Pete's upcoming, fall series of exhibitions against Roger Federer in the Far East.
On Wednesday evening, after wrapping things up with Pete, I went out to dinner with some of our Left Coast Tribesmen and women - Dunlop Maxply (Hank) and Beth, who brought along their Significant Others: Beth's husband, Mark, and Hank's lithe and willowy girlfriend, Tracy. We had dinner in Manhattan Beach, at a fish place called Rocky's. Hank, who drives a classy white Dodge Magnum station wagon, had a Roger Federer-esque vibe going. He wore nicely cut slacks and an olive shirt outside his trousers: very casual but neat. Tracy, who is an attorney, just like Hank, looked tres chic in black top and trousers. She's a former cross-country runner and recreational tennis player.
Beth, of course, is a California hottie-mommy. She was wearing pirata-style jeans and the red pumps she bought to celebrate Jet Boy's win at the French Open. Her husband, Mark, is a surfin' and snowboardin' surgeon with a pleasantly wicked sense of humor. They're the cool parents some of you had - and others wished you had. They recently hosted a prom party for 80 for their daughter, Missy, at their home in Palos Verdes. That takes Wilanders, no?
At Indian Wells last February, Richard Gasquet kept trying to start a conversation with Missy, who was appropriately unimpressed by his fumbling: I am French and sorry I don't speak English but what the hail, I might as well take a shot efforts. Apparently, Missy is crazy about Jet Boy - has her room papered with posters and other iconic images.
You know, I'm aware I left you all hanging with my recent What Happens in Beverly Hills post, and I confess that I knew some of you would find it too naughty and coy of me to end the entry that way. But I had a real and serious reason for doing so. The conversations Pete and Roger Federer had when they hit for a few days in California were private -something I had to remind myself about when writing my post. They weren't intended for consumption by the press or public at-large, partly because no player wants certain elements of his overall approach to the game or his rivals made public. Pete himself was always very shrewd about that. He wouldn't even admit for the record that he suffered from Thalasemia, a blood-iron deficiency common in men of Mediterranean descent, until his career was over.
And I can tell you from the ground we covered in our interviews that Pete's strategies against rivals like Andre Agassi, Jim Courier, and Stefan Eberg were closely-guarded secrets. None of them were very complicated; in fact, all of them were stunning in their simplicity and cut-to-the-chase efficiency, often leaving me thinking, Oh, that makes sense! How come none of the pundits ever really got it?
Some of you the Bev Hills post wondered if Pete bought Roger's explanation, and the answer is a resounding "hail yes!" Always remember that great champs are basically simple, cold-eyed folks who know enough not to argue with success. Pete would never say TMF needs to volley more at Wimbledon, simply because Roger seems to be doing more than fine the way he plays. The real issue here is why TMF has volleyed less at recent Wimbledons, and whether or not that is the best long-term strategy.
This is moot at the moment, but let's say he and Nadal get to the final, and Jet Boy wins. That's when things get interesting in this debate. TMF KADs may dismiss that possibility, but to me it's a real one. If Bjorn Borg could win so often at Wimbledon - back when the grass was fast and the balls were hard (another interesting topic I ought to address) - you'd have to be plum crazy to underestimate Jet Boy. And remember that last year, Nadal came within a few points of making that final a far more interesting dogfight than it ultimately was. In a way, it was a testament to the secret life of grass-court tennis, in which two or three points can change the entire complexion of a match. They didn't do that last year, but that was then and this is now. Scoff at your peril, I say.
You can assume from this that whatever TMF and Jet Boy - for instance - are thinking about each other, not a great deal of it goes out to the public, except in the most vague of ways. For instance, if Roger feels that he absolutely needs to pull Rafa off the court with his slice serve to the backhand in the deuce court (an entirely theoretically scenario, of course) to open up the forehand court, he will never explain that in a press conference, or let on to how important a part of his game plan it is, even if someone has picked up on it. You can't blame these guys for playing it so close to the vest; when it comes to anything beyond the banal generalities of a match-up, they ain't sayin' nothin'. Here's something for you: guess who really scared Pete, really scared him in a way that Andre Agassi did not. Post your guess in the Comments below,and I'll you if you get it right.
I can tell you this, though - Pete and The Mighty Fed had plenty of conversations during their Champions' Orietation in Beverly Hills: they would hit for a bit and then just talk for a while, sometimes a surprisingly long while, each of them asking the other how he handled certain aspects of his career, certain tournaments, or other players.
I'll be back later, but I'm preparing for my flight over on Sunday. The TWCTS, the TennisWorld Chica Transport Service is standing by: Rosangel is picking me up at the airport and we're going to have dinner. Then I hit the ground running at Wimbledon on Monday. I'll have a post up over at ESPN later today, on Jet Boy, so drop by if you get a moment.