Howdy. I’m back from a slightly extended vacation, part of which was spent at the beach (wife Lisa’s preferred outdoor environment), and part of which was spent visiting with friends on the Down East coast of Maine, just across the bay from Bar Harbor. Lisa couldn’t make that leg, as she started a new job on Monday, but Little Son Luke did, and he had three of the world’s cutest little girls for playmates most days, daughters of my friends Crocker and Stacia Nevin, Katherine, Lindsay and Margaret.
At one point, Luke and Margaret, who at three-and-a-half years is just three months younger than Luke, were playing house at parallel cypress trees. Luke wandered over and said: “Can I come to your house?
“Yes,” she said.
“Can I sleep over?” he added.
“Yes.”
“Can I spend the night with you?”
Whoa, buckaroo!
Well, I guess you’d all rather get down to business, given that tennis is building critical mass toward the U.S. Open, and a lot has transpired while I was away. One more thing before we move on, though:
I want to thank Steggy, TennisWorld’s Hillbilly Princess (do any of you other Elders play tennis in black high-top Converse Chuck Taylors?), for the wonderful Mistress of Ceremonies job she did while I was way. I'm so happy to see how well the entire TennisWorld tribe responded to the situation, and isn't it great to see that Lucy, or MIA Elder, is back among us? So thanks, everyone, especially those of you who took the time and trouble to write posts.
I not only thought it was great to have some of our regular comment posters write entries while I was away, but apparently readers did too: Traffic was up some 10 per cent while I was away, which leads me into our welcome home topic: Who’s Got Your Back (In His Crosshairs)?
During vacation, Greg Garber of ESPN.com called me. He’s mostly an NFL writer/feature presenter, but he enjoys and knows tennis and writes about it when they lengthten the leash. He was curious to know what I thought about young guns like Tomas Berdych, Novak Djokovic, Gael Monfils, Richard Gasquet, Tommy Robredo and some of the others who have cracked the Top 20, and of whom some people expect great things.
My first reaction was that they were a tribute to the dizzying parity among nations in tennis today. The Argentineans and Spanish seem to have the numbers game won, hands down, when it comes to populating the tour. But there’s just one reason they can’t be considered dynasties on the classic American or Australian model: They don’t win many Grand Slam titles. In fact, considering the breadth of talent in those nations – I’m talking about types of talent, as in dogged baseliner, artistic all-courter, etc. – and the basic versatility of so many of their players, their lack of performance at the highest level is striking.
I mean, you’ve got Guillermo Coria and David Nalbandian, and the guy who wins Roland Garros is Gaston Gaudio? You’ve got former World No. 1 Carlos Moya and Juan Carlos Ferrero, a semifinalist or better at four straight French Opens, starting at age 20, and Jet Boy Rafael Nadal, and the total take at the only tournaments that matter is four, (two of them by the guy who may break the mold, the stripling Nadal)?
I say Red Sox Nation is a land without borders, incorporating Comodoro Rivadavia and the outer precincts of Castellon de la Plana.
This ties into my conversation with Greg because I realized while talking to him that the one thing's changed enormously in the past few decades in tennis, and continues to change, is the pressure exerted on the players from below.
It used to be that a really good player could crack the Top 20 after serving a basic tour apprenticeship of three or four years, and then rest fairly content there for a leisurely period – what, 12 to 18 months? – before he was forced to Cowboy Up and take a shot at getting to the next level, or even the highest level.
These days, though, you’ve just got so many gifted players floating around, lurking in the sea weed or even the coral caves at lower depths of the talent pool, that nobody has the sheer psychic space to rest easy and plan the next move. A guy like Berdych is constantly in Tora! Tora! Tora! mode, because a “non-contender” like Fernando Gonzalez, Tommy Haas, Mario Ancic, Sebastian Grosjean, Mark Philippoussis lies in wait. And that’s just in the second round.
Among the young guns, Djokovic falls into either category at the moment – he’s both a rising guy who’s got to watch his back, and a guy sneaking up on some poor sod who isn’t watching his own (Tommy can you hear me? You too, Nikolay and Ivan!).
I guess that’s what they mean by parity, which is no stop-the-presses news. But I think few people really appreciate how much commuting goes on these days between the Slough of Despond and the Lagoon of Livin’ Large. To appreciate the degree of volatility, just compare the men’s and women’s games. The ranking history for the women is stable, while the ranking itinerary for men these days seems to be charted by Jacques Costeau – or Edvard Munch.
Right now, I can think of only two male big wave surfers: Roger Federer and Nadal. And I can think of just one among the women: Justine Henin-Hardenne - although a U.S. Open win or final by Amelie Mauresmo would certainly put her into that category.
The poster boy for this entire trend is Marat Safin. Twenty-five years ago (Yeeesh, has it been that long?), Safin is Ilie Nastase: always a contender at Grand Slams, a lurker in the top 5 to 10 despite the inexplicable first and second round losses. Marat is not true contender that Grand Slams at this point (of course, he will now go out and win the U.S. Open), and those losses are anything but inexplicable. And don’t blame it on the meltdowns; they’re tepid stuff compared to what Nastase used to go through.
Marat is swimming with sharks; the bottlenose dolphins have all been et. It's almost like there's no such thing as a bad loss anymore simply because there are so many fine players. When you swim with the sharks, losing an arm leaves you feeling like you got off easy. Of course, the players know this better than anyone, and this softens the blow of a bad loss. See the cycle building here?
Given Nadal’s relatively disappointing results since Wimbledon, and Federer’s tetchy loss to Andy Murray in Cincinnati, Kim Clijsters “same old Kimmy” year and Serena’s issues, this is shaping up as a truly unpredictable U.S. Open, which is why making a prediction has a certain Wheel-of-Fortune charm. It’s a win-win situation; because of the parity, you don’t need to feel like an idiot if, say, The Mighty Fed flames out. And if Marco Baghdatis wins the Open – presto! – you’re a seer in your own time
All of this should make for a profoundly interesting Open. I had to pick tournament winners for the website today, and I went with Lleyton Hewitt and Henin-Hardenne, although I’m officially amending my men’s pick (blame it on vacation decompression) to Marcos Baghdatis.
Jeez, but it’s good to be back.
P.S. TW's Spiritual Advisor, Miguel"I play just like Federer except that I have a forehand dropshot" Seabra sent me a few posts from fair Portugal. I'll start putting them up tomorrow.