Last year, shortly after his loss to Roger Federer, Andy Murray was in full-mope mode.  He had not played much in the weeks afterwards.  He felt he was ready to take that next step, finally get the monkey off his back.  He was in his second Slam final, playing good tennis to get to this point.  He head beaten Nadal once again, managed to beat a hot Cilic and was ready to take on Federer once again.

After losing in straight sets, unable to take the third set tiebreak, Murray shed tears.  He skipped Marseille.  He lost early in Dubai to Tipsarevic.

He was hoping the first two Masters 1000 events of the year would rejuvenate him.  He reached the quarterfinals at Indian Wells, losing to Robin Soderling.  Not too shabby, but Soderling was still transitioning to being a top player after his superlative post-French Open play.  Murray had expected to win.  He then lost to Mardy Fish in Miami in the opening round.  As it turned out, 2011 would be a big year for Mardy Fish, although several victories over Murray would help Fish’s cause.

Although Federer wasn’t able to defend his title in Melbourne this year, falling victim to Djokovic’s superior play, he bounced back in Indian Wells reaching the semis to, well, lose to Djokovic again (for the third time this year).  Still, he kept positive, kept trying to win.  Perhaps Federer realizes that the time left to him to accomplish history is limited, and he keeps a positive attitude and just pushes forward.

Murray, on the other hand, has had a worse post-Aussie Open than ever.  He went to Dubai and has a “respectable” loss to Marcos Baghdatis, but he didn’t play a close match, losing tamely.  He went into Indian Wells and lost to Donald Young in two close sets.  Young was ranked in the 100s.  Then, after saying he was ready to play once again and announcing frequent hitting partner and good friend, Dani Vallverdu, would be his coach, there was some sense that he had succumbed to odd decisions.

When Johnny Mac was trying to regain the top spot, something he ceded after a 1985 loss to Ivan Lendl in the finals of the US Open, followed by a Borg-like sabbatical of a few months, he hired a Korean guy who promised he could fix Mac’s game.  The man would carry his bags on court, and so forth.  The coaching arrangement was short-lived, but Mac was desperate to regain the magic that took him to the top of the tour.

The bad news last year, as well as this, is the clay season.  Murray’s weakest surface is clay.  Like Cilic and Berdych, Murray plays a flatter style.  He is steady for this kind of player, but lacks the heavy punishing topspin shots of a true clay courter.  He got pummeled by Kohlschreiber in Monte Carlo, then had two semi-respectable losses to David Ferrer in Rome and Madrid.  He did OK in the French, losing to eventual semifinalist, Tomas Berdych, before finally playing good tennis at Wimbledon, losing in the semis to Rafa Nadal.  Really, Murray didn’t recover until Wimbledon, though his game was getting back into shape by the late clay season.

Recently, Murray talked about straying too far from what he does best.  In his best years, Murray was a change-of-pace player, mixing spins, “pushing” the ball, and goading his opponent to come to net where he would pass them.  Players began to find tactics to handle this, and Murray revised his game based on criticism that he wasn’t playing a power game.  However, Murray isn’t a Nadal or even a Federer.  His game isn’t one of heavy topspin with pace, although he’s tried to learn this style.

Murray lost to Alex Bogomolov (Jr., apparently a trend of Russian types, such as Alexandr Dolgopolov–though technically, he’s Ukranian) ranked in the low 100s, much like Donald Young.  The first set wasn’t close.  The second set was close, but he couldn’t get a second set win.

And now, Murray finds himself in the same predicament as last year–trying to find answers.  This year, he seemed to take some solace playing doubles with brother Jamie.  The two play good doubles, made it to the quarterfinals of Indian Wells with strong chances of going another round over eventual winners, Malisse and Dolgopolov.

But with clay coming up, and results worst than last year (at least, Soderling and Fish were good players), the question remains. where is Andy Murray’s head.  We used to talk about how flaky Djokovic was.  However, we didn’t know what his personal life was like.  Djokovic said he spent the past year getting his personal life in order, presumably to remove things that would stress his life out of his life, so he could focus on tennis.

In other news, Devvarman continues his solid play by beating Raonic.  The magic that lead Raonic into a deep run (for a guy his ranking) in the Aussie Open, then to his first title and a finalist, Raonic appears to be coming (somewhat) back to earth.  He lost to Ryan Harrison, two  years his junior in Indian Wells.  And now, he’s lost to former college star, Somdev Devvarman.

Stan Wawrinka, who made a quarterfinal run at Indian Wells, fell to Spaniard Marcel Granollers in three sets.  del Potro once again beat Kohlschreiber in three sets.  Soderling needed 3 sets to beat Dodig.  Isner needed a 3rd set tiebreak to beat Ivan Dodig.  Isner had talked about losing confidence in his own play, but at least he still has his serve.

Gasquet continues to win, albeit over a lower-ranked player in Lorenzi.  Other Americans did well.  Fish beat Benneteau, Querrey beat Kukushkin.  Heck, even much maligned James Blake won his match over Bellucci.

Verdasco lost to Andujar in 3 sets.

And Djokovic?  Still steamrolling.  He lost one game to Denis Istomin, a solid player from Uzbekistan.  Djokovic is making good players look awful.  He had three 6-0 sets en route to his Indian Wells win, and he seems poised to making another deep run in Miami, especially with easy wins like this.

Andy Murray can now focus on doubles.  This week, both he and his partner are taking breaks from their “usual” partners.  Murray normally plays with his brother while Djokovic plays with Troicki.  The two are paired with each other as unseeded players.

There’s an odd thought that Murray might give up on singles to focus on doubles.  He’s not such a bad doubles player, actually.  With time, he could become better.  Federer made it to the finals of doubles and the semis of singles in Indian Wells.  Djokovic won Indian Wells and made the quarters in doubles, as did Murray.  Can the two gel together?  Will Djokovic’s magic rub off on moping Murray?

We’ll see.  It’s another installment in the saga of Andy Murray.