Although the year is not yet over, I'm ready to pick my best match of the year. I always hate when tennis pundits pick their best match of the year. Invariably, they pick a Slam, because they figure if it's some obscure event in Doha, none of the tennis public will know what they are
Davis Cup captains have, at least for countries that produce good players, generally gone to good players that have expressed interest. Back in the day, Arthur Ashe succeeded Tony Trabert as captain. The mild-mannered Ashe had to deal with the fiery McEnroe. As temperamental as Johnny Mac was, he was also intensely devoted to Davis
Now that the first Masters 1000 event is concluded, I thought I'd spend a little time to talk about how the top players are faring. This changes from month to month. Shortly after Wimbledon, everyone thought Federer was done and Nadal would steamroll. Just as the US Open started, the opinion was Nadal was ready
Last year, tennis was starting to get interesting at the end of the year. Juan Martin del Potro had become the second player in recent memory that had won a Slam who wasn't named Nadal or Federer (the other was Novak Djokovic in the 2008 Australian Open). Nikolay Davydenko was having a resurgence late in
Every year, as we head to the end of the calendar year, American sports pundits lament at the lack of a playoff system for Division 1 football (American football). In the US, many large universities have football teams with somewhere between 80 and 100 players (though most don't play and serve in backup roles). With
When you're called the best player ever, and your resume includes 16 Slams, a career Grand Slam, and three times you've won 3 Slams in a calendar year, you may forgiven delusions of grandeur. Roger Federer still believes. Still believes his game is good enough to win Slams. Still believes it's his match to win
Let's rewind back to Wimbledon which was where the men were playing before the US Open Series began. Rafael Nadal had endured two five-setters, then beat Robin Soderling (again) and then beat Tomas Berdych in the final. Oh yes, he beat Brit hopeful, Andy Murray once again. Rafa had been playing more aggressive tennis, trying
Baseball has generally been a sport of statistics. I think there's a variety of reasons for this. The first is: it's a slow game. Because of that, you can make lots of decisions based on whatever you want, e.g., numbers. Some managers, I guess, prefer using numbers and others are more instinctive, going with their
Everyone loves to rag on the commentators of tennis. Mary Carillo's voice is too deep. John McEnroe talks too much. And so forth, but the fact is, today's tennis commentators are far better, in terms of tennis knowledge, than their predecessors from the early 1980s. Indeed, as much of a bad rap as Carillo gets,
Andy Roddick, as many talented players do, wanted to be number 1. And, for a while, in that period between the decline of Sampras and the rise of Federer, he was number 1. Given players like Federer and Nadal and Djokovic and Murray and...., Andy Roddick could always say that, at the very least, he
