If you have to pick one day to visit Indian Wells to watch the men's matches, today is the day. All of the men play today with the culmination of Rafael Nadal playing upstart Somdev Devvarman and Roger Federer playing upstart Ryan Harrison. For those of you who say Ivo Karlovic is all serve, understand
When Pete Sampras was working through the juniors, he switched to a one-handed backhand. This lead to a lot of losses, but he stayed positive, and obviously, his pro career speaks volume about that change. However, as a junior, he lost frequently to Michael Chang. Somehow, Chang had this psychological edge over Sampras and it
Roger Federer struggled with his contemporaries before he became the dominant player that broke Sampras's record. Nalbandian, Hewitt, and Safin. Since then, Safin retired while Nalbandian and Hewitt struggle to stay relevant. Federer rarely has trouble playing players his age or older. And there are players in that age range that are pretty good, whether
It must be the 2012 Olympics. Singles players from countries that don't have strong tennis are often asked to play doubles. Federer credits his Olympic doubles win with Stan Wawrinka in 2008 to helping him win the US Open that year. Indian Wells has its strongest field, at least, with singles players. Nadal, Federer, Djokovic
For a few years, Devvarman was at the top of the game. The college game, that is. The star player at the University of Virginia, Devvarman reached the finals of the NCAA Division 1 Men's Championship, and won it two years in a row including a win over John Isner. Since then, Devvarman has been
Although most people know what a great singles player Rafa Nadal is, few realize that he occasionally plays doubles, and has won doubles titles before, typically with Marc Lopez, who looks like a young Tim Allen. At Indian Wells, 4 of the top 5 players are playing doubles. Federer is teaming up with Stan Wawrinka,
For some reason, Andreev gives Federer trouble. Apparently, Andreev trains a fair bit with David Ferrer, and his team has said that Andreev's game is huge in practice. He almost never misses, and he has a huge forehand. But there's practice and there's real matches. Federer didn't look bad, by any means. He's playing his
Now there's a name we haven't heard in a while. James Blake was once a top ten player, someone who came back from scoliosis (affecting his spine) where had to wear a back brace for most of a day, then from shingles and the death of his father. His ranking has since dropped, and he
It's not clear where Andy Murray's head is. Murray lost in the first round at Rotterdam to Marcos Baghdatis. Now he's lost to a guy that was once number 1 in the world--as a junior. Donald Young once thought he would be knocking on the door of the top ten. The US gave him wildcard
If you were a fair-weather tennis fan the last two years, someone who just watched the semis and finals of the Slams and maybe not even the Aussie Open, you might have thought of Soderling as a one-hit wonder. Oh sure, he upset Nadal and reached the final, but what has he done since? Clearly,
