something about great tennis

The New Yorker published "Without Fans, the Drama of the US Open Came from Within," a great piece, right after the 2020 US Open; the commentary includes this passage:

There were moments when I asked myself what this was all for. So much effort, and such high stakes, for what? The tournament was taking place against the backdrop of tremendous unrest in the United States—the unfathomable spread of a lethal disease, continuing protests against racial injustice, profound civic distrust, and soaring unemployment. What is the U.S. Open when it is sealed off from New York? What does a championship signify, if some of the top contenders don’t come? What does it mean if fans aren’t there to ratify it? What’s the value of sport right now?

Some of those questions are unanswerable, but not all. In most respects, the U.S. Open was a success. It happened safely. Two deserving champions were crowned. The quality of the play was, for the most part, remarkably good. And, by the end, something strange was happening, at least for me: the event seemed to become more meaningful, not less, for being so stripped away.

The New Yorker piece details the men's championship match—the final match of the tournament, the match perspective played the net and won.

I remember agreeing that this match became more meaningful for me than most previous US Open championships.

I had wondered, when the tournament decided to carry on without fans, whether the 2020 results would have an asterisk in people’s memory. Because of how it played out, it doesn't.

Tennis players are not supposed to get coaching or have any communication with the people in their player’s box; the player is out there alone, fighting himself and his opponent, often buoyed or rejected—especially in big matches on big stages—by the crowd. In this match, the isolation, the loneliness, was heightened to an extreme, and I really felt for them, felt the struggle, felt empathy.

Note: The Australian Open concluded today with an instant-classic match between Rafa Nadal and Daniil Medvedev.

 

about admiration for Roger Federer

Federer fans usually remark on the beauty of his play. His game is one of finesse; his style, one of elegance. His endorsement deals reinforce this perception: while other players pitch soft drinks and tennis shoes, Federer stars in Rolex and Mercedes Benz commercials.

I have always cheered for Roger Federer. I cheered for him when he was dominant with a number-one ranking. And I cheer for him now that he is tennis' best, oldest underdog.

After the ascension of Rafael Nadal (and then Novak Djokovic and then Andy Murray), Federer's recasting as an underdog gave me a new and convenient reason to cheer for him. But Federer has been a fan favorite most of his career. Why he has always been a fan favorite is not obvious to me; I am skeptical that style of play alone can earn a player such popularity.
 

Note:
(1) Federer's foil, nemesis, and antithesis is Rafael Nadal (known simply as Rafa). Nadal grinds you down like a stale routine. His game is hustle. Obsession. Compulsion. Nadal will get every ball back over the net, forcing his opponent to eventually lose the point by shanking the ball into the net or out of bounds. (Nadal's game is not without beauty.) In addition to his style of play, another ugly aspect of Nadal is that he is noticeably neurotic, pulling at his clothes and hair compulsively--this aspect is well documented.
(2) The French Open begins Sunday.

about "Open" by Andre Agassi

When it was released, this autobiography by American tennis player Andre Agassi was scandalous for the insulated world of professional tennis--a sport in which cussing umpires is a serious offense. The scandal was that Agassi confesses to experimenting with meth, a hard amphetamine, during his pro career. Truth is he did it twice, mostly out of boredom on the spur of the moment. And while high, all he really did was clean his house. So controversy is not the real story--that's the advertising.

The real story is that Agassi, like most other tennis pros, was mercilessly raised to succeed in professional tennis. His father drilled him on a home court everyday for years. Forever after Agassi resented his father and hated tennis. Nevertheless the experience left Agassi super-competitive and as he came of age he desperately wanted the coveted rankings of more consistent players in his era like Pete Sampras, his main rival. Unsurprisingly, Agassi traces his own inconsistent performance (more than once he fell from the top to the bottom) to his lack of confidence and poor sense of self. But these flaws, though nearly universal in their appeal, are never fully explored in Open.

The book's gossipy nuggets are these: Agassi hated Jim Courier until retirement (now they're friends); he never liked Michael Chang, chafing at the way Chang repeatedly thanked God every time he won; he declares Jimmy Conners a major irredeemable asshole (a judgement corroborated by many others); and he thinks Sampras, his career-long rival, is robotic, focused solely on tennis to the exclusion of all else. Ironically, Agassi's first wife, Christie Brinkley, seems to think the same of Agassi--that he's guilty of tennis tunnel-vision. Agassi doesn't seem to notice this irony. Ultimately the high-profile couple separated because they had nothing in common and each of them was focused on their respective careers.

This was a fine book, a good tour through a tennis life, but Agassi's Open is further evidence that autobiographies by musicians and, more so, athletes, are often boring. These gifted people have a hyper-focused passion and goal--to be the best, and they rarely put in the time and get the perspective needed to examine and expand their story into an insightful dialectic ready for the bookshelves.