Nole 2011 and Nole 2013

The current number one in the world, Novak (Nole) Djokovic, has had an incredible ride since Serbia won the Davis Cup in the fall of 2010. It was as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. The people of Serbia could now celebrate, and Nole could focus on himself.

And he did. Putting together a team he went about one of the most incredible transformations any athlete could go through. First he was diagnosed with a ‘gluten’ allergy which contributed to his almost ‘asthmatic’ condition on court. Then he hired a mentor, a shaman, who righted his mind to make him believe in himself. Then he got in the best shape of his life.

And 2011 was the Year of Nole, winning three of four Grand Slams; going undefeated from the beginning of the year until the semifinals of the French Open where he played a recharged Roger Federer and lost.

Novak’s shotmaking, confident — toeing the baseline confident — allowed him to take many of his opponent’s shots earlier, off the bounce or on the rise, step in and rip his shots. He was dominant from the baseline, dictating the rally, making all other opponents move further, wider and faster.

Nole controlled the baseline. His shots were consistently landing within the last fifth of the court, challenging the best players in the world — no! daring — to do more with less.

Nole in 2011 was the most dominant player who had emerged in quite some time.

How could anyone repeat such a performance? As Rafael Nadal said, ‘it will be difficult to repeat (2011), no?’ And that’s after losing to Nole six times: Masters 1000 in Indian Wells, Key Biscayne (Hardcourts); Madrid, Rome (claycourts); Wimbledon (grass) and the US Open (hardcourts).

In 2012, Nole repeated in Miami and Toronto (they move it each year from Toronto to Montreal) and logged in one Grand Slam, defending the Australian Open. He lost in the finals of the French Open and the US Open, but then played spectacularly at the end of the year and won the Masters 1000 in Shanghai and the ATP World Championships in London.

But it certainly wasn’t 2011. Nole was different, tentative and unable to find a consistent range on his shots. That’s what happens when a player over thinks, over analyzes a moment in tennis. Nole in 2011 just moved and hit. There was little or no cognizant thought behind the magic. It was just unquestioned and all action.

When a player throws too many ‘what ifs’ into sports, he becomes like a Porsche filled with sand: gears begin to lock, instincts begin to freeze, shots have second guesses behind them.

Well 2013 is a different year. And after surviving a stunning 12-10 in the fifth comeback against, Stanislaw Wawrinka, Novak Djokovic has faced challenges head on, found his footing, his match stride, and fondly tastes the Nole of 2011. He is becoming a dominant player who doesn’t question shots anymore, but quickly and confidently steps up and rips to his spots on the court.

The elusive title he has missed and wants is coming up at the end of this month, the French Open. And if there is any question about what he can do on the very slow European red clay, then you only have to go to his performance in Monte Carlo which was in question from day one because of an ankle injury suffered in the Davis Cup tie against the US, where Nole dominated the eight time champion, Rafael Nadal in straight sets.

The first set he was up 5-0.

Our World’s No 1 is beginning to feel it again. And this French Open will be particularly interesting to see which Nole shows up. Personally I think Novak 2013 is looking a lot like Nole 2011. Even after his loss to Grigor Dimitrov in the second round in this past week at the Mutua Madrid Open, he’s still the one to watch as we enter the 2013 French Open.

Enjoy the show.

$weet Maria

What can you say about Maria Sharapova that already hasn’t been said? All I know is if she were on an episode of ‘Mad Men’ it would represent a major plot twist in their portrayal of women. After all, she’d be the star! And women aren’t stars in the Mad Men world.

Maria Sharapova, though, is magnet for Madison Avenue. She’s an Ad Man’s dream because she’s well Maria: outgoing, vivacious, well spoken, dressed for success and model tall.

$weet Maria

Her latest conquest was signing a deal with Porsche. Terrific! I couldn’t think of two brands that go hand in hand better. Porsche, the German automaker, who produces some of the most powerful cars in the world with $weet Maria Sharapova who hammers a tennis ball with force and fury will produce a powerhouse team in the ad world.

Jokingly I tweeted ‘remember don’t text and drive’ as she announced her new venture. I was serious, you know if you get behind the wheel of one of these turbo madmen machines, you you need two hands on the wheel at all times. These boys can jump out of the starting gate and they demand full attention. Unfortunately when you see who actually purchases them, you realize one thing: they have no idea of the power behind these boys. None. And here in the US nobody can “air them out” since we’re confined by national speed laws. No Autobahn here (but there are those who will still try and break local speed records, trust me, with no success.)

The Ad world loves to possess things: ideas, concepts, illusions and most often delusions.

With this deal, they’ve paired two beauties together in one package for us.

Now, you might think I’m being snarky or a little crass, but in reality that’s what Ads are, they play on your emotion, not your reality.

The reality is Maria is accessible under her guidelines on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, and at Sugarpova events, but really no where else. And rightly so, it’s her life!

Porsche is accessible to a high end buyer who wants to show his/her ‘go getter’ attitude. The reality is you can’t drive the car within legal speed limits the way a Porsche should be driven.

In the Hamptons, you’ll see every ‘A’ list-er want to make an entrance, and during the summer season — prime Hamptons — they’ll dress up in their best ride, top down, and ready to be recognized.

Here’s the problem. Maximum speed limit on the roads is 40mph.

A Porsche idles at 40mph.

I remember one sweltering summer afternoon when the major highway leading into and out of the Hamptons was closed to a serious accident. All traffic was diverted to the back roads. And those of us who were lucky enough to appreciate the irony saw the undertow of high society and the locals play out in full splendor: Range Rover, Mercedes Benz, Maserati, Porsche and Mr. Bentley were swimming upstream against current with Corollas, Fords and Hondas, Landscapers, Gardeners, Truckers.

What a beautiful cross section of Americana. And there we were, stuck in the eddies of the back tributaries, local working class neighborhoods, looking at one another in complete disbelief. Locals smiling as ‘A’ list-ers were desperately searching for another stream to peel off and disappear away from anywhere but here.

After all it was cocktail hour.

Me? I just logged in another wonderful memory of the cross section that swims in the same pond.

I couldn’t be more happy for Maria. She worked hard to get to where she is in the tennis world, and her management team has done wonderfully to capture that success selling her photogenic features to the highest bidder.

Let’$ Go! Maria

But you still have to look at the Ad Men skeptically, as I always do, and wonder just wonder how they will forge this newly aligned partnership.

Time Will Tell

Eight straight Monte Carlo Championships. A record of records of consistency, and more importantly, one of dominance, but you’ll get none of those bold Muhammed Ali taunts. No, Rafa will slip around the bigger questions, in an awkwardly humble way.

What Rafael Nadal shows us that he is one the greatest players in the sport who manages to find the desire where most have retired and entered into another career. He’s just that good. And the reason for it is he has the best mind in the game.

What’s the key to his success?

If you were to understand his mind, the training that goes into the eventual way he ‘thinks’ on court, you have to be part Tibetan monk, fully focused on right now, no distactions.

Be. Here. Now.

Imagine your day. Now imagine your day with multiple hats to juggle, as things are going sideways, and then a major earthquake hits? The comedian Steven Wright describes it as ‘you know how you feel when you’re balancing your chair and you’re almost about to fall? That’s my life.’

It’s sort of the life of a professional tennis player as well. You’re faced with enormous challenges and it’s how you think your way through them as you’re executing your game plan, while someone is doing the same. The only difference between a tennis player and a professional boxer is the distance between you and your opponent. The blows can be as powerful, it’s just played out in your legs. And when your legs go, you mind follows.

What separates Nadal from the rest is his unique ability to focus on the ball through all sorts of extraordinarily harsh conditions, under often difficult pain. Look at his hands, tape swirls around each digit like a candy cane; tape circles his bum knee; and the weight of each point creates that infamous ‘scowl’ where Rafa shows he’s part animal.

You see when YOU are challenged, and you’re struggling, it’s easy for you, as a player to drift into your ‘stuff’ a carload of excess baggage that you’ve towed from the beginning of your journey into competitive tennis until present day: good, bad and difficult all are stowed away tightly. How you manage ‘your baggage’ particularly in sport makes or breaks you.

And you know and I know the top players have a pretty strong track record at managing their stuff, stowing it away up in some distant recess of their grey matter, never to let it fall off the shelves.

The up and coming player who learns how to discard any frivolous, extraneous and unneeded thought can actually Be. Here. Now. But he won’t enter the world of Rafa until he wins an unprecedented number of clay court events, season after season.

It’s the player who blames the equipment, the wind, the sun, the crowd rooting against him, who faces the daunting prospect of fighting three competitors: the elements, his opponent and himself who faces the greatest hike up to Mt. Rafa. And it’s a painful journey, particularly if you’re on the opposing side of the slow, slippery red clay court.

Rafael Nadal enters into another world where he only plays your shot during that one point. Then when the point is over, he readies himself for the next point with eternal optimism: this point is mine. Point to point. Game to game. Set to set and game, set and match.

He plays one point at a time and never enters into the last point, the upcoming point or the points ahead. He is literally all in on each and every point.

Rafa’s Mind

He rarely chides himself for a mistake. Blames the wind for blowing too hard, the ball bouncing irregularly, his opponent’s shot being hit too well, no, he’s in it to win it. Period.

If you’re running a marathon, Rafa is pacing you, drafting you, until that moment when he own you.

How do we get that mind?

Sounds easy to focus only on this point. But in practicality we all have to learn how to deal with ‘our stuff.’

And the stuff we carry is lodged in the sum of our experiences, and a little DNA.

In Rafa’s case, his greatest influence is his Uncle Toni who has built ‘life lessons’ into ‘match lessons.’ Part humble, mostly in deference to other’s accomplishments, Rafa lies somewhere in there, navigating press conferences and matches with equal skill, bobbing and weaving around the question about his place in tennis history, often deferring for ‘other’s to judge, not me.’

Uncle Toni had helped craft this mind whose solitary focus is to stay in the point, in the moment and venture no other place.

Tiger Woods has the ‘5 Step Rule.’ Hit a shot: good, bad or ugly and he allows himself five paces before he’s focused on this shot. Now we’ve seen Tiger carry his mistake longer than five steps, but nonetheless, you understand what he’s trying to do: minimize your out of the box first response.

Tiger ‘Five Step Rule’

Control your emotion.

Most great athletes in the midst of a game, tournament or a season never allow themselves the ‘highs and lows’ of normal everyday celebration. Some athletes believe that keeping your emotions in check prepares you for the long haul, the roller coaster ride of a game, the seven days in a tournament against different players, or the ebbs and flows of a season.

The more you ‘delay gratification’ the more focused you become on your long term goals. In tennis, season after season can become a ten month blur, with top players players 17-25 weeks, then add Davis Cup, exhibitions, charity events, and post season qualifying events and that number could run even higher. So most of the top players learn how to manage their expectations; train to peak for bigger events and sustain a career for more than the average number of years by hiring a ‘team.’

A whole economy has spawned of ‘teams’ that support a player’s ambition: agent, management, coach, trainer, physio, mental coach, mentor, stringer, etc.

But to afford all of that you have to win. And the pressure to win can consume most players.

Rafael Nadal isn’t like most players, he’s in a category unto himself. And we are the beneficiaries of it.

So enjoy this season, particularly after Rafa’s seven month absence from the game to take care of his knee. It’s going to be another gem as he’s already showed us, enter five events, lose in the final of the first and then run the table, including the prestigious Masters 1000 in Indian Wells.

Now, he’s back in his element on the deep rich red clay of Europe.

Enjoy the show, and learn from the mind of Rafa. It’s the best in the game.

 

My Two Cents

Hard courts hurt my body.

Think about it. You’re at the top of your profession, make countless millions in prize money and even more in endorsements, and you say, ‘I think the tour should consider using fewer hard courts in their calendar, so I can preserve my body.’

My response is simple: learn how to shorten the points and get off the court.

A hard court is the perfect surface. It has a uniform bounce. It has amazing traction allowing players to move quickly, change directions with little or no sliding.

Hard court players learn to play aggressively on the surface, even when it’s slowed down with added layers of sand in the composite during surfacing. It’s the way you were meant to play on a court that allows such great movement.

You can flatten out your groundstrokes to drive the ball through the court making it difficult for someone to track the ball down, or if they do track it down, to time a well struck shot.

A hard court creates an offensive style of play.

But in today’s game, the top tend to play more of a clay court style of play — lengthening the rallies, outlasting a player, hitting multiple shots while never coming into the net to finish the point.

Why?

I have a theory. Too much respect AND no one knows how to close for a finish volley anymore. I’ve harped on this before. Players who are singles players, specialists, who rarely play doubles, are never taken out of their comfort zone: the baseline. But in doubles, not only are you forced to hit aggressively, but you’re forced to take the net away from your opponents.

It’s the nature of the game. The movement in doubles is quick, aggressive, mainly towards the net. And the team that takes the net can force a player — the deeper player — to think that he is playing singles against a wall of offense coming to attack him, opening up holes in their defense, while giving the deep player little or no time to hit a ball through small gaps in the team that’s taken the net.

Doubles, by nature, has short quick offensive points. Doubles players know how to attack, join their partner up at net, and dominate from their tactically strong position.

Singles players are more like distance runners, waiting for the key moments in the match to find a break of serve or distance themselves from their opponent. There isn’t the urgency in singles that there is in doubles.

As a result singles players, particularly today’s singles player, tends to stay on the baseline a majority of the match.

On all surfaces, we’re seeing the same.

But not all surfaces are created equal. Grass (Wimbledon) is a fast surface, short rallies, poor bounces and often forces players to be more offensive. Grass can be difficult to run on as well. When moist, a grass court can be particularly difficult to stand up on.

Clay, on the other hand, is incredibly slow, difficult to run quickly on (because of the thin layer of sand on top of the court or crushed brick on the red clay) which prevents a player from quick bursts of speed. A player must gain balance, then gradually move and adjust to the ball. And if you have a good deal of speed running toward a shot, it is difficult to stop after hitting it. As a result, you’ll slide. When you slide, slows, then you can pick yourself up and make another burst towards then next shot.

As a player who grew up on hard courts, I had to learn how to play (albeit never could master) the clay court game. It’s a game of patience. Because the ball gets heavier as the match moves on, it becomes even more difficult to hit the ball through the court. With a slower ball, a player can track your shot down and force you to hit many more shots than you want to in order to win a point.

It was a steep learning curve. But one that I had to adjust to in my pro career.

Why can’t clay court players learn to adjust their game to the hard courts?

Both Victoria Azarenka and Rafael Nadal have complained about the hard court surface and how it punishes the body.

My suggestion is simple, learn the game of the surface. On a hard court, learn how to utilize the perfect bounce, the great traction and shorten the points. Learn how to finish at net.

Please don’t allow a couple of players (and a host of journalists, I might add) convince you that the surface is bad for the game. It’s not. It’s the player who must learn how to play on the surface, using the appropriate offensive tactics.

And in the case of hard court tennis, a player must learn how to shorten the point.

Increase Prize Money? The ATP Says ‘No!’

Larry Ellison (Oracle Corporation) gave the green light to Ray Moore, ‘increase the prize money for our event.’ Their event the BNP Paribas Masters 1000 in Indian Wells, California would’ve upped the prize money for all Master 1000 events to follow. They were in uncharted territory.

But to do so Ray Moore had to appeal to the governing body of the sport, the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), whose Board is comprised of three tournament directors, three players and the Executive Director.

As it would play out the three tournament directors decided NOT to accept the increase; the players voted to increase; and the Executive Director abstained from the vote (health reasons).

Motion declined.

Why?

Simple. The tournament directors were defending their turf. More money means having to go out on a ‘fund raising road show’ in search of new sponsors and additional money for their event to match Indian Wells. The Grand Slams (Australian, French, Wimbledon & US Open) have played this one ups-manship with one another for years. The Australian will increase their prize money, then next in line is the French who has to answer the increase or lose a notch, which means Wimbledon will follow; but Wimbledon is more prestigious so it will try and match then add even more to the pool; and by the end of the Grand Slam season the US Open will have to throw the biggest party of them all with the largest increase. Which means the Australian must open next year’s bid (total purse) even higher than the US Open did the prior year.

And the cycle continues. But it’s the Grand Slams. They have the world’s attention because all of the top players will always play their events. The have to, they are the career building events with the most exposure. So the cycle of success is guaranteed because with more money, all the top players, the best sponsors, television — worldwide television rights — now are added to the pot and the stakes can be raised.

But the tier below, the Master 1000 events are a different animal. They thrive on securing the best players, knowing that the players are obligated to play their events, but they don’t have the worldwide recognizability of the Grand Slams, and thus, less television revenue. It’s more of a region by region economic thing.

Then Larry Ellison steps in secures the rights to the Indian Wells event, builds a massive tournament (a third stadium will be added in 2014) that leads off the Masters 1000 series.

Indian Wells is, in essence, the Australian Open in the bidding pool.

The only difference is Larry Ellison is a billionaire and by adding a third stadium to this desert site, he will have matched what the US Open offers by 2014. In short, he’s surpassing our biggest event in the United States with bravado, or as our South American friends would say, jeuvos grandes.

Naturally the three tournament directors on the ATP Board need to protect their turf. They’ve legislated mandatory participation with their Masters 1000 event, so why should they want to compete on that scale. They can’t. Maybe China. Europe is in an economic crisis. Japan and the rest of Asia is struggling. South America is confronted with their own issues: Olympics & World Cup in Brazil alone will tap them out.

So it’s natural for the tournament directors to want to protect their turf.

But it’s myopic.

Our game must expand. We must create a supply of players, future stars who will slide comfortably into the shoes of those who will be leaving the game. Tennis needs new blood. Without it, it will wilt on the vine.

Invariably from all corners of the world we see players emerge out of the woodwork; some are developed through the patient diligent efforts of elite national training programs while other just appear.

That talent needs a place to develop. It needs a place to learn how to compete.

And that’s why the tournament directors on the ATP Board should’ve countered Larry Ellison’s bold increase (which, by the way was structured, to give the first four rounds more money than increasing the winner’s purse. In short, giving more to the early round losers to help them decrease expenses, and maybe increase a team member).

No, the tournament directors should’ve counter with ‘all right if you want to expand your purse, Larry, then we want you to expand the minor leagues of professional tennis, the Futures events.’

Find a metric. Tweak a formula. Measure it in a petri dish. But don’t lose a golden chance to expand the game. Forget about protecting turf. Think more about getting new blood into the ranks.

Because we all know the dirty little secret in professional tennis: the more money a player makes the more he can invest in his team: coach, physical coach, hitting partner, trainer, dietician, sports psychologist, or shaman (Think Nole). Whoever. While the lesser player must fight his way to the top.

Don’t get me wrong I’m not a redistributionist. Earn it. And when you earn it long enough you’ll surround yourself with the people and things which bring about more success.

What I am for is expanding more places for players to play. More tournaments where a player can hone his skill, gain more experience and eventually earn more points.

The problem for the tournament directors is a simple one: rust never sleeps, and current stars will become old injured warriors. The list is long: Federer at 31. Nadal absent for seven months due to injury at 27 in June.

But the world is full of talent that needs to school it’s talent, harness it, shape it, perfect someplace. And when you don’t qualify for the larger tiered events, and their are no smaller tiered events to play that week, then they idle talent will sit.

After all a players career, no matter when they start in the sport, is, on average, seven years.

Go ahead, bargain with Larry. Do a deal. If he really wants to inflate the game, then make it count.

Aussie Open 2013

If you missed the Djokovic – Wawrinka heavy weight match, then you missed the match of the tournament. It, by far, was the most dramatic, unfiltered spectacular tennis of any of the matches.

Novak, the number one seed and world’s number one player, had by far the easiest draw to the final since Rafael Nadal withdrew from the tournament because of a virus. His absence was not lost of Nole who sprinted through his first three rounds until he met an inspired Stanislas Wawrinka, Roger Federer’s fellow Swiss countryman, and his Gold Medal doubles partner (Beijing 2008).

Off court, in Twitterverse as discussion was put out there by the great coach, Nick Bolletieri, who put a nail in the coffin of the one-handed backhand saying, ‘it’s days are numbered.’ I challenged the assertion because quite a few one-handers have done well: Wawrinka, Gasquet, Almagro, and of course the prolific, Roger Federer. I mentioned that the delineating factor in the success of a one-hander is “great timing.”  Robert Landsdorp, the man responsible for Tracy Austin, Maria Sharapova, Eliot Teltscher to name a few has often cited that one quality alone the contributes to the separation of those at the top and the rest.

But I took the challenge even further saying that strategically a two-hander has to be quicker and closer to the ball to hit with the power that Bolletieri asserts is the real difference now. That a two-hander can be jammed on the return of serve, handcuffing a player and preventing them from a full aggressive swing on the ball. And most importantly, a well-timed one-hander can move a two-hander with drives, topspin or a hard hit chip backhand way outside of their comfort zone, extending their arms outside of their reach. Yes, if a two-hander gets close to a ball he will have more power with the second hand to deliver a harder struck ball, but he must — underscore it — be in a great position to accomplish this.

And that was the set up for this match: Djokovic’s tremendous range, lethal forehand and exceptionally powerful two-handed backhand versus Wawrinka’s solid forehand, spectacular one-handed backhand.

On paper is should’ve been Djokovic. But sometimes in this sport, players can find it and when they do they can bring legions of the greatest shotmakers in the history of the sport into one match.

This was Wawrinka’s day.

And believe me there was plenty of drama (see Thoughts from the Fringe : Cheaterenka) in our first Grand Slam of the new year.

As was the case last year, the same two players came out on top this year as well. Novak Djokovic won his third consecutive Australian Open Men’s Singles title beating the Scot, Andy Murray in the final. That accomplishment of winning three straight goes down as the first man in the Open Era of tennis (starting 1968) to have done so.

And since we’re talking records …

Bob and Mike Bryan, twins who are Americans, and fully vested in playing ‘doubles only’ for a majority of their careers set a record of their own by winning their 13th Grand Slam title together they surpass the great Australians, John Newcombe and Tony Roche who had twelve total.

No new records set for the ladies as Victoria Azarenka repeated as the champion of Li Na the 31 year old Chinese woman who captured the heart of the Australian crowds with her lively, spontaneous on air comments in her post match interviews. What a sense of humor!

And English is her second language. At 31, some feel her days are numbered. But when she decided to change coaches, she committed to better conditioning and a more sound approach to sustaining her career for the long term. And when asked during a post-match presser about the new training regimen, she said with a smile, “I didn’t know if I could finish. Yeah. I thought he might have to send for help.”

More to come about the influence of coaches in the game in future articles. But for now, it’s reasonable to say that Li Na is back on track to physically go deep into the Grand Slams and challenge the best, the younger, in the game.

 

Thoughts from the Fringe: Cheaterenka

‘Cheaterenka.’

Wow. You have to have done something really bad to have someone in the stands of the Australian Open take the time to craft a sign for the Women’s Final where Victoria Azarenka played Li Na. But the one fan wasn’t alone in his disgust of the defending champion, on air, on Twitter and around the globe, people were chiming in on just how Victoria Azarenka, the young Belarusian, ranked one in the world, escaped her semi-final match against the young American, Sloane Stephens. After all, Stephens showed us a round earlier that she certainly can play ball, taking out Serena Williams in her quarter-final.

All right, Serena was injured which one, which we knew of, a self-induced sprained ankle in her third round match, and two we later found out about in her post-match press conference where she laid out her case for the real reason she lost to Sloane Stephens, a lingering back injury for the past two weeks. We saw Serena aggravate it, during the Stephens quarter-final running aggressively toward the net, stopping short, then lurching over to extend for a short, weak shot, which she hit for a winner with her two-handed backhand.

‘I mean you’ve seen me play better matches, haven’t you?’ asked Serena to the press corps, searching, I think for agreement, while playing an underhanded ‘well done’ to Sloane Stephens. As you know, Serena NEVER lauds praise on an opponent who has beaten her, EVER. It’s not in her DNA. Some of us think that she could be the largest marketing bonanza since Bo Jackson, but it’s Serena’s edge that keeps her from attaining Sharapova-like numbers for endorsements. Blame Richard Williams. Then start to ticking down the list of people MIA in helping her forge a long-term invincibility in the market. At the top of the list is Jill Smoller her agent, who is more an enabler, than an agent. Think 2009 US Open Toe-gate I where Serena was called for a foot-fault at a key moment in her semi-final match against Kim Clijsters, and then went on a swearing bender threatening the Chinese lines woman that could easily have come out of a Quentin Tarantino movie.

Serena was defaulted. In her press conference, she said, ‘well you know I’m a competitive person,’ but came no where near to an apology for what she said. Never apologized for any of her actions, two days later went on Good Morning America and was ready to ‘move on.’ Still no apology.

The US Open then fined her a record $96,000 for the incident to which she replied on her website, ‘if a man had done it, no way would he have received anything close to this harsh of a penalty.’

Still no apology. Then in the summer of 2010, during an odd series of events, as she claims that she stepped on some glass at a German nightclub, severely cutting a tendon to her big toe. She had an obligation to play against Kim Clijsters in an exhibition, did, and then for eleven months Serena went underground. She promised a full summer of commitments, and pulled, one-by-one, a week out of all events. I called it ‘Toe-gate’ II.

How in the world could your management ever let any of this slide, while the luster of your brand is day-by-day losing it’s lure?

For some reason, there hasn’t been any urgency to rehash the deets with the press corps. Serena deflects with ‘that’s so far in the past, I’ve moved on.’ Unfortunately, so have potential sponsors.

Bo Knows Bo and Bo wouldn’t approve.

Fast forward to complications of a prolonged recovery to toe surgery, foot in a cast, sedentary high heel training for ‘special events’ like the Oscar’s parties, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster which came in the late-winter of 2011 where Serena suffered a pulmonary embolism due to a blood clot and circulation problems in her lungs.

Who manages this girl? That’s the only thing that went through my head. How can you possibly chuck away a season because of carelessness? Unchecked. Unmonitored and left to her own devices, Serena is Serena’s worst enemy. Just read her Twitter feed: unlucky in love; can’t resist this (food), etc.

In the Summer of 2011, Serena makes a miraculous comeback. Talks about the long road to recovery. The shots she had to take to thin her blood out. The complications of self-doctoring. And the shear joy of realizing how great it is to be back in this game again.

Wow. If I was a shrink, I’d think she was bi-polar. Highs are way too high. And lows are painfully low.

But thankfully I’m not. I have the luxury of sitting on a fence and watching the spectacle. The ‘new’ Serena was in tears, happy, thankful, complimentary and well very un-Serena.

That lasted about a month.

Flash forward to the final of the 2011 US Open and Serena loses to Sam Stosur in straight sets and in typical Serena fashion, is called for ‘hindrance’ during an early celebration of a shot she hit for what she thought was a winner, but Stosur tracked it down, looked up at the umpire who agreed, Violation, Ms. Williams, point penalty. Serena wagging finger to the umpire, scolding her, was classic Serena. The old tarnished brand, feisty, competitive and unforgiving.

Hindrance. Rule number 26 in the ITF Rules of Tennis vaguely defines the causes and the penalties of ‘distracting’ or ‘hindering’ someone from fairly playing a point. And when we talk about it, the most egregious violators: Sharapova and Azarenka with their shrills and shrieks as they strike a ball, and verbally follow the ball into another player’s contact point is a clear violation. It’s a distraction to the player on the other side. Don’t get me wrong, a grunt is one thing: tightening the muscles and exhaling upon impact, but shrieking from the point of impact into your opponent’s shot, is not fair.

Yet, the WTA refuses to take a harsh stance. They did it once with Monica Seles. They can do it again with Azarenka and Sharapova. If they don’t the WTA will continue to lose interest from their fan base. Just listen to both men and women talk about the ‘loud noise’ coming from both players and how it’s a ‘turn off’ or ‘I’ve got to mute the TV if I’m going to watch this.’

And that’s either player. But when they play against one another, it’s a disaster. No commentary. Mute. No sound of the ball striking. Mute. Nada. Zippo. Zilch. Not exactly what a sport wants.

Which brings us back to that fateful semi-final match where Victoria Azarenka is playing Sloane Stephens in the semi-finals and just tearing her to shreds, up 6-1, 5-3, Azarenka has five — count them — FIVE match points and she can’t close out the match. Stephens eventually breaks and is about to serve to get back into the second set.

Azarenka, who has had her share of injuries, fainting spells on court, furiously pounds a ball in anger when she loses the game, then proceeds to walk over to the bench, sits down and signals for the trainers to come out to the court because, ‘I can’t breathe … I can’t breathe.’

The point of a medical timeout or MTO is to deal with ‘real’ medical emergencies. Some of the worst violators, though, use it to gain an advantage, slow someone’s momentum, by making a player cool off as a trainer comes out to assist in a player’s “emergency.”

Novak Djokovic, the Serbian, who is the World’s No. 1 player, was the most effective violator who had ‘multiple’ injuries, miraculously moving around his body from ankle to low back to shoulder to neck which came out at the tightest points in the match. That was before he discovered that he had a ‘gluten’ allergy which affected, well, everything.

The young Belarusian surely had seen the miracle of a well-timed MTO. And she took it.

She took it, and another one for a total of six minutes, but never returned to the court until 10 minutes later.

She elucidated later, that it was ‘my bad’ for not taking a MTO a couple games earlier, when she was completely dominating, for a ‘rib that had moved and made it difficult for me to breathe.’

But why six minutes? ‘Well I didn’t want to take my dress off on court …’ But according to the rules, you’re only allowed 3 minutes per injury.

Meanwhile court side, Sloane Stephens is sitting patiently, towel draped around her shoulders, for Azarenka to come back to the court. She’s 19. And it was a rookie mistake not to have the umpire do her job, call the player back from the locker room or take points. It was a rookie mistake for her to not move around, hit some serves, stay loose on the sidelines stretching or whatever instead of sitting and completely losing all her momentum in that last spectacular five match point save and break of serve.

When asked afterwards, Stephens said, ‘seems to be the thing  going around this tournament, the round before and the round before that everyone had one (MTO) so it really didn’t affect me.’

Azarenka comes back to the court, walking fast-paced and ready to rock, proceeds to break serve back and close out the match, breaking Sloane’s serve on a 30-40 point.

Game, set and match, the World’s No. 1.

During her on court interview, Azarenka says, ‘wow that really would’ve been the choke of the year.’ Post-match ESPN interview with Tom Rinaldi, he asks, ‘so why did you leave the court?’ To which she replies, ‘I couldn’t breathe, you know.’

Later, during her press conference, the Belarusian says somewhat defiantly, ‘I didn’t understand his question, I was having trouble breathing. I should’ve taken a it (MTO) earlier but I didn’t, my bad.’ And then later, defiantly, ‘But if someone takes a MTO I never question for what reason.’

On being asked with some players having issues with her grunting, that it’s considered a hindrance, that players are complaining about it (yet no umpire is taking a stand on implementing it), Azarenka says boldly, ‘well, good luck with that (enforcement).’

As Azarenka played her final against the popular Chinese player, Li Na, she took advantage of two moments in the match, one, where Li Na slipped and twisted her ankle, and the second, where Li Na slipped again, and fell on her head creating a concussion where Li Na needed an MTO. During the wait, Azarenka was jumping around, moving aggressively, not wasting a moment to stay warm, to stay ready for the conclusion.

She did, and closed out Li Na in three sets.

Asked afterwards, what was she expecting from the crowd after her ‘controversial’ MTO, ‘to be quite honest with you, I thought it was going to be a lot worse. But you can’t change what you can’t change. You just have to focus on what you can do. And that’s what I did.’

‘Cheaterenka.’

Wow.

Where’s Rafa?

Rarely is someone’s presence so missed as Rafael Nadal’s absence since his early exit at the 2012 Wimbledon. There’s something honorable about a competitor who gives his all every point, never giving up, never thinking about the next point, only this one. When he’s finished with the last point,  he’ll be focused only on the current point. Rafa never dwells on the last point. It never stays with him. Instead, he’s one-hundred percent in this one. His mind is the ultimate in mental acuity, focus and drive; and only Rafa can make the claim to have the best mind in the game. But he won’t tell you. You’ll see it in his intense, piercing, angry eyes.

Rafael Nadal isn’t the only player to have been missed in the History of Tennis, though. Bjorn Borg, the iconic ‘Ice Man’ who won was a 5-time Wimbledon and 6-time French Open Champion, is one such player. And the manner with which he challenged the Men’s International Pro Tennis Council (MIPTC) and was summarily dismissed from it, delivers us into a particularly dark period of tennis authority.

MIPTC decided to implement the rules, suspending  from the Grand Prix for not playing the required 12 events. In his second to last year, Borg decided to play only 11 events. Instead of the MIPTC fining him, they suspended him from the tour. No wildcards. If he wanted back in, he’d have to qualify.

From Curry Kirkpatrick at the SI Vault http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1125431/1/index.htm :

Borg’s presence in the qualifying—the subject of so much hue and cry among the game’s image-mongers—was necessary because of his refusal to comply with Rule 8 in the 1982 Grand Prix guide. It states that a player must commit to playing a minimum of 10 tournaments a year, not counting the French Open, Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, or be forced to qualify for all tournaments. Claiming he needed his “retirement” months and saying he desired more rest later—translation: time to perform in exhibitions from the Falkland Islands to Timbuktu at wages commensurate with whatever the designated countries’ national debts will allow—Borg chose to enter seven tournaments and to petition the Men’s International Professional Tennis Council to alter the rule. Forehand crosscourt. The MIPTC refused. Volley deep. Borg said fine, he would just as soon not go through the qualies at the French, which he has won only six times, and at Wimbledon, where he’s only a five-time winner. Backhand pass. On the line.

Arthur Ashe, who’s a member of the council and helped write the rule, last week agreed it was unfair. He said Borg had the ad. “It’s one thing to say if a guy doesn’t go the distance with 502 plate appearances, he doesn’t qualify for the batting title,” Ashe said. “This rule doesn’t even let the guy come to bat.”

Borg’s decision was ultimately his own. And I bet if anyone were to ask him, ‘did you have any regrets?’ He’s take a few minutes to answer. Personally, I’d think he say, ‘yes, I’ve had a few.’

Nadal, though, has shown no inclination to challenge the system. Yes he’s had his fights on the ATP Board, over required number of tour events, but he’s resolved to work on the things that are in his complete control: his game.

But the complication with his knee has been a nagging issue since 2007, and with his baseline style of play — constant grinding: running, sliding, pounding — he hasn’t made things easier on himself.

Is it the tour (three-quarters comprised of hard or fast surfaces, with only two months escape to the rich red clay of Europe) that has contributed to the breakdown of his knee? Partly.

But I think the most concerning part of the story surrounding ‘the knee’ is that he left the tour AFTER his eight week reign on the red clay and only two matches on grass. He left the tour with complications on the softer surfaces. That’s not good.

If his knee couldn’t tolerate the softer surfaces, then what is contributing to his current concern?

I think it’s technical. I think it’s his serve.

The mechanics of any great serve are: shoulder rotation, knee bend and racket speed. All elements must work in perfect synch to — like a Major League baseball pitcher — reduce to wear and tear on his body. Look at Stephen Strasburg versus Nolan Ryan. The difference between the two is stark and dramatic. What Strasburg has in speed is complicated with a little coil, a slight ripple, in his arm which he overuses to sling the baseball in excess of 100 mph; versus, Nolan Ryan who was a model of efficiency and power containing most of his strength in his core and saving the smaller parts of his body (his arm) to shape a pitch, but really the drive and power came from his legs.

The same goes for the great serve actions in the History of Tennis. Rafael Nadal’s serve is not one of them. And every other game, he must serve. He can’t escape it. Most players like to bring their weight to a balanced core: rotating shoulders, bending knees while accelerating their racket in the moment to build racket head speed as their legs are ready to drive and release all the bodyweight up and into the toss. But Nadal struggles with his weight shift releasing too much of his weight forward BEFORE bending into a balanced core.

In short, he’s moved most of his weight forward toward his lead leg, and forces most of his weight to remain forward as the rest of his body plays catch up. Take a look here:

All his weight is moving forward to his bent right leg. His toss into the court makes him shift out early, begging him to go after the toss before his weight is balanced at the core,
underneath his trunk.

Now take a look at the photo at the top of the page.  His body has released all his weight from his right leg, upper body hunched, tilted off line. His left leg has already left the ground and his right leg bears all the weight.

If I were working on Rafa’s serve, I’d have him slide his left foot into the insole of his right, bring both knees down together, coiling all of his body weight with both legs bent in the same spot (like he’s on a diving board ready to spring into action) then release both legs, up and into the toss.

Right now he’s off balance and out of synch, using to much of his upper body, when a majority of his legs should be bearing the heavy lifting. BOTH legs.

And this technical flaw can be traced all the way back to Uncle Toni deciding to convert the young Rafa from his natural right hand, into a left hander.

Yes, Rafael Nadal is a natural righty.

Has the years of relearning how to do things from his left side contributed to his current condition? Maybe.

What we will see in 2013 out of Rafa is a perfectly scheduled tour where he has enough time to recover in between events, changes of surfaces, to reduce the wear and tear on his body. He must.

Until then, take a look at two of the greatest servers in the game and take a look at their body, the angle of their racket, the knee bend, as they’re about to deliver weight and racket speed into the ball.

Serena Williams

Maybe Team Rafa would benefit in the long run and at least reduce some of the wear and tear every other game, on his body.

A Memorable 2012

First, the breakdown of a “tennis season,” which in the US sports blender gets lost in three of our top-tier sports: basketball (fall-spring), baseball (spring-fall) and football (summer-winter). Tennis? January through November.

Tennis is comprised of one long season with four intricate parts which jell it all together. They are the Grand Slams. These events are weighted the most, they have the highest profile and, oddly, they’re spaced so poorly apart, one wonders how the system is jelled together at all. Compressed into and after these big boys are Master 1000s events (just below a Grand Slam in weight and importance) and the rest.

The order with which these Grand Slams are played? Australia in January, France in May, England in June and the US in September.

2012 was a ‘Golden Slam’ Year in tennis. It happens every four Olympic years where a player has the chance to run the table and get Olympic Gold as well. Only one player in the History of Tennis has done so and that’s Steffi Graf in 1988. The caveat to that is all the other Grand Slam winners: Budge (1938), Connolly (1953), Laver (1962, 1969) and Court (1970) never had a chance for Olympic Gold since it was not a medal sport from 1927-1987.

Tournaments leading into the Australian Open are hard court. Tournaments leading into the back to back Masters 1000 which take us out of the first surface and into the next, clay. From late-March to the end of May, we’re on the red dirt of Europe, culminating with the French Open. Then for three weeks the tour moves to grass leading us into ‘strawberries and cream’ at Wimbledon. After that the tour is buckshot into an action-packed hard court summer series leading us into the US Open. And lastly after the US Open there is the final Master 1000 series in the Far East; WTA & ATP World Championships; Fed Cup & Davis Cup finals.

You got it? Tennis is a full year sport. What makes this year so interesting was how would the standout players of 2011 come into 2012? Which players were going to rise to the occasion and who were going to be the story of 2012?

*

Who could forget the Year that was 2012 in the World of Tennis?

It started with that epic 5-set marathon between Novak Djokovic & Rafael Nadal. The stakes were enormous for Novak, because of the year he had in 2011, dominating the field with a newly found self-belief.  That match was just over 6 hours long and it was worth every second. Twice, both players had chances to finish the other off, and twice they failed until we went into the final set and through the dogged determination and supreme strength, Novak endured winning 5-7, 6-4, 6-2, 6-7, 7-5.

At the end of the match both players were so exhausted they nearly fell over as the main sponsor, KIA, went into a 15-minute, very slow speech; fortunately, someone saw both players hunched over and brought them chairs to sit in for the duration.

It was remarkable to see both players fight until the end. No one gave in. One endured.

That’s what this sport is all about, gut wrenching fight to the finish testing mind and body. On this day, Novak prevailed as he had so consistently in 2011 against Nadal. But who could count out the greatest mind in the game, the person who plays one point at a time and never, ever, gives up? No one.

On the ladies side, while Kim Clijsters announced her intention to retire — a crowd favorite in Melbourne — it was Victoria Azarenka who stole the spotlight with her first Grand Slam as well. She beat Maria Sharapova in the final in rather undramatic fashion, 6-3, 6-0. And yes, we had to mute the TV as the Hinderance rule (” ITF Rule 26 on “Hindrance,” which makes no specific reference to noise or level and covers only “deliberate” acts) is never used between the loudest of the grunters: Azarenka & Sharapova. The use of the rule and it’s industry wide implementation were a big part of the discussion this year as well.

Imagine you’re on the other side of the net and someone hits a shot with a loud shrill, a high pitched explosive banshee like shrill attached to the shot but — and here’s the violation — the grunt, shrill, loud pitched sound lingers into YOUR shot. That’s right, even as you’re about to hit the ball, the continued grunt hasn’t stopped, it’s escorted the ball all the way over and into your strike of the ball.

If you grunt, and we all do, when the ball lands on the other side of the net, you sound ends before your opponent strikes. Period. End of discussion.

But somehow these two: Azarenka and Sharapova sidestep the rule. Trust me, it will be revisited again in 2013.

And sadly, here I am, talking about it which takes away the accomplishment of the young Belarusian and her first Grand Slam title. But it should if it creates an advantage for a player. And it clearly is a distraction, a hindrance.

*

From Melbourne, Australia the tour scatters and then coalesces around two huge mini-Grand Slams called Masters 1000s in the US.

Rounding the hard court season players fly stateside in the US for the Masters 1000 series in Palm Springs and Key Biscayne. Here, Victoria Azarenka was in full stride getting a bump from her first ever Grand Slam still undefeated in the season, until Key Biscayne.

She was clearly the number one player at the time, and proved it with consistency and a newfound confidence.

On the men’s side, Roger Federer won Indian Wells, as Novak Djokovic beat Andy Murray to win Key Biscayne, and we seeing the set up for the clash of the titans: Djokovic, Nadal & Federer align themselves for the next phase: the clay court season. The undercards were Murray, Berdych, Tsongas were all playing well, just not top flight.

And in a surprise, Rafael Nadal pulled out of his semi-final match in Key Biscayne citing ‘knee troubles’ the same knee which had created complications in the past. The back to back hard court events were taking their toll on the Spaniard as he packed his bags and a day later, after his withdrawal due to injury, posted on his Facebook page, his practice on the red clay of Europe.

Not even a week rest. The next day, Nadal was on the practice court. And the extent of his ‘injury’ as he pulled from the Masters 1000 was largely ignored.

*

At the end of March, we usher in the red dirt of Europe the most challenging surface: mentally and physically on player’s of all generations. Why? Clay is the chess of our sport. It may take ten or fifteen exchanges by two players before someone decides to attack or out maneuver a player with a combination of power and finesse. It is a demanding surface that tests a player’s patience, particularly someone in the US. In fact the last US player to win the French Open is Andre Agassi in 1999. Prior to that Jim Courier, twice, in 1991 and 1992. And prior to that Michael Chang in 1989. You have to go all the way back to 1955 to find the next American to have won the championships, Tony Trabert, who won that year and the year before in 1954. No Ashe, Smith, McEnroe, Connors or Sampras, but Chang, Courier and Agassi broke the spell.

The USTA which I will talk about in the next article, rethought their mandate after such a long dry spell on clay and from emphasis (training) to execution (changing the summer circuit to clay from 1976-79), they did everything in their power to try and build a clay court champion not for world domination, but for Davis Cup.

In the clay court season, Rafael Nadal proved to be once again the most dominant player coming out of the season, with the exception of the Madrid Masters 1000 — aptly titled Smurf clay by the players (see Federer above) — culminating with his incredible seventh French Open title beating Novak Djokovic (who avenged his semi-final loss to Roger Federer in 2011) in the finals.

It was a repeat of the Australian Open Men’s Singles Final except for one thing, it was a ‘mudder’ final. In a weather beaten weekend of on and off rain, suspensions of play, Nadal proved he was the master, surpassing the great Bjorn Borg (six French Open singles titles) with his seventh.

It was a legendary accomplishment. One a many to come in the Year of 2012.

Maria Sharapova wrapped a beautiful shiny French Open Grand Slam trophy, the last of four other Grand Slams she needed to complete her trophy collection of Slams (she had a Wimbledon, US Open, Australian Open … but not a French Open), against the surprising Italian, Sara Errani (who upset Samantha Stosur to get) in the final.

All of a sudden the triad of Djokovic, Federer and Nadal were moving into an unprecedented turf war: Djokovic and Federer on the faster surfaces, and Nadal on the slower surfaces. But Federer won the Masters 1000 in Madrid, and Djokovic lost in the final of the French Open, so was Nadal becoming vulnerable?

*

We’ll lay that discussion aside as we move into the fast declining third surface of the season, grass.

And this is where the great stories began to surface.

One such was the ascension from four in the world in 2011, to number one, by Roger Federer. He had carried a remarkable fall/end of season confidence into the beginning of 2012. I had made a prediction that 2012 would be Roger’s reemergence from the bottom three to win a Grand Slam and Olympic Gold.

Federer did not disappoint. He won his 17th Grand Slam over the newly energized Andy Murray who didn’t have to confront Rafael Nadal, an early round exit to Marcus Rosol, allowed a clean sail toward the final where in his quarters he played David Ferrer and then Jo-Wilfred Tsongas in the semi. On grass, Tsongas is the threat. But the Spaniard was the one who almost outlasted Murray in four sets, three of them in tiebreakers.

But Murray escaped, and then beat the Frenchman, Tsongas in the semi to face Roger Federer in the final. All of Britain was wondering if the 76 year old drought of a British champion (Fred Perry in 1936) was over.

It wasn’t. Federer who had a bit of the luck of the Irish when the weather changed for the worse allowed for a timely delay in officials closing the retractable roof, and turning a blustery outdoor match into a fast paced indoor final.

Federer wins his 17th Grand Slam after dominating Djokovic in the semi, and clawing his way back in the final against Murray. Not only did Federer take the title but the following Monday he claimed the Number 1 ranking in the world.

One week later, still at the top, Federer smashes through Pete Sampras’ record 286 weeks at the top, and by the end of the summer and into the fall, Federer achieves the milestone, his 300th week at the top.

The other story was Serena Williams who faltered at the French Open in the first round having doubts in her game, retooled and for the next two months ramped up the most devastating run in singles and doubles of any player on the current tour.

With two back to back Singles and Doubles wins: Wimbledon & Olympics she could now begin her sprint to the top of the game. Clearly coming out of the Olympics, Serena was the most dominant force to be reckoned with and yet when it was said and done she still did not get to the top.

But nevertheless, only the winners of the Australian Open (Djokovic & Azarenka) had the chance for the lofty Golden Slam.

Nadal and Sharapova ended both players attempts at the second Grand Slam of the year at the French Open. C’est la vie.

Often there’s a epiphany for a player when he rises from normalcy to become the real talent he imaged as a kid growing up in this game, and Andy Murray grabbed that moment in the 2012 Olympics at Wimbledon. Like Djokovic finding his true talent after helping his country win the Davis Cup in 2010, racing through the draw in 2011, undefeated until the semifinals of that years French Open, Andy Murray punched through and got his rocket propelled launch when he took Olympic Gold from the hands of Roger Federer during the London 2012 Olympic Games.

All the weight of Britain slipped from his shoulders, and his newly aligned team with the former Grand Slam winner Ivan Lendl, now Murray started to feel his potential. And it was glorious to see the Scottish player, a child survivor of a horrible school massacre, leap for joy on the world’s greatest stage after winning Olympic Gold for Queen and country.

*

Where can you go from here? To the hard courts of America!

On a fast track to the US Open were Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, Serena Williams, Petra Kvitova and Li Na, but only one of this group would come out ahead at the US Open: Serena Williams.

So often a player wants to peak at the right time, but hey if you’re winning why question it? Well, the toll of winning more matches is on the body. Many of the European players in particular complain of the abuse the hard courts exact on their bodies, but I suggest that it’s the style of play they bring to the hard court which exacts it’s toll. After all, most fast court players must adjust to the pace of a clay court, and it’s a slow, mind-numbing pace for most of them. So why shouldn’t the Europeans retool their games as well on the hard courts? Isn’t that what Rafael Nadal did in 2008 on grass? And again in 2010 during his first US Open title?

Of course he did. He learned to play closer to the baseline and shorten the points. He retooled his serve, hitting his first serve harder, to get easier points. But now, his game has regressed to the old familiar friend of grinding point to point.

And that has taken the worst toll on him. We never saw Rafael Nadal after his lose in the second round of Wimbledon. And we don’t know when he will be coming back in 2013. He says he’ll be ready for the season, but the season will start on hard courts once again.

The counter to this argument, the punishing surface of a hard court, is the ever youthful, Roger Federer. More precisely, it’s how Roger Federer moves around the court. It’s an elegance in a league of one. No other player moves, anticipates, shifts, adjusts and balances to unload shots more beautifully than Roger Federer. No one.

Well the winds of September, some of the most viscious on record, created a bizarre ending to the summer series at the US Open. On the men’s side, if a severe weather maker hadn’t come in, David Ferrer was going to throttle Novak Djokovic in his semi-final match. As Nole commented after the match was suspended, ‘well, you know, my mind wasn’t quite in it as well as his. I think he wasn’t letting the wind into his thoughts like I was.’

But the rain came, the match was called and the following day, Novak handled things differently brushing the Spaniard aside in four sets while readying himself for a chance at his second Grand Slam title of the year.

Roger Federer, had trouble with the wind himself, bowing out to Tomas Berdych. Federer, a precise player, has shown us that wind even gets into his seams and slows the machine down. Why? His swing, particularly on the backhand side, comes up and off the ball a little earlier on windy days where the ball darts and wiggles around a little before contact. And Berdych made him pay taking him out in four sets.

The beneficiary of this was Andy Murray. After all he’s a Scotsman, and growing up on the coastal wind ravaged areas makes you, well, a ‘windtalker’ a master of the wind. And interestingly he made use of the breeze hitting slices, carving drop shots, inside out hacks to make the ball stay low and flutter around the court.

Berdych was no match for the mastery of ‘windtalker’ Murray. Again, Murray had his chance. Again, he was put in a situation to win. And again, Andy Murray would have to face his demons of ‘self-doubt’ but he had notched a Gold Medal performance, taking out the silver medalist, Federer on his way to the top of the podium.

Could this be Andy Murray’s year to win a Grand Slam? YES!

Murray outlasted Novak in the first set tiebreaker, had multiple opportunities to take him out easier, but nevertheless, won it, raced to a two-set lead before Novak reminded himself: ah, you may never get another Grand Slam chance again.

And the fight was on. Novak started in the third and then continued in the fourth set, an all out assault on the ball with a follow up at the net for some terrific offensive tennis. But the wind — even though still blustery on court — left his sails in the fifth and final set. Murray could easily have been devastated with a dwindling lead, evaporating before his eyes; Murray could have done, for better choice of words, a Murray! He could have shouted, yelled, smacked his racket in anger, and packed it up.

But he didn’t. Mary Carillo, the CBS analyst, said, ‘I’m afraid if Andy Murray loses this set (fourth) this could seal it for him once again.’

But we were looking at a different Andy Murray. A more confident man bucked it up and started to move Novak. It’s as if Murray got outside of himself, for the first time, and really understood that this match, his victory, was a game of attrition: a physical war. And the winner of the war, was the man who could move, be moved and move his opponent more without being effected by the barrage of baseline banging.

And there was banging out there! But what I noticed more was Murray recovering court more efficiently, than Novak. For example, when moved out of position to either wide side, Murray would side shuffle, two maybe three shuffles to find the center of the baseline again and ready himself for the next shot.

Novak on the other hand when pushed to the wide side of the court, would — and this is incomprehensible to me — SLIDE into a wide ball, like a gymnast on a full leg stretch. Imagine the toll on the upper legs, sliding out for so long in such a weak and vulnerable position, then having to recover, pop up at of the pose and start to sprint to recover court.

I mentioned his team must train Novak to rethink that move. As he becomes one of the aging veterans in particular, he will without question, injure himself.

And that’s what Murray saw on the other side. He saw Novak being moved further and wider out of position, sliding into a ball, hitting a relatively weak recovery shot, allowing Andy to pummel the next shot to the other side with little or no threat.

It was like Frazier taking the inside game on Ali and pounding away at the body until Ali’s  will and effectiveness were crushed. Andy Murray made Novak Djokovic run against his emotional physical wall, and Novak didn’t have anything left. Except …

Kabuki theater. I’ve always known players throughout who have taken advantage of certain rules of the game: Nadal the time clock to start points; and Novak was the master of the ‘injury timeout.’

But this time, Novak decided to employ the strategy too late in the fifth, down 5-2, Murray’s serve, Novak called for an injury timeout. And the New York crowd booed. They knew. They’d seen it before. Nole knew but feigned innocence. Murray knew, but danced around the court, readying him for the eventual, his first Grand Slam.

And it was only a matter of minutes before Andy Murray got back to where he was in mind and body and ended up serving out the match, taking the title, winning the title, grabbing the title into his rightful arms.

Andy Murray was no longer a bridesmaid. Andy Murray was a Grand Slam Champion.

But, this match was held on Monday night. It was the fourth straight delayed US Open. And the controversy remains why hasn’t the US Open build a ‘retractable roof ‘ for their stadium, and, in their expansion plans, why is there no ‘roof’ on any of the designs?

All of this benefitted the women who moved their Super Saturday rained out match to a Sunday prime time, after the National Football League (NFL) finished their Sunday games. It’s a boost to the tennis ratings (although tennis is ratings challenged) to be the lead in after the Sunday football.

And the ladies did not disappoint: Victoria Azarenka vs. Serena Williams. It was the blockbuster final that tournament officials and television executives wanted: the best vs the American.

Serena Williams came out and raced to a one-set lead in what could be described as a perfect set. She was invincible. Nothing Victoria Azarenka did shook Serena. She was calm. She was collected. And she was on fire!

I had the luxury of seeing her practice before one of her early rounds and what stood out was she worked on her return of serve for a solid 45 min to an hour. Only returns. Anchored on the baseline, if not her heels slightly inside, she rocked back and forth, and launched into a huge first serve hit by her 6′ 4″ male counterpart on the other side of the net. He hit rocket after rocket — jam, center service, body, wide — and she calmly, precisely, with exact measurement of time and space, moved forward and crushed the returns to the corners.

Crushed. There is no other way to describe the efficiency of the swing, the timing of the release of the racket and the weight moving in behind the ball. Crushed it!

That was the most appropriate description of her first set against Azarenka, who clearly was rattled, but not flustered. The difference is simple. Rattled you have no answers and self-doubt starts to slip it’s way into your thoughts and actions. Flustered is one stop away from all out panic.

Victoria Azarenka had a motivating hashtag on a lot of her Twitter posts: #letsdothis. And her mindset was no matter how long, how hard, I will be there from beginning to end.

And she was. Serena took a holiday in the second set. MIA. Nowhere near her shotmaking or dominance in the second, Serena was misfiring shots from all parts of the court. And she was misfiring badly.

How can someone go from complete and utter domination to utter confusion? I have a tough time with that since I believe, and I’ve trained, and I’ve trained others to the following notion: it’s not where you are, it’s where you’re going. From start to finish, your performance is a measured upward trend from getting a feel for the court, your environment, your range to eventually playing with complete confidence in all aspects of your game.

You move it forward. You solve the riddles by focusing intently on the other side of the net. Where’s their weakness? Is it improving? Or is it breaking down? How are they running? Are they tired? Or have they found their second wind?

All strategies, all adjustments of strategy comes from our observations of the other side of the court. And if we’re too preoccupied with our own shortcomings, then we’re not paying attention to all the clues before us.

For some reason, Serena didn’t believe in her first set performance. It was an out of body experience. And when a player questions that, then a player will be cognizant of everything. The great Australian two time Grand Slam winner, Rod Laver said it best, ‘never change a winning game.’ But Serena began to question all of it. They were the same starts to the points, but somehow shots were firing long and wide, missing their mark, when a set earlier they were hit with laser precision.

Azarenka, the tough Belarusian, capitalized and ran with it until serving for the match at 5-4 in the third set. Then she over thought it, flooded her mind with ‘I’m serving for my second Grand Slam title … in the same year!’ thoughts which are the first step towards being too aware.

At these moments, when they come, you must take each one and make it yours. What got you to this point, the game you brought to get to the match ending game, must be what takes you over the top. No matter who you face or what you hear or where you are in the world’s stage, you must dictate.

And this is where Serena is supreme. Her mind, much like Rafael Nadal’s mind, never doubts at the most critical points in the match. And out of a deep slumber, Serena came to defend, and then dominate. You see it in her eyes as they narrow in on you. And she looks at you as if to say, ‘all right, I’m ready to begin. You? I see you have doubts. So let’s begin.’

Boom. Break of serve. Boom. Hold serve. Boom. Break serve. Game, set and match Serena Williams.

It was a stunning reversal of fortune … for both players. And it was a terrific, dramatic toast to the ladies game on what was usually reserved for the Sunday Men’s Final.

*

Insert Davis Cup semi-final matches and move the tour to the Far East before entering the final phase: The World Championships reserved for the best, most highly ranked, most consistent players in the year.

The greatest growth in the game has come in the Far East. Bar none. It is not lost on either the ATP or the WTA to stake a presence in that market. And they have. China has two enormous events. Japan has an enormous event. India, Thailand, Indonesia all have events. And with the emergence of Li Na, first Grand Slam winner, and Kei Nishikori, highest ranked Japanese player, the game has exploded in the Far East.

It’s too bad that it also comes at the end of a grueling year. Take a look at the withdrawals. And that isn’t lost on the sponsorship. Trust me they like most will argue for a prime location in the calendar to ensure the best field of players.

And the players know that this market is a ripe, yet to be tapped market. The demographic numbers are astounding. And the penetration of your brand, whatever you’ve aligned yourself with for the long haul, can be marketed to a mass of people we have not seen in the history of this sport.

But, and this is a huge but, players are human. Their bodies break down. And much like the roster of an NFL, NBA or MLB team whoever manages their roster the best, has a great chance of making the playoffs and possibly winning it all.

And so we come down to the final leg of the tour which also qualifies players for the prestigious World Championships. The journalists love to update us on who’s ‘on the bubble’ and ‘who’s making a last ditch run’ at the final spots, but inevitably it’s the player who (1) is the most consistent player throughout the year, and (2) the player who schedules himself the best who ends up in the Final 8.

The Women lead off with their World Championship first. They were all there but only one came to dominate. And that was Serena Williams.

Unquestionably Serena Williams strung together the most dominant stretch of tennis out of the top players in the game, either men or women’s game. Wimbledon, Olympics, US Open, World Championships.

This was a crowning achievement for a player who missed nearly a year of tennis due to injury and a life-threatening pulmonary embolism; who came back in 2011 to the grass courts of England and was thankful for a second chance, a renewal, of her love for this sport.

And she has renewed her focus and domination. The question I always ask, what are the other players doing to compete with Serena? Certainly at 31 years old, Serena will become vulnerable: the sporting body never wears well. And the younger players have to be thinking maybe Serena is in my sights now.

After her year, you’d think Serena was ranked No. 1. She’s not. After this year, she’s No. 3 in the world. And yet, everyone knows who’s the most difficult player in the draw to compete against. Everyone knows it’s Serena Williams.

On the men’s side, the old standards met some new faces: Kei Nishikori won the Japan Open and lit a nation on fire achieving his highest world ranking at 19 in the world. He will be set for life with endorsements in his native country. And well deserved.

Novak Djokovic claims Beijing and Shanghai dominating the China run; while David Ferrer takes the Paris Open (which Roger Federer did not defend) and Juan Martin Del Potro storms through Europe taking two titles, one where he wrestled a title defense from Roger Federer in Basel.

London calling all top ATP players, and they all came. But in the end, it was Novak Djokovic who claimed the title and regained the No 1 ranking in the world. Federer who had to defend: Basel, Paris and the ATP World Championships coming into the final, lost in the final of two and passed on one.

And so Novak Djokovic grabs the golden ring and ends up the World No. 1 while the aging Roger Federer drops to No. 2.

What a year! But we’re not done. Last stop Fed Cup and Davis Cup.

*

It is the most dramatic of team events: Davis Cup for the men and Fed Cup for the ladies.

Outside of the exhibition event, The Hopman Cup, rarely does a player get to represent country. And yet, sprinkled through the grind of the normal tour event calendar, through the four Grand Slams, through the Olympics (every four years), the top players are supposed to represent their country as well. Federer did. And Switzerland flamed out in Switzerland against the US. A Davis Cup trophy is still one of the few trophy’s that Roger Federer, like an Olympic Gold, does not possess.

It’s what makes the event so … unpredictable. You never know.

In the Fed Cup, the Czech Republic played Serbia and the unheralded Lucy Safarova ended up winning two matches for the Czechs as the ladies repeat and become back to back Federation Cup winners. And Ana Ivanovic and the Serbs take their dreams of winning the world team championships home, empty handed; while Petra Kvitova and Lucy Safarova parade around in Prague with the Fed Cup trophy.

The Davis Cup, our last event of the tennis year, pitted five-time defending champions, Spain vs. the Czech Republic. The only noticeable difference in the teams, no Rafael Nadal. David Ferrer and Nicolas Almagro were assigned the heavy lifting, and coming out of Day 1 the tie was split. Berdych beat Almagro and Ferrer beat Stepankek.

Day 2 the doubles went to the Czech Republic who beat the ATP World Tour Masters champions Granollers-Lopez in four and all of a sudden the press was heralding Tomas Berdych as the next man to go down in the history books with 3 wins, if, that is he were to beat David Ferrer on the final day. The last player to do that was Pete Sampras in 1995.

And Berdych didn’t have a prayer. Ferrer came in and took the match away from him.

So now, in Prague, the heroics were on the shoulders of the 33 year old Radek Stepanek.

And he delivered! Stepanek beat the younger Nicolas Almagro in four sets on the faster hard surface, making Stepanek and instant hometown hero!

And it’s the first time in the History of Tennis that the Hopman Cup, Fed Cup and Davis Cup have been won by the same country, the Czech Republic.

What a year of tennis!

Classic Serena!

The WTA Conundrum

Well, we’re coming to the end. The end of another long year of tennis and still the same unresolved issues crop up into our sport just like so many others. Are the top ranked players ranked accordingly? Is the season too long? Do the top players have more of an advantage than the lower ranked players?

The most obvious concern for the WTA (Women’s Tennis Association) is whether the year end rankings rank the best of the sport at the top, or, whether the participation rate skews that ranking. Serena Williams clearly was the most dominant player in the big ticket events throughout the year: Wimbledon Champion (Singles & Doubles); Olympic Gold (Singles & Doubles); US Open Champion (Singles); WTA World Champion.

And yet her year end ranking is #3.

It’s the classic conundrum: win the most prestigious events, the most high profile events and yet you’re still not considered the best player in the rankings.

Does the WTA rethink their ranking model? Or should Serena simply play more events, dominate more tournaments and take the lion’s share of total points won?

There in lies the difficulty in the system. Players should be rewarded for participation, shouldn’t they? Tournaments should be weighted for their importance. And, here is the catch, all players should be given access to the same training as the top which means a more prize money allocated for the first two rounds of all tournaments.

It’s what the ATP is fighting for on the men’s side, more of the prize money allocated to the early rounds so the financial burden is lightened, and, if strategized well and resources are spent wisely, maybe just maybe an equal training opportunity, and access to building their team.

Just what is a team comprised of? A trainer, physiotherapist, mental coach, management which gives you, the player, the freedom to go out and play to the best of your abilities knowing a team has your back, scheduling you correctly, tweaking your physical condition, game and your mind for optimal performance. All the things the top can afford.

The only difference, and it’s a well deserved difference, is the marketing rewards for achieving the heights in your sport.

Would it create balance in the sport? Would the top trainers search for more members to add to their client list? Would they be able to handle all their clients?

No. No way. Why? Tennis is an international sport. Travel separates teams. Showcase events provide an opportunity for international exposure for your player and your team. The best will rise to those occasions, and those who are striving for the opportunity will still have to fight their way match to match, big event to larger exposure and do what the top has done year after year, win consistently!

It is the clear and obvious delineation of the deserved and those in pursuit: consistent wins over the consistently best in the world.

But to expand a game, their has to be participation. It’s not enough to come out and only win the big events while playing a limited schedule. Players who play more, risk more, and physically wear more. Shouldn’t they be rewarded for that as well?

So when answering the question; how come Serena isn’t ranked #1 in the world? I think you have to look at participation in a eleven month schedule. And Serena played in 15 events.

Expanding the game is the key. And any solution that brings about more participation, not less, is going to bring more viewers, fans and participants into our sport.

And that’s the ultimate solution.