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#5: 1996 women's singles final
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With the French Open finals just 5 days away, we're taking a look back at the greatest of the title matches while the crescendo builds to championships Sunday.
Checking in at No. 5 today, the 1996 women's final.
Steffi Graf def. Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, 6-3, 6-7(4), 10-8
While Steffi Graf went down as perhaps the greatest of all time, she was challenged again and again during her playing days for that title at the French Open. Arantxa Sanchez Vicario reached six Roland Garros finals in her career, three against Graf. Graf reached seven total, including her last Grand Slam victory, in 1999.
Their first encounter came in 1989, with Sanchez Vicario emerging victorious. The next year, Graf won the crown. Vicario lost in the final in 1991, Graf lost it in 1992, then won it in 1993. Vicario lost the final in 1994, then was beaten by Graf in 1995. The two met again in 1996 for an epic battle.
Not surprisingly, Graf entered the field as the No. 1 seed, with Vicario fourth behind Monica Seles and fellow Spaniard Conchita Martinez .
 Until facing Mary Jo Fernandez in the fourth round, Graf didn’t lose more than three games in a single set, and defeated Fernandez 6-1, 7-6(9-7).
Vicario was just as sensational, including losing just one game total in the second and third rounds combined.
Graf barely blinked in reaching the finals, crushing Ivan Majoli 6-3, 6-1 in the quarterfinals and Martinez 6-3, 6-1 in the semifinals.
The road was more stressful for Vicario, who outlasted Karina Habsudova 6-2, 6-7(4), 10-8 in the quarterfinals.
Down a set in the final, Vicario nipped Graf 7-6(4) in the second set, the German’s first set loss of the entire tournament. Graf bounced back for a 10-8 third set to claim the title, and would go on to down Vicario in the Wimbledon championship match as well.
While it was their last meeting for the Roland Garros title, the pair continued to dominate the tournament. Vicario won it in 1998 and Graf in 1999.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/1/2011 6:17:17 AM | with 0 comments
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No. 4: 1999 men's singles
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With the French Open finals just 4 days away, we're taking a look back at the greatest of the title matches while the crescendo builds to championships Sunday.
Checking in at No. 4 today, the 1999 men's final.
Andre Agassi def. Andriy Medvedev, 1-6, 2-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-4
 It was a battle of men with the same name spelled differently in the 1999 French Open final, and it’s tough to say which was the more-unexpected participant.
Andriy Medvedev was a very good, but never great pro, 24 years old by the spring of 1999. He had reached the semifinals at Roland Garros in 1993 and the quarterfinals there in 1994, at the US Open in 1993 and at the Australian Open in 1995. The near misses appeared to be the apex of his career. After the 1995 Australian, he never made it past the fourth round of a Slam in the next four seasons, including a first-round flameout at the French Open in 1998.
By 1999, Andre Agassi had achieved a remarkable rankings rise, sinking to No. 141 in the world in late 1997 and starting a habitual use of crystal meth. In 1998, he won five titles and jumped from 110th to sixth in the world, but by the spring of 1999, it had still been four years since his last Grand Slam title (Australian Open, 1995).
Agassi entered Roland Garros as the 13th seed, well behind frequent rival Pete Sampras (second), but ahead of Medvedev, who was ranked No. 100 in the world and who had the unenviable road ahead of Sampras in the second round.
Sampras, barely made it there, surviving an unexpected five-set first round, and Medvedev caught him off guard with a first-set 7-5 victory en route to a stunning 7-5, 1-6, 6-4, 6-3 win.
With the big dog out of the hunt, Medvedev went on to win his next two matches to reach the quarterfinals.
On the other end of the bracket, Agassi needed nine sets to ease his way through the first two rounds. He dropped the first set of the fourth round to No. 4 seeded Carlos Moya before winning three straight to fight to the quarterfinals.
In the round of eight, Medvedev shocked defending champion Gustavo Kuerten 7-5, 6-4, 6-4 while Agassi destroyed qualifier Marcelo Fillippini 6-2, 6-2, 6-0. Both men survived four-set semifinals, but Medvedev looked like he would write the final script of the Cinderella story when he took the first two sets from Agassi easily, 6-1, 6-2.
 Agassi, who had spent much of the past two off-seasons rigorously improving his stamina, made it pay off with a dramatic comeback, winning the next three sets to take his first-ever French Open title, completing his career Grand Slam, the first man to do so since Rod Laver.
The image of Agassi, with his head nearly shaven bald and in tears of joy and gratitude to his fans, is perhaps the most enduring of his legacy.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/2/2011 6:16:57 AM | with 0 comments
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Put your mouth where your money is
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 World No. 4 Andy Murray did nothing to dispel my belief that he might actually be a robot on Thursday when he boringly declared of his chances in Friday’s match with defending French Open champion Rafael Nadal: “I feel I can do it.”
Particularly when a quick search of our archives back to January of 2010 had him giving virtually the same quote in an interview about his chances of winning that season’s Australian Open.
On Thursday, Murray told an interviewer, “I feel I can do it. It’s just making sure that come Friday, I play my best tennis.”
Some 17 months ago, he told BBC Scotland, “I believe I can win it. I just need to make sure I play my best tennis.”
Wow, talk about some bulletin board material.
The denizens of the United Kingdom are not exactly known for their swagger, but Murray ’s dainty, “careful I don’t offend anyone” comments bore me to tears. Except for boxing, you don’t get any more one-on-one than tennis among the major, socially-acceptable sports.
Champions, even the quiet, professional kind, swagger. Champions don’t use “can”, they use “will.”
 Yoda didn’t tell Luke Skywalker, “Do or do not, or hey, just give it your best effort and you’ll still be OK in my book,” he shoved Luke’s whiny butt out of the way and yanked his X-wing out of the swamp.
“Can” is never going to beat Rafael Nadal. The only things beating him these days are his own body and one hell of a streaking Serbian, and Murray can’t pass for either one of them.
Here’s a bit of free advice for Mr. Murray. Open up. Admit that you’re human (if you are). Show your emotions. Do an in-depth interview and talk about subjects that you usually avoid – the 1996 Dunblane massacre, where Murray was a terrified nine-year-old, comes to mind.
Let people see you as more than just the latest British guy who can’t win a Grand Slam tournament. Get aggressive. Declare that you could care less if you’re No. 4 or No. 400, if you’re not No. 1, you aren’t satisfied.
Reveal that you’re still angry at yourself for the way you’ve played in your three career Grand Slam finals appearances (all straight-set losses). People like to see that emotion. It makes them realize you’re a real guy.
 Heck, John McEnroe is still pissed about losing the 1984 French Open final to Ivan Lendl, and that was 27 years ago! I’m still mad I missed a hole-in-one playing disc golf by about three inches in the summer of 2009, and I got married two days later!
 You don’t have to take it to the extreme of a Joe Namath and start guaranteeing victories to show that you’ve got some passion for your craft (and please, don't emulate Broadway Joe and given drunken sideline interviews either).
But be real, be fiery and maybe at some point in the future, you’ll be No. 1.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/2/2011 7:55:58 PM | with 0 comments
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No. 3: 1992 women's singles final
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With the French Open finals just 3 days away, we're taking a look back at the greatest of the title matches while the crescendo builds to championships Sunday.
Checking in at No. 3 today, the 1992 women's final.
Monica Seles def. Steffi Graf, 6-2, 3-6, 10-8
When the bracket was released for the 1992 French Open, No. 1 Seles had accrued five Grand Slam titles in a little over two years, and No. 2 Graf had notched 10 Slams since 1987.
The pair had met in the Roland Garros final in 1990, with Seles taking a win, and she had repeated her title in 1991, defeating Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, Graf’s other huge rival on clay.
Other than a fourth-round hiccup against Japan ’s Akiko Kijimuta, Seles was nearly flawless in winning her section. Graf was even better at the bottom of the bracket, losing only four games once in a set in the first
four rounds, that to 10th-seeded Jana Novotna in the fourth round.
Both players had vastly-improved competition in the semifinals. Seles outlasted Gabriela Sabatini in three sets; Graf did likewise against Vicario.
The top two players than traded uppercuts in the first two sets of the final before engaging in a monstrously-entertaining final, with Seles finally taking the crown, her third straight at Roland Garros, with a 10-8 victory.
Graf barely batted an eye, winning Wimbledon two months later over Seles, who in turn won the US Open that autumn and the Australian Open the following January.
But before she could go after a fourth straight French Open title, Seles saw her career broken in two when she was stabbed on-court.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/3/2011 6:23:10 AM | with 0 comments
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No. 2: 1984 men's singles final
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With just two days of the French Open left, we're taking a look back at the greatest of the title matches while the crescendo builds to the men's championship on Sunday
Checking in at No. 2 today, the 1984 men's final.
Ivan Lendl def. John McEnroe 3-6, 2-6, 6-4, 7-5, 7-5
What John McEnroe still calls his most disappointing loss in tennis was the moment of absolute breakthrough for Ivan Lendl.
 Despite winning eight other Grand Slam titles in his career, losing the finals of a match in which he led two sets to none was compounded by the fact that it cost him the chance to win the French and US Opens and Wimbledon in the same season.
There were no long shots or upstarts in this final matchup. McEnroe entered the field as the No. 1 seed and Lendl as No. 2. The third and fourth seeds - Jimmy Connors and Mats Wilander -- made the semifinals, and three of the next four seeds were in the quarters.
McEnroe didn't lose a set until the fourth round, while Lendl didn't suffer a blemish until the quarterfinals.
There, McEnroe beat his two closest American contemporaries - Jimmy Arias in the quarterfinals and Connors in the semifinals, both in straight sets.
Lendl elminated Wilander in three, but looked completely out of sorts against McEnroe, who jumped to a 6-3, 6-2 lead.
But playing for one point at a time, Lendl won the third set 6-4, then had pivotal breaks in each of the next two sets, both 7-5 victories to take the crown.
McEnroe more than made up for it, with wins at Wimbledon and the US Open, but they were the last majors of his career, even though he was just 25 years old at season's end.
For Lendl, the breakthrough was the start of something big. He followed his first Grand Slam with a second at the US Open in 1985, then won the French and US together in 1986 and 1987. He added two more titles, both at the Australian Open, in 1989 and 1990, finishing three straight seasons (1985-1987) as the No. 1 ranked player.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/4/2011 9:01:56 AM | with 0 comments
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#1: 1989 men's singles finals
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Michael Chang def. Stefan Edberg 6-1, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2
For any long shot who's been told he has no chance, any teenager told to wait a few years, there's the story of Michael Te-Pei Chang, the youngest-ever male player to win a Grand Slam title.
Chang had turned 17 a little more than two months before he entered the 1989 French Open as the No. 15 seed. Stefan Edberg was 23, had already achieved the No. 1 the ranking and had won three Grand Slam titles.
Edberg had little trouble getting through his section, losing just one set and sweeping an 18-year-old Goran Ivanisevic in the fourth round to reach the quarterfinals.
In the first section with top seed Ivan Lendl, Chang didn’t seem to have much hope of getting too far, particularly after losing the first set of his first match. He bounced back with nine straight set wins, including a second-round victory over an 18-year-old Pete Sampras.
In the fourth round, he found Lendl, who had yet to lose a set, waiting for him, and the Czech star won the first two sets in typical fashion.
Chang responded with one of the most shocking and unlikely comebacks in Open Era history, winning the next three sets (all by 6-3 counts). In the fourth set, he had severe leg cramps and considered retiring, even when ahead 2-1 in the fifth.
He began playing more aggressively to shorten points, and wolfed down bananas and drank water at every break. In the fifth set, he staggered Lendl with a quick, underhanded serve.
The usually unflappable Lendl began to struggle, and Chang played up the advantage. Ahead 5-3 and at break point, Chang stood almost at the center of the court awaiting a serve. The odd tactic against broke Lendl’s concentration and he double-faulted to give Chang the victory.
In the quarterfinals, Chang rallied past fellow upstart Ronalg Agenor and did the same to Andrei Chesnokov in the semifinals. The other semi pitted Edberg against No. 2 Boris Becker, and their match was one for the record books as well, with Edberg taking a 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6, 6-2 victory.
The final went another five sets, with Chang rallying from down 2-1 to win his only Grand Slam on June 5, the same day of the famous and infamous Chinese student rally in Tiananmen Square .
“I often tell people I think it was God's purpose for me to be able to win the French Open the way it was won because I was able to put a smile on Chinese people's faces around the world at a time when there wasn't much to smile about," Chang said.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/5/2011 8:12:12 AM | with 0 comments
That's right, I watch the Bachelorette. The Bachelor, too. Ditto on Dancing with the Stars.
The reason? I'm married, and would prefer to stay so.
The Bachelor/Bachelorette is one of our country's most delightful social experiments. Caucasians of above-average physical attractiveness get together in Southern California, assuming they have careers that don't mind them taking two months off, to engage in several rounds of dating. Said dating consists of going on dates in helicopters and fancy sports cards to tourist locations that would otherwise take a life savings to reach, spending time in hot tubs, crying about insecurities - such as "the guy I like has made out with seven other women today".
From there, two people get engaged on national TV, then break up over  the course of next 1-3 months via the covers of various tabloid magazines.
This year's Bachelorette is known as Dr. Tube Socks by my favorite reality TV blogger, and the first three episodes of the show have been dominated by a dude wearing a mask, whose only super powers appear to be creeping people out and .. well, wearing a mask.
The mask came off last night, and judging by the girl's reaction, probably should have stayed on for the duration. Masky got sent home by the good doctor about 25 minutes later.
 With the mask unveiled, I was able to concentrate on the rest of the cast, and I gasped in amazement when I saw the No. 1 tennis player in the world accepting a rose to stick around another week.
Rafael Nadal in the flesh, or at least the guy sure looks like him, and that's good enough for me to call him that every time he's on the screen, much to my wife's annoyance delight.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/7/2011 6:00:55 AM | with 1 comments
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Maybe Andy Roddick should consider employing Brock Lesnar?
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British men’s tennis just got interesting.
For starters, his middle name is Dino, which is almost awesome enough by itself. His dad is a taxi driver, and he recently began a fitness program with Argentinean cage fighter Diego “Toro” Visotzky.
Yes, the word “Argentinean cage fighter” just appeared in conjunction with a British tennis player. The only way I would have thought that possible before Tuesday would be if I had written, “Andy Murray was beaten with an inch of his life today for giving an Argentinean cage fighter a funny look at a club.”
London’s The Sun, played up the connection with its top sports headline “James is a knockout” following the upset of Wawrinka.
Ward, enjoying the rare limelight, showed a knack for humor and likability in his flurry of interviews post-match.
 “He is a little scary, to be honest,” Ward said of Visotzky, seen here appearing to deliver the cage fighter version of "The People's Elbow" to this poor guy.
“He hasn’t put me in a cage yet, but he keeps putting me in headlocks. He was walking around tournaments for a long time with all of his fighting gear on, so I had to give him a lot of stuff to make him blend in a little bit. He looked like was a bodyguard. I don’t need one of them just yet.”
Ward said that training with Visotzky has made him “more explosive” around the court, something that was apparent in his 7-6, 6-3 win over Wawrinka, the No. 14 player in the world.
The 24-year-old Ward is the No. 2-ranked British player, and has never been ranked higher than No. 187 in the world. He didn’t start playing tennis until age 11 and was formerly Rafael Nadal’s hitting partner during the winter of 2009 in Mallorca.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/8/2011 9:50:52 AM | with 0 comments
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Hard to believe that it's just hitting June, two majors are in the books, and qualifying for the year end championship is already well underway. The list will be updated right here to see who makes it to compete in the premier event at the O2 Arena in London.
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Well, the streak of Novak Djokovic was finally ended by a masterful performance from Roger Federer, the "old man" who is now a paltry 1-6 against the top two players in the world in 2011. On the positive side, against the rest of the world he is sitting at a comfortable 33-2.
While no one expects Federer to miss qualifying for the year end event, there are players that have already qualified. Along the way in his destruction of, well, everybody, up until the start of June, Novak Djokovic was the first to qualify for the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals. Nole has played in the event the previous four years.
After winning his sixth Roland Garros crown on June 5, Rafael Nadal has also qualified for the event. The Spaniard has played in the year end event five times previously, missing 2008 due to injury. His best result was the final in 2010, losing in three sets to Roger Federer.
One would have to expect Federer will be the next to qualify, but it will depend on his efforts at Wimbledon. His has participated in the year-end event every year since 2002, and has walked away with the title on five occasions.
As of June 9, 2011, the current standings are:
1. Rafael Nadal (Qualified)
2. Novak Djokovic (Qualified)
3. Roger Federer
4. Andy Murray
5. Robin Soderling
6. David Ferrer
7. Tomas Berdych
8. Gael Monfils
9. Mardy Fish
10. Andy Roddick
The top eight make it into the round robin style event, with usually the next two players arriving as alternates in case of injury.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Richard Lucas on 6/9/2011 12:39:38 PM | with 0 comments
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Cue the obligatory Boyz II Men "End of the Road" montage
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 Time, as Mick Jagger once crooned, waits for no one.
That truth is doubly the case for professional athletes, whose window of true dominance is much, much briefer than the span of a lifetime.
For the truly blessed, it can be two decades, like in the case of a golfer or a baseball pitcher. For others, the span is infinitely short, as any Olympic gymnast who peaks at the age of 18 can tell you.
Tennis players fall into the far end of the broad part of the bell curve when it comes to length of pro careers. Ten to 12-year careers not common, but certainly not rare.
Unfortunately, one of the most painful things to see in sports is when athletes hang around past their primes, becoming shells of their former selves before finally coming to terms with the fact that their moment in the sun is at an end.
 When it's bad, it's really bad, like for baseball's Willie Mays, falling down in the outfield chasing fly balls and hitting .211 as a 42-year-old with the New York Mets or football's Joe Namath, staggering through four games with the Los Angeles Rams at age 34 after being wiaved by his beloved New York Jets.
As competitors in a largely individual sport, tennis players fall victim to not seeing when they've reached their peak and started the often rapid descent. Appearances in tournament finals turn into quarterfinals which turn into first-round upsets that slowly cease to become upsets.
Injuries that used to take a day to overcome start taking weeks. Getting up early to hit 500 backhands goes from being a joy to a chore.
Here's a look at five current ATP and WTA players who need to consider making 2011 their final year on the tours.
 Lleyton Hewitt
Age - 30; Current Rank - 73rd; Last Top 10 ranking - June, 2006; Last major title - Washington D.C. , 2006; Commentary - The slide has become a plummet for the 30-year-old former No. 1. He ended 2010 with back-to-back losses to opponents ranked 109th and 191st. He’s 5-4 so far in 2011, pulling in a yawn-inspiring $69,000 in prize money in the process.
 Nikolay Davydenko
Age - 30; Current Rank - 29th; Last Top 10 ranking - October, 2010; Last major title - ATP World Tour Finals, 2009; Commentary - Yes, he won Munich six weeks ago and played Roger Federer in the Doha final in January, but the talent is starting to stretch as thin as his hair. He knocked out of Roland Garros by whoever Antonio Veic is, ranked 227th, and went without a win from Jan. 10 to Feb. 21.
Ivan Ljubicic
 Age - 32; Current Rank - 37th; Last Top 10 ranking - May, 2007; Last major title - Indian Wells, 2010; Commentary - Great, now I’m coming off as a bald hater. His 2010 Indian Wells title is starting to look like a miracle, considering he only reached one other final last year. His “defense” at Indian Wells this spring consisted of getting slaughtered by Juan Martin Del Potro, dropping Ljubicic 22 spots in the rankings. In 25 matches this season, he’s got five losses to guys ranked 84th or worse.
Venus Williams
 Age - 30; Current Rank - 32nd; Last Top 10 ranking - January, 2011; Last major title - Wimbledon, 2008; Commentary - Lost in the background of Serena’s non-stop injury/paparazzi/product endorsement bandwagon is the fact that Venus has been just as banged up and out of action for almost the same length of time. Her success at Wimbledon has kept her relevant as her skills have waned, but even that seems to be dissipating.
Greta Arn
 Age - 32; Current Rank - 46th; Last Top 10 ranking - Never: Last major title - Ummmmm …; Commentary - The first sign that you should retire in 2011? You were born in the 1970s. Arn has yet to reach the $1 million barrier for career earnings, but that hasn’t stopped her from plugging along season after season, even though she’s never been ranked higher than 40th. She stunned the world by winning Auckland this year, defeating Maria Sharapova in the quarters, but that’s looking like a once-in-a-lifetime victory.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/9/2011 7:43:11 PM | with 6 comments
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Maybe Lebron James can take up ping pong?
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 The NBA's best tennis player is now a world champion as well.
Germany's Dirk Nowitzki, star forward for the Dallas Mavericks, was named Finals MVP last night as his Mavericks shocked the highly-favored MIami Heat in six games, defeating the "Big Three" combination of Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh on their home court.
Nowitzki, who stands seven feet tall, registered to play pro league tennis for the German club TG Wuerzburg a month ago. The team includes Roland Mayer, who is the boyfriend of Nowitzki's sister.
"Dirk wants to play, he is very eager to be here," Mayer told a local German paper. "If it fits time wise, then all hell will break lose here."
Easily Germany's most popular non-soccer athlete, Nowitzki and the rest of the NBA face a looming lockout as their representation and the NBA owners clash on a number of subjects.
Most fans became cognizant of Nowitzki's affinity for tennis when he popped up at the USTA Pro Circuit's Challenger of Dallas event to support fellow German Rainer Schuettler, who reached the event's final.
While Nowitzki may never reach the level of say, Steffi Graf, in Germany's panethon of tennis stars, the fact that he can call Kevin Anderson, John Isner and Ivo Karlovic "shorty" will still make him an intriguing draw. Hard to hit a ball past the guy with the 84-inch wingspan.
And although I'm staunchly opposed to the city of Dallas ever winning anything, it's still enjoyable to know that Nowitzki had tons to do with making photos like these possible.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/13/2011 6:33:45 AM | with 1 comments
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With Wimbledon poised to begin in just eight days, the odds of the 13-time Grand Slam winner regaining enough of her former dominance to defend her title seems preposterous, but it's hard to bet against a proven winner, particularly one who has been in a similar situation before.
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Tuesday marks the return of Serena Williams to professional tennis after 11 months off the court due to a variety of ailments. Her sister took the court at Eastbourne on Monday, her first action since January.
With Wimbledon poised to begin in just eight days, the odds of the 13-time Grand Slam winner regaining enough of her former dominance to defend her title seems preposterous, but it's hard to bet against a proven winner, particularly one who has been in a similar situation before.
Lest we forget that Serena took eight months off the tour in 2004 and had to address speculation during the 2005 Australian Open that her reign was nearing its end. By April 2006, she was out of the Top 100 and finished that season at No. 95.
 Ranked 81st at the start of the 2007 Australian Open she won her eighth Grand Slam title in what BBC Sport called "arguably the most powerful display even see in women's tennis" - a 6-1, 6-2 pasting of Maria Sharapova.
Of course, that was then, and this is now, and Serena at 25 is a far different creature than at 29 coming off a long-lasting foot injury and a blood clot.
As the greatest female tennis player since Steffi Graf retired, Serena is in an elite class of athletes that few can comprehend when it comes to will and desire.
Regardless of your personal feelings (or mine) about the way she handled her long layoff, she remains perhaps the most athletically-gifted female player ever and one who has transcended sports.
With that in mind, I am reminded of perhaps the most famous sports comeback ever, the one that occurred in March of 1995, when Michael Jeffery Jordan decided that minor-league baseballl would have to remain a ridiculous pipedream (or that David Stern had let him know that his unofficial suspension from the league had ended), and it was time to get back to the NBA.
In his first game back, Jordan was terrible - shooting 7 of 28 from the floor and scoring 19 points as his Chicago Bulls lost to the Indiana Pacers. But while he was rusty beyond belief, the way Jordan assimilated himself back into playing shape was shocking.
 In his next game, he scored 27, a few nights later, 32. Then, when his favorite whipping boy, the New York Knicks came calling, Jordan dropped his infamous "double nickel" - 55 points -- on the hapless Bronx bunch.
Jordan played just 17 regular season games that year and his Bulls lost in the conference semifinals, but the swagger was back, and Chicago took the next three NBA titles before he hung up his sneakers again.
Am I saying Serena Williams is as good an athlete as Michael Jordan? Never, not in a million years. But competitive ferocity is a trait coveted by many, but only possessed by a select few.
Watch out, world. Here comes Serena.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/14/2011 6:02:54 AM | with 0 comments
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In 2003, Nick Newlife, a resident of Oxford, UK, placed a bet that a certain up-and-coming Swiss tennis star would win Wimbledon an outlandish seven times before 2019.
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In 2003, Nick Newlife, a resident of Oxford, UK, placed a bet that a certain up-and-coming Swiss tennis star would win Wimbledon an outlandish seven times before 2019.
At the time, the bet seemed like a perfect money-maker for British betting house William Hill, considering that 1) they were getting the entirety of the £1,881.44 ($3,032) bet up front; 2) Federer had just one Wimbledon title to his credit at the time and 3) only two men in history had ever won Wimbledon seven times – the recently-retired Pete Sampras and William Renshaw, who notched his last title in 1889.
By the beginning of the 2009 season, Federer was up to five Wimbledon crowns, and suddenly making those 66-to-1 odds that William Hill had given Newlife seem not such a great idea after all.
That February, Newlife passed away at the age of 59. Four months later, Federer won Wimbledon for the sixth time, moving within one win of allowing the now-deceased Newlife to collect on his bet, a return of $200,112.
If Federer, a 5/2 favorite to win Wimbledon in two weeks, should deliver that seventh title, Newlife’s wager of eight years ago will now bring “new life” to those who need it.
When the Oxford gambler passed on, he left the potential earnings of the bet to the charity Oxfam, which describes itself as “a global movement of people working with others to overcome poverty and suffering”.
Newlife had also bet on Federer to win Wimbledon in 2009, placing that bet in 2003 as well. He put down £250 six years before the event, earning Oxfam £16,750.
Of course, not even Newlife is omniscient when it comes to tennis knowledge. In 2003 he also put down a long-range bet that Andy Roddick would win seven Grand Slam titles before 2020.
With a grand total of one, the 30-year-old Roddick needs to get cracking if he doesn’t want Newlife haunting him.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/16/2011 1:17:07 PM | with 0 comments
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Shocking Details Revealed Below!
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Media and fans were stunned when they reached Court 3 on Monday to find John Isner and Nicolas Mahut already on court, playing and sporting matching, ZZ Top-esque beards.
 What onlookers first thought of as a practical joke slowly unraveled into the most shocking cover-up in the history of professional tennis when red-faced Wimbledon officials reluctantly admitted that the marathon Isner-Mahut match of 2010 had never actually ended.
"After that second day of play in 2010, we realized this might never be over," Wimbledon president D.P. Hopworth said guiltily on Tuesday morning, addressing a throng of reporters.
"We couldn't run the risk of it delaying the entire tournament, so we tried to coerce one of the two players to throw in the towel. Unfortunately, neither one of them would do it, so we resorted to drastic measures."
Hopworth revealed that the two men on Court 18 that day last summer, when Isner appeared to finally to vanquish Mahut with a 70-68 fifth-set victory, were impersonators. Meanwhile the real Isner and Mahut resumed their battle at an undisclosed location, playing eight hours before calling it a night tied at 144-144.
"It was supposed to be a temporary solution," Hopworth said. "The Isner stand-in got beaten badly by Thiemo de Bakker in the second round and we figured we had a good 10 days before either guy had to show up in person again. How were we supposed to know they would keep matching each other game for game?"
At that point, the ATP had to make a decision: Keep the illusion going or come clean? ATP President Adam Helfant, convinced the match would end at any moment, made the decision to send the faux-Mahut and faux-Isner out on tour.
"C'mon, all someone had to do was win two damn games in a row, how hard is that?" Helfant said via teleconference Tuesday morning in between sobs. "We figured the impersonators could play a tournament or two and disappear into the night, no one would be the wiser."
Impersonating a player who barely cracked the Top 100 was no problem for the faux-Mahut, who played in smaller venues like Segovia and Rennes, finishing the year with 12 wins and nine losses.
The real Mahut, who turned 29 years old on January 21, 2011, a day that saw his real match with Isner end with the fifth set tied at 2,933 games apiece, said he didn't feel he would have done much better than 12-9 the rest of the way in 2010 as it was.
The task was a bit more difficult for the faux-Isner, who had to impersonate a 6-foot, 9-inch, 245-pound athletic tennis player. The ATP used exhaustion as an excuse to keep the faux-Isner off the tour for a month while they taught him the game of tennis, which resulted in wildly inconsistent play the rest of the season.
When told on Tuesday that he had lost to an impersonator in the quarterfinals at Beijing last October, then-No. 6 ranked Nikolay Davydenko looked like he wanted to cry.
 "In native Russia, Nikolay trained to crush all resistance," Davydenko, who has since dropped to No. 28 said. "To lose to this string bean, and not even true American string bean, is real disappointment. Maybe Nikolay should retire like jerk writing TennisNow blog suggests."
The Isner impersonator revelaed that he had spent the off-season "pretty much partying and telling girls, 'Hey, I'm John Isner'", which likely has led to his 10-13 record and fall to No. 50 in the world so far in 2011.
The real Isner, meanwhile, turned 26 on April 26, 2011, with his fifth set against the real Mahut tied at 6,599.
"Sure, it was fatiguing at times," the real Isner said. "There were some points where I wanted to quit, and I really missed my family. Plus, I'm not sure my girlfriend knew that that guy wasn't me ... that's a bit concerning."
Even as Wimbledon 2011 approached, ATP and Grand Slam leadership remained convined that Isner-Mahut 2010 would end before the truth was discovered. The real pair had been allowed back to Wimbledon following the tour's departure in early July 2010, and had rented a flat together in nearby London to save money since neither was pulling in tour winnings.
"It was a bit odd living with John, but it made financial sense," Mahut said. "The first few days we were trash-talking at breakfast and on the way to the stadium, but eventually we settled into a nice routine - making fondue, getting a Netflix subscription and really getting into pilates. Of course, we could never go out anywhere since we were supposed to be on tour, so we started growing the beards to give ourselves a little bit of anonymity."
So used to their routine, by the time Day 2 of Wimbledon 2011 rolled around, Isner and Mahut forgot they weren't supposed to be using the facilities at Wimbledon, and were thus exposed in the year-long falsehood when their impersonators also arrived at Court 3 to begin warming up.
"It was weird seeing another me standing there, one who hasn't eaten, breathed and slept Mahut for the past 363 days," the real Isner said. "But what the hell, I'm really down to No. 50 in the world now?"
Stay tuned to Tennis 'n' Stuff to see how the ATP resolves this stunning controversy.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/21/2011 6:09:22 AM | with 1 comments
The official Wimbledon website has a neat little section dedicated to the future, more specifically what the game might look like 25 years from now.
This season is Wimbledon's 125th anniversary, and together with all the retrospect going on, there's a pretty thorough, clever look ahead to the tournament's 150th anniversary and what that might look like.
I'll leave it to you, gentle reader, to explore the Wimbledon 2036 site for yourself, but in the meantime, here are a few personal predictions about what will be going on when Centre Court reaches its sesquicentennial.
 Kimiko Date-Krumm will shake off her latest injury to reach the second round of the Pan-Pacific Open, but then give the sad news that at age 66, the game has finally passed her by.
The UK will declare bankruptcy, having spent 75% of its budget for the last 25 years on tennis development in an attempt to produce a champion who can break the now 100-year drought for the country without a Wimbledon winner.
 Brooklyn Decker, who left husband Andy Roddick for TennisNow.com funnyman Sean Bradley after a chance encounter at the Houston clay court tournament in 2013, will release the long-anticipated sequel to her 2010 film "Just Go With It" entitled "Just Stop It", a desperate plea to make Roddick stop calling her wanting to get back together.
Seventy-seven-year-old John McEnroe will challenge Bjorn Borg to a "best-of-one, motorized wheelchair" exhibition at Madison Square Garden to try and reinforce yet again that he was the better player during their primes.
 Twenty-seven-year-old Myla Rose Federer will try to deflect media buzz as she pursues her 10th straight Wimbledon crown, focusing instead on the fact that another Grand Slam will allow her to tie twin sister Charlene Riva Federer at 30 career Grand Slam titles apiece. The siblings each turned pro in 2020, at age 11.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/22/2011 7:01:31 AM | with 0 comments
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#10 1970 women's singles - Margaret Court def. Billie Jean King, 14-12, 11-9
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It seems like WImbledon just started, but truth be told we're only 10 days away from the men's final.
As Kermit the Frog once said, "Time's fun when you're having flies."
While the remaining players duke it out to add their names to the legendary list of winners at Centre Court in 2011, we take a look back at the best of the best from the Open Era, with a countdown of the 10 best Wimbledon finals.
 10. 1970 Margaret Court def. Billie Jean King 14-12, 11-9.
No, it didn’t go three sets, but when you play 26 games in the first set and 20 more in the second, can you really say fans didn’t get their money’s worth?
Tennis was a different animal in the early 1970s, just three years into the Open Era. Only the top eight players were seeded on the women’s side, and Margaret Court was the No. 1 target, with Billie Jean King second in a talented field.
The top eight all got first-round byes, and King smoked her way to the quarterfinals without losing a set, ditto Court, who lost just two games in her first two sets.
 In the quarterfinals, Germany’s Helga Niessen stunned Court 8-6 in the first set, but the Aussie responded with consecutive 6-0 donuts to move on. King also lost her first quarterfinal set to Australia’s Karen Krantzcke, and had to win in three.
Amazingly, both players entered the finals hurt. An ankle injury plagued Court, while King would have knee surgery the week after her loss.
The first set was the longest ever in a Wimbledon single’s final, and the two-set match took 2-1/2 hours to complete. Court won the title on her seventh match point.
The victory was Court’s second in as many Grand Slams in 1970, and a few months later she won the US Open and the Australian to complete the single-season Grand Slam, joining Muareen Collony Brinker (1953) as the only women to do so. The pair was later joined by Steffi Graf in 1988.
King missed two months with her knee injury, and took more than a full year to return to dominance, winning the 1971 US Open, and following it with three Grand Slams in 1972, and one each in 1973-1975.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/24/2011 7:32:19 PM | with 0 comments
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9. Boris Becker def. Kevin Curren 6-3, 6-7(4-7), 7-6(7-3), 6-4
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Boris Becker turned pro in 1984. He won Wimbledon in 1985. Any wonder why he’s a legend of Centre Court?
Becker wasn’t totally off the radar entering the tournament in 1985. He had reached the quarterfinals at the Australian Open near the end of 1984 just after his 17th birthday to rise to No. 55 in the world at year’s end.
He was inconsistent to start 1985 until reaching the semifinals at Rome and came into Wimbledon having won the title at Queen’s Club, losing just one set in the process to zoom up to 20th in the world. At a time when the seeding only went to 16, Becker was unseeded.
Seeded eighth was American Kevin Curren, a 27-year-old with two Grand Slam near-misses, having previously reached the 1983 semifinals at Wimbledon and the 1984 final at the Australian Open.
Becker first began getting notice when he knocked out seventh-seeded Joakim Nystrom in the third round in five sets, then needed another five to take out 16th-seeded American Tim Mayotte in the fourth round.
Curren lost just one set in his first four matches, knocking out future No. 1 Stefan Edberg in the fourth round.
The quarterfinals were a cornucopia of major talent and unexpected entries. Four of the top eight seed made it, as did three unseeded players, including Becker, and Cuban qualifier Ricardo Acuna.
Curren stunned defending champion John McEnroe 6-2, 6-2, 6-4 in the quarterfinals, in what would be his only victory against Big Mac in nine career tries.
Meanwhile Becker squared off against fellow non-seed Henri Leconte of France, who had stunned No. 2 seed Ivan Lendl in the fourth round.
Becker advanced in four, then took out fifth-seeded Anders Jarryd of Sweden in the semifinals.
Another American legend, Jimmy Connors, awaited Curren in the semis. As he had done to McEnroe, Current blistered his highly-ranked opponent in straight sets, 6-2, 6-2, 6-1, to enter the final as the clear favourite.
But Becker, as he would prove time and again on the grass courts, was not to be defeated, notching his first Grand Slam at the tender age of 17, the youngest man to win Wimbledon, taking the crown in four sets.
The match was not without its controversy. During a change-over, Becker bumped Curren’s shoulder in apparent distaste of a particular shot. The pair would meet four more times during their respective careers, with Becker winning all four.
It was the opening salvo of what would be one of the best modern-day grass-court careers. Becker went 116-25 (.823) on grass, winning seven titles, including three at Wimbledon.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/25/2011 3:18:10 PM | with 0 comments
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8. 2003 Serena Williams def. Venus Williams 4-6, 6-4, 6-2
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By the start of the 2003, the Williams sisters were doing what father Richard so cockily predicted when the pair turned pro.
Dominating the sport.
Younger sister Serena had five Grand Slam crowns and was ranked No. 1 in the world. Sister Venus had four Slams, a gold medal in singles play and was ranked fourth. Plus, the pair had six Grand Slam doubles titles together.
What they didn’t have was an inspiring Grand Slam final battle. To that point, the pair had played 11 times, including in the finals of the 2001 US Open and 2002 French and US Opens along with Wimbledon. All four Slam finals were two-set affairs, leading some critics to believe that they were also orchestrated by the sisters and their dad, based on who “needed” the win more.
As the more successful grass-court player, Venus crushed her first four appearances, including a young Vera Zvonareva in the fourth round.
Serena didn’t even need a tie-breaker to reach the quarterfinals. She ducked an upset-bid by Jennifer Capriati in the quarterfinals, taking a 2-6, 6-2, 6-3 victory, while Venus did likewise, knocking off Lindsay Davenport, 6-2, 2-6, 6-1.
Serena made short work of Justine Henin in the semis, while Venus rallied past second-seeded Kim Clijsters 4-6, 6-3, 6-1.
Serena didn’t know it at the time, but the final against her sister would be her last tournament of the year because of a knee operation. She made the most of it, rallying past Venus in three sets and ultimately holding the No. 1 ranking for 57 weeks before being passed by Kim Clijsters in August.
Venus took the loss in stride, returning to win Wimbledon in 2005, 2007 and 2008.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/26/2011 10:21:32 AM | with 0 comments
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7. 1982 men's final: Jimmy Connors over John McEnroe 3-6, 6-3, 6-7(2-7), 7-6(7-5), 6-4
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Before Sampras and Agassi, the great American rivalry was Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe. If only another one would emerge.
The two Americans were the top two seeds at Wimbledon in the summer of 1982, with McEnroe on top of the heap. Moreover, the top four seeds, five of the top six and a staggering nine of the Top 15 were from the USA.
McEnroe was the defending champion, while Connors, rapidly approaching 30 years old, hadn’t taken the crown since 1974. He was two years removed from his last Grand Slam, that coming at the 1980 French Open.
McEnroe entered the tournament at 26-5, having defeated Connors to open the season at Philadelphia. Connors, 43-6 to date in 1982, had returned the favour with a two-set victory at Queen’s Club the week before Wimbledon began, his fourth title of the season.
Connors lost two sets in his first four matches, McEnroe lost zero. Neither man faced an expected opponent in the semifinals, with Big Mac squaring off against American Tim Mayotte, a powerful server who was unseeded going into the event, then defeated three Top 15 seeds in succession. McEnroe ended Cinderella’s run abruptly, 6-3, 6-1, 6-2.
Connors took on Australia’s Mark Edmondson, the 12th seed who had upset No. 3 Vitas Gerulaitis in four. Like McEnroe, Connors gave no quarter in the semifinals with a 6-4, 6-3, 6-1 win.
The final was as epic as the rivalry. McEnroe, as would be his Achilles’ heel in several big matches, couldn’t stand prosperity. He won the first set 6-3 and took a crucial third-set tie-breaker 7-6(7-2), but with the match on the line couldn’t close Connors out in the fourth set, with the second seed pulling out a 7-5 tie-breaker, then taking the fifth set 6-4 for the title.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/27/2011 6:16:34 AM | with 0 comments
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6. 1978 Martina Navratilova def. Chris Evert 2-6, 6-4, 7-5
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Perhaps the two greatest rivals of all-time collided head on in a masterful final that was born from a tremendous field.
The top five seeds – Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Evonne Cawley, Virginia Wade and Billie Jean King – would retire with a combined 59 Grand Slam singles crowns, and Evert and Navratilova notched 18 apiece.
Navratilova was all of 21 years old at the dawn of the 1978 Wimbledon tournament and had yet to win a Grand Slam title. Evert was 24 and had already won Wimbledon twice, the French Open twice and the US Open three times; she would add a fourth later in 1978.
 Navratilova lost one set and needed one tie-break win to her section. Evert lost one set in the third round, but was otherwise unchallenged.Evert faced another American classic, King, in the quarterfinals. Seeded fifth at age 34, King was no easy out, pushing Evert to three sets before falling. That meant a matchup with the pride of England in Wade, who lost a marathon 8-6 tie-breaker to Evert in the first set en route to falling in two.
Navratilova swept the 11th-seeded Marise Kruger in the quarterfinals, then dropped the first set to Cawley in the semifinals, only to rally to a three-set victory.
Evert struck first blood in the final, but Navratilova’s key breaks gave her the first Grand Slam title of her career.
It was the pair’s fourth meeting in a Grand Slam match, and Navratilova’s first victory in one.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/28/2011 6:07:13 AM | with 0 comments
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5. 1998 Pete Sampras over Goran Ivanisevic 6-7 (2-7), 7-6(11-9), 6-4, 3-6, 6-2
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It was the classic David vs. Goliath story, except that David stood 6 feet, 4 inches tall and Goliath was arguably the most popular player in the history of the game.
By 1998, Pete Sampras officially owned Wimbledon, having won the event four times from 1993-1997 and racked up 10 Grand Slam titles total.
Not surprisingly, he entered the event as the No. 1 seed.
Goran Ivanisevic was 27 years old and the 14th seed, having reached the final at Wimbledon in 1992, and again in 1994, falling to Sampras. He would not win a Grand Slam until his magical 2001 run at Centre Court.
Sampras didn’t drop a set in the first four rounds, but he didn’t have any cake walks either. He had to eke out two tie-breaker victories in the third round.
Ivanisevic was paired into the bracket with England’s Greg Rusedski, the fourth seed, but the section became a wide-open race when Rusedski retired due because of injury in the first round.
After the first round, Ivanisevic needed four sets to get through each of the next three.
In the quarterfinals, he won a marathon 7-6(12-10), 7-6(5), 7-6(8-6) victory over unheralded Jan Siemerink, while Sampras was routing Mark Philippoussis.
Ivanisevic went even longer in the semifinals, edging ninth-seeded Richard Krajicek, 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 6-7(5), 15-13. Sampras struggled a bit in the semifinals, but still closed out Tim Henman in four sets.
The final was an absolute war. Ivanisevic took the first set in a tie-breaker, Sampras the second, by an 11-9 count. When Sampras took the third, the smart money was that Ivanisevic had finally run out of steam, given his marathon victories in the quarterfinals and semifinals.
But Ivanisevic rallied back for the fourth set victory before finally succumbing to fatigue as Sampras pulled away for his sixth Wimbledon crown.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/29/2011 4:39:35 PM | with 0 comments
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4. 1988 Stefi Graf def. Martina Navratilova 5-7, 6-2, 6-1
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Rarely do we actually witness the torch pass from one all-time great to another. But this was one of those times.
Heading into the 1988 Wimbledon tournament, 31-year-old Martina Navratilova had won 17 of her 18 Grand Slam titles. Nineteen-year-old Steffi Graf had two of her 22, both to start that very season.
The pair took the top two seeds in the tournament, a star-studded field that included Chris Evert, Pam Shriver and Gabriela Sabatini. Graf, the game’s rising star, had already won the titles at the Australian and French Opens in 1988, and was looking to become the first woman to win three majors in the same year since Navratilova had done so in 1984.
Older, but hardly showing it, Navratilova lost four games in a set just twice in the first four rounds. Graf was close to effortless in reaching the quarterfinals, dropping the donut on her first opponent altogether, and losing just two games in her first two matches.
The semifinals gave fans exactly what they wanted – Navratilova against third-seeded Evert and Graf against fourth-seeded Shriver.
Graf made the 26-year-old Shriver, who would never get further in a Grand Slam event, look positively ancient as Graf blew past her in straight sets, 6-1, 6-2.
The going was considerably tougher for Navratilova as she whipped Evert 6-1 in the first set, only to lose the second 6-4. A third set went the distance before Navratilova pulled out a 7-5 victory, It would be the pair’s final match in a Grand Slam event, and they would play twice more in 1988, both in finals, both with Navratilova coming out on top, before Evert retired.
The meeting marked the 22nd time in their 80-match rivalry that Navratilova and Evert had locked horns in either the semifinals or the finals of a Grand Slam.
The final marked the 11th time that Navratilova had met Graf on the court. At the time, Navratilova led the series 7-3, and was 4-1 in Grand Slam events, including a victory in the 1987 Wimbledon final.
When she took the first set from Graf, 7-5, it was the German’s first set loss in the entire tournament. But Graf, who would go on to win the elusive Golden Slam that year, rallied back to show the true depth of what would become her career-long domination, winning the next two sets 6-2, 6-1.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/30/2011 6:09:48 AM | with 0 comments
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#3 - 2005 women's final: Venus Williams def. Lindsay Davenport, 4-6, 7-6(4), 9-7
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After winning three of the four Grand Slam titles in a three-year period between 1998-2000, American Lindsay Davenport fell out of the Top 10 in 2002, but had battled her way back to No. 1 in the world in 2004 and was still there at the start of Wimbledon in 2005.
 Venus Williams had spent every year from 1998-2002 ranked in the top five, but injuries had begun to wear down her game, resulting in her fighting to stay in the Top 10 for the next three seasons, and going into a Grand Slam drought which dated back to the US Open in 2000.
When the field was drawn for the 2005 event, Davenport, the defending champion, was justifiably the No. 1 seed, although her Australian Open crown from that January had been tempered by a bitter first-round exit from the French Open, the only Slam she had yet to win.
Williams was seeded just 14th, a second-round casualty in 2004. She had fallen in the fourth round at Australia and the third round at the French.
Davenport’s road through her section was easy until the fourth round, when she had to hang on in three sets against a rising Kim Clijsters.
Venus was paired in a section with sister Serena, the fourth seed. The pair look destined for a fourth-round meeting until Jill Craybas upset Serena in the third round.
Venus avenged her sister’s loss in vicious fashion, crushing Craybas 6-0, 6-2. Williams was the lowest remaining seed of the eight quarterfinalists, and she won a bizarre 6-0, 7-6(12-10) victory over Mary pierce to reach the semifinals.
Davenport cruised past Svetlana Kuznetsova, then came precariously close to falling in the semifinals against Arnelie Mauresmo, saving match point twice in a 6-7(5), 7-6(4), 6-4 victory.
Venus just kept getting stronger, knocking off second-seeded Maria Sharapova 7-6(2), 6-1 to reach the final.
Davenport and Williams had met 26 times between 1997 and the beginning of the 2005 Wimbledon tournament, with each player taking 13 wins.
In what would be their final career meeting, Davenport had multiple chances to finish Williams off, but the resilient former and future champion fought each and every one off to ultimately rally to a 4-6, 7-6(4), 9-7 victory, returning to the winner’s circle at Centre Court for the first time in five seasons.
Posted to Tennis and stuff. by
Nick on 6/30/2011 9:46:15 PM | with 0 comments
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