It would have been great to see Ivan Lendl around more in 2015, but alas, it wasn't meant to be.
Photo Source: Corleve
It’s been a great tennis season. No, great is an understatement. It’s been magnanimously good, featuring everything from calendar Slam runs to underdog uprisings to Djoko-coronations to Stanimalizations and beyond. But it hasn’t been perfect. Nothing ever is.
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So on a chilly autumn Sunday, long after the last ball of the first day of Singapore has been clocked in anger (#EndlessTennis never stops), we’re looking back at a few of the things that went horribly wrong, in our own very humble opinion, this season.
1. Lendl Bailed on Birdman
It was just about a year ago today that Tomas Berdych announced on Twitter that he had met with Ivan Lendl and the result of their meeting was the realization that Lendl was “too busy” to help. That was last year. What came this year is the longing for what could have been. By no means has Berdych’s inability to land Lendl as his coach (he tried, and coveted the man’s services) set the burly Czech back. He’s qualified for London and a recent hot streak has seen him earn a few titles in 2015, but man, it’s hard not to think about what might have happened had these two Czech forces collided. With Dani Vallverdu at the helm, it seems as though Berdych calls the shots in that camp. Maybe he’d be better off with a taskmaster like Lendl at the helm instead? Somebody to crack the whip and steer the bus through the narrow alleys? It certainly did work out for Andy Murray…
2. Bouchard’s revival got thwarted in New York
After a long, depressing struggle with form and injuries, Eugenie Bouchard finally found the missing sizzle that her game had lacked at the U.S. Open. Following a few days of positive ruminations alongside friend and mentor Jimmy Connors, Bouchard played like a woman possessed in New York for three rounds. Her resurrected body had suddenly become animated again. She exuded positive energy, radiated belief, and percolated with passion. Then, suddenly, as if in a bad dream, the curtains closed on Bouchard’s 2015 in terrible fashion. The victim of a locker room fall, her momentum was curtailed, chewed up and spit out in the form of pending litigation against the USTA.
The lawsuit is neither here nor there—it’s simply the logical progression in today’s society—but the fact that Bouchard went from being back (with a capital B) to being on the sidelines with something even more debilitating than a lack of confidence, that’s what really hurts.
3. Rafa never got it going
Check that. Rafa did get it going. No, wait--false alarm. Then he did again. Then another soul-crushing loss that left us all in doubt about the future of one of the greatest tennis players in the history of the universe. Are we at the end of the road? He’s 29, for Chrissakes, how can that be? Of course it’s not true, but oh-me-lord is it hard to tell when you read the testaments of the growing legions of naysayers out there.
Still, the fact that Rafa had difficulty mustering one giant, evincible burden of proof that he was indeed on his way back to the top of the game was a general source of consternation (and nail biting and hand wringing) all year long.
Make no mistake—Nadal was exemplary in many ways in 2015. His legendary will to compete never diminished, and his lust for facing the day despite his diluted potency was unbearably admirable. But the form coughed and sputtered and coughed some more, particularly against the elite. Of course Nadal will be back at full potency sooner than we think (that is how this story ends, isn’t it?), but that doesn’t change the fact that his long, hard 2015 has not come to the end that we have been expecting—at least not yet.
4. The Race to London had ZERO drama
While Singapore simulations were ripe with possibility, London scenarios were about as boring as predicting the outcome of a Novak Djokovic-Marin Cilic quarterfinal. There was no drama. It’s not the ATP’s fault by any means, but clearly the road to London was paved with pubs full of the drunken and snoozing in 2015. Sometimes you win (this year’s Road To Singapore, clearly, won) and sometimes you lose.
5. Bacsinszky’s surge to Singapore never happened due to technicalities
Well, the aforementioned road to Singapore was truly awesome this year, but the fact that a technical snafu left Timea Bacsinszky in Luxembourg with no chance to add points to her total while 20 MEASLY POINTS!!! out of contention was maddening for all parties involved. According to the Tennis Island, Bacsinszky didn’t find out that she’d be marooned in Luxembourg with no chance to put the finishing touches on what would have been an amazing run to Singapore until she reached the semifinals in Beijing. By then it was far too late to do anything about it. Far, far too late. For more details on what happened, check the link below. Hopefully next year, this will all be a bit easier to navigate for those who find themselves in contention.
6. Nick Kyrgios became everybody’s outlet for vitriol
Yes, Nick Kyrgios can be foul-mouthed and yes, he can act like a big-time brat—even worse. But that doesn’t mean that in Kyrgios the media and tennis fans now have our official punching bag to bash on social media and in opinion pieces ad nauseam. Let’s consider, first, that Kyrgios is genuinely trying to walk the line and play by the rules. Let’s also consider that some of the vitriol launched at Kyrgios by people that don’t even know him is just as egregious as much of what Kyrgios has done on court.
Here’s a good rule to play by: Hurling obscenities about someone that you’ve never even met in the comment section of a blog or on Facebook is generally worth a code violation. Or something like that. Well, you get the point right? Peace profits, Hate hollows.
7. Generation next struggled to progress
Grigor Dimitrov, where art thou? Oh, we know you’re around, working out the kinks with your new racquet and your new coach, but it sure is a bummer that one of the players that was supposed to take up the mantel of tennis’ future has gone very far astray. Come to think of it, Kei Nishikori hasn’t exactly inspired hope that he could be a future Grand Slam winner, either. Japan’s No. 1 has had another very solid year, but his results at the majors and masters definitely slipped. Look, there’s nothing wrong with big four domination—in fact, many wish that tennis’s current hegemony would maintain order for perpetuity—but we’d like to know that generation next is in it to win it. Are they?
8. Grandstand is History
Next year when the U.S. Open begins, grounds pass holders will be smashed in the face with the brutal reality that a landmark has faded into oblivion. Gone are the late-night monster matches that end with lesser-knowns circling the court and handing out high-fives like baby-kissing politicians while the crowd goes berserk. Gone will be that exquisite catwalk between Armstrong and Grandstand that is considered by many the finest place in Grand Slam tennis to stand and lean over a railing. Gone will be those lonely shadows that crept ever so unwillingly onto the court, providing fans and players alike with much needed cool, and photographers with much needed lines with which to play. You served us well, Grandstand, and we’ll always love you.