McEnroe "Sort of" Picks Federer to Win Wimbledon

News

Scores

Rankings

Lucky Letcord Podcast

Shop

Pro Gear

Pickleball

Gear Sale

Add to Flipboard Magazine.

McEnroe "Sort of" Picks Federer to Win Wimbledon

By Chris Oddo

Photo Credit: Clive Brunskill/Getty Images

(June 21, 2012)—In a yesterday's conference call with reporters, ESPN’s John McEnroe, Chris Evert and Cliff Drysdale dished out their opinions on the upcoming Wimbledon fortnight. Here's a few snippets of what each had to say, starting with McEnroe's half-hearted pick of Roger Federer to win his seventh Wimbledon and his 17th Grand Slam.

Click here for ESPN's full Transcript

John McEnroe on Roger Federer:

I'm sort of picking him to win this year at Wimbledon, even though it looks like the gap has grown between the other two and him. But to me Wimbledon is his best chance to win another major. He seems to still want it as much as he'd already won. His body is he's a lot better athlete than he's given credit for. His movement has allowed him to remain incredibly healthy for the most part.

I think this is going to be his 52nd straight major. He's been to 32 straight quarters or better. His record speaks for itself. But I think the fact that he wants it so bad still, he's just got to find a way to... use the crowd to his favor. I'd be interested to see if he does any of that and alters any of that because he doesn't show much on the court. It seems like he's losing out on something that could help him maybe against these other two guys if he had to play those guys. I mean, not if, when. So I think he's got a great chance this year. I think that's his best bet.

Obviously, I mean, everyone knows he'll be 31. He could play another three, four, five years. His body has been pretty resilient. But winning majors, that's a short span now that you think he'd have a shot. Certainly at Wimbledon he'd have a shot the next couple years to me.

Cliff Drysdale on Serena Williams:

In my book Serena is a clear favorite. I think she was the best player in women's tennis going into the French championship. So she loses a match on clay. It's not her best surface by any means. You can name anybody including Sharapova, and you put them head to head, Serena is the clear favorite. I still think she's the best player in the business. The confidence level for her I think will be just fine, having lost the first round. I don't think that's a big issue for her. I'd be very surprised if she doesn't win. ‘

McEnroe on the big three dominating the men's game:

Well, let me just jump in and say that it's good for the game. As far as the rivalries, I think any sport that's a one on one sport needs that. I think that's what's hurt our sport for a while, that we didn't seem to have that, and with Nadal and Federer obviously and then Djokovic in the mix, to me has made it more interesting and in some ways more historic as we saw at the French.

Chris Evert on Serena and Maria's chances:

First of all, I feel like Serena, she can't be too happy with that first round loss at the French. I think grass is so much more suited to her game and her style, and she's so much more comfortable on the grass.

I think knowing how competitive she is, she's going to be full blast. She has to definitely be one of the top ones, if not the top one, in my book. But again, if you look at Australia, she's lost to Makarova, then you look at the French, and her last two Grand Slams she hasn't been very successful. It's a two week tournament. So hopefully if she's on top of her game, I don't think anybody disputes the fact that she is the favorite to win Wimbledon because of her game. But there's that unknown factor again.

Maria on the other hand has to be coming into Wimbledon with that much more confidence. Her serve has got to work on the grass, and it started to get better at the French. The double faults were down and she started to, I think, free herself up and serve the way she wanted to serve. I think she's looking good.

Azarenka, kind of an unknown on grass. I'm not 100 percent sure that she is 100 percent comfortable on the grass. And Kvitova, the pressure, I think she lost first round in the warm up tournaments, so you kind of have to wonder how the pressure coming in as Wimbledon champion is going to affect her.

Cliff Drysdale on Clijster's Return:

The toughest floater is going to be Kim Clijsters. She's done it before, comes out of nowhere, wins a Slam. Just watch for her.

John McEnroe on Ryan Harrison's future:

As far as Ryan Harrison, again, he's made some very good progress, he's very serious about his professionalism, and he's made it to where I think he's going to get straight in the Olympics. Again, he's got to find his own identity, his own thing that sort of separates him. He's not just a guy out there playing. He's already a very good player, but if he wants to make a real breakthrough and get higher than the top 20, 25, which I think he'll get to at some point, in order to get to the top ten he's going to develop his own thing, something that distinguishes him, and I haven't seen that yet.