Sports Then and Now

The U.S. hard court swing is underway this week as players compete at the ATP Masters Series Tennis Tournament in the desert at Indian Wells followed by another sunny outing at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami.

Last year’s champion at Indian Wells, Rafael Nadal, has been sidelined with injuries since the Australian Open.  No. 1 seed Roger Federer has also been absent from play since the Australian Open with a lung infection.

As the top players vie once again for supremacy, look for the rankings race to heat up as the lull is set aside and the summer season beckons.

The Top 10

1. Novak Djokovic (Last Power Ranking: OLI; ATP Ranking: 2)

Last Four Tournaments: Dubai [Winner], Rotterdam [Semifinalist], 2010 Australian Open [Quarterfinalist], ATP WTF London [RR 2-1].  Power Ranking Points: 382

Novak Djokovic takes the victory in Dubai from Mikhail Youzhny

Taking over the top spot this week is the Serb Djokovic who just repeated as the champion in Dubai overcoming Mikhail Youzhny in the final.  Even though Djokovic was not playing his best tennis, he found a way to win this event and cement his No. 2 status on the ATP tour.

This weekend Djokovic played Davis Cup for the Serbs against the U.S. and even though the U.S. team came back to win the doubles match, ultimately the Serbs prevailed thanks in part to Djokovic’s dual wins in singles.

Last year at Indian Wells Djokovic lost in the quarterfinals to American Andy Roddick 6-3, 6-2.  This year as the No. 2 seed, Djokovic will expect to do much better.  Much will depend upon the draw which is to be released shortly.   The current state of tennis mastery will become much clearer once the two ATP hard court Master Series events are concluded at Indian Wells and Miami.

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Roger Federer's records tower over those of his contemporaries.

I remember the GOAT talk starting when Roger Federer crushed Lleyton Hewitt to win the US Open in 2004, his third major of that season. His contemporaries, Hewitt and Andy Roddick, were clearly not equipped with the tools necessary to stop him, or even to slow him down. He struggled more on clay, but it seemed only a matter of time until he figured that out.

Still, I remember thinking that the field would inevitably evolve to catch up with Federer, at least slowing his progress if not stopping it. To an extent that has happened; Rafael Nadal proved a long-term impediment to Federer’s goals of winning in Paris, while Andy Murray and Juan Martin del Potro appear more imposing adversaries than Hewitt and Roddick did.

Yet Federer endures, now with wins at all four majors and 16 total Grand Slam titles, two more than any other player in history. Is there any legitimate metric left to deny him the title of the greatest ever? Read the rest of this entry →

The 2009 BMW Tournament was a breakout event for Robin Soderling.

Tomas Berdych and Robin Soderling are both representative players of the current generation on the ATP Tour.

First, there’s their common height and bulk: the Swede Soderling is listed at 6’4” and 192 pounds on the ATP Tour Web site, while Berdych is listed at 6’5” and 200 pounds.

Secondly, we have their game plans: The 25-year-old Soderling and the 24-year-old Berdych both serve big and hit hard off both wings, and like so many players today the centerpieces of their games are big forehands. The Czech’s is a bit flatter, and the Swede’s requires a bit more backswing, but both men are rightly considered to be among the hardest hitters around.

And by the time the two met in the finals of the BMW Tennis Championship last March, they could be considered to be in a similar phase in their careers. Soderling had broken through in 2003 by reaching his first tour final and the third round of Wimbledon, while Berdych’s big intro was in 2004, when he won his first title and beat Roger Federer at the Olympics.

Despite their early promise, however, their results were stagnant, with Berdych winning just four titles by early ’09 and Soderling only three. Their games had come to be known for one-dimensional power hitting, and both were struggling just to win matches in the early goings of ’09.

Berdych had pushed Federer to five sets at the Australian Open, and then won only one more match. Soderling took a 4-5 record into the event, and had to go through qualifying just to make the main draw of this unique event. Read the rest of this entry →

Victory in the Mexican Open lifts Venus Williams to the top of the women's tennis power rankings.

The headlines in women’s tennis have, for the last six months, focused squarely on a certain Belgian duo and on Serena. In one fell swoop, the elder Williams sister has this week reclaimed the limelight with back-to-back titles.

At 30, Venus is looking and sounding like a 20-year-old: fit, healthy, and full of enthusiasm. She has made hay while injury has subdued the top two seeds—Serena and Dinara Safina—and while the two Belgians have disappeared to regroup.

Top of the Power Rankings, and now clear of Justine Henin in the list of active WTA title holders, she appears hungry for more: “Who wants to have a limit on titles? Not me!”

The Top 10

1. Venus Williams (Last Power Ranking: 10; Current WTA Ranking: 5)

Last four tournaments: Acapulco [Winner], Dubai [Winner], Australian Open [Quarterfinals], Doha [Finals].

Power Ranking Points: 871

Venus has hit a purple patch, and the most impressive part of her successes this last fortnight is that she’s managed them on the hard courts of Dubai followed, in short order, by the clay of Mexico. It’s some achievement, all the more so because she won both tournaments last year as well. She’s now reached 43 WTA titles, the highest amongst active players and two more than Justine Henin.

Venus was outstanding in Dubai, not dropping a set, though she did not have to beat a player above herself in the rankings. It should have been easier progress still in Acapulco, but in the quarters she fought back from 5-1 in the third set against qualifier Laura Pous, and dropped a set in the semis and finals against relatively lowly ranked opposition. It’s a credit to her current fitness and her will to win that she pulled through those challenges.

She misses Indian Wells, as last year, and heads straight to Miami. She will hope the draw is kinder to her this time: she met and was beaten by her younger sister in the semis.

Venus looks fit and eager, and there are few better sights in the women’s game than that. Does she have the desire to win? I think so. Can she make it to Miami’s winner’s podium? It may depend on that draw! Read the rest of this entry →

Novak Djokovic wins in Dubai and receives trophy from Sheik Monsoor bin Mohammed.

Novak Djokovic headed into Dubai this past week as the defending champion, carrying with him a bad case of nerves. He had good reason to be on edge because he was defending 500 points, having won the Dubai Tennis Championships in 2009.

Dubai remains a high water-mark on the tennis landscape and one of the favorites of players who use it as a warm-up for the U.S. Hard Court swing through Indian Wells and Miami, two ATP Masters Series events, each worth 1,000 points for the champion.

As the No. 2 player in the world, Djokovic feels the hot breath of Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray on his neck as the two tennis giants begin their earnest campaigns to overtake the Serb’s No. 2 spot as soon as possible.

Nadal sits only 940 points back while Murray remains 1,010 points behind Djokovic in the current rankings race. Pressures like those leave even the strongest and most determined a little rattled.

The Serb found himself facing a potentially lethal field that early on was only missing Rafael Nadal.  Seeded players included Roger Federer, Andy Murray, Juan Martin del Potro, Nikolay Davydenko, and Andy Roddick as well as many other top 20 players.  In other words, the field was packed.

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There are names so ingrained into the tennis consciousness that one feels they’re still to be found gracing the Royal Box on Wimbledon’s Centre Court. The commentary team helpfully points out the faces to match the names. Rod Laver, Margaret Court, Ilie Nastase, Billie Jean King: They have become like family, like old friends.

Such is the case with Don Budge. A Grand Slam will not pass, nor a reference to “the greats of tennis” be made without his name being mentioned. And just lately, promoted by Roger Federer’s record-breaking feats, his name has appeared with ever greater frequency, bracketed alongside potential contenders for the “greatest ever” crown.

There is good reason for Budge to be one of those constants in the game. He was born way back in the Great War, achieved the first ever Grand Slam just as World War 2 was fermenting (and Rod Laver just a month old), and spanned the amateur and the professional age.

He played against the icons of tennis—Fred Perry, Bill Tilden, Frank Sedgman—and against modern greats such as Pancho Gonzalez.

As recently as 1973, aged 58, he teamed up with Sedgman to win the Veteran’s Doubles title at Wimbledon, so would have shared the locker room with men’s seeds such as Jimmy Connors and Bjorn Borg.

He lived—just—into the 21st century. Yet to modern fans, he is little more than a name. It’s time to put that right.

Budge came from good stock, from a bold father who upped sticks from Scotland at the turn of the 20th century for a healthier life in the warm climate of California.

Donald was born in 1915 and inherited his father’s sporty genes. Budge senior had played reserve for Rangers football team before he left for the New World.

Don was also bright—he went to the University of California at 18—and he was over 6’1” tall. He was, in fact, the perfect package for tennis.

As for his character, well Time magazine, which first featured Budge on its cover in September 1935, summed him up as:

“A phlegmatic, gentle youth, so homely that even his mother smiled when a friend said that, if not the best tennis player in the world, her son was certainly the ugliest, young Budge is likeable but undistinguished off a tennis court.”

His road to tennis was a familiar one. Budge tried, and was good at, many other sports, and excelled at baseball. It was his elder brother, Lloyd, who was the tennis player, and who persuaded Don to apply his fearsome bat-swinging prowess to a tennis racket.

He learned his trade quickly on the public hard courts of the West Coast and at just under 15, he won the California U15s Championships. That was his incentive to give up baseball.

By 18, he had won the National Junior Championships by beating the top contender Gene Mako, from a two set deficit.

At 19, he was picked for the Davis Cup auxiliary team and with that beckoning success, walked away from university to devote himself to tennis. Read the rest of this entry →