 is a tossup. They’ve beaten each other on clay and hard court. Gonzalez beat Querrey in their only matchup on hard court but that was two years ago. Gonzalez reached the quarterfinals in Beijing this week and I’ve only used him twice this year so Gonzalez is my pick. And since I need five players from this drawer and I’ve used Robredo five times already, I’m also taking Berdych.
I may have used my Andy Roddicks up too soon. He’s in the Beijing final and looking good. But Jo-Wilfried Tsonga is in the final in Bangkok and he beat his friend Gael Monfils to get there. I don’t think Tsonga can beat Andy Roddick but he should get to the semifinals so I’m picking him.
The Metz draw has last year’s semifinalists but no finalists and no quarterfinalists, so we’ll have to look at players’ indoor hard court records to evaluate them.
Ivo Karlovic is the top seed and he had a 13-4 record on indoor hard court last year, reached the semifinals in Rotterdam this year, and just won two Davis Cup matches on indoor hard court. However, he has a cruel draw in the person of his first round opponent: Marcos Baghdatis. Baghdatis reached the final in Marseille this year and reached the semifinal in an indoor hard court challenger last week. Guillermo Canas is also here and he was a semifinalist last year, but I think Karlovic and Baghdatis can beat him. I’m picking Karlovic for two reasons: Baghdatis retired during that semifinal and he’d just returned to the tour after a ten week layoff with a wrist injury, and Baghdatis’ indoor hard court record hasn’t been anywhere near as good as his record on carpet the past few years.
Ivan Ljubicic, Michael Llodra, Feliciano Lopez, and Radek Stepanek look most promising in the next quarter. Ljubicic has a stunning 54-19 record on hard court over the past five years but he’s only 7-6 the last two years and his ranking is down to number 47. Llodra won the title in Rotterdam this year but as far as I can tell, that’s the only time he’s ever gone past the second round in the main draw on indoor hard court and he just lost in the second round of a challenger. Lopez has lost in the first round in his last four tournaments. I’m picking Stepanek, he’s by far the most consistent performer indoors.
Mario Ancic is back from a seven week break due to ongoing problems with mononucleosis. He’s 7-1 on hard court this year and he won his Davis Cup match on indoor hard court two weeks ago. Ancic is 3-1 over Paul-Henri Mathieu including wins over him indoors in Madrid and Paris last fall, but his first opponent is Ernests Gulbis. Gulbis was 18-2 in indoor hard court challengers last year and he reached the quarterfinals in St. Petersburg last fall. I’m going to assume that Ancic’s main draw experience is more valuable than Gulbis’ challenger wins and pick Ancic.
Andreas Seppi beat Arnaud Clement in the first round here last year but he’d probably lose to Gilles Simon if he met him in the quarterfinals. Marc Gicquel reached the semifinals here two years ago but he hasn’t done well on indoor hard court this year. Simon is the third player in this draw with a tough first round. His opponent, Nicolas Mahut, reached the semifinals here last year while Simon lost in the first round. Simon reached the quarterfinals in Marseille and Rotterdam while Mahut reached the quarterfinals in Marseille and just reached the quarterfinals in Bangkok. It’s a tough pick but since I’ve already used Simon five times this year and I only need three players from this draw, I’m skipping this quarter altogether.
My picks are: Del Potro, Youzhny, Berdych, Gonzalez, Tsonga, Karlovic, Stepanek, and Ancic.
A short observation on the psychoanalytic development of babies combined with a look at Rafael Nadal’s amazing year of tennis.
And it has nothing to do with the US financial crisis. Last night I went to Chavez Ravine to watch baseball’s Los Angeles Dodgers take one step closer to a division title and I saw something that laid me out. At most sporting events these days, spectators compete to see who can get their face on the Jumbotron. US football fans dress up as if they were auditioning for Mad Max 3, basketball fans throw down Cranky Soulja Boy moves, and baseball fans get their kids into the act.
The music in the stadium was blasting as a man held up his young son who was shaking and twisting. This kid was not a day older than two years old and I swear, in the middle of his act, he turned to the Jumbotron and pointed at himself. This kid had totally skipped what a psychoanalyst would call the mirror stage – the point in a baby’s development where they see themselves in a mirror and realize that they are a separate being from their mother and also the point where they become captivated by their own image – and gone straight to American Idol.
I wonder whether we should now create a new psychoanalytic phenomenon called the Jumbotron stage, the point where a baby moves past the mirror stage and right onto the performance stage.
The men and women are playing in Beijing this week. The men are also playing in Bangkok and the women in Seoul. So far there’s been only one upset though it’s a pretty big one. David Ferrer lost his first match to Dudi Sela in Beijing. David is having a miserable year on hard court. I’d fly to Asia to see what’s wrong with him but our Tennis Diary travel budget won’t allow it and I’m not feeling like getting up in the middle of the night to check out the live streaming from Beijing.
Meanwhile, the ATP has finally caught up with youtube. They’ve launched the ATP World Tour channel. It’s about time. Tennis fans have been posting illegal TV clips of matches for forever and the ATP has been wisely encouraging it by not asking youtube to remove them. Their first effort is a celebration of Rafael Nadal’s golden year: eight tournament wins, two grand slams, an Olympic gold medal, and, possibly, a Davis Cup title.
So, is this the peak of Rafa’s career?
It could depend largely on the other three members of the top four: Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray. After all, Federer would still be sailing along with Wimbledon dominance if Rafa hadn’t come along. I’ll give Rafa the French Open/Wimbledon double for the next few years but, of course, no gold medal and, likely, no Davis Cup. He doesn’t play Davis Cup that often and that’s really Spain’s only chance.
Djokovic has been overlooked a bit in this year of Rafa dominance. Nole actually improved over last year. He beat Federer in the semifinals at the Australian Open and won his first slam even if Federer later announced that he was suffering from mononucleosis at the time. Nole got to the semifinals at the French Open and Wimbledon, same as last year, and slipped just the slightest bit by going out in the semifinals at the US Open. Last year he reached the final. Okay, so maybe he only held steady as the year wore on but he’s still good for at least a few more slams which means a few less for Rafa and Roger.
Roger looks good for a few more US Opens. He’s the only player who doesn’t seem to wear himself out by the end of the summer. The Australian Open is less predictable because it starts so early in the calendar.
Murray started off the year miserably in grand slams with a first round loss at the Australian Open and his US Open final was the first time he’d been past a quarterfinal in a slam. He seems to have trouble with startup. He lost his first round match at the Olympics after failing to adjust to the time change properly. So I’m not expecting much from him in Australia and he’s never done much on clay, so that leaves Wimbledon and the US Open. I’m thinking he’ll get one of the next few US Opens. Roger’s Opens might not come consecutively.
There’s one more person I’d watch beyond the top four: Juan Martin Del Potro. I’m not a stat person but I think you’d be hard pressed to find a guy who’d won four straight tournaments on two different surfaces that didn’t reach the number one ranking. Del Potro may not get there because there’s a logjam at the top but he could get pretty close. He followed up his four straight wins with a US Open quarterfinal and two singles victories in Davis Cup. This kid’s gonna fly.
Is this Rafa’s peak? My guess is that he’s not going win a US Open after a French/Wimbledon double. The only way he surpasses this year is to win three slams and that won’t happen at the same time