The booming sound of his forehand reverberating through Arthur Ashe Stadium won’t be soon forgotten by the spectators, and will endure forever in Roger Federer’s nightmares. On Monday, a new king of the hard-court was crowned in New York. Argentina’s Juan Martin Del Potro, possesses an Andy Roddick style game, but everything is bigger – powerful ground strokes and a lethal serve – and he’s only 20.
Most remarkable, perhaps, was his self belief throughout the match. Playing in his first Grand Slam final against one of the greatest ever, he was understandably nervous to start, losing the first set in a poor effort. But while most first timers would meekly walk off the court, accepting runners up status as an accomplishment, like Andy Murray lamely did one year ago, Del Potro pulled his act together in the second set showing why he was able to so easily beat Rafael Nadal the day before. Then, after double faulting twice in a row to lose the third set, he once again showed the wherewithal to play his best and win the fourth and fifth sets.
In an effort that was eerily reminiscent of, Pete Sampras, the tennis legend he grew up idolizing, Del Potro secured a service break early in the fifth set and proceeded to simply go through the motions on Federer’s remaining service games, saving energy for his own. He displayed a mature understanding of the scoreboard, knowing when to press and when to hold back, allowing him to last easily through a grueling five setter.
The comparisons to Sampras may continue throughout his career, as one of Pete’s most underrated skills was his service return. Because he often secured only as many breaks as necessary, then coasted to victory on his own serve, Sampras was not recognized as the incredible returner he was. Watching Del Potro put the ball back into play so many times throughout the match, it was clear that he may be right up there with some of the best of all time in return proficiency –Agassi, Connors, and Nadal. His wingspan plays a huge role, as it is almost impossible to serve outside his reach, and his ground game makes those returns more than just defensive blocks. Still, he seemed only to really go after those points at the big moments, as he did in breaking back to stay in the fourth set.
In the tennis world, finally, there is another man who can stand up to Federer, and such a stark contrast is he to the other. While Nadal whips his racket over and around the ball, spinning it like no one ever has, Del Potro hits it straight and flat, crushing the ball with the face of his weapon. The result is a ball that skids right through the speedy hard court, a complete contradiction to Nadal’s shots that bound up off the surface. This is why Rafa fares so well on the grippier surfaces of Melbourne, Wimbledon, and especially Paris where spin is exaggerated. On the hard-courts, something else is needed, and while Federer’s all-rounded game has done the job for years, Del Potro’s was designed for it.
Tennis fans should be excited for what’s to come: the best clay courter of all time, Nadal, has many titles left in him, and the man who may one day be considered his counterpart of the hard-court has just arrived. As they contend for majors in years to come, one thing is clear – a changing of the guard has just occurred.
In a previous Vancouver 2010 Olympics preview post, I wrote about Canada’s best medal hope in men’s figure skating. Today the focus is on our medal contender in female figure skating.
Joannie Rochette is a relative late bloomer in terms of how long it
took her to contend for world titles, but at the age of 23, she is pushing her name into the list of the world’s elite skaters. Her past results have been nothing to scoff at, with the most impressive being a 5th place finish at the 2006 Turin Olympics and a 5th at the 2008 World Championships in Sweden, but with the Olympics coming up in her home country, lately she has been setting her sights even higher.To set the tone for her 2009 season, she dominated the Canadian Figure Skating Championships in January, winning by a margin of 25 and capturing her fifth consecutive title as the country’s champion. Using that as a springboard into world competition, she won a silver medal at the Four Continents Championship in February, losing to Korea’s Kim Yu-Na. Indeed, Kim may be Rochette’s toughest competition on the world scene, as she showed again in March at the World Figure Skating Championships where Rochette achieved the best result of her career, winning a silver medal, and once again finishing second to the Korean.
With the next major world competition being the Olympics, Rochette aims to add a few elements to her routines to increase the her potential maximum score, the toughest being a triple-triple combination in her short program. If she manages to pull these jumps off by the time the Olympics come around, she may very well be standing atop the podium in Vancouver come February.
His sweat pours for you, New York. In every match he plays, in every point he fa
ces, with every shot he hits – no concern of the moment in the match or the scoreboard, Rafa gives you everything he’s got. It’s all to win the one Grand Slam title that has eluded him thus far, the one that’s in your back yard, and he’s doing it for you, New York.
For two months he watched and waited for his knees to mend, witnessing Roger Federer win the Wimbledon title he should have defended. During his second tournament upon returning, he acquired an abdominal injury that still bothers him now. On the days when he doesn’t play, he has a machine working on those abs, ensuring that he will be able to compete in true Nadal fashion in the next match. It’s the only way he knows how – to run down every single ball, to stretch for every impossible shot, and to fight for every point.
Yet, you will chant the names of Nicolas Kiefer and Gael Monfils when he faces them. Justifiably, you cheer for an even match, but you forget that Nadal has clawed his way back after Monfils won the first set in a tie-breaker. You applaud Kiefer for taking the second set from the mighty Spaniard and playing his best against the Goliath. But you forget what Nadal has been through to perform for you. You don’t realize that his willpower is so overwhelming that he convinces his own body’s ailments into submission, let alone his opposition’s game.
Here he is in the quarter finals, two steps from a championship match against Federer, a prospect that thrills every tennis fan, excites us to the core. Will you support him now? Cheer for him when you see his fist pump! Celebrate when you hear him yell ‘Vamos!” He gives it all for you, New York. Give him something back.
Notes:
- weigh in on your championship favourite in the poll on the right
- this is being posted in lieu of a Friday post
After Novak Djokovic beat Radek Stepanek on Tuesday night, in a post-game interview, Darren Cahill asked him if he’d like to hit a little with his new coach, Todd Martin. Djokovic declined but pointed up to the broadcasters booth and issued a challenge, “How about John!” Speaking of course to John McEnroe, the retired tennis legend.
Surprisingly, the 4 time U.S. Open champion accepted the challenge, and while he changed shoes, Cahill gave the “Djoker” the opportunity to do an impersonation of McEnroe. New Yorkers were exposed to a side of Djokovic’s personality that has disappeared of late. A change that was likely due to the weight of expectations that followed winning his first Grand Slam title at the Australian Open in 2008.
To see the video clip, click here.
Today, Djokovic will play 10th seed Fernando Verdasco for a semi-final date with Roger Federer. Hailing from Spain, and playing left handed as well, Verdasco looks like the second coming of Rafael Nadal, and Djokovic will definitely have to be on top of his game to have a chance in this one. If you're not stuck at work, make a point to tune into this one.
5. Venus Williams: I don’t often discuss women’s tennis, because the seedings seem to mean absolutely nothing, and any attempt at predictions is a crapshoot. Still, at the end of the U.S Open, we expect to see the Williams sisters battling it out, so Venus’s fourth round loss to Kim Clijsters is big news.
4. Kim Clijsters: She had a child in February 2008 and only returned to tennis 2 months ago at Wimbledon. In Sunday’s matchup against Venus Williams, it was clear why she was once the number 1 player in the world, and past U.S. Open champion. She did to Venus what Venus does to so many others, dominating her with power and aggressiveness, and in the end it was Venus who had no response. Comeback stories are always fan favourites, and she will be the Cinderella story of this tournament if she keeps it going.
3. Novak Djokovic: The 4th seed found it much too difficult to eliminate American Jesse Witten, who is ranked 276th in the world. The real negative for Djokovic, though, is that instead of embracing the fans in New York, and celebrating his success with them, he continues to act like he is against all of them. Upon winning a point, instead of smiling and allowing them to rejoice with him, he looks only to his box of supporters, acting like they are the only people encouraging him. Unfortunately, with an attitude like that, no one else wants to cheer for him, and his unpopularity at the U.S. Open continues.
2. Rafael Nadal: He has been hitting and moving very well so far in the tournament, but against Nicolas Almagro, he reaggravated an abdominal strain that first occurred in Cincinnati earlier this summer. If the injury is bad it could hamper him even more than his knee problems, because the core muscles are essential in generating the powerful strokes that Nadal has built his success on.
1. Andy Roddick: In a stunning third round upset, 5th seed Andy Roddick lost to fellow American John Isner on Saturday, ending his 2009 quest to win a second major championship. After nearly winning Wimbledon earlier this summer, much more was expected from Roddick on his favourite surface, but he will have to wait until next season for another shot at a Grand Slam.
With the Vancouver 2010 Olympics looming, I am going to devote some time to preparing for what’s to come. I will focus on the sports that Canada will be competitive in and attempt to introduce our medal contenders. We should know the athletes who will be wearing the maple leaf, so that we can put our full support behind them. To kick this off, we focus on figure skating.
Patrick Chan:
Patrick Chan provides us with a reason to believe that the future of Canadian figure skating is very promising. At just 18 years of age, we might have expected to wait a few more years for his work to bear fruition, but since he has been Canadian champion 2 years running, then winning the silver medal at the 2009 World Figure Skating Championships in Los Angeles, we can sense that the future is upon us.
The fact that he has already achieved so much in such a young career is indicative of Chan’s determination. In an article by Lori Ewing on the ctvolympics.ca website, Canadian figure skating legend, Kurt Browning, recalls a very motivated, younger Patrick Chan, declaring, “I want to be part of what keeps figure skating in this country great.”
This resolve is what pushes Chan to always be working. As Ewing writes, “When he's not on the ice, he's doing pilates and yoga, and taking care of his aching limbs in the whirlpool and ice bath.” Indeed, work ethic and ambition make up a large part of any professional athlete’s successes, but just as important are an individual’s built in talents.
In this regard, Chan has no shortage of praise being thrown his way. On his abilities, choreographer, Lori Nichol, says, “He has such mastery of his blades and of all the things blades can do, but he's also incredibly strong and so he can take it to all sorts of levels.”
Retired Canadian skater, Jeffrey Buttle, bronze medalist at the 2006 Turin Olympics, agrees, “"He skates like he's 10 years older than he actually is. In terms of maturity, he has skating skills and edges and posture that are head and shoulders ahead of the rest of the competition.''
The other ingredient to his accomplishments is perhaps just as rare and also essential: a lack of anxiety. Browning, a competitor who has felt the pressure of skating in front of millions at the Olympics, is notably impressed by the youngster, "You're used to seeing skaters go to the competition and the level drops because it's competition. You're nervous. It didn't with him, and I'm starting to get used to it now. He just has a way of going out there under different and difficult situations and being able to lay down a really high percentage of his planned content. . . it's rare, really rare.''
What’s rare is seeing so much admiration and respect pouring from past champions to such a young man. A greater endorsement is hard to imagine, and if they deem him worthy of such acclaim, there’s no reason we shouldn’t believe.
Come back on Monday to read about our female medal hopeful – Joannie Rochette
Yesterday, LA Kings’ GM, Dean Lombardi, stated that taking on Dany Heatley would be too great a risk for his team. His comments raise an interesting question, and it is not whether Heatley is worth the risk, it is how big a risk does Heatley actually pose? Since demanding a trade from the Senators in June, the team that gave him a second chance after his disastrous car accident in Atlanta, and then rejecting a potential trade to the Edmonton Oilers, Canadians have taken every opportunity to bash his integrity, this blogger included.
There is a good chance that it’s all been blown out of proportion. Obviously the way he’s gone about his business this summer is questionable, but does that really ruin his worth as a player and a teammate? While his current Senators associates are probably not supportive of his actions, surely he is not as unpopular as certain lightning rods, like Sean Avery and Ray Emery. Former NHL player and analyst, Ray Ferraro, who knows Heatley personally, has told the Team 1040 radio station that not only is Heatley a good teammate, but his game will return to its former glory this season.
Considering that he had a sub-standard performance last year, scoring only 39 goals, after achieving the 50 goal mark twice previously, a return to form would certainly make him a valuable commodity. And if his reputation as a bad teammate has indeed been blown out of proportion this summer, the only risk may be the large contract of $7.5 million per year that his new team will have to take on. For a big power forward who scores 50 goals, general managers should perhaps not be so quick to write him off.
