The point was driven home by a clip they showed the other night from a previous Australian Open, back when the Rebound Ace surface (since abandoned) was a neutral pea-green. My first thought on seeing the clip was: Man, I wish they were still using those courts (color-wise, if not surface-property wise). Yesterday, I asked Billie Jean King at a USTA luncheon what she thought of the blue courts and she wasted no time saying, "They're a little too much. . ."
In fact, the wag sitting alongside me passed on a comment on the courts made at the Deadspin blog: Since when did they start playing tennis at Boise State? (for you readers outside the U.S.: Boise State is infamous for its godawful blue Astro-turf football field).
This luncheon, BTW, was to announce a new partnership between the USTA and what has become King's lifelong pet project, *World Team Tennis*, currently traveling under the name Advanta World Team Tennis Pro League. The investment makes sense to the USTA because WTT can be used to advance and add prestige to its own Jr. Team Tennis program, and also serve many other grass-roots "grow the game" initiatives. Given BJK's reach and platform as a multi-faceted icon (yeech, I just made her sound like some kind power tool, but maybe that's not so far off the mark. . .), I'm ceaselessly amazed at how stubbornly Billie Jean has clung to her vision of team tennis. She's tweaked and altered and searched every possible niche (she told me that a spin-off, intramural college team tennis, is the fastest growing athletic diversion on the nation's campuses) for a place for WTT. And she's proud that WTT, now in its 33rd year, is the longest continuing pro sports league in that level below the NFL, MLB and other marquee sports.
As I've written before, I've always liked the idea of pro team tennis. But with the Australian Open underway, this isn't the time and place for an analysis of the team tennis issue. I will say that I think team competition (e.g., Davis Cup) brings additional dimensions to what is already the greatest individual sport of our time. To my mind, the one-trick pony nature of the calendar is a liability to the game; who but the most diehard fans really cares about tournament tennis after the final Grand Slam event of the year? Wouldn't it be more interesting - and refreshing - to have the fall and early winter devoted to team play?
Anyway, while Wayne Coffey of the New York Daily News was talking about his adventures in the kitchen, it occurred to me to ask Billie Jean when she had last cooked a meal. "Oh, about 20 years ago," she replied. "I probably made Sloppy Joes for Larry (King, BJK's ex-husband)." Most of you know that Billie's partner in business and life is the former South African pro, Ilona Kloss. It turns out that one time when Ilona's mother came to visit from South Africa, she offered to cook a meal at the apartment Billie Jean and Ilona share. The women jumped at the offer - only to discover that while they had been in the apartment for two years, neither of them could figure out how to open the oven door on their stove. "We ended up having to call the manufacturer," Billie Jean confessed.
Later in the afternoon and evening, I watched the tennis telecasts on both ESPN and Tennis Channel. I haven't been able to peruse the Comments as thoroughly as I'd like (y'all are doing a great job flooding Typepad!), but I share some of your discontents. I'm reluctant to get into direct criticism, because many of the commentators are colleagues and friends, but I will say that, in general, I've found find myself thinking words like "banal" or "irritating" and "self-aggrandizing" far too often. The number of excellent commentators is matched by the number of inferior or annoying ones, and that's not a good ratio (I'm talking about ESPN and TC together here).
Moving on then: Let me slip into my role as fashion arbiter for a moment to say that I've seen just one shirt (and I haven't seen them all) that I would consider actually buying to wear - that's the yellow-and-white Adidas job I saw on Safin. For my money, Adidas has always made the best-looking stuff, meaning gear that's sporty, elegant, and. . . appropriate. I know that "appropriate" is not a fashionable concept or word these days, which is too bad. I'm still trying to figure out why someone would want to drape an athlete like Jelena Jankovic in a green maternity dress, but I guess that's my problem (unless a "wardrobe malfunction" suddenly makes it Jankovic's).
Here's something else that irks me: Each time some overly enthusiastic clutch of supporters that still has ties to the old country turns up at a match, we're treated to long-winded lectures and moralistic denunciations by some of the commentators.
At the same time, the cameras virtually leap on every opportunity to show said supporters chanting, singing, or hopping around. Can you say self-fulfilling prophecy? You almost think some producer is sitting in the truck hoping that the Croatian fans get all loud and obstreperous so that the commentators can launch into one of their tedious stem-winders on nationalism. Somebody draft the memo: People like getting on TV. They'll do stoopid and even offensive things to get on TV. Putting them on TV every chance you get, therefore, is not such a hot idea. Why not just treat them as a non-problem until they become a problem, instead of using, say, Taylor Dent's complaints as a launch pad for turning them into a story?
Onward: Brad Gilbert looks almost shockingly different these days - the opposite of venerable Dick Enberg, who's looked the same all his life (and I mean that in a good way!). Brad these days is looking well groomed and slick, like some kind of CEO. I did find it funny, though, when, in talking about Amer Delic, Brad talked a little bit about Delic having played collegiate tennis at the "University of Illi-noise." It's nice to see some of the pre-CEO Brad seeping through, although I, as glad as anyone that Brad's out of that Metallica trucker's cap and all-black outfit phase.
Watching Marin Cilic clean Janko Tipsarevic's clock, I was struck by a quality that he shares with another beanpole of a guy, Sam Querrey. Both of them, at their best, seem to engulf the ball. You see them move forward, the ball disappears, and a milli-second later it rockets back across the net. This is effective tennis, the ultimate expression of a very valuable notion: playing through the court. It's an elusive, hard-to-define concept, but I know it when I see it - both in terms of technique and strategy. Some of it has to do with forward motion, and some of it has to do with the bio-mechanics of how a player addresses the ball. But you watch guys who do it well (Novak Djokovic also comes to mind) and you get a real feel for what they're doing - which is best-described as. . . commanding.
That talent alone won't ensure you a place in the hall-of-fame. Oddly enough, I don't often think of Roger Federer, or Rafael Nadal, commanding the ball in quite that way. The Mighty Fed plays a ball in a way that leaves it clear and non-negotiable instructions on where to go. Nadal disciplines the ball, like a man spanking an unruly puppy. Guys like Cilic inhale and then eject it back. Maybe I'm putting too fine a point on it, but each player seems to me to have a unique way of communicating with the ball, and who knows to what extent the nature of that relationship plays a part in the secret life of a point?
I've been touting Cilic ever since the coach deep in the background, Bob Brett, told me a lot about him way back in August, in Cincinnati. When Brett talks, I listen.
Let's get back to Jankovic for a moment. I thought her performance against Kirsten Flipkins was woeful, and I sure hope (for her sake) that it was just one of those days. Has anyone else noticed the degree to which commentators on certain women's matches somehow perform agonizing dances around uttering the only sentence that properly puts things in perspective: The girl is stinking out the joint! I'm afraid that was true of Jankovic yesterday. She was tentative and stony-faced; she hit everything short. She seemed to be watching instead of playing the points. Thank God there was no Jumbotron for her to view between points - if there were, she might have hurled, although maybe the designers of her dress chose that particular color for its cover-up properties).
At one point in the second set, Jankovic let a lob hit by Flipkins drop so low, and so far to her left, that a comprehensive combination of poor positioning, late preparation, and sheer reluctance to hit the danged thing caused poor Jelena to nearly fall over sideways (in that peculiar version of slow-motion that tennis fans will recognize as "choke-motion") when she finally did whack the smash.
It was surprisingly poor stuff from a girl who, at her best, wheels around the court like one of those robotic vacuum cleaners - efficient, economical, ever ready to turn on a dime until she hits the next wall or corner. The best face you can put on it is that Jankovic played a truly lousy match and still managed to win in straight sets; she got it out of her system and it's time to move on.
At the top level, it's less about how well you can play on a good day than about how you can survive a bad day. Jankovic did show some poise, and the reserves of confidence that are a perk for every top player, so she may turn up next round a different player. Her own assessment afterwards was accurate and about as honest as she could get without collatarally insulting her opponent: "I have to stay in the matches. . .try to. . . I just need to go after my shots more. I have to play a lot more aggressively, go out there with confidence. I have to work a little bit in the practice, you know, to try to clean up some things in my game and hopefully I will be better in my next round."
Jankovic's attitude about her status in the game is also encouraging; she seems comfortable with the pressures of her position: "Everybody wants to achieve and come to the No. 1 ranking, and I have done that. It will always be in any biography and record, and nobody can take it away from me. I can just enjoy any game and try to improve - get better as a player."
My gut feeling is that in order to attack her rivals' service games more efficiently, Jankovic will need to protect her own more effectively. That's just as much a matter of confidence as it is of control. We'll see what the next round brings.
[[TW programming note: Jackie Oh's Deuce Club will appear Friday morning (instead of the usual Thursday evening slot), in order to not to interfere with your viewing of the Australian Open. But it will be a good time for everyone to take a breather and indulge in some Off-Topic chatter]]
