For sheer quantity of news, nothing in sports beats the opening days of a Grand Slam. A five-set classic is upstaged minutes later by a curse word caught on a courtside mike; a major upset is quickly forgotten after a top seed has to be strapped to an IV. And then Roger Federer trumps them all just by getting broken.
Amidst a weekend full of football (boo the villainous Saints!), new movies (Children of Men—not as good as advertised; it somehow made the end of the world seem worse than I could have imagined), and new bourbon (Bulleitt—probably pronounced “bullet” in its Kentucky home), I managed to catch most of ESPN’s many hours from Melbourne. I tried to keep up by scribbling in my official “Reporter’s Notebook” (couldn’t find my official short-brimmed reporter’s hat to go with it, unfortunately). Here’s a transcription:
Roddick-Tsonga: Watching this alongside Mauresmo-Perry made me think that the men really should be paid more. This was a first-round match between a top seed and a no-name wild card, and there was virtually nothing separating them. As for the match itself, Roddick has improved his court sense around the net (his footwork still isn’t natural up there), but if Tsonga had had just a tiny bit more fight, confidence, or stamina, he would have been up two sets.
Darren Cahill: My snap, two-day reaction is that I like him in place of Brad Gilbert on ESPN. BG gave you more insights and opinions per second, certainly, but Cahill has a classy, calming effect. I’d gotten so used to Gilbert, I no longer noticed how hyper and agitating he was. Cahill has his share of insight as well—he was right to advise Sharapova to aim for the lines against Camille Pin, even if it was the lower-percentage play. She did, and it worked. One misstep: His white shirt and sober tie started to wilt in the heat, making him look like a haggard used-car salesman.
Nicole Vaidisova: Like Cahill, so far she seems calmer and more poised than the old Nicole. She didn’t lose her head when Jill Craybas came back to win the second set.
Marcos Baghdatis: I don’t think I’d ever noticed how early he takes his forehand. Few players can flat-out surprise their opponents with the direction of their shots as often as he does.
Rainer Schuettler: He’s gone now, but next time you see him, check out the extension on his two-handed backhand. Actually, I’d recommend that Robert Kendrick check it out as well.
Pat McEnroe: He’s underrated as an analyst, and not as biased toward the Americans as some people say. Pat Mac’s a tennis enthusiast who praises everyone pretty liberally, but he’s gotten a little tougher recently—Nadal’s returns were “terrible” yesterday, and McEnroe said that in the past he’d tried to get Roddick to serve and volley more just to mix things up, but that Roddick “didn’t buy it.” The eye-droppah, though, is hard to get your head around. What, exactly, differentiates it from a plain old droppah?
Clothes: I like the Nike green and gold thing, despite the cargo pant/military effect of the shorts. Sharapova’s understated outfit—thumbs up. But I liked Mauresmo’s red from last year better than what she’s got going in Melbourne. Can’t Lacoste put Roddick in something other than all white?
Maria Sharapova-Camille Pin: This resembled many a 14-and-under pushing contest. Sharapova was too nervous to hit through her serve or forehand for much of the third set; Pin was even worse, completely collapsing once she got the lead after being 5-0 down. Yuri didn’t disappoint, though, dutifully pushing the sponsors with a Nike T-shirt.
Rafael Nadal: At times it looked like he had changed his service motion, starting a little farther to his right and bringing the racquet up faster. At other times it looked like nothing had changed at all. Has anyone ever been called for a foot-fault across the center hash line? I think Nadal went across a couple times yesterday. He was a little lucky to sneak through the first set, relying on a bad forehand error from Kendrick when the American had a set point. But by the third set, Nadal had finally found the range on his deep, near-moonball forehand, a shot that will make a nice weapon on the high-bouncing Rebound Ace.
ESPN: The broadcasts have steadily improved over the years—they’re willing to fit Jankovic, Vaidisova, and Rochus-Guccione in rather than sticking completely with Americans. But the network interviewed Robby Ginepri rather than show the first break of the Nadal-Kendrick match, which was annoying. I’d rather simply see tennis and sacrifice the interviews, though Roddick’s was revealing; he came across as funny, intelligent, and adolescent in equal measures (He was also caught checking out his hair and skin before he knew the camera was on him.) Chris Fowler brings a welcome broadcasting acumen, though he enjoys showing his knowledge off to Pat McEnroe when they call matches together (I like to hear PMac dismiss Fowler’s attempts to disagree with his analysis—“No, no, don’t act like you know what you’re talking about, buddy.”) Still, you have to be impressed when Fowler offhandedly refers to Nicolas Lapentti’s penchant for five-setters—did he remember that even after a long season of college football and Lee Corso, or did someone feed Fowler that info a few seconds before?
Cliff Drysdale: Highlight so far for Cliffy—hearing him say “Ninja Turtle.” Low-light: A wildly overdone "Ohhh!!!" after a fairly routine passing shot by Tsonga.
Martina Hingis: Has she been listening to me? She came out and tried to dictate against Natalie Dechy, hitting flatter and stepping in to her shots. Of course, Dechy also let her do that, something Kim Clijsters won’t.
James Blake: It really is encouraging to see someone improve at age 27. Tennis can seem like a place strictly for the young—young as in under 24. I like knowing that age is not an automatic death sentence on the men’s tour. Blake looked strong for 99 percent of the match with Moya, using his wide serve into the deuce court well and putting the ball into the corners with authority. The only hiccup came in the first-set tiebreaker when Blake suddenly overhit three forehands in a row—the old (or young) James had reared his ugly head at the wrong moment. But the seasoned James reappeared at 7-8 in the breaker. With the set in the balance, Blake hit a three-quarters pace serve to Moya’s backhand and followed it up with a strong but measured forehand into the opposite corner for a winner. Smart stuff.
Enjoy the tennis tonight. Baghdatis-Monfils should be fun.
Suicide pool, 2nd round: Martina Hingis, Tomas Berdych