Rafa Bites the Bullet

Rafael Nadal, out of action with damaged knees since Wimbledon, doesn’t know exactly when he’ll be back in fighting trim, and furthermore doesn’t seem to feel that a great deal has changed since he left the tour to do “very conservative” rehab on his tendinitis-plagued knees.

Via conference call, Nadal told a group of us on Tuesday that he doesn’t put much stock in the notion that the articles of tennis war have changed with Andy Murray’s recent, long-deferred transformation from major also-ran into Grand Slam champion.  
“I don’t see a big difference now,” Nadal said, sounding a bit sleepy and subdued in the course of a call promoting his appearance in the BNP Paribas Showdown exhibition scheduled for early March in New York’s Madison Square Garden. In that event, Rafa will play Juan Martin del Potro, who’s had ailments of his own to worry about lately.  
“Even if Murray didn’t win a Grand Slam before, the level was not different from before,” Nadal continued. “Now he won a Grand Slam. But that is not going to change my thought on this. Even if he was or even if he was not (a Grand Slam winner) he’s a fantastic player and that’s how I see him.”  
It was nice to hear Nadal’s distinct manner of speaking again, nice to listen to that curious mixture of the earnest schoolboy and the realist who doesn’t like to traffic in “maybes”, “if onlys”, or, “on the other hands.” Very few people like to keep it as simple as Nadal does (or if they’d like to, they can’t manage it). And very few can be so black-and-white without seeming inflexible.  
Speaking of flexible: It seems Nadal’s knees are coming along quite well, but he is still steering clear of testing them on the tennis court. “I’m working every day and feeling a little better than in the first couple of months. Still we didn’t improve in the right direction, but now I can feel the improvement.”  
Nadal said he’s been going to the gym and working in the pool, following a rehabilitation regimen he embraced in order to avoid surgery. “The important thing is to not to have surgery if you can avoid it,” he said. “So we made a very conservative treatment program and it seems to be working well.”  
When Nadal was asked if he had “deeper concerns” in the wake of this lengthy absence, he was almost chipper. “Never retired nobody from this,” he pointed out, adding that his return is entirely contingent upon how the knees feel. “I will know when I feel completely without pain. In the past I never took so long out of competition. I can imagine that when I come back I will need some time to make my adaptation. If it will be three weeks or a month and a half, I don’t know.”  
One of the more intriguing questions this raises is whether or not Nadal will continue his career at full speed and with the same loaded schedule that might have contributed to the degeneration in his knees. If there’s ever been a good time for him to take a long, hard look at where he goes from here, this lengthy break may be it. If nothing else, being away from the fray must yield some perspective, and Nadal certainly has plenty of time to chase deeper, easily buried feelings instead of ranking points or Grand Slam titles.  
At 26, Nadal is at about the midpoint of his career (provided his health remains stable). In the past two years, his rivalry with Roger Federer has dimmed somewhat, and he faces new challenges from Novak Djokovic and perhaps the newly empowered Murray. He’s already claimed the (barely) arguable title of greatest clay-court player of all time, but he still trails Federer in the Grand Slam singles title count by a significant margin (Federer leads 17-11). Is it worth pursuing the dream of unseating him?  
Right now, Nadal certainly isn’t thinking quite so big picture. As he said, “Impossible is nothing, but difficult is real,” he said of what he might expect of the future (I think he meant that it’s silly to entertain ridiculous ambitions—like winning eight or nine more majors). “I don’t want to put in no goals. I am trying not to think too far, going day by day.”  
It really seemed to kill Nadal to have to pull out of the Olympics and, to a lesser degree perhaps, the U.S. Open. He also made some remarks over the past few weeks that showed the antipathy he feels toward hard courts, going so far as to pronounce them bad for the game, not simply problematic for him and his unique physical make-up. But he outright rejected the option of drastically reducing his participation in courts that are least friendly to his legs.  
“My feeling is that the hard courts is more aggressive (harmful) for my knees and ankles. But today, it’s one of the most important surfaces. I don’t have a lot of chance to change my schedule. If I want to stay at the top level, I have to accept this.”  
Short version: Nadal is going to bite the bullet. He’s going to return and carry on much as before, hoping that the healing benefits of this extended break, and whatever precautionary measures he takes going forward, will prove permanent.  
This seems somewhat risky, even if drastically cutting back in his participation on hard courts would endanger not only his ranking, but his standing in the ATP. It wasn’t so long ago that Bjorn Borg, that other clay-court icon, sought to cut back on his commitments to the tour and more or less play when he felt enthusiastic and where he chose. The Pro Council (which at that time administered the game) shot down his request, and would not make an exception for him. In that all-or-nothing scenario, Borg chose nothing and quietly left the game.  
More important than the disposition of the powers that be is the state of Nadal’s own desires. And that is going to provide his fans with good news. As much as he’s complained about the hard courts, the ranking system, and the length of the season, he’s never made menacing noises about quitting the game—or suggested that he’s willing to go to the mat with the ATP over commitments.  
Nadal knows that if he tried to tailor a schedule that would both maximize his results and protect his knees, he simply wouldn’t be able to retain his place in the Top 4. Clearly, this is not an option for him—so the takeaway is that when Nadal returns, it will be with undiminished fervor. And that will drop a major, new storyline on the game, as Nadal seeks to reclaim his form and his place at the top.  
As Federer demonstrated last year and Nadal got backwards today: Nothing is impossible.