Sure, Mardy Fish looks like he's carrying a few extra pounds. He's also got a few extra days growth on his chin. He's also wearing those anklets that make his feet look bigger than they are, and his loose-fitting, predominantly white shirts flap around like a jib on a tacking yacht when he rambles around the court. None of that hurts, though, because if you're going to play a big game you might as well also project a big persona, and that's something Fish has done well here at the U.S. Open. Today, he made Gael Monfils look like a skinny kid trying to dodge and weave his way through a match that he couldn't possibly win with mere escape strategies.
This was no small feat, for Monfils has played well at the US Open, suckering a series of opponents into baseline games of hide-and-seek that few of them are equipped to win. You know the essential Monfils strategy: turn the match into a track meet, played from so far behind the baseline that John McEnroe might be moved to describe you as playing "deep centerfield." Tease out spectacular placements from gifted ball strikers like David Nalbandian, flick back a something-or-other in response, and leave them scratching their heads, thinking: Hey, wasn't I supposed to win that point?
As Fish would put it after he put the finishing touches on his 7-5,6-2,6-2 win, "I think he (Monfils) expects guys to kind of self destruct when he plays. He gives people a lot of fits. Monfils is the kind of guy where you got to come to the net and serve well (preferably, not in that order!) or you're going to have to blow him off the court with some huge forehands - like James (Blake), who has played extremely well against him, just because his forehand is so big he can finish points with his forehand. So he's the kind of guy that just relishes people on the other side of the court throwing the racquet and self- destructing. I think he loves it when he sees people do that."
Fish's antidote to Monfils' puckishly perverse tendencies was simple. Taking advantage of a fact that seems to be lost on legions of today's pros, he decided that instead of chasing around after Monfils and his shots, he would calmly and precisely force him into a corner, throw a blanket over him, and tie has ankles. Fish may be the only country music fan on the ATP or WTA Tour; presumably, listening to a fair number of cowboy songs has learned him how to hog-tie a frisky doggie. You know what they say in Redneck Nation: Git 'er done. Fish did.
To appreciate the degree to which this accomplishment had nothing whatsoever to do with Fish's ability to crank out 130 MPH-plus serves, consider the stats: Monfils' first-serve percentage was 75, while Fish barely approached the so-so 50 per cent mark (he finished with 47 per cent). Monfils out-aced Fish, 6-5, and had one fewer double faults (4, to Fish's 5). Yet - Fish won 80 per cent of his first-serve points (to 60 per cent for Monfils) and 55 per cent of his second serve points (to Monfils 38 per cent). Those are the kinds of numbers you're more likely to find when you begin to analyze some politican's over-the-moon promises regarding the economy than when you're looking for an explanation of how a guy with a big serve took out a guy with big wheels on a tennis court.
There's an explanation for all this, just like there's an explanation for why your math goes awry and turns up some bizarre numbers if you, say, ignore the number 6 in your calculations. Let's say that the net game (either on defense or offense) is, for Monfils, the equivalent of number 6. On clay, the number six doesn't necessarily figure as prominently as it does in, oh, devil worship. That helps explain why Monfils could play centerfield all week at Roland Garros and dodge and weave his way all the way to the semifinals. Entire matches can go by on clay like so many equations in which the no. 6 just doesn't appear. But somebody, quick, tell Monfils - the US Open is played on hard courts, and the number 6 can turn up in that equation more often than in at a Satanist's orgy.
Fish knew that, and he took full advantage of the relatively fast courts at Flushing Meadow. When his serve didn't have Monfils back on his heels - which, come to think of it, was most of the time - his willingness to hit approach shots, and back them up with attacking play, did. I don't doubt that Monfils felt his athleticism would enable him to evade Fish's grasp, or allow him to escape from the corners that Fish tried to herd him into. But that was a miscalculation. Fish simply played too well; he never went for the fake-left, go-right strategy that can be so productive for Monfils, and like a well-trained high school basketball player, Fish kept his eye on the ball, not Monfils' face. He never went for the head fake; he went for the steal with surprisingly deft work of the hands.
