Yes, this column’s headline is also the name of a Journey song. It was the first thing that came to mind when I tried to think of a phrase to encapsulate the pro tours this week. Not Shakespeare, not Hemingway, not even Jagger/Richards—Journey. That gives you an idea of what 1980s red-state America did to the brains of its youth.
After a two-week gathering in Melbourne, the sport’s professional vagabonds headed in every direction imaginable—to Delray Beach, Fla.; Viña Del Mar, Chile; Zagreb, Croatia; and Tokyo. I wasn’t going to write about any of these events because they seemed like collective chopped liver in the wake of the Australian Open. But I found myself watching the finals of three of them on the Tennis Channel this weekend, so I’ve come back early from my hard-earned vacation—don’t worry, I didn’t have to travel far; I was on the couch eating Ritz Bits— to tell you how they went.
Tokyo
This is the second time in 2006 that the Tennis Channel has scheduled a final at the last minute because of Martina Hingis. While her comeback is certainly on track, Hingis has been a disappointment both times. At Gold Coast, she didn’t even reach the final; this time she may have wished she hadn’t. Elena Dementieva gave Hingis her much-awaited lesson in today’s power game, blitzing her 6-2, 6-0 on a quick indoor court before a silent Japanese audience that barely had time to blink.
Dementieva’s flat, slashing strokes were perfect for the low trajectory that the surface produced. She took every shot early and forced Hingis to return many balls from a defensive, open-stance crouch—she looked more like a hockey goalie than a tennis player. While Dementieva double-faulted on her first two service attempts of the match, she seemed to make a point of going after her second serve rather than resorting to her infamous sliding puffball. Surprisingly, this was Dementieva’s first Tier I title.
Hingis just shook her head and flashed a smile in defeat. She has to be happy about making the final and demolishing Maria Sharapova (as far as I know, that match wasn’t shown on TTC) along the way. She's gone from No. 349 to No. 48 in the rankings in three weeks. Still, knowing Hingis’ ambition and sense of her place in the game (i.e., at the top), she must be a little alarmed at having been run out of the building by the No. 8 player in the world, a woman who has never won a major.
Viña del Mar
This event, in Chile, looks like it has a terrific atmosphere. The big matches are scheduled at night, in a small stadium that’s packed with a loose, noisy crowd. The clay-court specialists who make up the draw go to war, standing way back and throwing long bombs at each other for hours.
It helps that there’s a high rate of success among Chilean players here. Fernando Gonzalez won it in 2005, and this year he lost in the semis to countryman and doubles partner Nicolas Massu in a crowd-pleasing three-setter. That must have taken something out of Massu, because he looked fatigued from the beginning of the final, which he lost to Jose Acasuso in straight sets.
Why hasn’t Acasuso been more successful? The 23-year-old Argentine has the tools. He’s 6-foot-3, with the perfect lanky tennis-player’s build. He has a good serve, controlling forehand, and dramatic one-handed backhand. He even looks like Pete Sampras with a beard, right down to the open-mouth hangdog half-smile he wears between points and the way he flicks his racquet as he waits to receive serve. But since turning pro in 1999, Acasuso hasn’t been ranked higher than No. 33 (which he reached today) and hasn’t made a dent at the majors. His strokes are rather long for hard courts—he takes a lot of first-round losses on faster surfaces—but that hasn’t stopped Gonzalez or Rafael Nadal. Acasuso loses a lot of close sets, which might indicate mental fragility or the lack of a weapon he can go to in the big moments.
Neither of those problems arose yesterday. He used his forehand to keep the shorter, underpowered, but still ornery Massu under his thumb all evening. Massu is from Viña Del Mar, and the crowd tried to rally him—when Acasuso won a point, you could hear crickets. But he shut the door with ease, winning the last eight points.
Delray Beach
The finalists here, Tommy Haas and Xavier Malisse, are two of a kind in many ways. They both mix Euro-style smoothness—Haas is German, Malisse is from Belgium—with American-style baseline bashing—each was raised at the Bollettieri Academy. Beyond that, neither player is known for his big-match chops. True to form, they played an attractive match yesterday, one that no one seemed to want to win.
As the third set progressed, both players got tight and failed to muster the confidence to take the match to the other guy. Spectacular shots were followed by errors, and defense was the best offense. Fittingly, the match ended when Malisse broke a string and sent a ball long at 5-6 in the third-set tiebreaker.
Malisse is a case study in the underrated importance of body language. He ambles around casually and almost never fires himself up. That doesn’t mean he’s not into the match every bit as much as anyone else. The problem is, Malisse doesn’t manifest that fact, doesn’t make his intensity a factor. It may seem like just an affectation, but the ferocity that a Nadal or a Sharapova show carries over into their play. Malisse is as talented a ball-striker as Nadal, if not more, but what carries over into his play at the crucial moments is a casual commitment to the match at hand.