When John Isner walked into the press interview room, the first thing I thought was "sight gag." Isner had his right shoulder wrapped in what looked like 75 yards of Saran Wrap, with some sort of big ice-pack with a red filler cap under it. It looked like he had just leaped out of a bed in a hospital somewhere. And when he was asked how the shoulder was, he answered, "Oh it's fine. . . This is just a precaution."
Man, if that's a precaution, I would hate to see what the dude warps in if he actually gets hurt!
Isner beat Jarkko Niemenen on Louis Armstrong this evening, in a classic serve-and-volley (remember what that is?) beatdown. Niemenen had seven break points, and converted none of them; Isner had three break points and converted 1; it was all he needed to wrap up a 6-7 (4),7-6(4),7-6(5),6-4 first-round win. One lousy break point made, one break of serve, end of story.
Well almost. Isner converted 62 per cent of his first serves, second to Niemenen's 67 per cent. Winning percentage on first points? 80% for Isner, one measly percentage point better than Niemenen's 79%; second serve winning percentage: strikingly similar, Isner was one percentage point better with 61 per cent. And when it came to winning net approaches, Isner looked mediocre at 59% to Niemenen's 70%. Okay, this last stat is deceptive, as a baseliner like Niemenen tends to approach only on a sure thing, as reflected by his mere 16 net approaches (Isner approached 47 times). But clearly, it seems perverse to say that Isner served his way to victory. Sure, Isner had 34 aces to Niemenen's 12; but he also made 70 unforced errors to Niemenen's 23.
All in all, I'd say this match was a demonstration less of the per-emptive power of the serve than of the importance of the serve in the context of an overall game. We all know Isner is not cut out to be a baseline grinder. However, Niemenen did say, ". . . He can obviously improve from the baseline, because he has pretty good - he has good strokes, but at least today he was missing quite a lot. . . He improves his movement on the baseline then he's even tougher to beat."
The shot Niemenen has the most trouble with was Isner's second serve. Because of his height, Isner can really bounce that second-serve kicker, and Niemenen reckons that the second serve is Isner's best shot. And y'all know that Pete Sampras's measure of a great opponent was the rival's second serve.
To truly appreciate the degree to which a serve can be the difference-maker stroke, it's best to forget aces and service winners. Isner didn't beat Niemenen today because his serve was "better" - he won because a sufficiently big serve, used in an integrated way, simply changes the entire tone and tenor of a match, and resonates just as much in the receiving player's game as it does in the server's own.
When a guy is serving big, and coming in behind the serve, the returner can't just swing from the heels on his returns. One of the Big Lies in today's game is that rackets have made almost all players great serve returners, but the reality is players who serve and stay back have created this generation of returning Einsteins. How hard is it to return big when you know you can hit the ball anywhere, at any height, and not be punished? By contrast, returning when you know that more than a foot above the net and/or more than a few feet inside either sideline means you're getting the ball shoved back down your throat is a different story.
The same is true for passing shots. Niemenen was still alive at 30-all in the fourth set, but Isner came to the net and Isner smacked a backhand pass into the tape. If that's a groundstroke instead of a pass, there's no way Niemenen misses that shot. Period. It was a pressure miss, a brain-cramp miss, not a technique miss or a space-out miss.
The other huge and largely unacknowledged factor is that the more dominant and overpowering a serve is, the more pressure it puts on an opponent to hold. Knowing that you are only going to get two, three looks at a break in an entire match suddenly means you'd better take danged good care of your own serve. Meanwhile, your hard-serving opponent, knowing that he can hold comfortably if he pays attention, is free to really attack your serve, trying to create that opportunity - or two - to break. It's all he needs, which is exactly why it becomes more and more critical - and thus, harder and harder - for you to hold.
It wasn't Isner's serve that won the match as much as Isner's excellent grasp of how to use that big honking serve to control every aspect of a match. And that's a great achievement that suggests that Isner is going to win a lot of tennis matches. Niemenen himself acknowledged that in the most telling comment of his presser. He was asked if it's surprising that a kid could come out of college and play such dominant tennis on the tour. Niemenen replied: "Yeah, even that you have such a good serve, its mentally demanding to win matches against top players. He's doing it really well. That's why I believe that he can improve, he can still improve a lot."