The volume of comments and e-mails containing specific, pointed questions regarding by my last Williams post, "Intervention by Ghost," makes me think a follow-up post is in order. One particular comment from "Phoenixstorm," striking for its clarity and even-temperedness, posed six questions for me. I think the best way to handle this is to publish Phoenixstorm’s comment here and to provide answers to each of his questions.
One reason I chose to handle this post in this way is because Phoenixstorm’s questions seem to touch on all of the sore points that irate readers bring to me when I criticize either Williams sister—or other fan favorites, for that matter.
Let me lay the groundwork so recognize those points when they pop up:
Production: OK. Most top players will tell you that a year in which they have won a Grand Slam is a great year; so, with Serena winning the Australian Open and Venus taking Wimbledon (especially in that spectacular manner), how can anyone say the sisters had a lousy year, or need to go back to the drawing board? Well, the game is about production, and the ability of any player to produce in accordance with his or her natural abilities. Who's record would you rather have, Iva Majoli's or Steffi Graf's?
We have a right to expect more of players who are conspicuously great, as Venus and Serena are, as Marat Safin and Roger Federer are. Among those four, Federer is the only one who has played up to his talent over the last two years.
One other thing: We know when a good player playing his or her best simply gets whipped, or can’t quite hack the competition (go ask Andy Roddick about that). We never criticize players for giving their best and coming up short. This is almost never the case with the Williamses, and they will be the first to pull out the excuses and, as many posters noted, refuse to give their opponents credit. Sorry, but you cannot have this both ways. You can’t qualify your losses with excuses related to injuries or having off days and then expect everyone to react with a shrug and comment like, “Gee, Serena played her heart out, but Anastasia was just too good.”
Comparison: Many posters take my comments or analysis as a template and try to fit them onto some other player’s ostensibly comparable situation to show that I’m being unfair to my subject. I think of this as the comparative fallacy, and I feel I can’t be too far off in my criticism when the best counter-argument someone can muster is, "But look at so-and-so, didn’t she do the same thing?" That line of reasoning is a form of evasion and cop-out. I’m more than happy to compare players if needed, but I usually focus on a single subject and examine it in context. Every case, like every player, is different, despite similarities that can run from minor to major.
Legitimacy of Injury: The cry goes up, "You’re not inside Serena’s knee, how do you know how she feels?" I don’t. I can’t. That’s the whole point. Injury issues are like line-call issues; debating them goes nowhere. A long time ago, the great sportsmen decided that injury is such an ambiguous, truth-clouding element, that there is only one way to deal with it. If you were fit enough to step on the court and play, you were fit. Period.
But you didn’t lose matches and then come off whining about your tennis elbow, because that created an ambiguity that was simply not fair to the winner. And even if you did use injury to get out of playing (of course, for most of tennis history, players wanted to play—and earn—more, not less), you certainly didn’t use it to explain or justify poor performances before, during, or after which you said nothing about being hurt.
Professionalism: I never would have written the "Ghosts" posts the way I did if Serena had just come out and said that she’s taking off the rest of the year to get fit and prepare for 2006. I need to repeat something easily overlooked here: My main beef is with the WTA, for putting out such a fawning, butt-lick press release. That was as unprofessional as anything Serena did in this whole episode, but remember this: The players have the right and obligation to approve press releases containing their words. In other words, either Serena approved the content of that release, or the WTA committed a serious breach of protocol and even ethics in putting it out without her knowing.
Personal Animosity: Assuming I hate Serena (or anyone else) because I think she’s doing some dumb, unprofessional things is like saying a doctor hates a patient to whom he says, "You’re killing yourself with your two-pack a day habit and addiction to Cheez Doodles."
My feelings have nothing to do with this, except in the sense that I find some qualities annoying and others admirable, and that’s going to influence how I feel about someone. You think I’m a playah-haytah for criticizing Serena? Go back and read what I’ve written about Lleyton Hewitt, or Mary Pierce.
So, here we go with Phoenixstorm’s questions:
1) Both Serena and Venus have won Grand Slams this year. Thats better than everyone on the tour besides Kim and Justine.
Who cares? The sisters were on track to being among the greatest players of all time, and right now they’ve fallen off the pace and in fact are no better than Kim or Justine. That’s the real story here. Who do you want me to measure the girls against, for crying out loud, Daniela Hantuchova? Please.
2) Is not Serena injured? You bring up Lindsay and her back troubles. I'm no doctor but comparing two different injuries that two different players have does not seem logical. At all.
I can’t answer about Serena’s injury (see my general comment above); I assume she is. I never brought up Lindsay and her back, or compared her to Serena in that context. I would have said not a word of criticism if Serena had simply announced that she’s taking the rest of the year off to get healthy and fit. It was the spin, especially from the WTA, and the arrogance and ambiguity therein that I found contemptible.
3) Why would Serena, a seven-time Grand Slam winner, throw away her coaches? If you went up to a tennis player and asked them if they would fire a coach who took them to seven Slam titles, I'm thinking the majority of answers would be: No.
The sisters won in spite of Richard’s coaching, not because of it (although he brought a lot of other formidable assets to the equation, especially on the mental and emotional side). I meet a lot of coaches in my line of work. I know many who have been on a practice court adjacent to one on which Richard and Serena or Venus were working out. There was a reason they went back to the locker room laughing their heads off.
So what, though? It’s all part of the amazing Williams saga. Trust me, you couldn’t make this stuff up and, at the end of the day, Richard and the girls did have the last laugh. And that’s for a simple reason: the girls’ amazing talent has usually triumphed over all things, including Richard’s incompetence as a coach. I’m happy for them, for theirs is a truly magical story. Or it was, until the wheels began to fall off. Which is why they need to explore other options. Nothing lasts forever.
Lately, though, I’m thinking that there are a few things that even Williams-grade talent can’t triumph over: injury, lack of desire, and the appalling conceit that takes root when players are not held acountable. That's when the the Caligula syndrome kicks in. And if you don’t know who Caligula was, please look him up.
4) Have you done any research? Have you talked to Serena? Venus? Their doctors? Their trainers? Seems like what you write is from some strange place of envy and dislike and ignorance.
I do a lot of research, I talk to a zillion people, and what I’ve written so far is the least of the controversial bits! I remind you, though: I’m not questioning Serena’s injury. I am criticizing the use to which she put that injury. It’s got "spin" and "cop-out" and even "delusion" written all over it.
5) Jennifer Capriati has been gone for the whole year. Where is the intense criticism of her lack of commitment to the game of tennis? Her work ethic? Or somehow is her injury more credible? How do you know Jennifer isn't sitting back taking some much needed time off?
See my general remarks about comparison. I’ll deal with JC if and when it moves me to write about her. But listen—she declared her injury, vanished, and will come back if and when she wants. Serena declared her injuries, kept playing, and then came out with what appears to be an elaborate, injury-based rationalization for why she’s played so badly and why she’s calling it quits for the year. It's all a little too pat and convenient for my taste.
6) Oh, and Serena and Venus and Justine and Kim and Maria don’t have to want to be stars because they already are stars. If they all retired on Friday they still have their records and titles and accomplishments.
Yikes, I’d have to write a whole lot about Daniela Hantuchova then, wouldn’t I?
7) It seems to me that you think you know what is best for Serena Williams when you don't even know anything about her besides the superficial. Well I know one thing: She won the Australian Open in 2005 and no one else in the WTA did.
Thanks for that newsflash. Listen, I’m a professional loudmouth, pot-stirrer, pundit, troublemaker, thorn-in-the-side of the High and Mighty. Nobody’s holding a gun to your head as you read this, right?
8) If her and her sister's tennis careers are over with that kind of accomplishment then what about poor players like Mauresmo?
You mean "player-impersonator Amelie Mauresmo"? Listen: I play God. That’s what I do. And you, Phoenixstorm, are one lucky hombre that I’m only playing him! Now get out of here, kid. I got work to do.
Adios friends, this is probably my last word on these subjects for a while.