Hi everyone. I got a big kick out of Andrew's post (Red State Road Trip, next item down) last night, and our social director, Heidi, will be posting a Deuce Club later as well. That will be your Off-Topic and community news post for the weekend.
Meanwhile, we are all awaiting the draw in Portland, which will be made a little later today. I'll write a post after the draw is made, so keep your powder dry unless you want to weigh-in on some other tennis-related issue here.
As this big Davis Cup weekend approaches, my own thoughts have drifted to Lleyton Hewitt, who did an admirable job adding to the glorious Aussie Davis Cup tradition. Between 1999 and 2003, roughly Hewitt's best years, the Aussies went to four Davis Cup finals and won the final twice. That was a great effort on behalf of a nation whose decline as a force in the men's game prefigured the US's own current woes. The Aussies crashed just as dramatically and publicly as the Yanks have, but you can argue that they kept the Davis Cup promise more effectively than the we did,
In 2008, the Aussies will be battling through zonal competition to get back into the elite World Group from which the Davis Cup winner annually emerges. Their first match will be against Chinese Taipei, in February. As I write this, Lleyton Hewitt, a former World No. 1, is still just 26. But he is out of the Top 20, and hasn't played on the tour since early October (due to an ankle injury). Although you can make the case that Lleyton is slowly and inexorably sliding out of the elite group of Grand Slam contenders, he'll roll into the Australian Open with a new coach, countryman Tony Roche (underestimate him at your peril). I think Lleyton has another surge left; perhaps the long break will recharge his batteries.
It seems mind-boggling, but Hewitt is already a more prolific Davis Cup winner than Aussie icons like John Newcombe, Roche, Ken Rosewall, Lew Hoad, and Rod Laver. Okay, we have to add an important asterisk here: Until 1980, Davis Cup used the "Challenge Round" system, in which the defending champ sat out the entire year, as the rest of the world battled it out for the right to "challenge" the Cup holder in the final. That means that many of the great teams and players of the Aussie dynasty under Harry Hopman simply didn't play many matches.
And while it's hard to hold this next bit against Hewitt, it's also true that during the Hopman years some very fine Australian players (Fred Stolle comes to mind) simply didn't get a chance to play because of the talent glut. Stolle was 10-2 in singles, and 3-1 in doubles, but had to compete with the likes of Roche and Rosewall for a place on the team. It isn't like Chris Guccione being kept from Davis Cup glory by Hewitt here, either. Stolle won two majors, lost in six other finals, and won a whopping 15 major doubles titles (including mixed).
Be that as it may: The record book says that Hewitt amassed the greatest number of singles wins for Australia (he is 30-8, and bound to add more W's), and while his winning percentage may not match Rosewall's outstanding 17-2, it is almost identical with Laver's 16-4. the US Davis Cup icon, McEnroe (John, not Patrick, although that may change by Sunday evening!) is 41-8, and it's conceivable that Hewitt will catch him in the win department, although it will be hard to beat Mac's winning percentage.
