Friday Miami So many scoops I don’t know where to start

Leander Paes is actually here and he was practicing till 7:30 on a far outside court with his friend Sanjay. Paes ranking has dropped so he’s here as an ALT still hopeful of getting an entry if any player drops out. Word is Rajeev Ram is ill. Paes was extremely gracious with all the fans who came by to chat and ask for photos and autographs. His friend Sanjay told me that Leander’s all time favorite partner in doubles was Radek Stepanek… Taylor Fritz played a sensation first set vs David Ferrer on stadium court. The eighteen year old was down 2-4 but fought back to earn two set points – one at 6-5 which ended with a missed forehand crosscourt wide by inches after a very long rally. The next set point was at 6-5 in the breaker with Ferrer serving. Of course Ferrer jacked up his intensity into full throttle beast grunt mode and hit his first forehand inside out to Fritz’s forehand then the second forehand was directed to Fritz’s backhand which Fritz shanked long. That was it for Fritz and Ferrer won the next two points quickly and the second set 6-1. But still for an eighteen year old playing just his fourth ATP event and debut on a big stadium it was another very impressive display and it’s exciting to imagine what this kid’s full potential will be… In the morning I had the pleasure to play with a friend at the off-site practice courts down the road and on the court next to us was Michael Venus with John Patrick Smith. Venus has won three ATP doubles titles and Smith has big wins over Tomic in Newport and also Karlovic in Delray Beach. Smith is an Aussie who played at Tennessee and he loves Newport and will play it again this year. It was pretty neat to see two ATP pros grinding next to us and even watching and commenting on some of our points… Had a nice lunch with two well known photographers in the cafeteria and they shared some old stories. We were talking about players who are nice now but were not nice in the beginning and players who were always nice from junior to now. Roddick is one who admits he was a bit of a jerk earlier in his career but he’s trying to amend that now that he’s retired. Monfils was another who was a troublemaker in his teens – an example was trying to take a photo of Monfils who would not smile or even stick his tongue out. Svetlana Kuznetsova Alexandra Pavlyuchenkova were two players they mentioned who were always very nice. Even Roger Federer was not a pleasant player. He would break a ton of racquets and use very bad language on court… Federer pulled out with the stomach problem at around one in the afternoon but a photographer told me he saw Fed’s earlier practice and said he looked fine. Then another journalist said Fed talked about retiring during his press conference yesterday and that if there was any discomfort with his knee he would not play or stop playing… Tickets were selling for as much as a thousand bucks in the parking lot and there was a huge crowd for Fed vs Del Potro. The grounds were so crowded that there was a long line to get in to see the Pierre Hughes Herbert/Nicolas Mahut vs Dominic Thiem/Oliver Marach doubles match… I spoke with a womens fitness coach at one of the WTA singles matches and he told me his player who is also a strong doubles player is just coming back from an injury and has reunited with a former doubles player who she won majors with. But the two are not very friendly and only talk on the court. It’s all business with the women. That’s the way it is with most all of the women players – they don’t talk in the locker room. And most of the doubles teams don’t speak to each other much either. And if they lose a match they start to fight. He said no teams stay together for more than a year or two… I went to see the end of Steve Johnson’s 76 76 win over Alexander Zverev on grandstand and it was a very important victory for Steve who has struggled this year. Let’s see if he can start a much needed roll off this. He will play the winner of Berdych/Ram. Juan Martin Del Potro lost to Lucky Loser Horacio Zeballos on the stadium. Remember I told you how well Zeballos was playing vs Harrison in qualies. An Argentine journalist told me that even though Del Potro is a loved player all over the world he has a poor relationship with the Argentine media ever since the Davis Cup final loss to Spain in 2009…A very prominent chair umpire told me he’s not allowed to do interviews and could get fired if he does. No chair umps are allowed to do interviews. It seems a strange rule because some of the chair umpires are very interesting people and could serve the sport as excellent ambassadors… There were several complaints by media about how boring it is to watch Venus Williams now. Venus lost in three sets to Elena Vesnina…Ran into the great Van Winitsky who was a peer of John McEnroe as a junior. Van said he bumped into Ivan Lendl at a recent Futures in Florida. Said Lendl was coaching American teens in that Futures event. Van had at one time coached Lendl to beat Johnnymac.. Go to my facebook page or the Tennis Prose Facebook page to see photos from today —

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