Grass court tennis

Another surprise as Rafa gets handled in straight sets in Germany at the Gerry Weber Open… Not too stunning considering Rafa physically & emotionally taxed himself over 2 weeks at RG on red clay to win FO #9… I was hoping he’d rest as he doesn’t need to overexert himself at a 250 pre-Wimbledon tune-up tourney… Give credit where it’s due to his deserving opponent who played the match of his life today on native soil… Anything can & does happen on grass… Such a rare surface type to play on that it truly levels the playing field!

Anything can happen in tennis, but Janowicz winning Wimbledon? Scoop, hope you are still eating those perogies!

Stevejo won. Final eight!

Actually, I think the 2 meter guys play worse on grass. Look at Raonic, the guy can’t serve as big because the big kick serve out wide is essentially taken away from him because he can’t kick it over their heads. And these guys don’t run well predominantly well so they’re really hampered.

The increased court speed, slickness (slippery nature), shorter points that cater to quick strike/power oriented tennis & rather low bouncing balls all make grass quite tricky & an enigma… The fact that players play 10 matches a year max on grass if they are lucky makes it a very unpredictable surface as well!

Yes, no way Rafa played that match to the death. When does he ever lose to anyone 6-1? And Harry didn’t lose in the qualis of Nottingham, he lost in the second round to a Bulgarian ranked No. 322. Who do you think has had the tougher career so far as far as expectations not met: DY or Harry?

I mean Sock is getting to the 3rd round of the French and Harry can’t buy a match on clay or grass. And Harry was considered the bigger “Can’t Miss” than Sock, right?

Rharry. Dude fell off map. At this point no one will wildcard him into usopen. Uphill climb certainly capable but will be tough. He is more or less on a losing streak. If it is because trying new thingthat will work itself out. But if he is playing his normal game it will be quite a road back. Good luck harry.

True! Klahn hasnt earned his top 100 stripes as a full time atpr. He has the game maybe some mental block

That’s why I look at Newport and Queens, I don’t know much about Halle, as the real grass court events now, not Wimbledon. Wimby is a hard court event essentially. The grass isn’t slick, the bounce is true and you don’t even have to come to net to win. Mats Wilander a few years ago told me that it’s a joke that Rafa could win Wimbledon. That he wouldn’t stand a chance on that surface in his day. Mats said Rafa couldn’t serve and volley on real grass if his life depended on it. Wilander in 10 Wimby’s only reached the quarters twice.

Every year he got beat by real grass court players: Cash three times, Brian Teacher, Roscoe Tanner, John McEnroe and John Fitzgerald. What do you think Rafa’s chances against Johnny Mac would be at Wimby if they played at their peaks on 1980 grass? McEnroe would beat Rafa in straight sets. I don’t even think Rafa could enter Newport this year and win in Rhode Island. Raonic has gotten killed at Newport and Izzie, who’s won it 2 out of the last 3 years, got beat in the first round the first two years he played.

Spadea said he knew he could beat Rafa on grass when he played him at Wimby in 2005. He had been hurt and hadn’t played at all, but he flew to London to pick up the first round paycheck and found himself playing Nadal, Vince’s first and last time on Centre Court. Vince had beaten Nadal on fast hard indoor courts in Madrid the year before, and he said the way to beat Nadal on grass was to hit your backhand sideways to Nadal’s backhand and Vince could do this. You hit it flat, sideways and away from Nadal.

Now, of course, Vince got killed, but he said at like 3-all in the first set, his body tied up and he couldn’t play his game. Also, he said after that match that nobody, not Sampras, not Agassi, not Kuerten, not Hewitt, hits the ball on the run better than Nadal.

Theres great resume fodder for your boy Spadea. In the midst of his career, he considered Wimby, just another First round paycheck. Not worth training for, as his peak conditioned( sarcasm) body “tied up” at 3 all in the first set, not 3 all in the fifth set.

I would want him leading me into battle( sarcasm again), because it seems like he always had an excuse or someone to blame for his losses, lack of conditioning.

Just saw a little of Stepanek, 35 and going strong. Maybe you should rewrite history and do a book on him. Is he dating Safarova yet ?

Sorry to go off topic, but since Wilander has been mentioned in this thread, and him being one of my all-time faves, he said something that bothered me recently.

He is another one of the retired players who believe they should change the rule to play the lets on serves. Next time, could someone ask him or JMac, who also seeks to change the rule, if they were in a fifth set breaker and they lost because a serve dribbled over the net, and non returnable. I know if it was me, it wouldd not be the way I’d want a match to end.

Leave the game alone

grass is for cows! 🙂

It is amazing that people will trash Nadal twice for winning Wimbledon on the so-called slower grass. The so-called slower grass still has players serving and volleying on it successfully. Case in point Sergei Stakhovsky who beat Federer in the second round of Wimbledon last year. They can not sustain it for seven rounds because they have few obstacles to doing it that did not exist 20-30 years ago. First is the parity in the serving. Everyone on the tour can serve at 120 mph or more now. Back in the 1980s and 1990s only a dozen men in the top 100 could. They had a distinct advantage over the rest of the field. Namely, Sampras, Ivanisevic, Becker, Stich, Krajicek, and Agassi. Edberg was the last sub-120 mph server to win Wimbledon with his amazing speed to the net. Second is the grass routes training. All players train at a young age to hit better and more powerful groundstrokes than ever. The serve and volley is a secondary skill and option because it is more high risk. Training more time on serve and volley and less on strokes can hold a player back from advancing in the ranks. McEnroe, Edberg, Becker, Sampras, Ivanisevic, Krajicek, Cash and others who won Wimbledon also had tour quality groundstrokes. Besides no pure serve and volleyer with less than tour quality strokes (for their time) can win Wimbledon, i.e. Tim Henmen and Greg Rusedski. Sergei Stakhovsky sadly has less than tour quality strokes for this time.

A player who is comfortable in movement on all parts of the court along with serving at 120+ mph, and adequate shotmaking from all parts of the court is going to do well on grass of any speed.

Nadal won Wimbledon on the so-called slower grass. So did Federer, Hewitt, Ivanisevic, Djokovic, and Murray. They changed the grass to 100% rye, and packed in more dirt in 2001. There has been no change ever since.

The only player I am disgusted by his Wimbledon win is Djokovic because he used illegal grass spikes. He has the worst movement (i.e. his awful splits that he should fall on with conventional grass shoes), the worst volleys, overheads and mediocre lobs, amongst the top 40.

Wilander is bitter, period – when you’re on tour and you are that competitive (and let’s not kid ourselves – Nadal knows EXACTLY how good, or not, his peers are and where they stand etc), you look even at the new generations of champions as taking away from your share of the pie. After his peerless 1988 that looked an awful lot like Nadal’s 2013 (which is why I thought Nadal would slump in 2014 – boy was I wrong!!!), Wilander went way downhill. He was passed by Sampras in 1989 – that’s a match I doubt Nadal would have lost (and which Sampras was unsure of how to follow).

Wilander was nearly unbeatable in 1988 – nowadays he looks for chinks in the armor of current champs to make himself feel better. Sometimes Wilander is the most astute analyst or among them for sure – he knew Nadal was a champ and started talking about Federer’s downfall and how Federer didnt have guts. Now that Nadal is top dog he’s doing the same thing. Except for one exception:

Wilander for however great he was (and at his best he really was a phenomenal champion) didn’t pull off what Nadal’s doing. part of this is history – Nadal’s looking at past champs, looking at their legacies, and just smashing the records – he’s standing on the shoulders of giants including Wilander and Sampras. There would be no Nadal without Sampras and Wilander (I think Nadal’s model for mentality is in fact Sampras) Wilander however shouldnt be bitter – he had his chance before and the bar for greatness changed from being better than Lendl on any given day to being the best of all time. Wilander probably had that ambition but he is likley looking at 1989 and 1990 as blown opportunities. But for whatever reason Wilander was totally spent after 1988 and the rest of his career became the slow and uninteresting decline of someone who used to want the big match to someone who was struggling with whatever he was dealing with.

The sport needs Wilander but should recognize that when he starts talking about why Nadal’s winning and blames the surface, that what he’s not saying is Nadal has more courage and more heart, and there’s no one that wants to admit that – definitely not an insecure champ like Wilander. why these guys dont embrace Nadal and the current champs is weird – funny thing is Sampras does. Sampras knows that in the tennis world when you are top dog you are top dog and there are no do-overs. And once Nadal wins his 15th and passes Sampras, and this is a credit to Sampras, he’ll say straight up that Nadal is greater than he was because the slam record proves it.

No problem from me on Spadea. I respect all non doping players.

spadea aint afraidaya!

steps definitely had a better career and i think steps had better women too even though he’s more funky looking than spadea…..however spadea was definitely the better rapper! 🙂

I am actually with Scoop on Hewitt’s ability to hit on the run. Though I do not use Spadea as a barometer. I use his many wins on the tour against Federer, Nadal, Sampras and Agassi as indicators. His movement and ability to hit on the run is such that he has taken sets off Nadal on clay despite not being trained enough on the surface when younger. He beat Sampras at Queens Club. I believe Sampras said that Hewitt may have the best first step in tennis after his loss to him at the 2001 US Open final. Before Federer was #1, he had to get past Hewitt who held #1 first. And Hewitt as a teenager beat Agassi on the way to win his first title. And he had more wins against him later.

Seeing Hewitt even past his TRUE PEAK & BEST, I can see the quickness he has & the ability to hit supreme running winners so I will take Scoop & Dan’s word for it… To be quicker than Rafa is saying something as many consider Rafa to be the fastest player in history other than Bjon Borg… If Hewitt were blessed to be a little bigger, more powerful & less prone to injuries, who knows just how far he could have gotten? Not saying he would have been able to hold off Roger eventually becoming THE MAN but he may have made Roger’s ascension to the #1 spot take a while longer… The FINE CAREER that the last Great Aussie has had is still more than enough to land him a spot in Newport Beach 1 day & it will be well deserved… Nearly impossible not to respect & admire the way Lleyton Hewitt gives everything he has on that tennis court… During his peak years, I did see him play some but I have to admit that I was focused primarily on Sampras & Agassi at the time!

I feel Dimitrov has all the tools to be the heir to the #1 in the world throne in the post: Rafa, Roger, Novak & Murray era… Time will tell though… The natural tennis skills are there but is the necessary FIRE & DESIRE TO BE THE BEST there? To be answered in the years ahead!

Dimitrov at least doing better week in and out. He could be a big match player. Makes you wonder what could be if he took sport more seriously earlier but like a few players of his generation at least their games r maturing . Right now dimitrov will be lucky to put up gasquet results. Thank our stars that the big four are leading the sport on the mens side. I like some of the up and coming players but no one yet strikes me as heir to those guys. That said the big.four earned their stripes so these guys could too.