Newsflash: Roddick Doesn’t Dance!

Just a week ago, I had the pleasure of attending an early-season tennis event in Atlantic City, New Jersey — the Caesar's Tennis Challenge. For those of you who keep up with current celebrity, that would be the "Jersey Shore." Fortunately, while I was in Atlantic City (AC to us here) for some great tennis, the cast of the show "Jersey Shore," including Mike "The Situation," Snooki, J-Wow, and the rest of the guidos were sunning themselves in Miami.

Good thing there, too, as the Sony Ericsson Open had just finished and I was able to escape back home before they arrived at South Beach. I'm thinking Andy Roddick was happy, too, as he was able to defeat Rafael Nadal on his way to the title at Key Biscayne before there was the potential for his great victory to be overshadowed by this cast of characters.

Roddick was the headline player at the Caesar's Tennis Challenge at Boardwalk Hall in AC. At this amazing exhibition, Andy Roddick, Pete Sampras, Marat Safin, Ivan Lendl, and Mats Wilander all put it on the line for four hours of dazzling tennis. They were joined by Venus Williams, who served as co-host for the evening.

Roddick's appearance here was interesting. Normally, during the "regular" season, top players like Andy don't deviate from tournament play, let alone take a short weekend trip to New Jersey. True, the early U.S. season had come to a close with the final of the Sony Ericsson Open, but most of the top players normally leave the U.S. behind and make a b-line straight for Monte Carlo and the deep red clay following Key Biscayne so that they can start to prep for the French Open in late May.

This is one of the reasons professional tennis is the premier sport, at least in my humble opinion. In the middle of playing year, a top-10 player and the number one American player, found time to bring the sport to fans who otherwise would never get the chance to see one on their native soil. Even more important is that Roddick is having the best start to a year in his career, and was still here on the boardwalk to hit with Marat and Pete.

Roddick did take a few minutes for himself, as he announced a long-term partnership with a new company called AQUISS (pronounced a-kiss) that will be mass marketing nano-encapsulated hydration drinks starting in May. Roddick stated that he has been using the new formulations since the beginning of 2010 and that it is a major factor, at least in his mind, to his current success and level of play.

Maybe the best thing about the event, not including the witty banter between New Jerseyan Justin Gimelstob and co-host Venus Williams (who also made her first-ever appearance in New Jersey) was watching Ivan Lendl play his first competitive set of tennis in 16 years. Lendl has had back problems since his playing days, and recently found treatments for his chronic back condition that have allowed him to resume competitive play.

In the pre-challenge press conference Lendl was quite expressive, and also gave a great insight into the differences between professional tennis when he ruled the world and professional tennis now. When I asked him about the differences in the game, he replied, "In my day, the key was speed and stamina. You had to hit the ball at least 50 times before you won a point. Today, I think the game is speed and strength. You don't need stamina because the players will hit a strong shot at any moment to finish the point."

I won't argue with him. Watching Lendl and Wilander play their exhibition set was a throwback to those days of speed and stamina. The ball crossed the net at least 30 times during most points, and both players used touch and placement to open up the court for the winner. Just a few hours later, Marat Safin and Roddick put on a contrasting show of strength. No doubt about it, the points were shorter and it was actually hard to track the ball, as both players were hitting the ball super hard.

I had the opportunity to pose a similar question to Mats Wilander following his match with Lendl. I asked him why fellow Swede Robin Soderling has suddenly "blossomed" after many years of lower-tier play. Wilander was quite complimentary, and pointed out some early career mistakes that Soderling had made. Wilander believes that Soderling has matured as both a player and a person, and he has finally figured out how to play on and with a team, including his current team of management and coaches. Wilander was quite clear in his response that he "would be surprised if Soderling didn't win a major soon, and more surprised if he never won a major." Pretty high praise from a former Australian, French, and U.S. Open champion and Hall of Fame player.

I won't comment too much about Pete Sampras, as he was the gentleman he always is, and he still showed some of the greatness in his play that made him one of the greatest all-time. Justin Gimelstob did allude to another exhibition incident at Indian Wells, CA a few weeks ago where Pete and Andre Agassi exchanged words, and enough has been written about that, so I'll just leave that alone. Nice to see Pete here. I think the last time I saw him in New Jersey was when he got off a plane in Newark and ran through the airport on his way to a tournament many years ago.

As the press conference was coming to a close, Lendl, Wilander, and Safin all had commented how much their backs hurt since the end of their careers and after working out for these exhibitions. There weren't too many tennis media personalities at the press conferences, and I was very happy to be among my peers, including Bonnie Ford of ESPN.com.

While there were many great questions from the press, it seemed that the media was avoiding the obvious question. So, as you would guess, that left it up to me. So I asked, "Will we see any of you on 'Dancing with the Stars?'" After a chuckle from Lendle, a wink from Wilander, and after Safin rolled his eyes, Roddick stepped to the microphone and said, "Tom, just by asking that question, you made my back hurt." 'Nuff said.