Monday, June 7, 2010
Why Tennis Media Needs a Reality Check
During the Roland Garros men's final match, I heard John McEnroe describe all the improvements that Rafael Nadal has made to his game. Let me first assure everyone that I find McEnroe to be an excellent color commentator. He is entertaining and fun, and obviously reads the game very well. Therefore, even when the best in business get caught up in the moment and make a "far out there" remark, it shows that everyone is prey to the seduction of exaggeration.
But to list the areas where Nadal has improved and to include in that list something absurd like "one can make a solid case that he is a better volleyer than Roger Federer" is simply beyond common sense. Okay, Johnny Mac, take a deep breath.
Then it got me thinking: when he makes that assertion, most casual tennis fans probably believe it. What else have exaggerations made people believe? What legends and myths have actually crossed the line between reality and fantasy?
Let's start with another McEnroe comment that I have heard many other announcers repeat also (especially the male announcers): Justine Henin's one-handed backhand is the best shot in women's tennis. Sorry, but no! Yes, it is a beautiful-looking shot with solid fundamentals; yes, she can use it to add variety, but gentlemen, come on! Just because a WTA player hits a one-handed backhand, it does not make it a sensation, certainly not the best shot in women's tennis. It is not even Henin's own best shot, albeit a fantastic one.
Henin will often run around her backhand to hit her real number one weapon (her forehand) to finish the point. She will rely more on her forehand to hit winners from the back of the court than her backhand, because she trusts in her forehand more to hit a winner. Finally, on faster surfaces, more powerful players have hit hard to Henin's backhand to break her game down; the Williams sisters used that tactic successfully many times at Wimbledon.
So this love affair that male announcers have with female tennis players who hit a one-handed backhand needs to end. Yes, the latest Roland Garros winner, Francesca Schiavone, has a one-handed backhand, Amelie Mauresmo had a nice one-handed backhand, and Henin may have the best one-handed backhand in recent years, but let's leave it there and not blow it out of proportions please. There are several players in the last decade in WTA who have better backhands than these players, but who happen to hit it with two hands. And because of it, they can hit better angles, can handle power better, and can return better. Fascination with a female tennis player hitting a one-handed backhand should not lead to unwarranted emotional exaggeration.
Another exaggeration is the impression sometimes created that, back in the 1970s and '80s, everybody played serve-and-volley. While it is true that Wimbledon's grass and the different pressured balls during those days favored the serve-and-volley style player more than today's Wimbledon, the ATP tour was by no means dominated by serve-and-volleyers like you would hear in the tall tales of today. There were plenty of Guillermo Vilas, Corrado Barrazzutti, Bjorn Borg, Jimmy Connors, Mats Wilander, and Ivan Lendl types of players since the beginning of the Open Era in 1968. Even before these guys above, Ken Rosewall dominated Roland Garros and many other clay court tournaments for many years by emulating a backboard from the baseline.
While a general observation that the number of serve-and-volley style players have declined in the last two decades is very accurate, to say that everybody rushed to the net after their serve prior to that period, or that the game was dominated completely by serve-and-volley style, is nothing short of an extreme exaggeration and mostly inaccurate.
The last exaggeration that I will mention is a total creation of the American media led by Bud Collins; their relentless campaign during the last several years to make the number of Slam tournaments won the single most important record in tennis, and one that should be the main tool for measuring the greatest player of all-time. Isn't it funny that until the '90s, it was rarely mentioned, and the calendar Grand Slam was rather held at the highest esteem? The big question was who will be the next one to win the Grand Slam since Rod Laver, or who will even get close to Borg's record of five Wimbledon titles in a row?
Then, all of a sudden, Pete Sampras started winning a large number of Slam tournaments. When he reached his 12th and surpassed Laver and Borg, it was the perfect opportunity to all of a sudden exaggerate the Slam number and basically declare it, out of nowhere, as the number one tool for determining the greatest player of all-time. Sampras was an American and the timing was perfect. That is all that Collins, the McEnroe brothers, Brad Gilbert, and Cliff Drysdale talked about for many years ... until Roger Federer ruined the party.
But they tried hard to hold on to Sampras, by exaggerating the importance given to the number of Slam titles. They held on to it for dear life when Federer began to break all the other records one-by-one, the number "14" became all that they talked about; it was the only thing that was left for them to talk about. Never mind that by the time Federer had his 12th and 13th Slam titles, he was more accomplished than Sampras in many categories, never mind that on clay, one of the three major surfaces on the tour, Sampras was never a top-five player during his career (and many years, quite mediocre), never mind that Federer had winning streaks that Sampras never saw in his dreams. All that mattered was that Sampras had 14 Slam titles, so he was the greatest player of all-time, period.
Let me pause here and reaffirm that number of Slams won is indeed an extremely important number in the discussion of who is the best player of all times. But it's only one of several records. How about the distribution of your success on every surface? Or how about the following records:
* Winning Wimbledon record five times in a row like Federer and Borg?
* Winning U.S. Open five times in a row (Federer)?
* Winning Roland Garros four times in a row (Nadal, Borg)?
* Winning the Grand Slam (Laver)?
* Playing 23 Slam semifinals in a row (Federer)?
* Most weeks at number one (Sampras ahead of Federer by one week)?
* Winning a Slam title without losing a set (Borg three times, Nadal twice)?
* Winning all four slams (Laver, Agassi, Federer)?
* 96% winning record in one season (J. McEnroe in 1984)?
* 81 clay court matches won in a row (Nadal 2005-2007)?
* Only one single match lost on grass from 2002-to-present (Federer)?
These are just some of many that come to my mind immediately. I am sure there are more, but the relentless efforts of the American media in trying to reduce the measure of greatness into one single number in order to keep Sampras floating above everyone else, even though he lagged behind in most other categories, was not only unfair, but downright silly. After all, how else can you call a player who won one European clay court title his whole career and a total of three on clay the greatest of all-time? But Federer spoiled that, too, by passing Sampras' record by two more Slams.
One thing that they did succeed is to blow up the importance of Slam titles, although it was not their main goal. Now we hear constantly that Federer has 16, Sampras has 14, and Nadal has just won his seventh, will he reach that level? Let's say that Nadal wins two more Roland Garros titles and reaches nine, and then he stops there; shall we consider him better than Andre Agassi in the history of the game just based on that number since Agassi has only eight? Shall we not consider the fact that Agassi won the career Grand Slam, and that his career lasted close to 20 years?
Or let's say that Nadal wins another six Slam titles in upcoming years, including the U.S. Open, to have 13 Slam titles. Are we to say that Nadal is still behind Sampras, who never reached the finals of Roland Garros and never established any type of remote dominance on clay over the rest of the field, only because Nadal has 13 titles, while Sampras has 14? Finally, if Nadal win three more Slams, including the U.S. Open and has 10 Slam titles, does he still remain behind Borg who has 11, but has never won the U.S. Open or the Australian Open?
The American media who has focused on that number so much during the 2005-to-now period for the reasons mentioned above, and convinced the somewhat casual fan I might add, that it is the only number that determines greatness, would like you to believe that it's how it works. Sorry, Bud Collins and the rest of your crew, but come on, stop exaggerating.
If any readers have noticed other exaggerations gain momentum in the tennis world, feel free to share them. Until next time!