Croissants and Cafe

I've only been following the French Open by results, and then, only rather casually. There was once a time, back when I was in junior high school (what they now call "middle" school) where I used to watch all the tennis I could, on television.

This is where cable was wonderful. The major channels--ABC, NBC, CBS, show some tennis, but not a whole lot. Between NBC and CBS, the two would cover Wimbledon, the French Open, and the U.S. Open, but usually on weekends.

Weekday coverage of the French used to be handled by ESPN, the U.S. Open by USA network, and Wimbledon by HBO. ESPN used to cover the entire of the Australian Open, the forgotten Grand Slam, at least, by Americans. This has changed (HBO stopped carrying Wimbledon, and there's more limited coverage of the French).

I wouldn't see Wimbledon, alas, since our family didn't get HBO, but we'd get pretty much everything else.

With cable, I could probably watch the semis and finals of maybe 15-20 tournaments a year. Most weekends I would watch if I could.

This was during the 80s and early 90s. Back then, there were still pretty good American players. Connors was starting to fade, but played well for much of the 80s. McEnroe was at the top of his game in the early 80s, but faded after Lendl beat him in straight sets. McEnroe took some time off, much like Borg, but was never the same again.

During this time, players like Edberg, Becker, Graf, Evert, Navratilova, Sanchez-Vicario, Mandlikova, Clerc, Vilas, Wilander, Mayotte, Sampras, Chang, Agassi, Courier all played. In particular, American tennis, both men and women, were at the very top of the game.

This is not the case now, and tennis interest has plummeted. The best men's players, Roddick and Blake, aren't quite ready to leap to the level of top 5. Roddick, in particular, can't seem to tame his shots, unable to play smart tennis, and to stay mentally focused. Agassi had, from time to time, been able to achieve this, though against a good player like Sampras, he could panic.

Blake has improved, but has no shots that are particularly scary. He's not a good enough volleyer (no one is these days) to win that way, nor a consistent enough rallyer, nor a hard enough hitter. He's very solid, just not outstanding.

People would love Blake to make that next step up. He's the kind of African American that people like. He's good looking. He's well spoken. sort of the Derek Jeter of tennis, rather than the Barry Bonds of tennis. Really, we can have a player like Blake, because of what Ashe went through. No longer do African American tennis players have to think so hard about civil rights issues, and Blake less than most, since, unlike Tiger Woods, he's not become an icon in his own sport.

This weekend, the women are playing. I don't even recall if I watched last year. I certainly don't remember who won. These stats used to be on the top of my head. Right now, it's Kutznesova against Henin-Hardenne. Oh yes, last year, it was Henin-Hardenne against Mary Pierce who had played great to get to the final, but then sprayed balls everywhere in the finals.

The women's finals for the French Open have often been disappointing because one of the finalists just got nerves and would just play poorly. When there were the great champions: Evert vs. Navratilova, Seles vs. Graf, you would expect high level of play from both of them. Women's tennis has produced some streaky players who would play great one day, and awful the next. Men's tennis has far fewer of those players, especially on clay. Even a "bad" finalist can rally at length, and not make too many stupid errors.

Still, when the women's final does feature really good players, it can be more exciting than the French men's finals, which is often laborious as players punch and counterpunch.

This year, the men's finals is worth watching. It's the dream final between Federer and Nadal. This is perhaps as exciting to Americans that don't watch tennis as a Danish player and a Korean player in the finals of a world badminton championship. Who are Federer and Nadal?

Part of the lack of interest is jingoism. Fans prefer watching Americans. True, neither Seles nor Graf were born in the U.S., Seles did most of her tennis training in the U.S. and basically tried not to talk up her Yugoslavian upbrining. Still, even sports commentators don't watch tennis with much passion, and barely follow who's who. They like Henin-Hardenne's name because there's two (names) and they can say it Frenchified (she's Belgian, but they speak a form of French there).

Federer has been spoken of as the greatest player that's ever lived, which is amazing, given that people were saying that of Sampras (despite Sampras never winning the French, nor reaching the finals), and Sampras was only playing a few years ago.

Federer serves hard, hits the ball off the ground hard, and volleys reasonably well. He has what Sampras lacked, which was a real ground game. Sampras learned to hit well enough off the ground that he could contain Agassi on a hard court, but on a clay court, Sampras was just, eh. Top clay courters could push him around all day long. This isn't the case with Federer. He can stay in rallies with the best of him. Even so, clay is his weakest surface, though not by much.

Nadal is the Agassi of Spain, or perhaps more like a Vilas. Long hair, flowing, running around. He's number 2 in the world, has recently broken Vilas's consecutive streak on clay, and more than that, he's beaten Federer 5-1 when they've met in tournaments and while most of the matches have been on clay, two have been on hard courts. Nadal won a particularly close match the last two times winning in fifth set tiebreakers, 7-5.

It used to be Nalbandian, an Argentine, had a mental edge on Federer. Nalbandian himself is quite a good player, just behind Federer and Nadal. He used to beat Federer when they were juniors much like Chang used to beat Sampras. However, Federer has recently realized that he can beat Nalbandian, and has won many of their most recent meetings. To be fair, Nalbandian has reached the finals of Wimbledon in 2002, and the semifinals of the other three Grand Slam events. He's quite a good player, and it was no shame for Federer to lose to him.

But Nadal seems to have the mental edge against Federer. Don't underestimate this. When matches are close, the player that has won the close matches often pulls it out. Players who lead head-to-head somehow feel great confidence and play better. A classic example was Sampras vs. Agassi. Sampras usually won their matches.

One year, Sampras had played rather poorly. He hadn't been winning tournaments. But Sampras focuses better than any player for a single tournament. He played really up for the US Open, and Agassi had recently gotten back to the top of his game. (This was in 2002). Still, when they met in the finals, Sampras met Agassi, the feeling that he knew he could beat Agassi and the Agassi knew it lead him to a four set victory.

We'll see how this turns out for Federer and Nadal in tomorrow's match. Nadal should be supremely confident, yet, Federer is also playing quite well, reaching his first French final. Hopefully, a great match ahead.