A tacit rhetorical assumption here is that you have very probably never heard of Michael Joyce of Brentwood, L.A. Nor of Tommy Ho of Florida. Nor of Vince Spadea nor Jonathan Stark nor Robbie Weiss nor Steve Bryan -- all ranked in the world’s top one hundred at one point in 1995. Nor of Jeff Tarango, sixty-eight in the world, unless you remember his unfortunate psychotic breakdown in full public view during last year’s Wimbledon
Notice Wallace is careful to use the hedge word "probably". After all, there might be tennis fans out there who pay attention to players that are ranked outside the top 10, or, as the case may be, outside the top 30.
As it turns out, I had heard of Michael Joyce, Vince Spadea, Tommy Ho (of which I'd say Thundercats, ho!), Jonathan Stark, Robbie Weiss. Steve Bryan, I don't recall so much. Jeff Tarango, yes, I've heard. The meltdown occurred when he accused an umpire, one Bruno Rebeuh, for having it against him. Tarango was a modern day John McEnroe, and like McEnroe, Stanford educated, and a tennis professional, but lacking McEnroe's stellar resume. His wife then was accused of spitting at the umpire. It was a bizarre scene, with lilting French accents from one Mrs. Tarango.
Vince Spadea manages to stay in the news. Spadea looked like one of those up-and-comers. He had played Agassi tough at a US Open, and I thought he'd knock him out. Recently, Spadea tried to make a bigger splash as a self-styled tennis rapper, two words that shouldn't go together. He was recently in DC playing at the Legg Mason. He's got a book about him where he talked about his dad. Tennis is filled with tennis dads, but mostly, they oversee their talented daughters.
They range from Stefan Capriati, to Richard Williams. Jim Pierce, Mary Pierce's dad, was so volatile that Mary's mother divorced him, and he was banned from attending WTA events. Until then, Mary always seemed so stressed. She was so much happier afterwards.
Surely, there are tennis dads that pressure their sons to succeed. Indeed, Andre Agassi fits the bill. He was something like Richard Williams in that he studied the game even as tennis was not his first sport. Sons of tennis fathers generally don't get as much press because the fathers typically disappear after they get good, so we don't see the over-protection. The closest to that might have been Michael Chang's mother, but even after a while, she stopped traveling with him.
Vince Spadea, as it turns out, was a product of a tennis father who trained all the Spadea siblings in tennis. Even as Spadea's older sisters showed talent, they lacked the heart of Spadea, and so it was Vince that held the mantle of Spadea success. In many ways, Spadea is as successful as his dad could have hoped.
Any one that rises to the top 30 has made a huge breakthrough, and even as they may toil in relative anonymity, they've proven themselves to be members of a tennis elite.
Because Wallace was a tennis junior, he understands how hard it is for players to reach the top. Wallace could easily have picked players ranked 300 or below. I've never heard of them. How long do their careers last? Can they afford to be on more than a few years. You imagine these are the younger players, early in their career, trying to work their way up the rankings. It would be hard to imagine, short of independently wealthy players, someone toiling at 500-600 all their lives. The cost of travel would be too prohibitive.
Indeed the top pros have perks beyond perks. If you're seeded (a seed means you get some protection in the draw from meeting other seeds too early--basketball is too nice letting the top seed always face the lowest possible seed at each round, where only a small fraction of players get seeded, so they could easily meet a high-ranked unseeded player), you get benefits.
You get free hotel rooms. You get free food. The perks go to the players that can most afford them. But, they also extend to doubles players. So the Bryan brothers, who don't have much of a ranking in singles, benefit from this. Although the Bryan brothers do fine for a living, they don't make the stratospheric income of a top 5 singles player.
When you're used to watching only the top players, your view is completely skewed. You don't realize what they do is so atypical. I'm sure the same thing happens in many sports. A basketball player who plays in college might look at a top player like Kobe and wonder how Kobe and do the things he does.
What's all the more remarkable, beyond the physical ability, is the mental ability. Top pros will find themselves in close matches, perhaps far more than they want, and yet, they manage to win nearly all the close sets. They lift their games, hit the extra shot, even get a lucky net cord, and win matches that they look like they should lose. Weaker players rarely do this.
People say luck favors the well-prepared. Luck seems to favor the talented too. At times, games, sets, hinge on little things. I was watching a match between Federer and Nadal in Miami. In every set, it looked like one player was dominating the set, but then a few points would get played, and momentum would completely shift. It happens in their matches time and again. Just when you think one is on the brink of disaster, they shore their game up just enough, and then they win the set.
Does this happen even among weaker players? I'm sure, yes, to some extent. Perhaps they can simply use their superior shot-making skills, or superior speed, or exploit a weakness of an opponent. There's still some hint that talent can win over smarts and mental strength.
Witness Fernando Gonzalez of Chile, who just whales at the ball. He's a man that seems governed by whim. When he's in the zone, he goes all out on his forehand. It serves him well when he plays well, but when the opponent is holding his own, Gonzalez has no plan B. He plays stupid in those situations, trying to go for bigger, less probable shots, and like a gambler deep in debt, his sense of odds disappears.
Few people understand the level of concentration, the level of confidence, and the level of physical talent needed to win at the very top. Concentration, and the ability to hit the shot when you want, plays a huge roll in winning. Chris Evert wasn't the most physically blessed player, but she could focus, and hit good shots even in duress, and if you weren't pressuring her, she could outsteady you, make you hit one shot, then another, then another.
Basketball seems to lack the concentration element, one that allows a player to keep hitting good shots, even as their opponent is doing the same, and win them at the end.
Golf, on the other hand, is all concentration, and lacks the physical movement and reaction time that tennis needs.
Football has some of these elements, but not over and over and over again, except for possibly the quarterback.
The top players are often where they are because of superior physical talent, but certainly they are there because of their superior mental tenacity, the sheer mind over muscle getting their bodies to do exactly what they want.
No comments:
Post a Comment