Exhibitionist

A while back, I remarked how close Sampras played Federer in an exhibition. I recall hearing John Feinstein comment of this. He covered tennis for a year, back around 1991 or so.

He said the whole thing is a setup. He says that McEnroe and Agassi played a series of exhibitions and they never had a straight set win. Given how common straight set wins are, and given Agassi would be in much better shape than McEnroe in those days, he should have had his fair share of straight set wins.

If there was some fakery, Federer must feel ultimate confidence, because the third set, which is usually where both players take it seriously, had Federer down, but not quite out. Federer fell down a break, and was down in the tiebreak, before coming back. If that's faking it--and I'm not saying it isn't--then Federer must feel he can turn it on whenever and defeat Sampras, which is a pretty risky game to play.