Davis Cup Journal: Day 3 
Doubles Loss puts USA in a Hole

by John Yandell

My idea was to find the new emotion in Davis Cup tennis. By that, I was thinking of the players and the drama of the matches. Andre showed that in his match. But other than that it hasn’t been very much you could call positive emotional stimulation. And that's an understatement when it comes to the doubles—a straight set loss for the U.S. 

I don’t really watch much doubles, a game dominated by journeymen players who’ve found a way to make a living at the pro level. Jared Palmer and Alex O’Brien are the number one team in the world. I’d never seen them play, but today they didn’t look as good as the Czech team: Juri Novak and David Rikl. From the start the Czechs just looked stronger. 

They cruised through their service games. Novak hit some incredible backhand returns. I guess that’s why Pete kept serving his forehand yesterday. Rikl easily held his own. A short lefty, he served well, volleyed well, hit some big returns. 

The Czechs just had more punch in the points, and at times the Americans appeared very nervous.  Alex missed several overheads that should have at least been in play. He missed quite a few low volleys, a couple at key times, and got smoked down the alley by 2 or 3 big passes.  Jared was definitely the more consistent and aggressive of the pair and hit some big returns and some great volleys, but he also bounced a backhand return about halfway to the net on his side on a big deuce point. 

The first two sets were one break. In the third the Americans got down a break again, but broke back.  For a moment there was a serious crowd response—like the one for a big play at a big time in an NBA game, if you’ve ever felt that.  But the Americans immediately gave the break back and that was that. Rikl served out the match, hitting a couple of very solid volleys under the pressure of the match game. 

In the press conference Jared and Alex both looked a bit shell shocked.  Someone asked Alex if he was nervous. “I didn’t really feel nervous. Things weren’t going our way and we tried to fight through it.” 

You get the feeling the whole experience is getting to McEnroe. So far there hasn’t been any of that special Davis Cup magic he has generated as a player. His analysis is as follows: 

 “We’re acting like spoiled kids. We’re acting like my kids actually. (Laughter.) They just expect someone to hand over the goods. We’ve got to work harder.” Did he mean Pete, someone asked? “I don’t feel Pete worked hard enough. It’s easy for me to say.  There were matches where I didn’t answer the call. I’m not criticizing. I’m into this as a team thing. We all have to work harder. We need to suck it up and work harder. It just feels horrible we didn’t answer the call. They’re good, but they’re not as good as us.” 

John is trying to stay positive, but you get the feeling it’s getting harder especially after he read the morning papers in LA: “Tradition Takes Beating in Embarrassing Opener.” 

Seems the USTA played the combined Czech and Slovak anthems—you probably know that Czechoslovakia doesn’t exist anymore and was split in two. Seems they split up the anthem at the same time. So it wasn’t too cool that the USTA played the Slovakian anthem, and the Czech players say it fired them up. 

One particularly nasty column played this up, and also derided and condemned the  USTA attempt at spectacle: bringing in the Lakers girls, and the smoke and the fireworks. “Was it Davis Cup or the World Wrestling Federation? someone asked John. Was it good or too much? 

“Both,” he replied. Now that was a sophisticated answer. But it also started him down a certain road with predictable consequences. “Some of it is too much, but what I don’t like is the negativity. It’s too bad you’re looking for negatives. We need help from the media.  It’s discouraging to see the negative press.” 

As if to prove his point, the next question was this: why are you wearing a Lakers cap if you want more Davis Cup press?  Shouldn’t you be wearing a Davis Cup hat? Now that was amazing—what was the connection there?  If John had been wearing the right hat, suddenly his press file would start to improve? I don’t think so, but that’s what the question seemed to imply: his hat was the source of the negative press. OK, finally an explanation. His wardrobe errors were the root of the Davis Cup PR problem. No wonder the players hate the writers. But this writer got what she was going for. I’m thinking it was probably the same LA Times writer who wrote the nasty column. She got to John, upset him, and got a hostile response. 

“That’s an asinine question,” he says with that familiar edge coming into his voice.  “Please, don’t make me answer that.” 

With that the USTA press guy ends the interview. Can’t wait to see how the press tries to make John pay for that tomorrow. It’s not like she doesn’t have a point. The hype is kind of dumb. Personally it puts me off too. But I think what upsets John is that it’s her only point, her main point, and there is little or nothing about the tennis to balance this negative framework, much less about the serious Davis Cup revival he and the USTA are trying to engineer. Let’s face it, it’s different this year. The top players are playing and it’s at the LA Forum. And the biggest and most controversial media figure in the sport is the captain. Personally, I think that’s a positive, on balance.