US Open Journal

Day 6

A.J. Chabria

Today, I’m thinking men’s tennis is the neglected step child around here, so here goes.

James Blake and Lleyton Hewitt put on a show most of us will remember for years. The atmosphere was pure Davis Cup. Unfortunately for the American, Hewitt can summon his best stuff on the road.


James Blake and Lleyton Hewitt put on a show most of us will remember for years.

There were definitely some similarities to their 5 set war a year ago, but the differences made themselves known. This time, Lleyton was the one with the two sets to one lead. This time, J.B.’s body held up right to the end. In fact, he was over in the gym after the match.

Blake seemed like he comprehended his assignment clearly: to play flawless offensive tennis. He was able to pull it off at times and man, was it fun to watch. The champ on the other hand, plays a much lower risk style and it paid off for the Aussie to the tune of a satisfying, hard-fought 5 set victory.

There were tense moments at the end of the fourth set. To just about everyone, it looked like it would be decided by a tie-breaker, but at 3-4, someone from a seat near me heckled something like:

“C’mon, James. Don’t let this guy win, he’s a racist!”

Usually, players are so single-minded that they hear the crowd as background music, white noise even. This one, however got under the edgy Aussie’s skin. He dropped serve and didn’t put up much resistance in the next game as Blake vaulted to a confident start to the final set. It reminded me of a Davis Cup match in Las Vegas, the ’95 semis against the Swedes. The USA had won the tie 3-1, and Mats Wilander was up against Pete Sampras in a post-celebration 2 out of 3 set dead rubber. Pete was elsewhere for much of the first set and a friend of mine joked aloud, “Wake up Pete, the Rocket wouldn’t have let go like this.” Our seats were right by Pete, and my friend believes Pete listened. He immediately went into Rod Laver mode, coming back from a break and dominating the rest of the match for a 4-1 win for team USA. Two and a half months later, Pete was responsible for 3 wins against the Russians in Moscow in the final.

Maybe they do hear your voice, and sometimes it gets to them. Hewitt is an intense, stubborn and defensive person, which may be why he dropped that set. It’s also why he came out serving like a man inspired in the fifth. He won 14 of 15 first serve points and 6 of 10 second serve points. He sensed some tightness from James in the sixth game, broke him at love and rode out the set 6-3.

Federer’s backhand is as powerful and diverse as anyone’s on the tour.

Blake is always learning and improving. He will surely take a page out of Hewitt’s book after this battle.

Soon after, I caught most of the Federer/Malisse match. In a parallel world without sport, this could have been a performance art exhibit our people could be proud to show off. Xavier and Roger are both just over 6 feet tall but they move like Ken Rosewall, turning defense into offense effortlessly. Both players were able to make more winners than unforced errors, so it was a pretty clean match, despite some blustery conditions. They mostly stalk the baseline, but are capable volleyers and touch artists, too. Serving and volleying was mostly a sneak play and so was the chip and charge.

Federer’s backhand is as powerful and diverse as anyone’s on the tour. In the end the difference was the silky Swiss’ willingness to pressure the Belgian with some wicked slice backhand approaches. Federer was successful 28 out of 43 times at net, a shade better than the X-boy, who approached 29 times and won a decent 15 of them.

Federer took the match 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 and next will have to deal with one of the last of the true serve and volleyers, Max Mirnyi of Belarus. Max thrives in NYC and has always enjoyed lots of support here (remember the 5 setter with Kuerten last year?) As a kid, long before he earned the nickname the beast, Max trained at an indoor club in Brighton Beach in Brooklyn and lived among the Russian community here.

Last night I mentioned how Roddick dominated Sluiter, the two hander off both sides. Roddick complimented his usual power game by mixing in some short-angles to get the Dutchman off balance. This is generally what intelligent players have done to Jan-Michael Gambill another two-hander. Kuerten, Agassi and various other players with great variety have had success against Gambill using off pace spinners to the side T’s.

Gambill is strong as an ox. Moya tried to out slug him and that was clearly a big mistake.

It’s clearly a big mistake to try to out slug the rangy and strong as an ox Gambill (or Roddick, for that matter). Moya tried the other night and tonight, so did Argentina’s Gaston Gaudio.

Gaudio seeded 21 this week, is a consistent performer with reliable strokes that simply do not break down. He did his best to hit with the unseeded Gambill, but got bullied left, right and center. Gambill served like a genius and returned like Agassi against my grandmother. It doesn’t happen often, but the seeded player was upset 6-0, 6-2, 6-0. The big man from Washington has earned a match with Andre Agassi in the round of sixteen. We’ll see if the Zen master can figure out how to out-fox the big JAG on Monday.

Last year, on his way to a quarterfinal epic against the eventual champion, Roddick had a similar win over another rock-solid veteran, Alex Corretja. Corretja later admitted that it had been a mistake to try and outhit the big hitter. Tomorrow night we’ll see if lessons have been learned as Corretja gets a rematch against the red-hot Roddick.

The junior draws begin tomorrow and just this evening, I ran into a friend who’s a hitting partner/coach for Swedish junior Hanna Nooni (what a great name!). They echoed how competitive the game has become at all levels. International junior tennis is almost a pro sport these days. I’ll be following some of those matches tomorrow.

Cute little human interest story: right after Agassi’s routine win over Paraguay’s Ramon Delgado, a young man got on one knee and proposed to his girlfriend in the USTA President’s Box today. Their names are Corey Ehlen and Jamie Pease and their parents, executives with the USTA set them up five years ago. She said yes.

See you tomorrow for the final installment of the First Week Journal. Enjoy the tennis!

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