re: Official French Open Discussion Thread

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There's a huge difference between a junior who played Sectional tournaments and some national tournaments and maybe some college tennis too vs. those on the tour and especially a former top 10 player on the ATP.

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I know. I could have played lower level college tennis, but I decided it wasn't worth it and went to UT because they had hot girls. I definitely couldn't have played at UT. And only the very top guys (rhyne williams, tennys sandgren, etc.) at an SEC level tennis program will play on the tour. No, I understand the varying levels of tennis. Read "string theory" by David Foster Wallace. He writes eloquently about this very concept.

All this being said, you wouldn't have disagreed if I said I could move better than John Isner. Because, well, of course I can move better than John Isner! Everybody can move better than John Isner.

John Isner can do everything on a tennis court better than me, but he can't move better than me.

James Blake can do everything on a tennis court better than me, but he can't hit a backhand better than me. Does this mean James Blake would do anything other than bagel me in a set? No, it doesn't. I couldn't exploit his backhand. But his backhand is garbage. Blake would take my backhand in a second. He'd pay me 50K for my backhand.

Coin flip after 1 and 2 are set.

Bobby and Rosco, this thread is pretty interesting. Most think Johnny Mac would still embarrass a 5.0 to this day.
LINK

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Bobby and Rosco, this thread is pretty interesting. Most think Johnny Mac would still embarrass a 5.0 to this day.

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I agree with them. Johnny Mac would make even a very good 5.0 look really silly. I mean, Johnny Mac is still in great shape and plays tennis pretty much every day of his life. He'd toy with them.

Ooooo sorry I don't follow tennis regularly, thanks guys!

I think there is a difference between moving well/quickness and moving well/efficiently. Federer, like Agassi, moves at pight angles to the line of flight of the ball. That is the shortest distance to travel. This cannot be done while giving up ground (as when Harrison gets tight). You can buy some time by moving back or just staying at a constant depth in the court. You will have to travel further and therefore be quicker. I think Harrison is just as quick as anyone, but at times his court positioning makes him less efficient.

Nadal, at net, reminds me a lot of Borg. Not the best at net play, but ventures in under circumstance where the prior shots hand him something that you or I can handle pretty easily. He's no McEnroe, Rafter, Sampras, Edberg, or Becker up there, but he doesn't have to be. In fact. Edberg would be a really good role model for Ryan's game. Won a bunch of majors with a very substandard backhand, but a wicked kick serve and sound volleys.

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Federer, like Agassi, moves at pight angles to the line of flight of the ball. That is the shortest distance to travel

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I assume you meant right angles?

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by this. Can you elaborate?

I assumed he meant tight angles

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I assumed he meant tight angles

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Either way, I'm still a bit unclear on what he meant.

Imagine watching a match from the Goodyear blimp. The line of flight of the ball is the line from where the ball leaves the opponent's racket to where it will bounce the second time. Wherever you are on the court, the shortest distance to get to that shot is by taking a line of movement that is perpendicular the the line of flight of that shot (I.e. approaching the line of that shot by taking a right angle to it). This is a fairly advanced thing to do as it will require hitting a lot of shots while the ball is on the rise. Players like Federer, Agassi, and Jack Kramer all do/did this exceptionally well. By traveling shorter distances, movement is made more efficient. A player like Nadal deviates from this rule of geometry, but overcomes the resulting problem with amazing quickness. You can see quite easily, how much more movement is required by his technique. This is one of the reason that there has been speculation that his body won't hold up whereas, Agassi was able to win a major after his 30th birthday and Fed is still in the hunt for them.