By Art Spander
SportsXchange
OAKLAND — Fans know the operative term when teams start poorly, to wit, "It's early."
Literally yes, only two weeks into a major league season that extends six months. Still, early or late, the Oakland Athletics and Texas Rangers, who on Monday night begin a three-game series at the Oakland Coliseum, are going in the wrong direction.
Copyright 2017 SportsXchange
By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner
Buster’s on the disabled list, if only momentarily. Mad Bum is on the outs with fortune. Brandon Belt is, well, struggling is the kind way to phrase it, although, glorioski he did get a hit after going, ooh, 0-for-18. Oh, those odd-year blues for the Giants.
Yes, the season isn’t two weeks old, and a year ago San Francisco started beautifully and ended less so, proving over 162 games and six months a great deal can change, sometimes for the better as opposed to 2016 when it was for the worse.
©2017 The San Francisco Examiner
By Art Spander
It’s an odd year, isn’t it? We should stop there, when it comes to the San Francisco Giants. It isn’t so much that in even years, at least three of them, everything goes right and the Giants win World Series.
It’s that in odd years too much goes wrong.
Buster Posey was run over at home plate in May 2011; he missed the rest of the season. Hunter Pence’s arm was broken by a pitch in spring training 2015; he never was completely healthy throughout the year.
And now, Posey again, in 2017. Hit by a pitch two days ago, the first home game of the season. Put on the disabled list with a concussion.
Odd years aren’t a jinx, they’re a curse. For the Giants, there’s nothing odd about the odd years, there’s something evil. Already they’re in a hole. And they had Buster.
A terrible opening week, losing every game except one. Now they lose Buster, who’s drilled in the head.
The Giants will take no chances with Posey, their main man, their cleanup hitter, their star. Nor should they. After Posey was run over at the plate in 2011, Major League Baseball changed a rule, providing catchers more protection. But that’s on defense.
In the National League, everyone comes to bat, and even wearing a helmet is vulnerable. Posey was unable to duck a Taijuan Walker fastball.
A pitcher’s job is to keep a hitter off balance, to instill fear. He throws inside, usually without any repercussion — or concussion. This inside pitch at 94 mph couldn’t be escaped.
“The fact he is a catcher, taking shots, it doesn’t take a lot,” said Bruce Bochy, the Giants manager, of being properly wary about bringing Posey back too soon.
Bochy knows. He was a catcher. We all know. The year Bochy took control of the Giants, 2007, their catcher the previous season, Mike Matheny, retired because of concussion symptoms, headaches and dizziness. That was a decade ago. Now Matheny is manager of the St. Louis Cardinals.
"This is not a shoulder, a knee or an elbow,” Matheny explained on making the decision to quit playing.
"We're talking about the brain. ... I didn't expect this. I don't think anybody did."
Ten years later we have learned so much more, from studies of NFL players and athletes in other contact sports. Talking about the brain? All those stories of chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Catchers are jarred by foul tips off their mask, dangerous for a man recovering from a head injury.
“You get hit in the head,” said Bochy, “it doesn’t take a lot.”
So Posey is out a week. At least. Are the Giants so quickly out of contention?
“I think we’re better able to withstand this short-term,” said Bobby Evans, the Giants' general manager. “We’re going to exercise caution.”
Nothing is more important than a person’s health. Whether it’s Buster Posey, an MVP, or a lesser player, the responsibility is to the individual. The Giants, a caring organization, will err on the safe side.
“I don’t anticipate it being a long time,” Posey said. “That’s based on how I feel.”
Also how the medical people feel. Football players, in the vernacular, would talk about “having their bell rung.” Trainers would show a hand and ask how many fingers were being held up. A correct answer would get the player back into the game.
Then two days later, the man would complain about headaches, about reacting slowly. Now the majority of sports have developed what is called concussion protocol, applied before an athlete can be cleared.
“Obviously,” Posey admitted, “we’ve seen some guys with lingering effects. Again, I feel pretty good.”
Pretty good, however, isn’t good enough.
“I think it was a smart move,” Posey conceded about being placed on the DL, “especially being a catcher and having the one (Monday), and you never know if you’ll get some more.”
In this odd year, the Giants — struggling, without Buster Posey for even a few days — don’t need any more.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
AUGUSTA, Ga. — This was supposed to be Jordan Spieth’s Masters, wasn’t it? Two shots out of the lead going to the final round, a former champion, ready to take chances, ready to create excitement.
But he just couldn’t make it happen Sunday at Augusta National.
Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
AUGUSTA, Ga. — He is 28 now, and his career, while impressive, remains one of unmet expectations. Rickie Fowler has teased us but not pleased us. Or most definitely himself.
He was a Ryder Cup star as a rookie in 2010 on a losing American team, making birdies the last four holes to get a half against Edoardo Molinari. Then in 2014, Fowler finished top five in all four of golf’s majors. In 2015 he won the Players Championship. Yet he still doesn’t have a major victory and he missed the cut in last year’s Masters.
Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
AUGUSTA, Ga. — So Jordan Spieth took seven more shots at the 15th than Gene Sarazen. Let’s not pick on the poor guy. He’s got enough troubles with those water holes at the Masters.
Young Mr. Spieth unquestionably is one of golf’s premier players. In 2015 he won the Masters and U.S. Open, in the last 70 years a double accomplished only by a couple of guys named Arnie and Jack.
Spieth even had his own bobblehead doll, which is not to be confused with a bobble or, as the pros like to say, a hiccup. Less painful to say than “quadruple bogey.”
Which is what Spieth had Thursday on the 15th hole in the opening round of the 2017 Masters. And, as you remember and Spieth chooses to forget, what he had in the final round in 2016 at the 12th hole.
A year ago at 12, a hole that some say is the toughest par-3 in the game, give or take an island green or two, Spieth, seemingly headed for a second straight Masters win, hit consecutive shots into Rae’s Creek and — yikes — took a four-over-par seven.
All summer and winter, Spieth was asked what the heck happened and if the memory would haunt him this spring. No, he said over and over. That’s in the past. It may be in our heads but not in his.
On a dangerously windy afternoon, Spieth had no problem on his return to 12. But he had a huge problem with 15, described in a spectator guide as “a reachable par-5 when the winds are favorable.” The winds weren’t favorable Thursday, nor was the manner in which Spieth played the hole.
We pause. At the second Masters in 1935, Sarazen took a 4 wood, then called a spoon, for his second shot at 15 and from 235 yards away knocked the ball in the cup for a double-eagle or, as it is known in Britain, an albatross.
“The shot heard ‘round the world,” it was named, a line first used about patriots at Concord Bridge in the American revolution and subsequently repeated for Bobby Thomson’s pennant-winning home for the New York Giants in the 1951 playoff.
What Sarazen’s shot did was make the Masters a major story about a tournament not yet a major and help get him into a 36-hole playoff against Craig Wood, which Sarazen won.
So much for history. What Spieth’s shot, his third Thursday at 15 since he was forced to lay up, did was spin back into the evil pond that waits menacingly between a sloping fairway and the green. Splash. He dropped a new ball and hit that one long.
“I obviously wasn’t going to hit in the water again,” said Spieth. “So it went over, and from there it’s very difficult.” Four more shots difficult. When the ball plopped into the hole, Spieth — oops — had a four-over-par nine.
But ain’t golf bizarre? Spieth followed with a birdie on the difficult par-3 16th — sure, 9-2 on consecutive holes — and finished at 3-over 75. That didn’t seem too bad until Charley Hoffman, out of nowhere, shot a 7-under-par 65, leaving Spieth 10 behind.
The good news is he has 54 holes to play. The bad news is two of those holes are the 12th and 15th.
A very unusual first day of the 81st Masters, the first since 1954 without Arnold Palmer on the grounds as either a normal contestant or honorary entrant.
Palmer died at 87 in September. Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player, who along with Arnie formed golf’s Big Three of the 1960s, wept as they prepared to strike the traditional first balls following a memorial tribute from Masters Chairman Billy Payne.
A very unusual first day. Until first William McGirt finished and then Hoffman emphatically followed, there was a strong possibility this would be the first Masters in 59 years in which no one broke 70 in the opening round.
A very unusual first day. After warming up, Dustin Johnson, No. 1 in the world rankings, went to the first tee and then walked away, unable to take an unhindered, painless swing after a fall down a flight of stairs Wednesday.
"It sucks," Johnson said using the vernacular of the times. "I'm playing the best golf of my career. This is one of my favorite tournaments of the year. Then a freak accident happened (Wednesday) when I got back from the course. It sucks. It sucks really bad."
Jordan Spieth could say the same about the way he played 15.
By Art Spander
AUGUSTA, Ga. — Somewhere in the misty afternoon, one could discern the past at Augusta National.
The Masters certainly is layered upon history as much as on the dark soil of east Georgia, and on a Wednesday when the traditional par-three tournament was ended early because of the weather, thoughts turned to earlier times.
To Byron Nelson, “Lord Byron,” winning the Masters in 1937, 80 years ago.
To hometowner Larry Mize holing a chip shot off the 11th green to stun star-crossed Greg Norman in a playoff in 1987, 30 years ago.
To a 21-year-old named Tiger Woods changing all we knew about golf by winning in record fashion in 1997, 20 years ago.
Nostalgia is as thick as the Georgia pines down here. In the luxurious, enormous new media facility there are dozens of photos from earlier Masters, photos of Sam Snead and Ben Hogan, of Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus and, of course, photos of Arnold Palmer.
Arnie, among all his triumphs, was most identified with the Masters, which he won four times.
This was where the phrase “Arnie’s Army” was born, created by a writer noticing uniformed soldiers from nearby Fort Gordon in Palmer’s boisterous gallery. This was where Arnie became a TV star, offering style and success that would resonate forever.
Palmer died last fall at 87. He lives on in the pictures and plaques at Augusta National, a young man, handsome and bold, and in the words of Masters Chairman Billy Payne.
Payne was in charge of the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. He had played football at South Carolina. And yet he was particularly impressed by Palmer.
“I first met Arnold Palmer when I was invited here before I was a member — also before I played golf,” said Payne, who meant befpre he played golf seriously. “But I played with Arnold and with his dear friend, Russ Meyer, and with (former chairman) Jack Stevens.
“Of course I was in total awe, and he was so nice and so accepting of my embarrassing play ... Through the years, I was fortunate to get close to Arnie, as a consequence of his return as a member and as a former champion. And I’m not sure I ever met a man who was more giving than Arnold. He had a profound influence on my life.”
Payne is protective of the club and the game, as expected. The Masters was involved in controversy over the decades before Payne was elevated to the top position — no minority members, no women members. Now the club has both. There’s always some issue out there, however.
On Wednesday, Payne was asked a rather angular question, whether President Donald Trump’s association with golf made Payne “uncomfortable to be associated with the game you love and represent.”
The answer hardly was a surprise. You think Billy Payne is going to get into politics when his concern is battling Mother Nature this weekend?
“I am not fully aware of anything that our president may have said controversial about the game of golf,” Payne responded. “We have had several presidents, including one who was a member here (Dwight Eisenhower) who have been significant advocates and players of golf. And I think someone who loves the game would espouse and be proud of that association.”
Yes, the Masters exists in its own sphere, where the major worry is not, say, immigration or healthcare, but why there will be so few azaleas in bloom during this year’s tournament. (Warm weather in early March followed by a hard freeze ruined the flowers.)
“So this year,” said Payne with a laugh, “we have decided that our color of choice is green, Augusta green, and I hope you agree it is both abundant and beautiful.”
On this damp afternoon, there wasn’t much else we could do. Except recall the past.
By Art Spander
GLENDALE, Ariz. — The road ended here. So did the dream. So wonderful a story, the outsider, the small school with the big plan, to stand college basketball on its ear, to beat the big boys with some big men and tenacious defense.
Gonzaga, the “Zags,” as it said in white letters on their blue tops, was ahead, leading North Carolina by a point Saturday night in the NCAA basketball championship of 2017, 1 minute and 40 seconds from the win.
And then never scored again. And then thrashed and missed and fouled and fell. And just like that it seemed, so quickly, a royal coach turning into a pumpkin, a magnificent season turning into a disappointment: Carolina was a 71-65 winner.
There were the Zags, leaning on each others’ shoulders, fighting back tears, knowing the season was finished, the goal unreached. They had lost for only the second time, finished the season 37-2. But it was the wrong game to lose, the game that would have given the school the sporting respect it seeks.
For Carolina, with so much history and six national championships, there was redemption. A year ago, the Tar Heels were beaten in the NCAA final with a second to play by Villanova. This time, it was Carolina’s turn.
“One of the things we talked about,” said Roy Williams, the Carolina coach, “was whether this group was tough enough. I think they were tough enough tonight.”
Tough enough and relentless enough. Defense wins, we’re told, and defense means persistence, tenacity and resilience. Carolina shot 30 percent in the first half, 35 percent for the game. But it battered and badgered Gonzaga after intermission. The Zags shot just 27 percent in the second half.
You can’t lose if the other team doesn’t score. In the last 1:40 of the most important game in the Zags’ history, they didn’t score.
They had a turnover, missed a jumper and had a shot blocked. The one-point lead became a one-point deficit, then a three-point deficit. Then five. It was over.
Przemek Karnowski, the senior, the 7-footer from Poland, usually so capable under the basket with his twists and turns and hook shots, was a sad 1-for-8. If Carolina didn’t know how to get the ball in the basket, it did know how to keep the Zags from getting it in.
“We got good shots,” insisted Mark Few, the Zags' coach. “We had the ball where we wanted.”
Except going through the net.
“(Nigel Williams-Goss) is such a warrior. He blew his ankle and he still was able to get a shot. The kid’s just a flat-out winner, but we never would have gotten to this point without him. He’s about the only guy we could call on who’s really deliberate down the stretch there. We needed a defensive rebound after they missed on a shot that ended up bging a jump ball. That was a back-breaker.”
Gonzaga never had been this far before, never had made it to college basketball’s ultimate week, to the Final Four. So many doubts. So many questions. Still, the Zags couldn’t climb the full way.
“I think we’ll settle in here,” said Few about the Gonzaga program. "I’m hoping it will settle in and we’ll feel better tomorrow and in the days to come.
“It doesn’t feel that great right now for a couple of reasons. You’re on the brink of a national championship. You want to give that to your time. But at the same time, the thing that crushes you is you won’t get to coach these guys again.”
There will be other guys and other teams. Gonzaga can only wish for another result.
By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner
PHOENIX — Somewhere beyond the usual platitudes and justifications, the expected words that it was only one game and yes, baseball can be bewilderingly strange, is the unavoidable fact the Giants started the 2017 season exactly the way they ended the 2016 season: With a massive bullpen failure.
Say what you want, and what manager Bruce Bochy said Sunday was true to his character, that the Giants should have scored more, that the Arizona Diamondbacks had some good fortune — “seeing-eye hits,” is the phrase — and that a couple of calls by the umpires could have, more specifically, should have gone the other way.
©2017 The San Francisco Examiner
By Art Spander
GLENDALE, Ariz. — One game now. So near. So far. A place Mark Few never had been. A place Gonzaga never had been. All the hopes, the disappointments, the slights, the dreams, distilled to one game.
The Zags have left base camp. Finally. The summit looms. That they’ve made it this far is more than many believed possible. The Zags, the little school that couldn’t but this magnificent season of 2016-17 certainly proved it can.
They’re 37-1, the best record in college basketball. They beat physical South Carolina, losing a big lead but not their poise, winning 77-73 Saturday night at University of Phoenix Stadium. The school that never could get to the Final Four is now in the final one.
The win had Zags coach Mark Few, a minister’s son, doing handstands in the locker room. The win had Gonzaga, named for a 16th-century Jesuit priest who died caring for epidemic victims, moving into the big time and out of that silly designation, mid-major.
“They’re always on me to show emotion after a win,” said Few of his acrobatics. “So that’s my fairly weak effort of showing emotion. I got out of it with a healthy rotator cuff and healthy Achilles, so I think I’m in a good place.”
Gonzaga, in Spokane, Wash., alma mater of Bing Crosby, with its roster of recruits and transfers, with its stress on defense, with its critics who insist the Zags — well, the official nickname is Bulldogs — play a weak schedule, is at worst going to be the No. 2 team in the country and very well could end up as No. 1.
Gonzaga gave up a 14-point second-half lead in four minutes — or, more correctly, South Carolina overcame that lead with defense and shooting. And then the Zags suddenly were down by two, 67-65, with 7:06 to play. Then all the coaching and hustle and skill came forward, and Gonzaga regained control. Zach Collins, a 7-foot freshman, made the most unlikely of baskets for a 7-footer, a three-pointer. Winners find a way.
“Our late-game execution,” said Few. “That’s been a topic of speculation because we haven’t really had many close games. But we practiced it a lot. And I mean the guys executed it perfectly down the last four minutes. So I'm really proud of them for that. And just ecstatic — to be still playing the last game of the year is just crazy cool.”
Few is 54, and you don’t picture or hear him saying “crazy cool,” but he does. He’s been at Gonzaga 18 years. He’s been chased by larger schools — UCLA was interested at one time — but seems satisfied and rooted.
Basketball certainly isn’t football, a sport that Gonzaga, like most smaller schools in America, have dropped. Get yourself two or three excellent players, one of them specifically a point guard, and several other competent ones willing to play roles and listen to instructions, and you can win a title, no matter the total enrollment.
Nigel Williams-Goss spent two years on the other side of the Cascades, at the U. of Washington in Seattle. He left, then heard Few’s call. The man can shoot. He had 23 points Saturday night, high for the game. He also can orate.
“The journey we’ve been on has been unreal,” said Williams-Goss. “We just never stopped believing, and we’ve had the utmost confidence in ourselves the entire season.
“I guess they were saying we were the most nervous team in the tournament. And you know we heard everything all year, haven’t played tight games, were not tough enough ... No one’s here by accident. You have 37 wins in a college season, that’s unbelievable. We’re here to win it.”
Williams-Goss and Collins are roommates. “He told me,” Williams-Goss said of Collins, the freshman from Las Vegas, “he wouldn’t want to be playing against (himself) today. And coach says all year we just can’t talk the talk, we gotta walk the walk.”
Hard to say about walking, but Collins made that go-ahead three-pointer, had six blocks and ended up with 14 points and 13 rebounds.
“He loves being part of the team,” Few said of Collins. “We trust him at the end of the game.”
By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner
He’s the man who goes unnoticed until you can’t stop watching him, the guy who gets his teammates’ — and his coach’s — praise, but rarely gets the headlines.
Andre Iguodala’s problem is not that he isn’t a key component of the Warriors but that he’s not Stephen Curry or Klay Thompson. Or Draymond Green or Kevin Durant.
©2017 The San Francisco Examiner
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SAN JOSE, Calif. — All the years. And for Gonzaga the tears. “Tears of joy,” from Mark Few after at last making it to basketball’s promised land, the Final Four.
Gonzaga, named for a saint, Aloysius Gonzaga, nicknamed the Bulldogs but known as the “Zags,” had qualified for the NCAA basketball tournament 19 previous times and never got past the regionals. Until Saturday.
Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Jordan Mathews, a graduate transfer from Cal who went to summer school with the hope of playing in the NCAA championship game, kept that dream alive Thursday night for himself and Gonzaga.
With the top-seeded Zags trailing fourth-seeded West Virginia, Mathews connected on a wide-open three-pointer from the left wing with 57 seconds left to give Gonzaga the lead for good in a 61-58 win.
Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — The battles are over now. Donald Young against the tennis establishment. Against himself. And on Tuesday, with the temperature reaching 96 degrees, against favored Louis Pouille.
For the first time, Young was into the fourth round of the BNP Paribas Open.
Not for the first time, a career that was too full of potential, of obscenities, of second-guessing, brought forth that most agonizing of phrases in sport: Oh what might have been.
Let us say this, at age 27, too late to reach the heights but not too late to achieve satisfaction, Young, who was going to be the Tiger Woods of tennis, a young black man who was the No. 1 ranked junior in the world — not just the U.S. — apparently has found contentment.
No more letters loaded with profanities castigating the United States Tennis Association, the organization that governs tennis in this country and that six years ago a frustrated Young felt was governing his life.
No more winless streaks, as in 2012 when Young went 17 matches without a victory.
No more questions from the media on why and how the kid who was labeled a prodigy, coached by his mother, a teaching professional, didn’t live up to expectations, ours as much as his.
Pouille is 15th in the world rankings, an upset winner last summer over Rafael Nadal in the U.S. Open. Young is 60th. When Young blasted out in the second set Tuesday, then allowed a 5-0 lead in the third to start getting away, the result could have been predictable.
Instead, it was unforgettable.
Young was a 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 winner. This after a surprising triumph in the previous match over Sam Querrey, who won the Acapulco Open a few days back and had stunned Novak Djokovic in the third round of last year’s Wimbledon.
“My hand was shaking quite a bit toward the end,” said Young of the situation against Pouille, “but I was happy to pull through. The other guy had more (total) points, but I’m winning.”
And he’s smiling, unburdened by what others thought, an individual at peace with himself, loving where he is finally and loving what he does. That certainly is a change from the painful times six and seven years ago when the USTA wanted him under its control and his mother, Ilona, and Young refused to accede.
Maybe it’s the same thing now with the Ball brothers, the basketball players whose father calls the shots as his sons follow his directions, at least off the court. For Young the instruction also came on the court, and there was a conflict.
He dashed off a tweet, with no swear words deleted, that said the “USTA screwed me for the last time.” That was in 2011, when Young should have been at his peak as a tennis player, although in retrospect he may have peaked at age 15.
Young was moved up to face older, stronger athletes. He lost matches. Surely he also lost his confidence.
“Yeah,” he said, when asked if he would change the early years looking back. “At the time it seemed right. Now, knowing, I wouldn’t take away all of it, but ... I wouldn’t blame anybody. It was a first time. There were a few decisions. They thought I would do well at a faster pace. Hindsight is 100 percent.“
Young wished he had other Americans of his age to compete against and develop friendships, as Taylor Fritz and Francis Tiafoe have now. He was alone. And he was African-American in a sport that was predominately white.
“The kids now, they’re playing each other,” said Young. “They have a chance to get their feet wet. A great group of guys. It’s a different generation. They trash talk each other, say anything and get away with it.”
But if there was bitterness, it has gone with the years and matches.
“You live for days like this,” said Young, responding to a question. “It’s my job. I love it. When I’m gone two, three days I miss it. What else better could I do?”
By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner
This is pro football at the moment in the Bay Area: The 49ers are looking for a quarterback while the Raiders — like that song about the boll weevil — are looking for a home.
You hesitate to predict which team has a greater chance of success, although that billion-dollar-plus figure being tossed around for a new Raiders facility across the state border certainly grabs your attention.
©2017 The San Francisco Examiner
By Art Spander
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — The bicep is the clue, the left one, so much bigger than the right, stretching the sleeve of Rafael Nadal’s post-match T-shirt. Tennis players, like blacksmiths, pound with one arm, hour after hour, day after day, season after season.
The serve, the forehand, all done with Nadal’s left. The two-handed backhand doesn’t make much difference. There’s an imbalance between the two arms, as there is for anyone who’s spent a lifetime in the sport.
Nadal is 30 now, old — veteran of more than 1,000 pro matches over 14 years, and winner of 14 Grand Slams — and yet in today’s world of improved diet and exercise techniques, he is young.
Roger Federer, beating Nadal in the final, won the Australian Open a month and a half ago at 35. And Nadal, apparently free of one injury after another, said, “I am playing at a very high level.” That includes his 6-3, 6-2, win Sunday in the BNP Paribas Open over an Argentinean named Guido Pella.
The great ones just keep playing: Nadal, Federer, Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray — yes, great, even though Murray, the No. 1 seed, No. 1 in the world rankings, was upset Saturday night by Vasek Pospisil.
Playing against the other stars. Playing against themselves.
Tennis is their life, as well as their job. Tennis is what they do, what Rafa Nadal does, until someday he won’t be able to do it any longer.
They are competitors. They are globetrotters. Starting in December, Nadal has been in Dubai, Australia, Mexico and now the California desert. It beats being trapped in an office cubicle, especially when you’re able to beat most of your opponents.
Is it unusual that in tennis, as in golf, fans cheer for the favorite, not the underdog? They want Federer to win, Nadal to win. When that happens the paying customers are satisfied they got what they expected, what they wanted. “Hey, saw Djokovic break serve.”
Hard to know what the players want other than good facilities (the Tennis Garden at Indian Wells is one of the finest), good health and an effective game. They are nomads, facing the same people across the net or in the media rooms, trying to get a little more topspin, trying to do a little less explaining. Not that they don’t understand what comes with the territory.
Most of the better players, no matter if they’re from Switzerland, Serbia or Shanghai, speak English impressively. Nadal, however, used translators for his first several years. He has picked up the language, although with a strong accent, and sometimes his thoughts as well as his words are confusing to the listener.
To his credit, what Nadal, along with others of his skill level, has learned is he must deal with all sorts of questions from the press, some professional, some personal, some stupid.
On Sunday, after Nadal said he thought he played a solid match against the 166th-ranked Pella — “For a few moments I played well; for a few moments I played less well” — he was asked where the sport would be in the future. Would the men all be 6-foot-5? Would there be limits on racquets?
Nadal doesn’t want a serve and volley game, but one in which shots go back and forth, long rallies. “People can think it’s because it helps me, but I am talking about the sport overall, no? ... I think good points, if we want to maintain a good show for the people.”
With his frantic movements and his wicked forehands, Nadal presents an exceptional show. He’s a scrambler, a battler, not as graceful as Federer but arguably more exciting to watch.
“In Melbourne,” he said, meaning the Australian Open, “I played some great matches. In Acapulco (where he lost in the final to Sam Querrey) I played well. In Brisbane (before the Australian) I played well. In Abu Dhabi (Dubai, the end of December) I played great.
“Four events I played at a very high level. Very happy the way I started the season. Now there is another opportunity.”
An opportunity to continue flexing his muscles.
By Art Spander
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — The little sister — is it fair to describe Serena Williams that way? — withdrew a few days earlier because of an injury. And now, despite chants on her behalf from the crowd, it seemed Venus Williams was also out of here, a second-round loser in the BNP Paribas Open.
Venus was crushed in the first set, and after first falling behind 4-1 in the second set she was facing match point, as well as facing a competitor she knows all too well, Jelena Jankovic.
“There’s a lot of history out here with us,” Venus would say later And on this Saturday, when the temperature reached 92 degrees, Williams would create more, rallying for a 1-6, 7-6 (5), 6-1 victory.
She’s always had the determination and now, three months from her 37th birthday, Venus still has the game.
Two California girls, in a way, Venus, born and raised in Compton, the tough suburb of Los Angeles, and Jankovic, the Serb who with her winnings and endorsements built a 20,000-square-foot home in Rancho Santa Fe, where Phil Mickelson resides, west of the San Jacinto miles from this desert locale, near the Pacific Ocean.
This is the first big tournament every year following the Australian Open, with both men and women in competition, like the four Grand Slams.
Back in 2001, when the world was different, and people less understanding or forgiving, the Williams sisters were to meet in a semi here at Indian Wells.
The day before, Elena Dementieva accused the girls’ father, Richard, of deciding who would win family matches — she later said it was a joke — and when Venus pulled out four minutes before the scheduled start the crowd was outraged.
Boos filled the stadium. Two days later, when Serena defeated Kim Clijsters, the derision continued. Richard Williams said the predominantly white crowd booing his African-American daughters was pure racism. The Williams sisters refused to enter the event, not yet known as the BNP, year after year. Finally in 2015, Serena, after soul-searching and many discussions, returned, and then last year Venus did, to the delight of the tournament and the fans.
The spectators, thinking Venus was done Saturday, started chanting and applauding rhythmically, as if they were at a football game, “Let’s go Vee-nus. Let’s go Vee-nus.”
She went. And in their 13th meeting of a rivalry that began in 2005 and was even at six wins apiece, Williams found her game. Jankovic, once No, 1 but never a Grand Slam winner, lost hers. And the match.
“At match point she was off to the side,” the 32-year-old Jankovic said of Venus, “and all I had to was hit it. It was a big mistake, a bad error. I’m still nervous after coming back from injuries last year. Venus played well. I had my chances.”
In any sport, particularly tennis, one must take advantage of those chances. They come so infrequently that when squandered — particularly against a champion such as Venus, who was in the final of the Australian two months ago, losing to Serena — a victory turns into defeat.
“Venus is a great champion,” said Jankovic, “She plays so well.”
In her first tournament since Australia, Venus started slowly, to be kind. In the desert, dry and hot, balls fly farther than in more lush, humid areas. Williams was spraying shots long and wide.
“That’s why they have a second set,” said Williams, who then forced a third, appropriately ending that the match with a service ace.
“I think the biggest takeaway from the Australian for me,” said Venus, “was just even more confidence. That's the biggest takeaway. I definitely look forward, like, all right, I want to build on that and continue to play well and to just improve my game, which is what I worked on.
“So I'm not necessarily living in the past. It just makes me more excited for the future.”
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
MESA, Ariz. — It’s 45 miles from the Cleveland Indians’ spring training complex in Goodyear, Arizona, to Hohokam Stadium, where the Oakland A’s play, the longest distance between sites in the Cactus League.
“And we had to do it twice in one week,” Indians manager Terry Francona said.
Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — The Joker, they call him, and there were times that Novak Djokovic — yes, the “D” is silent — with his skill at mimicry could make us laugh. But now, after a year when triumph was muted by disappointment, he sees life and tennis from a different view.
Once at the top, of course, as the line goes in the musical Evita, it’s a long, long way to fall. Djokovic didn’t tumble that far, but not only did he fail to win either of last two Grand Slam tournaments, after winning the previous four in succession, he dropped from the No. 1 ranking to behind Andy Murray.
Progression worked against him. A great start, an unsatisfying finish. Four straight Grand Slam victories, beginning with the 2015 Wimbledon and climaxing with the 2016 French Open, his first win there.
Satisfaction worked against him. Asked if after the French he subconsciously relaxed, Djokovic unhesitatingly answered, “Yes.”
And why not? Since the start of the Open era in tennis, April 1968, only four men had won each of the four Slams: Rod Laver, Andre Agassi, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Now this agile Serb had become the fifth.
“It was the crowning achievement for me,” said a candid Djokovic. “The French was a priority, but it took a lot of emotion out of me.”
He was sitting in the interview room Thursday at the BNP Paribas Open, the defending champ, seemingly relaxed, unquestionably honest — with himself and the media. It was hot outside, 91 degrees in this desert community some 15 miles southeast of Palm Springs, but inside the air conditioning was working its magic.
“Generally, I see myself in perspective from the end of last season,” said Djokovic. He will be 30 in May, and despite the struggles after the French, relatively speaking — a third-round loss at Wimbledon, a finals loss at the U.S. Open, a quick departure from the Rio Olympics — he was still considered the man to beat.
“I feel much better in terms of my game from the mental side, than I was some months ago,” he said.
The pressure never ceases, pressure to advance when you’re young, pressure to persist as you become established.
“No doubt there’s pressure,” agreed Djokovic. “It’s part of the work. It means we’re doing something that is worthy and has value.
“Something that I always dreamed of doing on such a high level. Certainly as one of the top players, one of favorites to win a Grand Slam, you put pressure on yourself.”
Until winning the French, until making history.
The years and the service returns and the forehands caught up with him. It was as if he said, “Phew. That’s over.” But in the competitive world of tennis, it’s never over until as long as you’re on the court, especially when you have a reputation to enhance.
“I don’t regret things in my life,” said Djokovic, who has won 12 Slams, fourth highest behind Federer, 18, and Nadal and Pete Sampras, 14 each.
“But maybe I should have taken a long break after the French to recharge emotionally. It didn’t happen. I just kept going.”
Not very far in results but, Djokovic said, a considerable distance in his mind.
“It was a lesson to be learned,” he said. “I think those four to five months the second part of 2016 were very important to me, for my growth as a player, as a human being.
“Particularly after the U.S. Open. Then I had those couple months where I wasn't myself on the court. Now I'm at the better place and I believe that I'm headed in the right direction."
Djokovic is in the tough part of the draw at Indian Wells, a tournament he’s won five times previously. In his bottom quarter are Federer, a four-time winner, Nadal, a two-time champ, and Nick Kyrgios.
“I haven't had too many draws like that," Djokovic said. "It's quite amazing to see that many quality players are in one quarter.”
You might say it’s no Djoke.
By Art Spander
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — The words went straight to the heart and — no less important in today’s sporting world — the television ratings. “Sadly, I have to withdraw from the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells and the Miami Open,” said Serena Williams in a statement.
Of course it was in a statement. That’s the way stars dole out bad news these days. In a statement, or in the case of Tiger Woods, on his web site. As little direct contact as possible.
So we accept it. The way Serena has to accept her knee problems.
The way people in charge of the BNP tennis event have to accept the reality that the world’s No. 1 women’s player will not be entering what is the sport’s first big event since the Australian Open, which Serena won, defeating older sister Venus in a historic final.
The way that golf people accept that Tiger Woods is battling the same difficulties as Serena, relative old age leading to constant ailments that never heal.
There's nobody to blame. There are injuries in every sport, as we’re all too aware with Kevin Durant. “Next man up” is the litany. The trouble in individual sports, dependent on stars and personalities, sports without team loyalty, is there may not be a “next” man or woman.
There’s only one Serena. Only one Tiger.
The older you get, the more you’re injured. The fact is undeniable. The years of swinging a tennis racquet or golf club take their toll.
Tiger was different, special. He brought non-golfers to golf, attracted a new, expanded following, crossed ethnic and social barriers.
It wasn’t the game itself that proved fascinating. Some didn’t know a birdie from a bogey. But they knew Tiger.
Knew he was winning, knew he was spectacular, knew he was unique.
Now Tiger, 41, after two back surgeries, rehab and painful attempts at playing, is idled in Florida.
Three weeks ago in the Genesis Open, the former Los Angeles Open, an event benefitting the Tiger Woods Foundation, an event for which Woods was the unofficial host, he was ordered by his doctor not even to appear at Riviera Country Club to address the media but to stay horizontal. That’s serious.
Serena’s condition, the left knee that bothered her at the U.S. Open last summer, seems less critical. However, Williams is 35 and has had knee troubles in the past. That she waited until two days ago to announce her withdrawal from the BNP Paribas is somewhat bewildering. Did she think the knee would heal in a few days when she hadn’t played in a tournament since the Australian at the end of January?
Indian Wells already was missing Victoria Azarenka, on maternity leave; Maria Sharapova, who has one month left in her 15-month suspension for taking a drug banned by the WTA but available in her native Russia; and two-time Wimbledon champ Petra Kvitova, recovering from stab wounds inflicted during a robbery of her apartment in the Czech Republic just before Christmas.
The advice in these situations from some is not to write about those who aren’t in a tournament but those who are. Yet Serena and Sharapova truly are bigger than their sport, just as Tiger is in his. They can’t be ignored.
People who wouldn’t cross the street, or the base line, to watch tennis would very happily choose to see Williams. Or Sharapova.
Even in team sports it’s all about the individual, about Tom Brady or Steph Curry or Alex Ovechkin, the stars who make the money and the headlines, which certainly describes Serena.
Bill Veeck, the late team owner and promoter, used to say if you had to depend on baseball fans for support “you’d be out of business by Mother’s Day.” You’d better bring in the curious, the outsiders.
Veeck did it with gimmicks, sending a midget, Eddie Gaedel, to bat for the St. Louis Browns, holding disco night with the Chicago White Sox.
Tennis has to rely on famous players. In America, maybe the world, there’s no woman tennis player as famous, and successful, as Serena Williams. She’ll be missed.