Tuesday's Rainout Will Make Repeating Tougher For Nadal

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I've chosen the obligatory Jimmy Connors washout video to accompany the bad news that is coming from the US Open on Tuesday. With the rain nixing Rafael Nadal's 4th-round match with Gilles Muller (along with three other men's 4th-round tilts), I immediately wondered the following: Can we really expect Nadal to defend his title by winning four best-of-five set matches in five days? The same goes for Andy Murray, and the other six players who were scheduled to battle for spots in the quarterfinals today.

I just don't know how they are going to get through this. There's rain in the forecast for six of the next seven days and there's no roof.

Then I started thinking: Is there any way that we can get Larry Ellison in so that he could fly all players and ticket holders from New York to Indian Wells?

Excuse me if I sound like an anti-USTA ranter at the moment, but really, it's kind of hard to be anything but at this point. There is no roof at the National Tennis Center, nor is one likely for at least 10 years, and to make matters more complicated, the US Open remains as the only Grand Slam that plays the semifinals and finals on back-to-back days.

That double-whammy has made for more headaches than great tennis in recent years. Super Saturday at the US Open supposedly began for the sake of the fans (let's be honest: it's really more about the advertisers), but does anybody really benefit from having a Grand Slam final played less than 24 hours after the semifinals? It makes no sense, especially when you consider the way tennis is played these days. The points are longer, the matches are longer and the physical rigor of the game is exponentially greater.

With Tuesday's play cancelled, it appears as if the players won't even be fresh when Super Saturday begins, and the advantage has swung decidedly in favor of the four players who are already through to the quarters: Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Janko Tipsarevic and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. If rain causes no further cancellations, each will still have to play three matches in five days, but that seems a lot more manageable than the herculean task that the other eight players slated to play fourth-rounders tomorrow face.

Of course, I'm operating under the assumption that matches will be played on Wednesday through Saturday, but we all know mother nature might have other designs. So, here we are, at the mercy of factors beyond anybody's control, in a tournament that has already proved that they care more about TV ratings than ensuring that their finalists are rested and ready to go for the final (I'm all for commercialization, but prefer to draw the line a little closer to the player's wishes).

You do the math, if you can stomach the conclusion: advantage, mother nature.

All we can do now is cross our fingers and hope and pray that an equable solution drops out of the sky with all those raindrops.

Agony and Ecstasy

Novak Djokovic was tremendous on Sunday night. But Andy Murray was awful, and so was the highly anticipated men's final.

After a masterful performance in Melbourne -- one that featured straight-set wins over Tomas Berdych, Roger Federer, and Andy Murray -- we can now officially say that not only is Novak Djokovic (finally!) back to being the player he was at the end of the 2007 and in the beginning of 2008, when he won his maiden Grand Slam title, we can also so that he is most definitely and assertively better than he was before.

Djokovic has been riding the roller coaster for three full years now, and only now is he again displaying a level of consistency and maturity to match his unyielding athleticism. Over these last three years it has been painful at times to watch Djokovic, knowing full well that he had the game to beat the best, yet also knowing full well that he seemed destined to find a way to fall short, to sabotage his best intentions with a heat-related malady, or an uninspired performance when he needed precisely the opposite.

But a major growth spurt has occurred over the last six months, not just in the game of the wildly talented acrobatic Serbian, but probably more so in the spirit.

Perhaps it was the way he was received in New York, when he vanquished Federer in the semis of the 2010 U.S. Open and once again was the only player in the draw who could truly push Nadal in a way that forced him to bring out an extra gear.

Perhaps it was the camaraderie and the infectious joy of his merry band of Serbian brothers as they captured the Davis Cup from France in Belgrade, manifesting itself in his play.

In reality, it was probably all of the above, and a bit more. The 23-year-old has come a long way since his irreverent late teens and early 20's, when it was him and his family against the world. He had a serious chip on his shoulder in those days, and many of us feared that he'd never reach the same level of all-court dominance without that chip.

But Sunday, against a befuddled Andy Murray, he did all that and more.

Djokovic, who has long possessed one of the most sublime court presences in the sport, was passionate from the first ball Sunday evening until long after he threw his shirt and shoes into the crowd for souvenirs. And when he needed to prove his superiority, he answered the bell by unleashing his heat-seeking forehand or a screaming corner-bound first serve.

It was an uplifting display on all fronts for Djokovic, and with it I do believe he's officially announced himself as a very real threat to claim more Grand Slam crowns and to ascend to No. 1 in the ATP rankings.

For Murray, the prospects appear to be much dimmer. It's not that the Scot has failed in all three of his Grand Slam finals -- it's the way that he has failed. Take nothing away from Djokovic but Murray's performance was shrouded in a black cloud of self doubt, and colored with a morose anxiety-ridden paste.

With the body language of a zombie, Murray moped around between points with the look of a man who'd already been beaten for most of the match. It was so bad that it was hard to focus on just how divine Djokovic was playing, because you could tell that most of his brilliance was completely unnecessary. The Serb had brought all his weapons to a fight in which Murray had brought none.

I'd like to defend Murray here, I really would. Like all true tennis fans, I wanted this Murray-Djokovic final to be a showcase of the talents of both men. The limber and clinical Djokovic, and the cat-and-mouse counter puncher Murray. Sadly, Murray was weighed down by something inexplicably heavy and grey. While Djokovic was at full potential, Murray was somewhere less than half.

There's no way to sugarcoat it, and I do believe that the widely chastised British Press is well within its rights to lambaste Murray.

His was a truly embarrassing performance, given the occasion, given the amount of ability he possesses, and his doleful, borderline psychotic behavior cast a pall over what should have been a joyous match, and a massive coming-out party for Djokovic.

I have long been a Murray supporter, and I thought -- all the way up until the night of the final -- that he was a shoe-in to break the British curse. Moreover, I felt that he deserved to be the guy to do it, because I felt that he was a fighter, and because I liked his unique brand of tennis and the way he seemed to relish the antagonistic elements of tennis warfare.

But having seen his worst last night, I've come to the realization that I'd rather not see this type of performance again in a Grand Slam final.

If this is what we get to replace Federer and Nadal, tennis fans should be concerned.

To his credit, Djokovic was still able to shine. But Murray brought this final way way down. It was hard to watch.

I was thrilled for Djokovic, but I was glad it was over as well.