Kipketer?

So this is the best thing Novak has said in a while: listing the athletes he has bothered for photos this week in China he mentioned "‘‘Kipketer, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, all the top athletes in the world. I do ask them for pictures. This is a memory that is going to stay in my life forever.’’ Kipketer? Apparently Novak is a sucker for the middle distance. And Kipketer comes first on the list, and is the only one-namer in that group for Djokovic. Good stuff.

Kipketer was capable of some good stuff in his younger days as well.

sound of silence

Here at fuzzy we actually love Mary Carillo and John McEnroe (thats them around the time they won the French Open mixed doubles together). But they really do talk an awful lot, as Tennis Magazine recently commented.

To sample the alternative, NBC is offering high quality video of full matches at the Olympics with absolutely no commentary at all. Just the crowd, the squeaks and the groans. For us on the east coast its pretty easy to wake up, avoid any headlines, and watch the match fresh.

China

Roger was looking youthful and patriotic at the opening ceremony, and sharp against Tursunov. Plenty of shouts of "allez" and some vintage stuff from the backhand side. Rafa struggled a bit more and has a tough second round match against Hewitt.

The NY Times is using Roger's career as a metaphor for how to be eclipsed gracefully (predicting China will surpass the US in medals). Well, it certainly has been graceful, not least from Nadal, who said this the day his rise to #1 became inevitable:

“I never saw anybody play better than him. For sure, he’s going to continue to have a lot of chances to continue to be No. 1 and win Grand Slams. Roger is having a good season, but in the last four years, he did some unbelievable things. I think he’s going to be the favorite for the Olympics and the U.S. Open."

Roger is coming around to Rafa's way of thinking, it seems: “I just think more about, you know, being at the top for a long time. I mean, at the top doesn’t mean No. 1 in the world. It can mean deep into Grand Slams, being in the top five, top 10 for, whatever, 10 years, 15 years, just be up there and having a shot at Grand Slams.

face of things to come

Okay, it took a while to get over the Wimbledon final. But fuzzy is now ready to stare into the face of things to come. Rafa becoming #1 in the next few weeks is being treated as an inevitability. We here at fuzzy still believe that Roger can win Cincy, the Olympics, and the US Open and make things interesting going into the fall. Allez Rog!

But our hopes took a hit watching Roger hit four straight errors while serving to stay in the match against Simon.

Then our hopes took another hit watching Rafa take his freakish intensity and actually turn it up a notch in his semi against Murray.

advice

Marat Safin on how to beat Federer:

Q. You said in answer to the first question that you know the game plan, you know what you have to do to beat him. Can you describe that a little bit?
MARAT SAFIN: "Well, everybody says his best shot, so based on that. They need to build up the game plan against Federer. I mean, every time he has under pressure he puts the slice, short slice, for you to come into the net. So everybody's always just slicing back to the backhand, and he makes the passing shot down the line, which is a simple one. Or who has a better backhand, they try to spin it a little bit too much. Then of course the frame's coming in and then you missing on the let tape. That's what's happening. Nobody really give him a chance to pass you. That's what's happened today, because we were going a little bit for too much. That's the problem. But rather than that, he is pushing you on the forehand. Slice it to the backhand, you know, with a backspin. So you can't really attack it, you can't really do anything special with it. You can build up the point, but every time you touch his forehand, he start to push you around. So that's basically two free shots that you know that he gonna make it. And every time you have it you miss it. So it's too simple. It's really simple, but you can't do nothing about it. Because every time you have it, you frame it or you put it on the net. It is annoying, annoying. And every time you have a breakpoint and he's really under pressure, he serve the first serve, that's for sure. So it's simple, but disappointing."

Allez!

Tomorrow's final offers the opportunity for the sort of match that people will talk about for decades. Will we get it? Who knows. That depends on Rafa, of course, especially his serve.

But no matter what happens tomorrow we should appreciate having two players at the top of the game who are so exciting, so classy, and so consistently excellent that they meet this often in important finals.

I liked this from Rafa's blog for the Times of London:

Question: Who is your favorite sports man or woman in the world?
Rafa: Spain's National football team, Tiger Woods, Roger Federer.

Jumping

Here at fuzzy dunlop we have always been big supporters of the Williams sisters. They have played incredible tennis, changed the women's game, and dealt with a lot of strange moments and rude questions with class and dignity. Love those girls, and good luck to them for a great match tomorrow. That said, we don't love the way Venus keeps jumping up and down in the face of whoever she has just beaten in a big match -- thursday it was Elena Dementiava. If Venus does any jumping tomorrow we hope it is of the variety shown above.