[Waymninelia]

Scotty, have you visited the Dumpster yet? 8-)

Ahem.
Anyway this is a scouting report of the St Paul Challenger. It's long but very interesting.

Scouting Report: Saint Paul $50K Challenger (Tuesday)
A tennis career is not for the faint of heart.

I don't mean it's like, say, American football or boxing, where a certain part of the crowd goes out in hopes of seeing someone seriously hurt (though anyone who saw the doubles final here a few years ago, when Trudi Musgrave destroyed her knee on the court, knows how bad tennis injuries can be). But consider the obvious: Every match results in as many losers as winners. What's more, there are tens of millions of women around the world who play tennis. Only about 1500 of them are ranked. Say one in a thousand. Nearly every one of those ranked women could destroy nearly any of the millions of unranked women.

And yet, the WTA only expects 150-250 women to be able to make a living at tennis. Some of these players -- these very good players! -- will never see the Top 100, or play a WTA match.

It's a frightening gamble, following this career -- the more so since it's almost impossible to go to college if you want to be a tennis pro; with a few honorable exceptions such as Lisa Raymond and Jill Craybas, going to school means losing the years when the best players really make their marks on the game. But they keep trying, year after year. And who knows -- some will become WTA players. Earlier this week, I mentioned Olga Poutchkova, who played here last year and now is Top Forty. Elena Vesnina, who played Saint Paul in 2005, is Top Sixty. Alicia Molik, who played here in its very first year, was Top Ten for a while and seems to be coming back to life after a long illness. Shinobu Asagoe, the doubles finalist in 2002, was Top 25 two years ago. Samantha Stosur, now in the Top Thirty in singles and #1 in doubles, played here a few years back.

But not every player who comes to a Challenger is a bright-eyed youngster starting out, nor indeed someone who has been toiling at this level for years. Some are veterans fallen on hard times, trying to revive careers. Iva Majoli and Daja Bedanova were one-time Top Twenty players who came here and failed. On the other hand, 2002 champion Els Callens used a title here to revive her career for two more years.

Which brings us to... Alexandra Stevenson. Stevenson in 2002 and 2003 did a John Henry impression: Having had a few good events in previous years (notably, of course, Wimbledon 1999), 2002 was the year she turned consistent, with two finals and no fewer than three wins over Jennifer Capriati, plus her only doubles title. She ended the year Top Twenty.

And it broke her back. Not literally, of course, but she has had back problems for much of her career, and lately she has added shoulder problems as well. 2003 was the last time she was healthy enough to play all four Slams. Since then, it's been a long trail of attempted comebacks and injuries. Last week, she was playing Midland qualifying, where she lost to Leanne Baker in the first round. Here, she was in the main draw.

It turned out to be a contest of wildcards: Stevenson versus Ashley Weinhold, another American. Weinhold is ranked #367, based on twelve events; Stevenson is currently #402, with 15 events. The difference in experience is stunning; Stevenson a one-time Wimbledon semifinalist, while Weinhold has never played a WTA match, or been past a $50K or better quarterfinal; most of the results I saw were in Challenger qualifying.

The difference in size is almost as great as the difference in experience. Weinhold is tiny; Stevenson is of course one of the tallest players on the Tour. Her size results in her biggest weakness: She isn't fast. There was every indication that this would be power versus speed. And Laura Granville once said that this is a pretty fast court, and the humidity is extremely low. (I don't own a barometer, or I would have brought it. I did bring a thermometer and humidity meter: 62 degrees Fahrenheit, and relative humidity of 27 percent. No wonder so few people bother with towels around here! Good thing they don't have live music, either; the instruments would be crumbling before our eyes.)

Stevenson gave notice of what was coming on the very first point, hitting a big service winner. Second point, she won at the net. Third point, she hit a fault on her first serve, so Weinhold managed a slightly stronger return, but Stevenson hit a winner past her. And then produced another service winner for a love hold.

Weinhold has a bit of an Amanda Coetzer-ish look: Not big, but very solidly built. But she found herself very quickly on the defensive. Put it this way: During the third game, I was at Weinhold's end of the court. Stevenson was twice as far away from me as Weinhold. Even so, Stevenson's backhand (her weaker side) made a louder, more solid noise than Weinhold's forehand. As for Stevenson's forehand -- it was the difference between a lightning bolt and striking sparks from a cat's fur. Stevenson broke at 15 in game two.

Given Weinhold credit for the Jelena Jankovic "I'll crash into anything" attitude. In the first set, she took out one of the side curtains chasing a ball. Give her this, too: She seemed to adjust. In game four, she started to hit the ball away from Stevenson a little more, and hit more balls at her feet, and it earned her a hold, and even a break point in the next game. But Stevenson managed to hold for 4-1.

Then Stevenson seemed to come apart. Weinhold held for 4-2, and Stevenson produced three double-faults in game seven, and was broken.

There are no ballkids today (it's a school day), and I note that Stevenson moves very slowly to retrieve her balls. Few players hurry, but most walk; Stevenson's pace is more of a slow stroll. Maybe a "mosey." Trying to catch her breath? Not sure. (She was sniffling a bit, though, so it's not unlikely. Her eyes also looked a little red, and she coughed a few times.) She finally broke again after a very long game ten that could have gone either way. 6-4, Stevenson.

Stevenson is not only walking slowly, but rather stiffly. If I were walking like that, it would be a sure sign of a backache. Though Stevenson has had so many back problems that it might just be habitual; I don't see any other signs of back problems.

Weinhold's voice is interesting. Much too deep for her size. Not many women that size have voices with such low overtones. I doubt it means anything, but it's unusual.

The second set was a war which could have gone either way. There were several breaks, but they ended up on serve at 6-5. Weinhold then went down 0-30, and faced a match point in that game, but saved it. In the tiebreak, Stevenson went up 6-2, blew more match points, but finally advanced 6-4 7-6.

That was actually the second match on center court. The first was the qualifying final between Madison Brengle and #3 seed Hannah Nooni. To a certain extent, that was power versus variety. Both were quick, but Brengle hit a little harder, and kept the ball in play a little better. Nooni, by the end, was coming in a lot, probably to try to change things up, but she made a few too many errors. And some of her backhand volleys were pretty wobbly, allowing Brengle to hit some good passing shots. Maybe it was surface shift. I don't know where Nooni had been playing before coming here, but her tan was two shades darker than her hair -- it looked like she'd been on an equatorial beach somewhere. Brengle made the main draw 6-3 6-1. The other qualifiers were #2 seed Olga Govortsova (whom I still haven't seen), Stanislava Hrozenska (whom I talked about on Sunday), and Ipek Senoglu (whom I also saw on Sunday).

I had hoped to see some outside court matches at this point, but they were both so close to finishing that I decided to stay at center court to watch #1 seed and defending champion Milagros Sequera take on Angelika Bachmann. I was pretty sure that would be good, anyway, because Sequera is a lot of fun to watch -- quick, plus she's competent anywhere on the court. If she hadn't messed up her knee a few years ago, she would, I suspect, have stayed on the #50-#60 range (as it is, she came here at #83). But it was one of those injuries that cost her not just in recovery time but in rust. You can still see the scar on her knee, too. Plus he had pressure cuffs on both ankles.

Bachmann is a veteran, 27 years old, but whose last WTA match came over a year ago, at Philadelphia 2005, where she lost in the second round to Dementieva. She has spent most of her career in the #150-#250 range. On the other hand, she did make the semifinal at Waikoloa two weeks ago -- her best result in a while -- so maybe she has been working things out. Too bad these two had to face each other in the first round.

Both are right-handed, with two-handed backhands. Bachmann is taller, but quite fit-looking; she seems pretty quick for her height. (She doesn't look anything like her media guide photo, whatever that says). Still, Sequera broke her in game two. Bachmann was just making too many errors, because Sequera was getting everything back. Sequera served amazingly well, too.

Game four brought a scare. Sequera did something, and started feeling her knee, and Bachmann held. I thought Sequera would call the trainer, but she didn't, and held for 4-1. And broke again with a laser into the backhand corner that was right on both lines; 5-1. Another hold, and Sequera had the first set.