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**freddystone** · 05-28-2009, 03:09 PM

I don't know if I understand why everyone's saying James Blake "isn't trying" in his matches. That seems to me to be a misrepresentation of his statement. And wasn't he just in a clay court final? He said Americans don't prepare for the French Open as much because they're focusing on preparing for other tournaments. Is this not a description of the second half of Pete Sampras' career? He really telegraphed in some poor results there after 1996.

And I'm not terribly pleased with the selective reporting either. I just watched some of and read the transcript of the interview and the message I'm getting is not "I didn't try." He was asked a question about why US men don't handle best-of-five-set matches on clay well. James countered that by mentioning some good Davis Cup results (by Andy Roddick) but James, being James, tries to be diplomatic and suggests reasons why U.S. men haven't done well. He's not making excuses, he's stating a fact. But seriously, people here have a problem with the notion that Andy Roddick would take his Wimbledon preparation more seriously than his French Open prep?

A few reactions.

First, thank you for highlighting the issue of selective reporting. We as tennis fans need to be a bit more vigilant about reading entire transcripts of such interviews... And then making our judgments. You could easily pull one sentence out of a perfectly fine interview when considering the whole context and yet twist it into something that is completely contrary to the player's real intent. I don't know if that's the case here, but it's a possibility.

Second, I saw most of that match. James put forth a horrific effort. I would argue that he tried, and nothing was working, so he ended up saying, more or less, WTF?

Third, these types of questions should be reserved for the USTA, not James. I think they're trying to make some progress on this front via player development. But it's going to take time. You not only have to have the influence of capable coaches with a claycourt mindset; you also have to have talent that's comparable to the rest of the field and the mindset of a winner. It's going to take time before the USTA is going to be able to develop an arsenal of players who combine those three characteristics.

05-28-2009, 03:09 PM	#27
freddystone Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 652 Senior Member	I don't know if I understand why everyone's saying James Blake "isn't trying" in his matches. That seems to me to be a misrepresentation of his statement. And wasn't he just in a clay court final? He said Americans don't prepare for the French Open as much because they're focusing on preparing for other tournaments. Is this not a description of the second half of Pete Sampras' career? He really telegraphed in some poor results there after 1996. And I'm not terribly pleased with the selective reporting either. I just watched some of and read the transcript of the interview and the message I'm getting is not "I didn't try." He was asked a question about why US men don't handle best-of-five-set matches on clay well. James countered that by mentioning some good Davis Cup results (by Andy Roddick) but James, being James, tries to be diplomatic and suggests reasons why U.S. men haven't done well. He's not making excuses, he's stating a fact. But seriously, people here have a problem with the notion that Andy Roddick would take his Wimbledon preparation more seriously than his French Open prep? A few reactions. First, thank you for highlighting the issue of selective reporting. We as tennis fans need to be a bit more vigilant about reading entire transcripts of such interviews... And then making our judgments. You could easily pull one sentence out of a perfectly fine interview when considering the whole context and yet twist it into something that is completely contrary to the player's real intent. I don't know if that's the case here, but it's a possibility. Second, I saw most of that match. James put forth a horrific effort. I would argue that he tried, and nothing was working, so he ended up saying, more or less, WTF? Third, these types of questions should be reserved for the USTA, not James. I think they're trying to make some progress on this front via player development. But it's going to take time. You not only have to have the influence of capable coaches with a claycourt mindset; you also have to have talent that's comparable to the rest of the field and the mindset of a winner. It's going to take time before the USTA is going to be able to develop an arsenal of players who combine those three characteristics.
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