I have no idea how many (if any) tennis fans are out there, but I thought I would make this thread with hopes that some people will respond/discuss the upcoming and ongoing major tournaments this year, since it could be a very interesting one. I thought i would create it after watching the Australian Open final. What an unbelievable rivalry with Nadal and Federer. I play tennis, and i played some competitive tennis in my younger days...but these guys are not human. They're too good.

A few open questions: Do you think that Nadal will beat Sampras' record of 14 slams? Can Federer ever beat Nadal again in a major?

cheers,
Matt

i would say nadal will surpass sampras, but everybody thought fed was a deadlock to do it and who knows if he'll ever get past nadal before he plateaus and falls off like sampras did.

i will say that i hated nadal for a long time but i respect him a lot more now. being a complete sampras apologist ive always liked guys that can hammer the hell out of it, which is why the fact that roddick blows so epically always pisses me off. the day he wins another grand slam is the day i suck off a goat. the guy is awful against good players. i wanted him to be my favorite player so bad but i probably hate him more than anybody on tour right now, even andy murray, and thats saying something.

my favorite "newcomer" id say is del potro. i love how he plays. big, booming groundstrokes with a serve that makes you recoil. and fernando gonzalez, who i got to see play at the french open last year, is another. i saw mark philippoussis play at the us open in the 90's, and his serve probably had more pop than anybody i've seen, but gonzo's forehand is fucking NUTS. there's this mini sonic boom every time he smacks it. love watching him play.

I like Del Potro too. Also, the newcomer from Spain that made it all the way to the semifinals of the Australia Open...he's got some potential, that's for sure.

The only way that I see Federer win the French is if Nadal gets hurt and can't play in the tournament. As long as Nadal is there I can't see Federer defeating him. Kinda like all those years that Andy played Federer...just can't beat the guy.

*edit Andy Roddick that is...i'm thinking about all those epic losses during Wimbledon and the US open mostly...

Viva Gonzales.He is good and a cool guy.Rios was a fucker but a good player.Gonzales will win one grand slam.Im sure of it.

I have this thing with Spanish players that play epic games and are mainly clay plyers. I was a big, big fan of Juan Carlos Ferrero. But ever since I first saw Nadal play, there's only one man for me. I respect Federer a lot, but I don't really enjoy watching him. I mean, you can enjoy the beautiful, near perfect tennis. But I don't know, there's something substantially lacking that I do find in Ferrero & Nadal.
I watched last year's Wimbledon's final in a great pub in Spain and it was so awesome. Great memories from that game. I never thought he'd stand a chance on grass. But seeing as he has now won grand slams against Federer on grass & hard court, I don't know how people will stop him.
The thing I am wondering is how long he will be able to play that game. Physically it must be exhausting for his body. If you hear that in wintertime, he can hardly run, you start thinking. Don't know...

oh dear god don't get me started on rios. i can't imagine hating a single player more in the history of sports. everything about him reeked of "fucker."

I'm so glad rios never won a grand slam...thank fucking god.

Hey Parchy...how do you feel about Hewitt? I personally don't care for him, and it's strange to me that he won Wimbledon, just doesn't sound right to my ears.

hewitt's kind of like water to me. his game has no personality. i've heard he's kind of an ass at times on tour, but on the court there's nothing to really get excited about. he's small and scrappy, but he's a weak player. he errs more on the side of speedster but he's not a clay court guy. its weird.

hewitt got lucky with wimbledon (and his 01 us open title). he snuck into the spotlight in that power vacuum between the sampras/agassi/ivanisevic etc eras ending and the nadal/fed eras beginning. he beat nalbandian in the 02 wimbledon finals for crissake. nobody is going to be that lucky again in a very long time. if somebody squeezes by federer or nadal, they're going to be a whole lot better than hewitt. and whaddaya know, he hasn't graced a slam final since 05 i think. and he lost to friggin safin.

I was lucky because I started loving/playing tennis around 90-91. So i was able to see and appreciate the legends like Connors, Becker, Mcenroe, and Lendl. I also saw the rise of Agassi, Sampras and a bunch of other stars. 2001-2003 was the dark ages for me in terms of tennis...i stopped playing for a while, and I was nostalgic and missed the players that i grew up watching (of course Agassi being the exception). After watching the 03 US open final between Ferrero and Roddick, i was worried for the sport of tennis. It was one of the biggest letdowns in terms of the stage they were playing in. I mean damn...i didn't even watch the wimbledon finals in 2002.

This period of time is exciting for me, and in the past 2 years i've started playing tennis regularly again

Haha.Rios,for us,is our kind of Kurt Cobain.He was indiferent (he usually sayed a phrase that is :"No estoy ni ahi",that minds like nevermind.)and youth took him like and example.But his was incredible.

i need to get back into it. its been almost a year since i last played. and i agree, the early 00's were the dark ages of the sport. even now there's no real compelling characters. they're all just kind of 'blah.' federer is boring and nadal is just kind of a machine. i think i just need an american to get behind, and they all suck right now.

and i never really knew this, but looking up that 01 us open when hewitt dropped sampras in straights, it was only sampras' fourth lost slam final. he was 14-4 in those. what a badass

I was really sad when Sampras and Agassi retired. I grew up with them, you know? Agassi's great run at the US open in 06 and his final win against bagdathis (spelling??) at the us open 07 are some of my favorite memories in tennis

watched james blake BARELY get past sam effin querry in the quarters of the SAP open. and i had such high hopes for him...

roddick is on the other side of the draw and should get another meaningless atp tourney trophy to add to his shelf next to that lonely us open guy. its funny how, when the competition has gradually increased over the last three or four years, roddick's gotten worse. funny how that works. one win over nadal? 2004. one grand salami title? 2003. and i don't know when roddick got his two wins over fed in his 18 TRIES, but im sure federer was sick or briefly missing a limb or temporarily blind.

i honestly dont know who taught him fundamentals, but for somebody with a serve like that to have absolutely no net game is criminal. jimmy connors

did I hear correctly? Murray just beat Nadal?

Nadal was injured, but it was pleasant anyway.

It's pretty silly that some people give no credence to Murray beating Nadal in any tournament - it's a big effort. I'm sure the world's best player doesn't want to lose anytime.

However, he won't get anywhere the respect he desires until he does it in a major. US Open this year looks to be his best chance.

I agree with you, and I also think Murray will only get better at Wimbledon IMHO. He would have to play absolutely insane to beat Federer or Nadal, but I think Murray can go far in this tournament this year.

I'm willing to give Murray all the credit he deserves and he's a good player, I like him a lot, but come on, even Murray himself said the scoreline is not a correct reflection of the game. Even on one working leg, Nadal managed to win the second set. In the 3rd he just cracked.

Anyway, I'm learning here that I have a totally different perspective on tennis than you guys. I was very glad the Sampras-Agassi era was over. And I have so much fun in that prick Roddick that it's hilarious.

yeah but you weren't a fan of either player, were you? its like a red sox fan telling a yankee fan that he's glad its not 2001 anymore. well, duh, the yankees kicked ass then, and you're a two-time world champ now. its kinda like that with nadal/federer fans now.

plus, when the guy you hitch your cart to in the present is a complete and utter fuckup, its hard not to pine for the days when your tennis starts didn't fold against good players. i like nadal but me rooting for him is just front-running at this point, hence my desire for another sampras to come along that i can get behind at the ground level.

I understand.