Andy's Misurray

Andy Murray played well.

He didn't collapse, he didn't choke, he didn't get in his own head and take himself out of the match.

He kept battling despite falling all over the tennis court, despite possibly having ankle and/or back issues, despite definitely being worn out.

Unfortunately for Murray, he was playing against the best of all time at more or less his best. Roger Federer was once again on fire, scorching first serves in play at a high percentage, moving like he was 25 and doing everything right at the net.

So now Federer has won seven Wimbledons, as much as any other man. He's won 17 Grand Slams, adding to his already-record total.

But this day wasn't about Federer's winning, as masterful as it was to watch. It was about Murray being 0-1 in Wimbledon finals, and how that loss led to this.



For those of us that love sports, speeches like Murray's are the second reason we come up with when we explain our love for them. The first we think of, of course, is the elation we see and feel when our favorite teams win. But this emotional response, this ache that comes from losing, but this respect of your opponent and knowledge that you couldn't have done more, is really the best.

Somebody always loses. That never feels good. Losing in a championship is often described as a worse feeling than winning the championship is a good feeling. But to lose with the class Murray does, to care as much as Murray clearly did, is what really makes this great. Where else does that happen than in sports?

My favorite part of the clip: When Murray addresses the crowd, and says this:

And last of all to you guys. Everybody always talks about the pressure of playing at Wimbledon, how tough it is. But it's not the people watching, they make it so much easier to play. The support has been incredible, so thank you.

Everybody knows Britain wants the Wimbledon trophy to stay at home pretty badly. But man, the love those fans gave Murray throughout the match and during and after his speech, even though he failed to accomplish what they wanted, was unbelievable. It was one of the coolest things I've seen in sports in quite awhile.

It was one of the coolest things I've seen in awhile. Period. And that's why sports rule.

"You were sensational today"

http://img.bleacherreport.net/img/images/photos/001/778/666/147828158_crop_exact.jpg?w=650&h=440&q=75
"You were sensational today."

With those words, the British cat doing post-match interviews at Wimbledon summed a match up, and reminded us what we used to see all the time from Roger Federer.

Federer's semifinal match with Novak Djokovic, aside from a thrilling third set, was mostly boring. One of the two players got a break, and was not broken back. For the first time in a long time, it was one of the business-as-usual matches that was routinely seen from Federer in his hay-day, when I got into tennis.

Djokovic perhaps did not play at his top level. He didn't seem to have the willingness to brawl that has made him the No. 1 player in the world Friday morning. But that's also because Federer played such a dominant match, he never could get comfortable.

It's the type of thing that doesn't happen often anymore in men's tennis. Typically when we see a phenomenal individual effort, it's coming from Djokovic or Nadal, and it comes in a form very different than that exhibited this morning. When those two are at their best, it manifests as an unwillingness to break, this sort of invincibility to losing even individual points. With Federer, it is more like total control and comfort with everything happening.

That was there today. Federer's serve was landing, his forehands were crisp, his slice backhand was landing deep and bringing him back into points. His greatness took Djokovic's fight out of the equation.

Whether that will be there Sunday to the same degree is yet to be seen, and is unlikely. But it's good to be reminded every once in awhile what the greatest really can be.

The Rafapocalypse

It was getting to be nighttime in London. Rafael Nadal had just dominated the fourth set of a second round match at Wimbledon. Everyone spectating at Center Court and watching on TV was shocked that Nadal was even involved in a fourth set, let alone that he needed to win just to stay alive and force a fifth set. Nadal doesn't have trouble with players in the second round of a tennis tournament. He hardly has trouble with the rest of the top 10. But there he was, hurting against Lukas Rozol, and then responding with a dominant set to force a fifth, like he always does. Forcing a fifth, that final set where most matches don't go, where most players lose gas but Nadal (and Djokovic) lose nothing. So we assumed it would just be an early match where Nadal got some trouble, but overcame it, won and then trounced his next four opponents.

But then something strange happened. With darkness coming in a little under an hour, the powers that be at the All-England club decided to halt the match before starting the fifth set so they could close the roof on Center Court and play an uninterrupted set. So the players waited for 45 minutes to play. Then, as seems to happen all the time in tennis, the player with the momentum was bested after the break. Rozol broke Nadal in the very first game of the set, and was never threatened with a break back. Nadal didn't even take him to deuce during a single service game. Rafa lost his earliest match at a Grand Slam event since 2005, when he was 19 and still only great on clay.

Nadal, the invincible competitor, was outplayed by Lukas Rozol. And it's not like it was an unlucky draw in the second round against an up-and-comer or a great grass court player. Rozol is 26 and has never even played in the main draw at Wimbledon until this year. In 2011, he was ousted in the first round of Wimbledon qualifying.

I don't know how to explain how this happened. The top four (and really six) men's tennis players have basically been invincible against the lesser players, to the point that it would have been boring if their matches against each other weren't fantastic. Rafa broke that spell, and not with a loss to somebody in the top 15 who played a great match when Rafa wasn't at his best. This loss was to a nobody. It doesn't make sense.

But I know how I would like to explain it. Rafael Nadal is still not an all-court player. His game has evolved an incredible amount over the years, but it still isn't the complete game that other players (ahem...Roger Federer) have displayed across every surface. His hustle and will have taken him beyond his pretty prodigious skill level.

That last paragraph, of course, is ridiculous. But when you think about the discussion for greatest players of all time, isn't this loss the type of thing that makes a difference? This type of thing hasn't been happening to Roger Federer over a much longer span of years. It hasn't happened to Djokovice in years. Andy Murray and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga overcame a bit of adversity today.

Rafa will be back. But today, there's only confusion.