Been
very busy lately. The last week and change has been full of a daily
regimen of laying at a beach, or a pool, or taking in island views.
But something weird still ended up in my luggage for vacation:
And
there have been some pro developments worth noting between my light
afternoon hit and the hot tub. I know, rubbing this in is not classy
at all. Which reminds me of my massage at noon:
1.
I haven't seen the Rafael Nadal/Novak Djokovic China Open final yet,
but I have seen the scoreline -- 6-2, 6-2. Yowsuh. Because of his
recent struggles, Rafael Nadal is the subject of much speculation.
Does he still have it? Can he still compete with the best? Is it
finally time to consider a haircut? But his response to these
trouncings he's getting from Djokovic will be interesting to see.
It's not the first time Nadal has found himself struggling in a
rivalry. For a couple years, he came up short to Roger Federer at
Wimbledon especially, and he tweaked his game to change that. He
might have to do a bit more than tweak in this situation, because
Djokovic seems to be getting better and better. He is a fluke French
Open loss away from holding all the Grand Slam cards for 2015. Of
course, in the middle of a year, that's not an accomplishment that
can be fully realized, but here we are. So what can Nadal do to
reverse this? Let's ask Djokovic:
"I
knew that he's going to make mistakes and he's going to give me
shorter balls so I can dominate the rallies, which happened."
That
from his post-match press conference, according to tennis
writer Carole
Bouchard. So can Nadal flatten out his shots? Is he going to man
up that serve at all?
Oh,
sorry. I was just asking the questions. I don't have the answer.
2.
Serena Williams decided to shut it down for the year and everybody
lost their mind. Me? It's like, "meh." Frankly, this
nonsense about her being engaged to Drake is a bit more unsettling. I
mean, he was on Degrassi, guys. Does this bother anyone else but me?!
3.
However, whatever happened to all this talk of a shorter calendar for
ATP and WTA tournaments? Is pushing back the Australian Open by a
couple weeks supposed to make everything better? I just realized that
even though it's October and there are still seven tournaments left,
not including Shanghai, which starts this week. With Serena out of
the WTA year-ending event, and other good players (Victoria Azarenka,
Maria Sharapova, Garbine Mugaruza) pulling up lame, here's another
question: Who wants to see a year-ending tournament without the
players who made the regular season interesting?
I
think I got this answer: No one, that's who.
