At the beginning of August of this year, my wife told me to leave a particular Friday evening open at the end of the month because she had gotten tickets to go to Broadway play in NYC. I love theater, so I didn’t ask much and just looked forward to a night out of town at the end of a hard worked summer. The day came, and we hit the road early in that Friday afternoon. As we were about to get onto one of the big bridges in NY, my wife started facing her phone at me while filming me and went on to tell me that thanks to a connection from Rogelio, we were not really going to a play, but that we were heading to the US Open to watch the men’s semifinals!!!! I thought that she was joking, and because of that, she has a video of me showing no emotion regarding getting to go to watch Alcaraz and Medvedev!!! She is going to make fun of me for the rest of my life with that video.
The match was incredible. The atmosphere that these two charismatic guys brought to such a big stadium clearly kept everyone in awe regarding the levels of shot making ability, athleticism, and power that mixed with the emotions and the fist pumps made for a masterpiece of where the game is and where the game is heading. What impressed ME the most was the simple fact that both of these warriors were running for literally EVERY ball regardless of how impossible it seemed. These guys have full bank accounts, and they have thousands of loyal fans, but the three plus hours of tennis that I got to watch showed me how humble they both are about putting the best possible fight for every single point despite a whole hot summer of big events on the US hardcourt circuit. It takes a lot of love for the game and a lot of humbleness to chase that yellow ball for so many hours with so many emotions and distractions involved. The fact of the matter is that the show that I got to enjoy and learn from can only be witnessed if many many hours take place behind the scenes with that resilient and almost crazy demeanor that EVERY ball needs to be chased. Watching these guys made me look back at my early days as a hitting partner with Venus and Serena (when they were 11 and 13 years old), and the clear and constant reinforcement that Richard had towards them running for EVERYTHING in practice (including the out balls!!!).
Creating higher levels of accountability during matches is a priority for our program in regard to our players and coaches, and we start this work by continuously reinforcing the goal of reaching every single ball in one bounce and not letting an opponent get away with a clean winner without our player giving that particular ball his/her best effort. I know that we are going to make a difference with this, and I am looking forward for the results to start finding a way to materialize from these humble and hard-working habits that we continue to bring to the table week in and week out.
