Tennis parents, self-doubt and invisible wedgies

Rafael Nadal is a telenovela. From the second he appears on court he radiates intensity — and all he’s doing is walking to his chair. I’d call him a bad actor except that he isn’t acting. TV audiences are familiar with his obsessive-compulsive rituals: he spreads out his towel, lines up his beverages on the floor and adjusts them so all the labels are facing the same way, then opens a foil pack with his teeth. (Why doesn’t he just apply his enormous arms to the task? Will their power cause the stuff in the foil to shoot out like ninja shuriken and kill random audience members?)

By the time Nadal finishes arranging his temporary nest to his satisfaction his opponent is warming up. Suddenly Rafa leaps from his seat and starts jogging in place, his ginormous thighs pumping in long white drawers. Gone are the Capri pants he sported early in his career. His Day-Glo green shirt has sleeves now, concealing his massive biceps lest his opponent expire from fear. Upon his face is a look of determination so grim his facial muscles seem determined to batter the other guy into submission. Then, wielding his racquet like a bludgeon, he takes his spot on the court. If the opponent knows what’s good for him he would surrender now.

Except that the other guy has owned Rafa for the past year. Until 2011 Novak Djokovic was not what you would call a tenacious competitor. He was kind of an ass, actually, and I don’t mean his clowning around or his quite accurate impressions of Nadal, Sharapova, Boris Becker and other players. On several occasions Djokovic retired from matches he was losing, claiming ailments that never seemed to flare up when he was leading. Later, in the press conference, he would have the gall to say he had the match under control.

Then there were his stage parents — not his fault of course, but we still took them against him. They were not nearly as awful as Mary Pierce’s father, and who knows what Martina Hingis’s relationship with her coach/mom was really like, but they were loud in both the auditory and visual senses. Mr. Djokovic’s decision to sit courtside wearing a shirt with his son’s face on it, sprouting out of the midsection like the creature in Total Recall, was deplorable.

The Djoker who turned up at tournaments in late 2010 was an upgraded version, stronger and steadier. By 2011 when he’d collected his second major and was on a 40-game streak, pundits were attributing Djoko 2.0 to his new gluten-free diet. This diet supposedly led to a dramatic improvement in his physical conditioning (no more running out of breath), which led to a more positive mindset (no more tanking or whining), which resulted in the streak. Later there was talk of an egg-like chamber that hastened recovery from physical stress. Questions about the performance-enhancing benefits of this chamber were thankfully not pursued.

Shunning gluten may have been a great idea but all the diets, regimens and psychological treatments cannot produce something that isn’t there. After four years of waiting in the wings as an understudy in the Federer-Nadal show, Djokovic had opened a hit of his own.

The winning streak was ended at Roland Garros by Roger Federer, who then followed the usual script by losing to Nadal in the final. Every Federite has his/her own theory as to why Federer loses to Nadal when in theory he has the weapons to neutralize the Spaniard’s blunt force game. These prescriptions range from the comparative weakness of The Fed’s one-handed backhand to a lack of competitive fire (In his prime he never really had to summon it up). Certainly Federer is not Federer when it’s Nadal across the net. He cannot — or does not — bring his best game, he is forced to engage in baseline rallies with the tireless Spaniard. It must be disheartening after trading 20 shots to hit what should be an outright winner, only to have it come back to you with extra topspin. If watching baseline rallies on TV makes your eyelids grow heavy, imagine what playing them must be like. You zone out for a second and there goes the point.

So The Fed, stymied, starts thinking too much instead of just doing what he’s done countless times against other opponents. With overthinking comes doubt. (The icy exterior must conceal turbulence; why else would he cry so often in public?) While it pleases me to think that my two favorite tennis players, Federer and Marat Safin (now a future president of Russia), are masses of self-doubt, I would rather that The Fed beat Nadal comprehensively and remove the asterisk lurking beside his Greatest Of All Time title.

The Australian Open men’s final between Djokovic and Nadal starts at 1930hrs. Djoko is in white, Nadal in chartreuse. Judging from the number of flags and the decibels produced by the cheering sections, the crowd at the Rod Laver Arena is largely pro-Rafa.

Djokovic seems tight — is he feeling the effects of the five-hour semifinal against Murray? Nadal seems relaxed, or as relaxed as a walking telenovela can be. Before long the tic/ritual manifests itself. Nadal reaches behind him to pick his shorts out of his butt — an unnecessary action as we can see through his white shorts that the wedgie is imaginary. Then he brings his fingers to his nose, sniffs them, and with the same fingers adjusts his hair behind his ears.

This behavior is not unusual among children — my friend’s son does the same thing constantly, but he is six years old. Has the regime of coach Uncle Toni kept Rafa fixed at the age of six?

It’s touching and distressing to think that this big, strapping 25-year-old who can reduce opponents to pudding is still a child.

Perhaps that is the secret of successful athletes. Do what you’ve been trained to do. Don’t ask why. Don’t think of anything else. Sport is your life. Outside this court there is nothing. When you start asking questions, you let the world in.

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Thanks to Lacoste and Stores Specialists Inc. for bringing us to the Australian Open. We had to get up from our front-row seats after the first set of the men’s final to get to the airport in time for the day’s only flight to Manila. The match was still going on as we boarded the plane. As you all know, Novak Djokovic defeated Rafael Nadal in the longest men’s final in grand slam history.