Ranking Schmanking

It must drive casual fans nuts when they see that Rafael Nadal could have overtaken the top ranking from Roger Federer if Federer failed to reach the Melbourne semifinals and Rafa won the title. Can’t happen now, but considering that Federer has reached an unprecedented 10 consecutive Grand Slam finals – winning eight – it begs thequestion: Is the ranking system screwed up? How can dominance be so fragile? OK, Nadal has put up some heady numbers and accumulated more ranking points than any of the recent No. 1s (Sampras, Agassi, Hewitt, Safin, Roddick) at No. 2. Federer said it didn’t bother him in his presser Wednesday. “I think it's fair, seriously,” said Federer of the rankings, while also admitting he doesn’t know exactly how it works. Blake also agreed. “It’s not really a system you can bluff your way through,” he said.

Speaking of Blake and Federer, one aspect I simply adored from their high quality match Wednesday night was the pace. Not their shots, but the pace of play. Both go about their business on the court with few pauses. There’s no ball scrutiny, no bouncing 24 times before serving or walking back to the backstop, no string-picking, no jumping up and down, no tugging on pants or brushing back hair. Just get up to the baseline and serve. Wow, how refreshing! It’s as if they were summoning the spirit of Andre and Steffi.

Another observation from last night's Blake-Federer match-up: One of the amazing things about Federer is that he intimidates without being a jerk. He merely operates on his own ethereal plane. He doesn’t need to insulate himself with a large entourage. He doesn’t need to be secretive. He isn’t cool or aloof. Blake described how on the night before his quarterfinal match the two of them ended up at the same restaurant. The hostess made a big deal about asking him if he wanted to be moved to different table, but he didn’t even think about it. They exchanged a friendly hello and went about their business. Federer doesn’t need to rage like Connors or McEnroe (or sometimes Roddick); he doesn’t need a coterie of hand-holders like Navratilova or Serena; he doesn’t have to shield himself like Borg or Henin. It's his play, not his ‘tude.

“He doesn't try to, you know, make himself somewhat unknown or mysterious to the rest of us, what he's doing. He's genuinely a friendly guy….He seems like one of the guys in the locker room. Then you go out there, he beats the crap out of you, you come back in the locker room and he's one of the guys. I mean, it's not intimidation by him being extremely huge muscular, talking down to anybody, being condescending, having any sort of a huge entourage, keeping himself isolated. He's just that good.”

Adios USA

With Venus Williams and the Bryan brothers bowing out Wednesday, all the Americans are out of Melbourne. It’s one of the worst performances at a major in post-1968 Open era history, with not a single U.S. player advancing beyond the quarterfinals in any draw - singles, doubles or mixed. We took home two titles in 2007 - Serena in women’s singles and the Bryans in men’s doubles. The last time zero players from the USA did so poorly at the Australian Open was in 1973, when no Americans entered. The only other time in the Open era that we failed to get to a semifinal in one of the draws was the 2000 French Open. And this isn't dreaded clay.

Fed Express – no, the real one!

By the way, I haven’t only been tracking the tennis, I’ve been eagerly keeping watch on my recording replacement. A few days into the tournament I lost one of favorite new reporting tools, my digital recorder. After the panic subsided, my editor at USA Today trekked to Best Buy and purchased a new one, which he kindly sent since I couldn’t find the same model Down Under. Well, it was supposed to arrive Monday. When it hadn’t shown on Tuesday, I started to worry, and when I saw that it was in Alexandria, I momentarily jumped out of my seat thinking it was still in Virginia! It was a false alarm, but here's how the international shipment wended its way here, according to the FedEx tracking:

Vienna, Va., to Herdon,Va., to Indianapolis to Los Angeles to Honolulu to Alexandria, Australia andfinally to some place called Derrimut Australia.

It finally arrived Wednesday –just in time for the semifinals. Ugh.

Perfection

Finally, on another light note, here was Nadal’s unintentionally vain response when someone asked about his physical condition the other day: “My body is perfect, no?” he said, breaking up the room. “Physically speaking,” he quickly corrected when he realized how his remark could be interpreted. “Nothing (is) perfect.”