{"id":1146,"date":"2010-03-18T01:38:07","date_gmt":"2010-03-18T05:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/?p=1146"},"modified":"2010-03-18T01:38:07","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T05:38:07","slug":"isner-or-querrey-wholl-go-farther","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/isner-or-querrey-wholl-go-farther\/","title":{"rendered":"Isner or Querrey \u2013 Who\u2019ll Go Farther?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"float:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/view.picapp.com\/default.aspx?term=isner querrey&#038;iid=8045387\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cdn.picapp.com\/ftp\/Images\/c\/1\/c\/b\/Sam_Querrey_and_9649.jpg?adImageId=11380922&#038;imageId=8045387\" width=\"234\" height=\"175\"  border=\"0\" alt=\"Sam Querrey and John Isner\"\/><\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"clear:left;height:0px;overflow: hidden;\"><\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"http:\/\/cdn.pis.picapp.com\/IamProd\/PicAppPIS\/JavaScript\/PisV4.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Sorry, just getting my feet wet at Indian Well so I missed <b>Novak Djokovic<\/b> going down tamely to <b>Ivan Ljubicic<\/b> today on an outer court. I was riveted to the <b>Rafael Nadal<\/b> and <b>John Isner<\/b> match.<\/p>\n<p>See that image above? <b>Isner<\/b> (on the right) is three inches taller than <b>Sam Querrey<\/b> but look how much longer his limbs are. I\u2019d love to see a tale of the tape comparison between those two like they do for boxers. And I\u2019m curious. Who\u2019ll go farther \u2013 Isner or Querrey? <\/p>\n<p>First, let\u2019s look at the match. Long about 5-5 in the first set I\u2019m surprised by how much Isner goes for his shots and how good his forehand is. Here\u2019s Rafa\u2019s take on his game:<\/p>\n<p><i>He has good movement around the court. He can improve his volley but he volleys well and he has a very good forehand so it\u2019s gonna be really difficult to stop him if he keeps improving.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Okay, so I\u2019ll give Isner the edge over Querrey for movement. With Isner serving at 5-5 in the first set, Rafa tightened the noose a bit. He hit a deep return that Isner flubbed and then hit a net cord that drew Isner to the net whereupon Rafa passed him. Bad luck but it\u2019s all in the timing at the top level of tennis and Rafa is a master at it.<\/p>\n<p>Isner suffered through the usual lull after a first set loss \u2013 why is it that a tall tall player hanging his head looks so mournful compared to a shorty? \u2013 but he managed to hold on long enough for Rafa to play a horrible game in the fourth game of the second set to go up a break. As someone in the media center blurted out, \u201cBlimey.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Isner took the second set but lost his serve early in the third set and here\u2019s the problem: Isner is ranked #48 in converting break points while Querrey is #10. Isner couldn\u2019t put enough pressure on Rafa to break him and when he did try, he repeatedly overhit. Match to Rafa in three sets.<\/p>\n<p>Querrey has played Rafa three times and every time he\u2019s taken a set off him. Querrey beat Isner for the Memphis title this year but Isner beat Querrey here in the third round. Querrey is probably the better clay court player but Isner has already passed Querrey for career high ranking by two places at #20.<\/p>\n<p>They look like twins to me and given the current state of tennis in the U.S. and its long in the tooth top players, maybe the question isn\u2019t who\u2019ll be better but do either of these players have a chance of matching <b>Andy Roddick<\/b>\u2019s run at the top? And can either bring home a slam?<\/p>\n<p>If they\u2019d both turned up at the same time Roddick came along, yes, they\u2019d have a chance because they have better all court games than Roddick and only slightly worse serves. I\u2019ll give them a few slam semifinals on hard court and a some hard court Masters titles but there are too many all court players with incredible reflexes for me to give them any more.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m gonna say that Roddick and <b>James Blake<\/b> will be replaced by two players who\u2019ll consistently hang around between #10 and #20 but they won\u2019t touch their forebears combined record for appearances in the final eight at the year end tournament.<\/p>\n<p><a href=http:\/\/twitter.com\/ninarota>twitter.com\/ninarota<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sorry, just getting my feet wet at Indian Well so I missed Novak Djokovic going down tamely to Ivan Ljubicic today on an outer court. I was riveted to the Rafael Nadal and John Isner match. See that image above? Isner (on the right) is three inches taller than Sam Querrey but look how much [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1146","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}