When Blake was "on" you were in for a real treat. He could play the most crowd pleasing amazing how the hell did he do that tennis. But he was inconsistent. He hit the ball so hard and so flat there was zero margin for error. He did add more variety and more consistency to his game but he just couldn't crack into the elite level of those 3 or 4 guys that always showed up in the quarters and semis. But to say he didn't live up to expectations is garbage. How many people get to say they spent a few years in the top 10 on the ATP. Not too many. I love watching James crack that forehand.
Blake actually used to trouble Rafa quite a lot back then (if I remember right, he won all of their first 3 meetings). Problem in general was he was too hit & miss.
James I think never realized his potential his playing style I think if he real made it an effort to attack and move forward could beat anyone on tour today he had a great serve great forehand his backhand grip should be modified to more of a bit more spin friendly grip but other than that he could beat anyone on tour today with the right guidance and I don't think he ever had that
huge forehand but he played wayyy to risky... never really won anything, he reminds me of a gimped gonzalez, but then again gonzalez didnt do that much but he was my favorite
Good video BUT I have to make one complaint. I feel it is misleading to put the name of the video '...Amazing Forehands!' when the title card CLEARLY said '...Awesome Forehand!' and therefore demand my internets back. I clicked on this video expecting a fine selection of forehands that were 'amazing' but instead was faced with forehands nothing short of 'awesome' and in the singular form.
Depends mostly on his current health and level of commitment Players his age generally begin to lose motivation to compete at the top level. He's close to retirement age, has millions of dollars and probably beautiful women stalking him. In his prime, the best he was able to manage was a few quarterfinal appearances at grandslams and a masters final. It's difficult to see him improving on past performances at this stage, just being realistic although I'd certainly love to see it.
For precisely that same reason. He hits like a madman. When it goes in, its great! But that's a big IF. He's a shot-maker and some of his shots look spectacular because of it. But he has this go-for-broke, all or nothing style that makes him very inconsistent. There is no way to be consistent enough to win a grandslam (which is 7 rounds of 5-set tennis against the best player in the world) with Blake's playing style.
You can see how much Nadal struggles against big hitters in this video. Blake' only problem was; lack of consistency; reason why he would get beaten easily in the end. Djokovic is a prime example of someone who can sustain big hitting in the match.
James is one of those players with the tools but not the intangibles. He could not win a 5 set match to save his life. Reason being, he's great at homer in but he has hard time with singles.
he never won on anything but hard courts since he was nothing but a hard court specialist who never made an effort to win on anything but hard courts;he never made 1 slam semis and never won a master
Blake had the weapons, the 1st serve, the forehand, a stable kick serve and an okay backhand not to mention the speed. Most of his issues were errors and his emotions on court. One of my faves!! I'd take his forehand over Roddick's any day.
@captainbryce1 yea lol from 2000-2002 Roddick and Blake were virtually the exact same player, massive forehands and serves and great foot speed. Blake though obviously had a bigger fh and roddick had a bigger serve
I do. Roddick's foot speed has always been "average" as far as tennis players in the top 10 go. The proof of that come from just watching his matches against any other player that has a strong forehand and a weak backhand. Check out any of his matches against Federer. Look at how many times during a rally Federer has time to run around his backhand and hit a forehand against Roddick. Roddick on the other hand has to hit mostly backhands because he doesn't have the speed to run around.
@lolzooweemama There are already several videos of Fernando Gonzalez on here. "Just type in Fernando Gonzalez : World's best forehand in tennis". So far, that one is the best I've seen.
Yes, it's true...but the score said RF vs FG 6/3 5/7 5/2...thats the difference beetween a n.1 and a great player: it seems like RF is doing nothing exceptional, but he easily wins...
