John Farley Spotlight on: Andrea Petkovic

John Farley Spotlight on:  Andrea Petkovic

I think many in the WTA tennis world would agree that Andrea Petkovic is one of the friendliest, funniest, playful players on the tour, and has been, at times, one of the best.  I picked up on her a few years ago after reading an article about her coming back from a string of injuries in 2012 and 2013.  I was touched by the article. I was a jock once, so stories about athletes overcoming adversity pull at my heartstrings - they always grab me.

I checked the WTA tournament results from time to time to see how she was doing.  It was the beginning of 2014.  She began winning again and climbing back up the rankings chart.  I visited her website and checked out her videos.  She made me laugh.  I saw the Petko dance.  Here, I thought, is a refreshing personality.

That year she won Charleston (beating Bouchard in the semis and Cepelova in the final), made the semis at Roland Garros, and then won Bad Gastein,  Sofia (taking out Suarez-Navarro, Pironkova, Cibulkova, Muguruza, and Pannetta in the final), and topping off the year winning the WTA World Championship, ending the year #14.  She would go on to win at Antwerp (losing to Clijsters in a good-natured exhibition finale) early in 2015 and regain a spot in the top 10.  She held her spot reaching the semis in Charleston and Miami and the quarters in Eastbourne, but then her game began to slip along with her ranking, rarely getting beyond the third round the rest of 2015.  At the end of the year she proclaimed to be in a midlife crisis but rallied with renewed enthusiasm to take on 2016.  But except for a semi showing in Doha (knocking out Makarova, Vandeweghe, and Muguruza) most of 2016 saw her one and done or two and not thru.

She's obviously struggling now, but we can't omit her contribution over the years to Germany's Fed Cup team, the debacle in Hawaii with the German national anthem notwithstanding.  In the past Fed Cups her ferocity to win for the motherland was often the difference between Germany's winning or losing.  She needs to bring the ferocity she had then to win in the Fed Cups to her tournament matches, where too often over the past year and a half she has played to a different drummer that was pounding out only a tepid beat. That beat has continued into 2017 where she went two and out in Hobart, the Australian Open, and St Petersburg where she had to go through the qualies.

OK, she's not the same player who tore through the draws in 2014 and part of 2015, but I get the feeling she's still got it in her to be a top player. She knows how to win, but she's lost that edge, what I call "the-go-for-the-jugular" factor. It's clear.  She has not been able to put her opponents away. Instances of this abound in her matches in 2016.  Since Indian Wells last March, in 9 of her 17 matches, she won either the first or second set, often the first, but was unable to close it out. Examples:  In Stuttgart, she took the first set from Radwanska 6-1, lost the match.  In the Olympics in Rio, she took the first set from Svitolina 6-2, lost the match.  In Fed Cup against Romania, she took the second set from Halep 7-6, lost the match. However, supporting my claim she could shift into high gear during Fed Cup, after getting bageled in the first set against Niculescu, she comes back to win. She "went for the jugular" and got the win and with it Germany won the tie (in Fedcupese).

What to say though about the Fed Cup match with the USA in Hawaii?  The whole team was rattled by the experience with the insulting national anthem, and none more so than Petkovic.  She had this to say about it:

"I thought it was the epitome of ignorance, and I've never felt more disrespected in my whole life, let alone Fed Cup, and I've played Fed Cup for 13 years now and it is the worst that thing has ever happened to me." 

Immediately after the anthem was sung, she had to go on court.  She lost to Riske. The following day in the reverse singles she was a set up on Vandeweghe and lost.  It would be cruel of me to say, considering the prevailing sentiments set in motion the day before, that she couldn't put her away. The whole German team consciousness was stung. They played under what must have felt like inhospitable circumstances. Concerning evaluating her performance or any of the German players' performances during that tie, I think we just have to forget it.

Although Petkovic has played the past couple of years like she was the poster girl for unforced errors, wilting in the face of adverse momentum swings, and not putting her opponents away when she was up, she still has at 29 an opportunity to rekindle a potential brilliance that has shown brightly over much of her career. She now has a new coach and hopefully a clear, optimistic, and ambitious vision for the year and the rest of her career.  Injuries are always an issue, but I hope when she walks on court this year the number of pounds of physio tape and leg wraps she's bearing are at a minimum. The body may be strong, the movement swift, and the mechanics of performance tight and clean, but ultimately it is in the mind where victory resides.  We wish you well in Indian Wells and onward.  I want see that Petko dance again.

Anyway, that's how I see it.

John Farley Spotlight on: New Metrics? Squeakiest Shoes on Court?

John Farley Spotlight on: New Tennis Metrics?  

Squeakiest Shoes on Court?

There's a new "gig" for the tennis metric folks and that's Tennis Australia's Game Insight Group (GIG), which is taking tennis metrics to a new level to quantify specific dynamics of the game, or taking it possibly to a new level of distraction. The running comparative metrics of matches these days are the familiar:  number of aces, winners, break points saved, serve percentages, and unforced errors. Sometimes on our screens we are shown ball spin rates and the number of meters a player has traveled around the arena in her attempt to land a winner. I say around the arena because sometimes a player is returning a ball from closer to the courtside seats than from the tramlines.  Anyway we get to see how many fewer meters a player with a bandaged thigh has traversed than her unbandaged opponent. Good to know, yes?

GIG thinks there are other metrics the fans and especially the coaches might like to know - the players, I'm not so sure. Anyway GIG's technology is generating now the following metrics:

• Fastest Reaction Time
• Fastest Forehand
• Fastest Backhand
• Speediest on court (the road runner phenomenon)
• Works hardest on each point (work rate - per point energy expended)
• Clutch Serve Index: reveals a player's success or lack thereof in tie breaks, facing break point, and closing out a match.

You might like to know that GIG put it's technology to work to evaluate WTA players during play at Australian Opens 2014-2016 and came up with the following:  Madison Keys led the women in both forehand speed (81.3 mph - 8th overall including men) and in backhand speed (74.6 mph - 7th overall). Our own road runner, Simona Halep was found to be speediest on court.  Barbora Strycova had the highest work rate per shot. Yulia Putintseva had the highest work rate per point. (Seems like the shorter players have to work harder.)  In the "Clutch Serve Index" (the-going-for-the-jugular index), Konta, Serena, and Muguruza came in at the top.  I couldn't find any data for the women on Fastest Reaction Time.  I think these days though the fastest reaction times are needed by the ball kids, lines people, and the chair umpires.

So how does a player consciously put these to work in a match?  The answer is - they don't.  Do they work on improving  these areas on the practice court or on their sports psychologist's couch?  Yes - of course. But during the match, a player looks to get into a flow that integrates their game plan for the opponent with their natural, spontaneous court instincts.  In other words, it's a level of consciousness that transcends statistics. They've heard the metrics, but during play it is the wholeness that takes over. To the extent that it does not, the player is at a disadvantage.
With all that said, I think there are some other metrics that should be considered in analyzing the game and its players.  I offer the following:

• Most Number of Towel Swipes/Episodes per Match ("going to the towel")
• Slowest to the Net to Shake Hands
• Most Friendly and Sincere Handshake at Net
• Most Annoying Service Routine
• Squeakiest Shoes on Court
• Most Distracting Waiting-for-Serve Motions
• Most Bites of Banana During Sit-Downs/Change of Ends
• Most Hair-Fixing Episodes per Match 
• Weirdest Looking Glasses on Court 
• Most Distracting Eye Makeup
• Most Articulate During On-Court Interview 
• Most Profanities Per Point Lost or Per Set Lost

I think these metrics are important.  For example, if you know your opponent is in the top 5 in "going for the towel" you'll know you'll have more time to rest between points. If she's among the top in Most Friendly and Sincere Handshake at Net, you know you'll be somewhat comforted if you lose. Knowing these new metrics can be quite practical.
Now, as you look over these new metrics certain players might pop into your mind.  So let me know which players on the WTA tour you think might be among the top players in these new metrics. To prime the pump on this a bit, I offer a few names:

• Weirdest Looking Glasses on Court - Flipkens?
• Most Profanities Per Point Lost or Per Set Lost - Vandeweghe?
• Most Annoying Service Routine - Konta? 
• Most Hair-Fixing Episodes per Match - Kuznetsova?

So there you go.  Let's hear from you, and then I'll post the results.

No doubt the new metrics out of he Game Insight Group can generally be quite useful, but I question what effect knowing them going into a match might have on a player's psychology.  For example, would a player want to know that she is ranked 112th on tie breaks going into a tie break or ranked 67th in court speed and she's about to play Simona Halep.  But if you know your opponent up next on the draw is in the top 5 for Squeakiest Shoes, you could simply throw some earplugs into your bag. Now that's a useful metric.

Anyway, that's how I see it.