Nadal’s Knees vs. The Media Machine

Please, no más.  I’ve hit the wall.  I’m up to my eyeballs with the growing tendency of some (not all) members of the sports media to build up an athlete, attributing to them preternatural powers and unsurpassed stamina, but when that athlete inevitably demonstrates that they are, after all, only human, the sharks start to circle.  (This happens with nearly all mass media – today’s media darling is tomorrow’s media whipping boy – but I’ll focus on the sports media for the sake of simplicity.)

As a perfect illustration of this irritating phenomenon, I give you Rafael Nadal, currently ranked by the ATP as the Number 1 men’s tennis player in the world.   This is the man upon whom the media has bestowed a number of nicknames: The King of Clay, El Toro, El Jefe, The Matador, The Beast.  Take your pick – they’re all a little obsequious.  Apparently, several in Sports Media Land have decided that his 4th round loss in the 2009 French Open is an indicator that “The King of Clay” has, ahem, feet of clay.

A June 11, ‘09 post in the LA Times Sports Section’s The Fabulous Forum takes Rafa and Team Nadal to task for Rafa’s 2009 clay court tournament schedule, which admittedly has been grueling – can’t argue with that.  But the timing and the tone of this “constructive” criticism is more than a little galling to this tennis fan, given that it follows on the heels of several days of innuendo being churned out by the sports media: Rafa beat a hasty retreat from Paris because he’s devastated and/or sulking; subsequent rumors about his knee troubles were part of a strategy engineered by his coach/uncle Toni Nadal to give an emotionally shattered Rafa time to recover; Rafa’s in the early stages of mental and/or physical burnout…blah, blah, blah and a big Bronx Cheer.

Come on – the media got its usual post-match press conference.  True, it was a more subdued occasion than usual, but that’s not exactly a surprise.  Rafa lost, he congratulated his opponent, he admitted that he didn’t play his best tennis.  No sobbing, no histrionics, no mention of painful knee problems – probably because he would consider it unsportsmanlike.  Instead, he seemed to be attempting to remove himself from the limelight that rightfully belonged to Robin Soderling.  To the victor go the spoils.

Rafa’s subsequent withdrawal from his usual pre-Wimbledon warm-up, the AEGON Championship at The Queen’s Club, was met with substantial innuendo – some of it directly generated by sports commentators and reporters, some of it undoubtedly encouraged by the tone of the questions they asked players such as Roger Federer, resulting in statements such as this one published by the AP on June 8, ‘09.

“It seems like it’s not 100 percent serious, his knee injury. I only wish him the best and I hope it’s not true that he will miss Wimbledon. I think it’s a lot of speculation at the moment,” Federer said. “He wasn’t taping his knees here in Paris. He seemed fine, (from) what I saw, anyway. I’ve played him so many times, I can tell when he’s in pain and when he’s not.”  That really doesn’t seem like a statement Federer would typically volunteer; he usually plays it a little cooler, a little classier, a little closer to his vest.

Roger also withdrew from his usual pre-Wimbledon warm-up, the Gerry Weber Open, stating on his website “….I simply cannot imagine giving my best effort in another tournament right away and I don’t want to risk injury if I am not 100 percent prepared. I need to rest and recuperate.”  Look out, Rog, you may be headed for the shark tank.

Oh, wait – been there, done that.  He was the object of intense media speculation last year (while he was still ranked Number 1, surprise, surprise) that he was practically on his way down & out due to a chronic back injury and because he’d “lost his edge” in terms of mental toughness.  It’s such a miracle the poor guy could shuffle on in to the ‘09 French Open and take the championship.  Cue the Bronx Cheer refrain.

Apparently, the media didn’t learn its lesson with Roger and so the cycle continues, with a side order of melodrama.  That Fabulous Forum post concluded with a mischaracterization of a statement posted on Rafa’s website, stating it “quotes (Rafa) as saying that he played most of the past months in complete agony and pain.  What was Rafa thinking?”  Well, my guess is he’s thinking that no matter how straightforward he is with the media, his words will be twisted – even those offered up for all to see on his website: “I have been playing with pain on my knees for some months now and I simply can’t go on like this. The pain was limiting certain movements in my body, which affected me mentally as well.”  Very painful, yep, no doubt about that; but “complete agony and pain” seems a little, well, melodramatic, doesn’t it?

Enough is enough for this tennis fan, who was playing this game before most of today’s top professional tennis players were a twinkle in their daddy’s eye.  I can remember “the good old days” of sports coverage; I respectfully request that the sports media stop building these young people up, only to tear them down at the first opportunity, the first sign that they’re not demigods.  Concentrate on the principles of good journalism; please leave the innuendo and melodrama to the supermarket tabloids and the career-making/breaking decisions to the athletes and their teams.

Sports media needs to concentrate on giving fans what they really want: factual reporting of the actual events.  Feel free to give it a little personality, add some verve, but that’s truly all we need from you – don’t push it.  (In fact, you should all take lessons from – and I can’t believe I’m saying this – John McEnroe, in his sports commentator role.  He does an incredible job.)  We’ll take it from there; we’re more than capable of creating our own heroes and making our own assumptions, inferences and predictions, however erroneous they may be.  We, too, are only human.