When the grass wasn't greener

Never content with the sport as it is, tennis fans, writers, players and pundits have a complaint for every season. Sometimes it's just a two-week problem, as is the case each year during Wimbledon. Once upon a time, the grass was too fast and needed to be ripped out and replaced with a hard court. But in the last two or three years, we've come full circle. Now the yearly mantra is about how the grass game has been killed because the surface is too firm and slow.

OK, no one wants Wimbledon to become a cow-pasture version of the French Open. And the chance, once a year, to see the serve-and-volley game employed effectively is a treat. But I recently watched the DVD production of the match that fans point to as the apex of Wimbledon tennis: the 1980 final between Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe. I'm sure you know all about this classic and it's 34-point tiebreaker, but have you sat through the whole thing lately?

The match deserves its place in history, both because of the personalities involved and the unbelievable tension and drama. But for the tennis itself? Not so much. After two weeks of play, the court wasn't so much lawn as it was a dirt floor. With their small-headed wooden racquets, neither guy could blast the ball the way the men do today, yet rallies were nonexistent because the ball skidded erratically off the "grass." Borg and Mac both shanked dozens of makeable returns, and the idea that it was "classic contrast of styles" is false: Borg was forced to go away from his baseline game and rush the net so he wouldn't have to deal with the bounces. Let's just say his volleys were never a thing of beauty (but they were effective).

Today the grass is firmer, less bumpy, and nearly full throughout the two weeks. While it plays something like a fast hard court, to say that you can't serve and volley on it is wrong. The men rarely serve and volley anywhere now, and they don't have time to revamp their games immediately after two months on clay. Blame the lack of a grass-court season for the demise of vintage grass tennis, not the surface itself.

Watching this week, I've felt like the elements that make grassball (not to be confused with dirtball) unique and dramatic are still in place. Even a nominal mismatch between Rafael Nadal and Mardy Fish was tight and tense most of the time. Each set came down, like grass-court matches always have, to just a few lucky breaks and well-taken chances by Nadal in his return games.

This is why we love grass tennis, and what makes it such a terrific contrast with the clay season just past. What's really changed is the quality of play, which has only gone up since Borg and Mac and the War of 18-16. That's something every fan and pundit should applaud and enjoy.

TENNIS.com