GRAND SLAM v. Grand slam

In the card game Bridge, a grand slam is a bid to win all thirteen tricks, and I dare not venture into that cerebral world.

Though I am small, only 5’1” (in centimetres, 155) tall and weigh about 53 kilograms (117 pounds), I was slightly up the ladder from a spectator in golf and tennis, two physical sports (golf is much more than a walk in the park, for the uninitiated). I have spent quite a sum of money playing Par 3 golf, played a lot more tennis, but only on public courts, a long, long time ago. Yes, I played them at the lowest levels but follow them (even now) at the highest as they hold a fascination for me.

Yes, I connected Bridge, golf and tennis, through the term, “Grand Slam”. That is how I started this piece. And, there is a reason behind this. “Grand Slam” is not easy to achieve, in any of the games/sports. It is a special achievement.

Bobby Jones won The Open (The Brits are too snooty to identify any of their events in any plebeian way by identifying it with a nation/kingdom; Wimbledon is The Championships, if I need to jog your brain cells), the British Amateur, the United States Open and the United States Amateur, holding all the four major trophies at the same time. That was, to my knowledge the first instance of “Grand Slam” being used in anything other than Bridge.

The last time anyone won the Grand Slam in tennis was in 1988, Steffi Graf winning French Open, Wimbledon, the US Open and the Australian Open. Her gold medal winning effort at the Olympics was added to the list of the majors (repeating once every four years) that year, making it a Golden Slam.

But, when you Google Steffi Graf, the first result marks “Grand slams won (singles) 22”. Bobby Jones won one Grand Slam, Don Budge, one, Rod Laver, two, Margaret Court, one, Steffi Graf, one. Oops, Steffi Graf won22 Grand Slams!

I pulled a fast one on you! Steffi won 1 Grand Slam and 22 Grand slam (women singles) titles. Note the difference, the uppercase ‘S’ in the first and the detail in the second. But, in these days of SMS, WhatsApp, Twitter, who cares about uppercase letters? Hence, no difference between “Grand Slam” and “Grand slam titles”! Indeed, “title” has gone for a toss in most mainstream media outlets and “Grand slam” has become a synonym for “Grand Slam”!

 Now, how do you square this circle? Now, a Grand Slam has lost its connection with Bridge and also with golf. No one has come close to winning the Grand Slam of Golf (which now lists The Masters [Bobby Jones tournament], The Open, the United States Open and the United States PGA tournament).

Now, after my extended foray into history (of recent vintage), I step into the present. I am a big fan of Novak Djokovic; just the way I slowly started admiring Ivan Lendl. If you seriously watched them play, you would definitely go “Oooh! Aaah...!” or "Arh...! a few times in a match. But ... these are not like Roger Federer or John McEnroe, who gave you a plenty of such moments in a game, not to mention a set or a match.

I believe we may pit this difference to the so-called “innate talent”.

Yes, I would really have been thrilled had Djokovic gone on to win The Championships. But, it is not to be. Even then, unless Djokovic had won the US Open in September, to my mind, he would not have been a true Grand Slam champion. He is already a “Calendar Grand slam champion”, but he is NOT a “Grand Slam Champion”.

Because, to be true “Grand Slam Champion” is something different, much higher than “Career Grand slam”, “Calendar Grand slam” and other sham “Grand slam”s that are conjured by the media gone hyperbolic.

There was only one potential male singles Grand Slam Champion – the pinnacle title, along with its counterpart for the women – over the past 42 years. It was 1974, when Connors was barred – and he was at the peak that year, winning French, Wimbledon and US Open – from playing in the French Open. If you discount the contra-factual scenario, let us just say that Connors won that year’s French Open too. This is how close any male tennis player got to a true Grand Slam accomplishment since Laver in 1969.

When Djokovic lost in the current edition of The Championship, I had ambivalent feelings. I was sad the way I would have been when Lendl lost late in his career. I was happy that at least now the media may understand the true accomplishment of a Don Budge, a Rod Laver, a Margaret Court, a Steffi Graf and also how close Connors, Lew Hoad and now Djokovic came to that supreme position only to stumble at the ultimate or penultimate step. Add to this, year 2015 and Leander Pais missing out on French Open while capturing the other three.

That is how great a GRAND SLAM is, by recognizing the great talents that failed (Djokovic may still achieve that status, but as of this moment he starts from scratch at the next year’s Australian Open). Add Roger Federer, John McEnroe, Ivan Lendl, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg (Oh, that French Open finals that he lost to Michael Chang, such a heart break), Billie Jean King, Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert ... to this list of never to be ...

Then, to say that Steffi Graf has won 22 Grand slam singles titles has the tone of the nanosized disclaimers one sees in advertisements. Tut, tut ...

A Grand Slam is a Grand Slam and all the others are merely major titles.

Raghuram Ekambaram

No helmet, no protection

So, a woman constable in Chennai was triple driving a two-wheeler without a helmet and was fined Rs. 200/-. The justification for the paltry penalty was that the offence was in June of this year when the current, more stringent rules and penalties were not in force. But, shouldn't there be a premium for traffic infractions by police? Should they not be leading the citizens by their actions? Oh, you say, that is all such idealistic crap. OK, I won’t dispute that (does not mean that position is indisputable!). But, I'll let this slide, for the moment.

I live in Srirangam, a satellite town of Tiruchirappalli and let me give you a run down on what I have witnessed for the past more than a week, starting a few days after the current helmet law came into force. I walk about 600 meters to catch the college bus in the morning and get dropped off a little closer to home, about 400 meters, in the evening. In this 1,000 m total of walking along one of the main roads in the town, lasting no more than 11 minutes in total, I have counted helmet-less driving of motorized two-wheelers 27, 34, 15, 28, 52, 45, 37 times ... I stopped counting because it taxed my mental arithmetic capability.

With this small set of data points no computer can discern a pattern. But, I did, with some help from tennis.

In tennis, there was a time players took hardly anytime between points. But, there were some gamesmanship, by some players (mainly the “ugly American”, aka Jimbo, Jimmy Connors, the ultimate gamesmanship artist; and Ilie Nastase too) who deliberately took forever to start play after a point. It is to stop this practice a time limit between points was imposed. Now, what do you think happened? The games got longer. Now it is 25 seconds, not a second less, before the server tosses the ball in the air for her serve. Indeed, now the chair referee hardly imposes the 25 second rule unless it is egregiously violated.

So, what really happened was even those players who may have wanted to get on with the game waited for 25 seconds. The number of times bounced the balls increased to fill the time allotted. Just watch Djokovic’s pre-serve ritual and you would understand what I mean. One version of Murphy’s Law I have heard is that a task will expand itself to fill the time allotted to it! This is a fit case to be given as a rule. Steffi Graf proves the rule by being its exception!

Something similar may be happening with the helmet rule. Without the rule, those who wanted to be safe and be on the safe side of law were wearing it. Now, with the rule and with so many people violating it, even those who were safety conscious must feel like sissies and must have discarded their helmets. That is, the law, by not being studiously enforced, has had precisely the opposite effect on the behavior of motorists from what was intended. Now, the parallel between the helmet rule and the 25 second rule in tennis stands established.

Again, going back to the woman constable, why wouldn't a non-police citizen demand that he be given concession on the quantum of fine? Something to think about. Now, that is a slippery slope with no exit ramps. Where would you put the exit ramp?

Giving exemplary punishment to a few who are merely unlucky to get caught is a non-starter.

Yes, I am going to sound truly heartless – scrap the rule. Advertise widely that citizens are at their own risk if while riding (or pillion riding) a two-wheeler without a helmet get into an accident no matter who caused the accident. Their treatment (including the cost) will not be underwritten by civil society. Insurance policies are notorious for their nano-scale conditionalities. Add a few in respect of helmet-less driving.

No helmet, no protection.

Raghuram

Tennis greats

Almost seven or eight years ago I had claimed that for my money it was John McEnroe who was the greatest tennis player of at least the so-called Open Era [1]. I want to revisit that topic mainly because so many things are being said about Roger Federer having played 1,000 matches, at a winning percentage of 81.4.

As I have given the link to my earlier post, I will not go over the points again, but would take a slightly different tack, based on a table of minimal statistics, The 1000 Club, given in today’s The Hindu [2].

I reproduce the table below:

Player	Total matches played	Won / Lost	Winning %
Jimmy Connors	1,427	1,156 / 271	81.01
Ivan Lendl	1,310	1,068 / 242	81.53
Guillermo Vilas	1,226	940 / 286	76.67
Andre Agassi	1,144	870 / 274	76.05
John McEnroe	1,079	881 / 198	81.65
Stefan Edberg	1,076	806 / 270	74.91
Ilie Nastase	1,026	730 / 296	71.15
Roger Federer	1,000	814 / 186	81.4

The above numbers reveal a lot and also almost preclude claiming anyone of them the “Best” of the Open Era.

If you went into the details behind the numbers, you would find that in general the rivalries of the 1970s-90s were more, and more varied. Connors had said something like he would chase Borg to the ends of the earth. That does not seem to be the case anymore, the chasing left to the precious few majors and the season-enders, to claim the bragging rights and bag a chunk of the loot.

When Federer and Nadal meet in the on-going Australian Open, they will be playing head-to-head for the 26^th time. Compare that to Lendl v. McEnroe, it was 36 by the time the two guys quit.

The flip side of that argument could be that the talent beyond the first two was too thin. But, the numbers belie that, with five of the eight guys in the table having been contemporaries (even if one excluded Agassi and Edberg as latecomers).

When Pete Sampras was on top, he was the “Greatest” of all time. In my earlier post I shot down that preposterous claim and I seem to have been proven right. It is hardly ever his name is mentioned with much awe, probably because he focused too sharply on the so-called majors. It is quite sad that he lost even that crown, “winner of most majors” to Federer.

To be sure, to play 1,000 matches and have a winning percentage exceeding 80, like Connors, Lendl, McEnroe, and Federer is truly impressive and I do not begrudge the fan adulation the last one gets. But, it is a different matter that he be judged the best of even the limited Open Era. Simple calculation shows that to match McEnroe’s numbers, Federer has to play 79 more matches (say, 16 tournaments, year and a half) and win 12 of them. That is for every tournament he enters, he has to win 5.5 matches for every loss. A tall order, particularly given that his opponents have tasted blood.

There are many things beyond numbers that go to make a player shine among the best; what these are in my opinion I have already written about. The above table, celebrating Federer reaching a milestone has not persuaded me to change my opinion.

References

1.    http://raghuram-ekambaram.sulekha.com/blog/post/2004/10/the-greatest-tennis-player.htm

2.    The 1000 club, the Hindu, January 25, 2012

Australians are afraid

Australians have been declared by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) as the loser in their Davis Cup Asia/Oceania Group I tie with India scheduled for May 8-10 at Chennai, says this news report. You must read the full report, even perhaps source additional material from other media outlets to understand the paranoia of Australians.

Australians are hesitant to come to Chennai, Tennis Australia (TA) says, on account of the security concerns. TA president Geoff Pollard said, “… we have major security concerns for the players, particularly during the election.” India is “an area of such high risk.”

Mr Pollard has been joined by John Fitzgerald, the Davis Cup captain in detailing and elaborating the risk. Mr Fitzgerald believes that ITF should have “followed the move to switch the Indian Premier League to South Africa due to security concerns.” Dismissing the assurance from various sources, including the positive reports of the security review, Mr Fitzgerald lists the recent events that have drip fed his concerns – “… dozens of people are killed along the campaign trail of the event … [a] train was hijacked.” He discounted the safe conduct of the ATP tour event in Chennai in January. He asks, if all the safety assurances are satisfactory, why did IPL move to South Africa?

Now, come to Todd Woodbridge, the most capped Australian Davis Cupper. He characterized the Indian situation as a “very, very difficult predicament with the way their social system’s running.” Suddenly, a tennis player has become the sociology professor!

My replies, which of course, Messrs Pollard, Fitzgerald and Woodbridge shall remain obviously oblivious to. IPL is a sustained campaign involving at least eight venues in eight cities with fifty nine matches to be played over a span of about a little more than a month. Davis Cup tie is a three day affair, at one location. The minimum seating capacity in an IPL arena is about 25,000 and that is at least twice as large as the capacity of the stadium for the tennis tie. The size of any one IPL contingent should be at least thrice as big as that for the Davis Cup.

That is, there is at least an order of difference between the security efforts required at the IPL campaign vis-à-vis the Davis Cup tie. It is really surprising that no one hit the three Australian Musketeers with this feature of their anomalous comparison.

Let me teach a few points of Indian sociology to the good Australian professor and his compatriots! India adds to its population nearly an Australian population every year (India’s eighteen million to Australia’s twenty one million). Our society is functional even under this ever increasing burden. What is a mere dozens of deaths in a surcharged atmosphere where 714 million people (thirty five times the population of Australia!) are exercising their rights? Will the Australian players be walking along the campaign trail, which is where such violence is encountered? I, as much as any Indian, would like to play out the ideal scenario - violence-free elections. But, when there are deviations from the idyll, we need to bring in the context. When we do, we see that India during elections is a model to emulate. Indeed, India is a country of low risk.

Pray tell how many of the Australian Davis Cuppers are going to travel by train, to cite as a concern the brief hijacking drama of a train in a place far from Chennai where the match is to be played. Please do not play up the fear factor because you end up undermining your arguments. That is my advice to Mr Fitzgerald et al.

By the time, the matches roll around, the election fever will be on the down side, having completed more than 80% of it. Chennai goes to poll on May 13th, the last of the five phases, three days after the Davis Cup tie. By then, the Australians would be ensconced quite comfortably in their native land, if not with a warm feeling of having entered the World Group (that is my prognosis for the event that is now not to be).

Now, I want to ask the Australians a few questions. Aren’t Australians going on vacation to Bali? Did the English team not come back after the Mumbai event to play out the test series? Was the English team not protected during the event and evacuated safely to their country? Will you refuse to go to the US to play a Davis Cup tie, because, after all the terror-defining 9/11 happened there? Did the Australian players not take part in Wimbledon when the IRA was active? You must remember that Louis Mountbatten was assassinated by the IRA. Japan has had terror attacks and so has China and not to talk of Russia, Israel, South Africa, Spain, Germany. Where will you play, please tell us. Iceland? Or, perhaps Antarctica? If I had the choice, I will send you off to Afghanistan. If you want to hide behind the reason of safety from terror attacks, you really have no place to hide.

Now, to conclude, I know why the Australians are not coming. They are afraid. They are not afraid for their safety but for their performance against India. It is better to lick the wounds before they are inflicted.

Raghuram Ekambaram

Leave “Grand Slam” alone – no retronyms, please!

Jut as the good old guitar got a new name, “acoustic guitar”, when “guitar” was hijacked by electric guitar, we are being forced to look for a new name for the venerable term, Grand Slam.

In 2007, so far ten Grand Slam Titles have been won – five each (Men’ and Women’s Singles and Doubles and Mixed Doubles). And, there are ten more to be won this year.

I remember the times when the four championships used to be called major titles. There is a parallel – golf too has its four: Masters, The US Open, the Open Championships and the US PGA Tournament. Collectively, golf still calls these events the “majors”, on its globe trotting calendar. But, tennis, the brasher and perhaps the more down market of the two, has shifted the terminology – from “majors” to “Grand Slam Titles”. And, that is a point to ponder.

Already we have a number of sons and daughters of Grand Slam – Career Grand Slam, Golden Grand Slam. And, many more should be in the offing shortly. But, the greatest tragedy is if anyone held all the four major titles simultaneously then he/she would be a Grand Slammist.

This is what Federer failed to achieve by not winning the French Open. The last time anyone was a Grand Slammist, in the diluted sense, was when Martina Navratilova won all the four trophies, Wimbledon, US Open and Australian Open of ’83 and the French Open of ’84. As much a fan of Martina I was, and still am, I just could not accept that she won the Grand Slam, Philippe Chatrier’s claim notwithstanding. The purist says, Martina never won the Grand Slam and Steffi Graf did, in 1988. But, this purist also claims – that fact alone does not make Steffi the better of the two.

It is all in the matter of opportunities for scoring a Grand Slam. The rarer it is, the more valuable it becomes. It can be realized if and only if a player starts on a high, winning the Australian, and stays high through the season, winning the other three. Lew Hoad missed it by a whisker in 1956.

Let us imagine (and I would not mind if this scenario came true) Federer winning ’07 US Open and Australian, French and Wimbledon in 2008. In my book, he would be holding all the four titles simultaneously, but would not have won the Grand Slam. But, in the age of SMS no one is going to do the thumb dance “Federer holds all the four trophies simultaneously!” It is going to be “Fedex gets GS!” Note the absense of the 'T' [Title].

Then the question arises, what did Budge and Laver (twice) achieve, and on the distaff side, Margaret Court? They did much more than hold the four championships simultaneously. They won their titles in the same calendar year. They accomplished Grand Slams. That year, there was nothing more to conquer (tennis was not an Olympics sport!). They were the ultimate champions that year.

Federer can launch himself on a Grand Slam quest at the ’08 Australian. Imagine the motivating power of aiming for that remote star, not just any neighborhood one. Making something difficult to get is a motivational tool and I don’t see any argument on this from the players; really, there should be none from the fans too.

I believe I have argued vigorously for retaining the original meaning of Grand Slam. But then, I have to acknowledge that winning the four major titles in an unbroken sequence is no ordinary matter. It is definitely of a higher order than Career Grand Slam. If I don’t want a retronym for Grand Slam, I must offer suggestions for the achievement between Grand Slam and Career Grand Slam. These are the sons and daughters of Grand Slam I mentioned earlier. How about, Grand Slam (2007-2008) [to indicate it was not won in a calendar year].

It really should have been guitar (electric) instead of acoustic guitar.

Raghuram Ekambaram