Latest victory leaves tennis star tad blasé

by editor2
August 8th, 2006

CARLSBAD – It’s not that Maria Sharapova isn’t grateful, but she certainly isn’t giddy. Tennis’ ranking teenage superstar won another tournament yesterday, and a spiffy new car, and $196,900, and she was polite enough not to yawn in public. Yet if it weren’t for a couple of tell-tale fist pumps, the new champion of the Acura Classic would have registered roughly the same level of excitement as the kids parking cars at the La Costa Resort and Spa.

“I can’t say, ‘Wow, I just beat Kim (Clijsters) and that’s where it all ends,’ ” Sharapova said. “I have a wider perspective on things and life. . . . Of course, I’m happy, but I’m not going to jump up and down on this table to show you how happy I am.”

The trouble with winning Wimbledon at 17, of earning the world’s No. 1 ranking at 18, of being named one of People magazine’s 50 Most Beautiful People and as Forbes’ wealthiest female athlete is that it tends to render the rest of your life an anticlimax.

Maria Sharapova has checked off more items on her personal to-do list than even television’s haunted Earl Hickey. If she seems slightly jaded at 19 years old, this probably goes with her gold-plated territory.

Sharapova finally defeated Clijsters yesterday on her fifth career try, and it was not so much a breakthrough as a blip. Her 7-5, 7-5 victory meant that the picturesque camera spokesmodel won all five of her tournament matches in straight sets. What it did not mean was a prolonged celebration.

“We were talking about this yesterday,” she said. “When the match was over, I said I just wanted to go home. (Someone said), ‘You’re going to get home and you’re going to think it’s just another training week.’ I said, ‘I don’t care.’ ”

Outside of the Grand Slam events, in which players compete for posterity as well as purses, top players often view the typical tour stop as a glorified tuneup. The thrill of victory is muted. The agony of defeat is mitigated. The sense that anything significant is at stake is conspicuously absent.

This is as true on the men’s tennis tour as it is on the women’s. Maybe more. Case in point: In 1988, before the sport’s prize money mushroomed, Stefan Edberg paused during a changeover in a championship match in Cincinnati to ask his opponent, Mats Wilander, if they were playing a best-of-three sets or a best-of-five.

Granted, Edberg’s lack of palpable passion only proved that he was a Swede. But his lack of prematch preparation suggested that this was just another payday on his summer schedule. It was the same message Sharapova sent with her verbal shrugs, her qualified enthusiasm, and her monotone musings yesterday at La Costa.

“I love competing,” she said. “I love going out there. I love those tight moments. I love competing in them. No matter how big or small the stadium is, no matter what the circumstances are, no matter if we’re in Australia or somewhere in the Middle East or somewhere here, I’m excited to go out and perform and do my job and hopefully do it well. . . .

“Winning is great. But at the end of the day, I have a broad perspective on life and it’s not about winning or losing.”

Some of this speaks to Sharapova’s maturity. Some of it speaks to her remarkable success. At 19, Sharapova has already won 12 WTA singles titles, more than $6 million in prize money, and she appears to be improving. Clijsters, an old hand of 23, said she has seen Sharapova evolve into a more patient and versatile player.

“In the past, if her game wasn’t on, she would still try to go for it,” Clijsters said. “She wouldn’t change. I felt like today, she would mix it up a little bit. She would go for the shorter angles a little bit more, sometimes put a higher ball in there. . . .

“It’s great to see a player grow up, not just off the court, but on the court as well.”

In another era, Sharapova’s stoicism would have been the standard. Some of us are old enough to remember when a touchdown run was complete without choreography; when home run hitters circled the bases in a hurry with their head down; when professional sports was conducted with subdued professionalism rather than as an outlet for narcissism.

But those days grow more distant and quaint with each passing year. The modern athlete who fails to register emotion makes the modern spectator wonder if the event even matters. If you didn’t speak English, you could have watched Maria Sharapova and Kim Clijsters discuss their match yesterday and wonder who had won.

“To beat a player who is at the top – and she’s No. 2 in the world – of course, it’s a great achievement,” Sharapova said. “But I’ve got to move on. This is my work toward the U.S. Open. I’m happy with the win, but I’ve got another big task ahead of me.”

Maybe something worth savoring.