Sampras Compares Del Potro to Federer

Written by: Erin Frauenhofer on 30th July 2011

Juan Martin Del Potro may have fallen in Los Angeles on Friday, but the Argentine remains one of the top talents on the ATP tour. Del Potro will be looking to make his mark at the U.S. Open this year after winning the title in 2009, and according to the legendary Pete Sampras, the world No. 19 has what it takes to become one of the best in the sport. Sampras recently told the LA Times that he sees similarities between Del Potro and Roger Federer.

“I am a big proponent of his game,” Sampras recently told the LA Times. “He has a murder serve and I like the fact he hits a pretty flat ball. That’s not easy for a guy of his height.”

But more importantly, 14-time Grand Slam champion Sampras pointed toward Del Potro’s mental toughness as a key indicator of his potential to someday join the ranks of Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Federer.

“I also like his big attitude,” Sampras added. “He’s not afraid of winning or saying he wants to be right there with Nadal and Djokovic and Federer. And part of his attitude is that he’s willing to take chances.”

“In that way he’s a little like Federer. Federer will go for big shots and he’s willing to miss, but the makes can be incredible. DelPo is the same way.”

On Friday, the Argentine was ousted by Ernests Gulbis in straight sets in Los Angeles, but despite the disappointing showing by the second-seeded Del Potro, he will continue his hard-court preparations as the U.S. Open looms on the horizon.

Del Potro has been steadily working his way back up the rankings this year, after missing a significant chunk of time last season due to injuries. The Argentine will be looking to continue improving on the hard courts this summer as he works to regain his top form.

As Friday’s loss to Gulbis showed, Del Potro certainly has room for improvement, but the 22-year-old is up for the challenge, recently telling reporters in Los Angeles that he is eager to improve all aspects of his game and is looking forward to the U.S. Open.

“I’m not thinking about my wrist, about different injuries that I had last year and the beginning of this season,” Del Potro had said. “Now I have everything to improve, starting with my ranking, with my game, with my body, with my physicality.”

Referring to the U.S. Open, the Argentine said, “I am very excited to come back to New York. If I could start to play tomorrow I would. First, I have very important tournaments before.”

http://www.10sballs.com/2011/07/30/sampras-compares-del-potro-to-federer/

Farmers Classic/UCLA - Friday, 29 July

Del Potro is halfway between vacation and back into tennis. His first serve was the dead giveaway where he pulled his head down before making contact with the ball way too many times. Probably wanted to put his head down on a pillow and go to sleep. Still it's fun to watch the big man move around the court.

Gulbis was pretty inspired and fired up. I saw him warming up with Canas. I was surprised to see that Gulbis hired someone who was banned from the sport for a time for drug offense. I guess he and his team believe in second chances for those who made wrong turns at some point in their lives. Pretty generous I'd say.

Larry Passos

More fun than watching that match was meeting and talking to Larry Passos during the Belluci / Bogomolov match. He's an intense character. The very stern fatherly type. No nonsense. And he gesticulates with his hands like crazy. If Bellucci missed a shot, Passos would imitate the correct way to hit it with his hands. Then fold his arms and wait for the next point to end. Half the time it was just an ongoing conversation Passos had with himself. Bellucci played a stunning first set and then Bogomolov found ways to break his rythym by challenging line calls, taking a MTO, more line call discussions, hitting loopy moonballs back. Pretty much anything to throw off Bellucci and it worked. Bellucci 's ability to focus grew increasingly worse in the 2nd set. At one point Passos told Alex B to knock off all the line call crap. There was also quite a bit of back and forth between Passos and Bellucci when Thomaz' mind started wandering. Since I don't speak Portuguese I can't be sure Passos was coaching but it sure seemed like it.

Between the points we spoke about Bogomolov's Brazilian wife (who is why Larry knows him and thought it was fine to call him out on the nutty line calls), Bogomolov's gambling and subsequent ban from the game, and Bellucci's focus. I managed to ask him what he thought of Dimitrov's game. His answer: 'Beautiful game. Beautiful strokes. Very talented. He's young.'

Then I asked "Where's Guga?"

Passos' response: "On a beach somewhere."

Some guy two seats over turned to Passos and asked him if he knew Bellucci. "I'm his coach!" croaked Larry.

A man of few words and loads of gestures. Larry Passos. Love the guy.

Farmers Classic/UCLA - Tuesday, 26 July

It wasn't my plan to attend the event other than to see Del Potro. But the line-up yesterday had Ryan Harrison v. Richard Berankes and later Haas v. Dimitrov. Too many interesting players to miss any of it.

These smaller events are pure gold. I always find coaches at the outer courts who are more than willing to talk about all things tennis and I hit pay dirt yesterday. The coach I found kn0ws Berankes well. He also knows Ryan Harrison. He's coached a number of juniors – mostly from Eastern European countries - including Grigor Dimitrov so he's been around the world attending events from the slams to the bowls and everything else in between. It’s an excellent way to get the skinny on players, how they think, their strengths and uncover some bonehead moves. Well worth the effort.

Richard Berankes

He's been out of circulation due to a back injury and he's really terrific. The guy has one of the cleanest games I've seen. No wasted movement. His second serve is fantastic and he uses solid point structure to set up at the net where he hits a sweet volley. I suspect it was his lack of match play post-injury that caused the mental fatique in the third set where, up a break on Harrison, he lost serve twice in a row. I like Berankes' on court demeanor. No foolishness, no wasted emotion or inane challenges to buy time to catch his breath. He does his very best from start to finish. I understand why Roger has practiced with him in the past. He’s a refreshing player. No weapons other than his quickness about the court. He's not tall but he's got heart, he's a thinker and he respects the sport.

Ryan Harrison

This kid has the kind of personality that gives Americans a bad rap. He’s got a big serve and had absolutely no game plan to back it up against Berankes yesterday. All Berankes had to do was wait for a second serve to get the ball into play and it drove Harrison into several melt downs. Racket throwing, swearing, spitting, accusing Berankes of winning a game without hitting a clean shot. All the while the chair umpire, Mohamed Lahyani, didn’t issue any warnings. Lahyani is one of my favorite umpires and it was disappointing to see him give the punk a pass. Meanwhile, Berankes had a bit of a laugh at Harrison’s on court antics. The coach I sat next to pointed out how Harrison was behaving, badly, in front of a bunch of children who were looking at him as their next tennis idol. What a mess.

James Blake

He played beautiful tennis last night. Everything was fluid and it was a joy to see him hit immaculate ground strokes at this late stage of his career. He looked great against Michael Berrer last night but I expect he’s going to have a heap of trouble against del Potro tonight.

Grigor Dimitrov

He looked fantastic on the practice court and a tad wobbly in his first set against Tommy Haas. He seemed startled by his increasing power. As though he was thinking “I can hit the ball that hard!” and then not have his feet planted under his body to support his developing strength. Awkward. You see the same adjustment challenges with shot selection on big points. Some sloppy work on groundies – hitting bigger forehands than necessary – when all he needed to do was pull it back to 80% to win the point. And then he goes and hits a running BH DTL winner to take the first set. He’s got game and he’s working with the right coach now. Lundgren messed him up by putting him in the big events, against the better players too soon. McNamara is taking him through the lower events so he can win a few rounds and develop confidence. It’s fun watching him sort it out and pull his all court game together. The one cause for concern is that Dimitrov hasn’t taken any kind of a break this summer and the hard court season is only getting started. His serve reminds me a lot of Roger’s.

One sweet note from the Dimitrov/Haas match. The coach I mentioned came into the stadium with 5 or 6 of his junior players and marched them all down to the front row for an unobstructed view of Dimitrov. That was nice.

Players’ Wives

Next to coaches, these are the next best people to sit next to at events. They tell much different stories than the coaches and the one I spoke with last night should seriously consider stand up comedy. Her husband’s played Nadal twice at Wimbledon and she told me how Uncle Toni cheats. At one point during a match at Wimbledon, she had to remove herself from the players’ box to avoid attacking Uncle Toni. ROFLMAO! Throughout all the matches, Uncle Toni is telling Nadal what to do. More slice VAMOS! Backhand VAMOS! He issues the instructions and ends the comment with VAMOS so it sounds like all he’s doing is encouraging Nadal, which he’s entitled to do. The chair umpires don’t challenge this because the tournament directors need Nadal in the event to continue to sell tickets. But watching this woman imitate how Uncle Toni calls out to Nadal was priceless.