Q: Nick, can you give a proper explanation about why you didn’t return those serves? Looked like you were tanking the set. A proper explanation please.
Nick Kyrgios: What’s the question?
Q: Looked like you weren’t returning those serves. Looked like you weren’t trying, which is very unusual at Wimbledon.
Nick Kyrgios: Do you want to try and return Richard Gasquet’s serve? I’ll give you the racquet and we’ll see how many times you can return his serve.
Q: But you’re a professional tennis player, I’m not.
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A defensive and defiant Nick Kyrgios sat in front of the media on Monday after his controversial four-set loss to Richard Gasquet at Wimbledon and snidely answered questions about his tanking of a game second set, fooling no one in insisting that he “did move” to return serve. (Yeah, right. The last time there were so many tanks in London, Eisenhower was getting ready to send them to Normandy.) The press conference continued Krygios down a path that is becoming more defined every time he takes the court or speaks to the media: Despite being just 20 years old and exactly one year from his debut as a big-time player, Nick Kyrgios is the most hated man in tennis. He also might be its future.
Here’s Monday’s contentious tank job, which occurred as Kyrgios was in the midst of dropping the first two sets to the higher-ranked Gasquet.
That was blatant and obvious. But how bad was it for Kyrgios or the sport? Well, we’ll get to that. But first, let’s acknowledge how tennis needs some new, boiling blood and Kyrgios is certainly up for the task. The fiery Greek-Aussie keeps a running on-court dialogue that sounds like the script to a Scorsese movie; he engages with fans mid-match; he hugs ballboys; he’s brash when he wins, obstinate when he loses and, as you can see, he already has a fine relationship with the press. He’s entertainment in a gold chain and bad haircut.
Q: So you’re not denying that you stopped for that game?
Nick Kyrgios: Denying what?
Q: You’re denying that you stopped playing for that game.
Nick Kyrgios: I kept playing.
Q: For that moment, you weren’t returning.
Nick Kyrgios: And that’s coming from you? That’s your opinion.
(AP)
You can chalk up his antics and answers to being 20 years old. (Think about what you were doing when you were 20.) You can also say the interviewers were pressing a little too hard — Kyrgios clearly wasn’t going to tell the truth about tanking that game, so let it go. This is Wimbledon, not the magistrate’s court.
Frankly, I don’t mind the theoretical tanking either. Sometimes, if you’re down 0-40 on your opponent’s serve, it can make sense to tank a point and save energy before getting back on your serve. And anyway, even if you disagree with that, Kyrgios came back to win the third set and had two set points in a fourth-set tiebreak to push the match to a decisive fifth set. Tanking a few points clearly had no effect on the young Aussie. That’s been way overblown. It’s the brazen way Kyrgios does it though, making a mockery of the game and turning what he thinks is swagger into being a self-serving showboat.
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But I love Kyrgios. For as great as tennis has been over the past decade — perhaps its best run in history, at least on the men’s side — the players have been vanilla. The only drama is in the matches, which thankfully have provided plenty of it. Except for the occasional eye roll or snide remark, you can count on one hand the number of times The Big Three has gotten truly testy with a chair umpire or been rude to the media. And all that effort on those 0-40 points, the lack of which Kyrgios is being eviscerated for today — that’s from those same players, who never are at any point in a game they don’t think they can win. That’s great for the sport too, but the pendulum has to swing back every now and then. A little controversy never hurt anybody.
(EPA)
Q: Do you think the crowd misjudged you when they started booing? Because I heard the booing from the crowd.
Nick Kyrgios: Yeah, and then I started playing well and they started cheering. Did you hear that too?
Q: Yes, but it’s so rare to hear that around —
Nick Kyrgios: (Interrupting and sarcastically) Okay, that okay. No, that’s okay.
A: Wimbledon.
(EPA)
There’s a fine line Kyrgios is walking here and the danger is following in the same footsteps as fellow countryman Bernard Tomic. Because the press and fans will put up with the antics as long as the on-court success backs it up. But if Kyrgios’s game falls off, like Tomic’s, or the headlines become increasingly more for what he says rather than what he does, suddenly the brashness of youth becomes the petulance of a falling star.
For now, Nick Kyrgios can get away with it, because when you’re controversial, you’re interesting too, and “the most interesting man in sport” has a nicer ring than “the most hated man in tennis.” So stay thirsty, Nick. Keep being a breath of fresh air. Just don’t let it get stale.
(Getty Images)
