By Charles Bricker
What a pleasure it was to see Mardy Fish playing defense and hitting running forehands. Not just running forehands to stay in a point but running forehands that took him from defense to offense with one sweep of his racket.
This was the new diet Mardy Fish. Mardy Lite, you might say. Down 30 pounds, looking svelte and quicker. No more muffin top showing when his shirt flew up. And this new fitness was a big reason why he took down Big John Isner 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (4) on a sweltering Sunday in the final of the Atlanta Tennis Championships.
How could he lose 30 pounds? He’ll tell you he’s on a new, smarter diet and has a real commitment to getting back into the top 20, though, in reality, he was so overweight that probably that first 10 to 15 pounds came off pretty easily. All he had to do was knock off the fries and the other culinary grease.
Fish’s foot speed is never going to approach Rafa Nadal’s, but there is no doubt he is faster, and quicker. He never looked faster than when tracking down Isner’s crashing forehands to the corners, and he never looked quicker than the fine work he did against Isner’s big serving.
The 6-foot-9 Isner, who trains with Fish at Saddlebrook Resort just outside Tampa, had only five aces in the opening two sets and, though he cracked another nine in the final set, it was Fish’s good returning that got him into the third set.
And on Isner’s second serves, Fish was super-aggressive throughout this match, taking the returns very early — perhaps three-to-five feet inside the baseline — and not allowing Isner to take early control of the points off his seconds.
While Isner had nine aces in that final set, he got only 58 percent of his first serves in and Fish was 9-7 on John’s seconds. That helped him get into the tiebreak, where he made two more big plays on Isner’s second serves.
Trailing 0-1 in the breaker, Isner broke off an enormous kicker on second serve, but Fish, stretched wide on the ad court, made a super two-handed return. Then, at 0-2, Isner slammed a body-shot second serve at Fish, whose feet, so much quicker now than a year ago, made just enough space for himself to parry back a deep return, take control of the point and go up 3-0.
That was the key to the breaker.
For Mardy, he’s now 18-2 in his last 20 matches and has won 10 in a row, combining this ATP 250 title with the championship he won on grass at Newport a couple weeks ago. When the new rankings are out Monday, he’ll be around 34 to 36 from 49 — about 45 spots better than when this streak began.
A 250 is the lowest level ATP tournament on the schedule, but Fish wins over Andy Roddick and Isner in the semis and finals at Atlanta are very significant. This level of fitness has been a long time coming for Fish, who has been goaded by a succession of coaches who have tried to get him into better condition — from Davis Cup captain Patrick McEnroe to Todd Martin, who worked with him a couple years ago.
Can he maintain it? That’s a question. This is a 28-year-old player who, on the upside, should have two or three very good years in him but who, on the downside, has had multiple wrist surgeries and now knee surgery last year. You always worry about a player with injury history, but all Fish can do now is maintain what he’s done, physically, over the last year — schedule smart and hope to stay off the injured list.
If he can do all that he’s still got top-20 ability in him.
Charles Bricker can be reached at nflwriterr@aol.com