Down love-4, 15-40 in the final set and with his serve — of all things — looking like it needs a tune up really badly, Andy Roddick headed for his changeover chair.
It was only when he looked up to see Mardy Fish moving to the deuce court for the next point that he realized this semifinal wasn’t over . . . yet.
Does Andy need a head clearing? He didn’t seem to be into this semifinal. Where’s the fire? And, more importantly, what’s going on with his serve?
I don’t want to detract from Mardy Fish’s 4-6, 7-6 (3), 6-1 win, which plunges him into the final at the Cincinnati ATP 1000 on Sunday, but something isn’t right with Roddick and it could be some residual effect of the minor case of mononucleosis he’s been fighting for several weeks.
Andy Roddick doesn’t fire four double faults in a match. He did Saturday afternoon against Fish and he did in the round of 16 and the quarters as well. That’s 12 in the last three days and 15 doubles for the tournament. That probably sounds great to Elena Dementieva, who can easily knock off 15 in a single match. But for Roddick, it’s a signal that his serve has gone off.
Roddick came into Cincinnati with a 35-9 record — 44 matches and 60 double faults, or an average of 1.3 per match, and eight of those doubles came in that interminable five-set loss to Lu Yen-Hsun at Wimbledon. As hard as he hits both firsts and seconds, doubles for him are rare.
And if it was just a few too many double faults we’re dealing with here, we could write this one off as a bad day — which it was with a couple of rain delays.
But there are a couple other factors which are raising yellow flags here about Roddick’s serving:
* He came into the tournament ranked No. 5 in first serves in (70%). His numbers for five matches at Cincinnati: 63%, 62%, 60%, 57% and, Saturday, 60% vs. Fish.
* He came into the tournament ranked No. 3 in first-serve points won (79%). Against Fish he was 41-for-61 for 67%.
* He came into the tournament ranked No. 2 in second-serve points won (57%), a tribute to the pace as well as his second-serve kickers. He was 19-for-40 for 48% vs. Fish.
It’s no revelation that Roddick isn’t even close to the best service returners in the game and, because of the continuing mediocrity of his returns, his serve becomes that much more important. When he’s hitting his numbers (70% in, 80% wins on first serve), it allows him to take more chances on his returns because he knows he’s going to hold. It also puts more pressure on his opponents.
And he has held for the most part in Cincinnati. But he’s struggling to hold and it’s making him play more than he normally has to. The free points have not been there this past week and that’s what he needs to get back before the U.S. Open starts in eight days.
This was a match Roddick led 6-4, 5-2 and couldn’t close out serving at 5-3. Fish got square, then received a few donations from Roddick in the tiebreak before firing away in the final set by breaking Roddick’s first two service games.
Andy was down love-30 serving at 0-5 in the third and looking at his first shutout since he lost to Rafa Nadal on clay in the U.S.-Spain Davis Cup semis in 2008. Even a 6-1 loss is rare for Roddick because his serve is so good.
If this is a leftover case of mono, OK. We’ll keep the flag at yellow instead of red. But Andy needs to go home and fully recover. The way Nadal, Federer, Murray, Djokovic, Berdych and, eventually, Del Potro, are playing, who knows how many more opportunities he’ll have to win a second U.S. Open.
But if this performance isn’t related to his health, then he’s got work to do with his serve. That’s Roddick No. 1 weapon and, if that goes off, he’s not going to survive deep into a major draw on the strength of his returns.