GREAT AMERICAN INSURANCE ATP CHAMPIONSHIP

August 13, 1998

Todd Martin

TODD MARTIN: Well, nobody enjoys laying it out on the line for a couple hours and then all of a sudden having -- having it all fall apart. Just the amount of pressure that Pat put on me throughout the course of the match just built up to the point where, you know, it forced a few errors out of me and that's the way I like to play and it's the reason why he's had so much success in the last year or so.

TODD MARTIN: Well, it all depends on the first hit of the point. If you hit a good serve or if you hit a good return, it's a lot easier to move well. And early on, I served great and I was moving very well and he had a little trouble getting started and I was up 30-Love with two break points to go up 40-Love and that's -- that happens to everybody and I was unfortunately a hundred percent confident in Pat to pick it up. But I also was confident in my abilities to keep it up and I did. I just -- I played a couple loose points at 3-4 in the second set on my serve. But for that I played a pretty good first two sets and I just -- I just missed out where he just came up with a good shot when he needed to on his serves when I was getting close to breaking him. And you know, it's a matter of having the confidence to come up with the shots at the right time and he's got that right now.

TODD MARTIN: These three matches I've played here, I've played very well. I played Pat four times in the last -- since I came back last September and each match has gone to a final set, and unfortunately, each match he's won. I think I feel great. I couldn't be happier with the way I feel. It's just before, I think I went out on the court with somebody like Pat and I think: One, I was able to sustain my return -- like I started off the patch for a period of -- a longer period of time; and two, I think I was probably a little bit more imposing as a server and as a returner before; not necessarily because I did it better, just because I came -- I came up with the good serve or the good return when I needed to. And I think, you know if my results up to this point had been better, I think that match would have been a little more difficult for Pat to play just because I don't -- I don't think he necessarily feels the pressure that maybe he used to, looking across the net and seeing me.

TODD MARTIN: It's a matter of confidence. Also, I think the better the player across the court,, the better you think the player is across the court, the more times you think the player's going to hit a good return and the more times you think that player is going to hit a good serve, volley or a ground stroke, the more difficult it is; the more you force yourself to hit a better shot to the point where you hit a bad shot because you've gone for too much. And that's what happened to me, looking across the court at Pat. I knew he was a hundred percent comfortable returning my serve, albeit he wasn't returning it real well. I knew he was comfortable and I don't know if he necessarily looked across the court and felt the same thing about me as much as I did about him. I don't know if that's -- explains it properly. The game's a lot about implied pressure and he's implying a lot of pressure just by the way he plays.

TODD MARTIN: Yeah, he's so effective in so many ways. You know, his return game is not brilliant at all but he puts -- first serves, he puts probably 70 or 75 percent of the balls back in play. The game I got broken in the second, I missed two or three very easy volleys. Just the fact that those balls kept coming back against Muster and against Santoro, those balls weren't coming back. His passing shots aren't as good. His returns aren't maybe as flashy as some of the other players, but they are in and that says a lot.

TODD MARTIN: I was ready to say: A let court winner on a deuce point and he all of a sudden turned into Carl Lewis and scooped it up and hit a winner. Pat and I where pretty good friends and we'll see how good of friends we are after I beat him once (laughter). But the last four times we've played, we've been very good friends so it was a big point and we both knew it. And it was going it be bad luck for him and it turned out to be bad luck for me.

TODD MARTIN: Stockholm in '96, maybe, is the only other time.

TODD MARTIN: I almost decapitated somebody with a ball, I think. No, I just hit it in the crowd. That's not true. I have one more. Both times with the same supervisor and the same tour manager.

TODD MARTIN: I have three now. Building them up.

TODD MARTIN: Similar to the one in Stockholm, but I shouldn't have gotten that one.

TODD MARTIN: Playfully. Didn't get fined. I'll get fined today.

TODD MARTIN: I will be. I haven't signed any paper.

TODD MARTIN: I did not hit the Mercedes. It was on the other side of the net. I hit that round thing holding up the net. Believe me, the Mercedes sign wouldn't have done what it did to my racket.

TODD MARTIN: It's bent, yeah, many places. Some kid's probably going to slice himself with it.