WIMBLEDON

June 26, 2003

James Blake

JAMES BLAKE: Shoulder feels fine, yep. Feels all right.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah. Unfortunately, I got another one today. Conditions were fine. It was a little windy today, swirling a little bit in there. But, otherwise, it wasn't -- that wasn't a problem.

JAMES BLAKE: No. No, I didn't even notice. I guess that's a good thing. But, no, I didn't hear a child screaming.

JAMES BLAKE: No, I wouldn't say it was noisy compared to any kind of Davis Cup match or US Open match or anything like that. It is still Wimbledon. We're getting, you know, a new generation Wimbledon with sleeveless and, you know, taping a movie down in Centre Court. But it's still Wimbledon, so it wasn't quite that noisy.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, that was tough to lose. He tightened up quite a bit, obviously, at 5-2. I think he was a little nervous to get up two-sets-to-love, and I tried to exploit that. I felt like that was the one time I did do a good job of executing my game plan. He made some mistakes, so I got it back to the tiebreaker and then missed a few returns and just let him control the play in the tiebreaker again. That was very disappointing. Yeah, that was tough. My serve let me down pretty much the whole match, but also in that tiebreaker. I mean, that could be related to the shoulder. I haven't hit serves 100 percent in three or four weeks, so that's gonna have an effect on my serve, I guess. But that was inexcusable, the way I served today.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, I definitely don't think it helped. That shouldn't be an excuse for what happened today. You know, I'm just pretty disappointed in the way I played, the way I got down on myself too quickly, and just the whole level of improvement the last six months. Maybe it's my expectations are too high because I'd improved so quickly the last year, but just pretty disappointed. I don't feel like I've improved my grass court game as much this year. Maybe it's because, like you said, I had an interrupted preparation - I didn't play Queen's, I didn't get a chance to practice on it for that long. But, still, I feel like I should have played better.

JAMES BLAKE: Well, for one thing, like I said, not get down on myself so quickly. It's happened to me a few times this year where I come off the court and my coach or any of the other guys that were watching, they say the biggest problem is that I start hanging my head way too quickly - or at all. I mean, you watch a guy like Todd Martin play or Pete Sampras, and they don't -- you turn it on at 5-4 in the fifth set and you have no idea what's happened. They don't show that they've given away two matchpoints, they don't show that they're down two sets and a break. It just doesn't show on their faces. With me, you know, when I was a kid, I had a terrible temper and it was obvious after every point whether I won or lost. Now, it's just to the point where I'm not outwardly expressing my emotions so vocally, but I just get down on myself. I got to stop doing that. That's not spending a lot more time on the practice court, that's not getting out and running hills and getting in better shape; it's just a matter of playing the matches and making a conscious effort of being better at that, whether I'm winning or losing, just staying focused. At 23 years old, it's pathetic that it comes down to just something that, you know, a 15-year-old should be able to figure out. You're going to play better if you're holding your head high and you're focused on each point and not worrying about the last point. It's really simple, and I'm disappointed that that's possibly a reason why I'm not ranked higher or I'm not as good a player as I could be.

JAMES BLAKE: Every which way possible - throwing racquets, yelling, screaming, whining, crying. Ask my parents. They remember it all, I'm sure (smiling).

JAMES BLAKE: Very much so. There were times my dad wanted to pull me off the court, I think times coaches pulled me off the court. My parents were, you know -- my dad was very strict, and he was having no part of it. And, you know, there were times my coach sat me down for weeks at a time. At one point I think he told me that I should take a whole year off tennis and just not play because I had the wrong attitude. I begged and pleaded for him to let me play, and he did - luckily - and I kept playing. But I just -- that's probably when I realized I couldn't keep up in that way.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah. I mean, those things actually -- I don't think those are a problem, when I flip a racquet once in a while. Because it's an emotional sport. Things are going to happen. If you let loose for five seconds and then get right back to it, keep your head up, and make sure you focus on the next point, I don't see that as being a problem. That's just being who I am, and I think it's great to see when people are being who they are on the court. But it's the consistent, you know, I'm down a set and a break or something, and my head's constantly looking at my shoes and my shoulders are slumped. You can tell that I don't have the same attitude as I did in the first point or if I was up a set and a break where "I'm really gonna put this guy away," and I'm thinking about that. I need to find a way to just trick myself into thinking that's the case all the time and that I need every single game, no matter what the score is. I'm gonna make my best effort to do that from now on.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, I think that's definitely one of the best things about him. He's one of the people that has told me the same thing that I'm learning by losing. But he said, you know, "Being a good tennis player, you got to have a short memory - as short a memory as possible - whether it comes to just forgetting about the point before, forgetting about the game before, forgetting about the whole practice before, anything like that." You know, I'll get down on myself after a practice with him, especially when I felt like I should really get up for playing possibly the best player ever, and I just had a bad practice and I was still beating myself up about it. He'd say, "Look, it's a practice. Go out and play a great match tomorrow. Who cares?" And, you know, "You got to learn to have a short memory and forget about these things." Like I said before, I think that is definitely one of the things that made him unbelievable. If you're up two sets and a break and you see a guy slumped over, pretty disappointed, you know they feel like they're gonna lose. It makes you feel like you're gonna win a lot more. If you see them fighting, bouncing, getting ready to return, you're thinking, "What do I have to do to break this guy's spirit? I still now have to play a few more great games and keep this level up." And that might be tough for people to do, and it's gonna make them a little more nervous. I felt like this whole year I've come into press conferences and said, "Three or four points here or there and I could have won that match," and "It could have been the other way." Maybe that's because they didn't feel that kind of pressure that I wasn't applying like Pete does. But, I don't know, it's something I've got to work on.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, I mean, today it's just become a realization, more of a realization today. It's not necessarily all because of today's match. Today's match, I didn't serve well at all. He played, like you said, might have just been his day. Was hitting a couple of shank lob winners. You know, came up with some unbelievable gets, some great shots. Some close calls went his way. Maybe it was just his day today. I'm not saying just today this occurred to me. It's a pattern that needs to be broken, and it's coming more and more to realization here. But, no, I mean, it could just be his day. But I also do remember a couple of those times he got shanks for winners, and I remember specifically then I stopped and just, you know, either looked at my coach or looked down and couldn't believe it. If I thought back to a match where, you know, Sampras got, you know -- someone hit a ridiculous shank return off his serve, he'd turn around, get another ball and get ready to serve again, not even think twice about it because those things are gonna happen. I'm gonna get shank lob winners, I'm gonna, you know, get let cords that drop over. I can't worry about if the other guy does, too.

JAMES BLAKE: No. My coach is -- knows me well enough to know my mentality and help me out in that way. And I don't feel like I need one of those. Maybe I do, but I really don't feel like I do.

JAMES BLAKE: No, definitely not. I think they might screw me up more than I could screw myself up (laughter).

JAMES BLAKE: Actually, I wasn't at the meeting, unfortunately -- well, unfortunately and fortunately. I found out at the last minute. I didn't know about the meeting until the last minute, and I'd already secured tickets to the Eminem concert, so I couldn't really go back on those.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, so I went to that. But my feelings on it are I'm gonna support the ATP. But right now, I've been given the form. And I haven't signed anything, but I need to talk to people at the ATP about it because I wasn't at that meeting. And, you know, the time to do it wasn't really to concentrate on it right before I go out and play a match. The time to concentrate on it is now. I'm out of this tournament. I'm gonna take a day or two off. Now I'll think about exactly what they're proposing and what the situation is and what's gonna be best for the tour and for the future of the tour, not just for whether it's the players short term or anything like that. We need to make strides for the long term.

JAMES BLAKE: Originally, I did sign something to become a member of that, and I then -- couple months, a month or two later, asked them to take my name off the list. I think it was originally reported that I was in it, and just the fact that they got those names was the first step in me having ill feelings towards them because they were never supposed to release that and they did. I was worried about exactly what the lawyers and the people trying to run that, what their intentions were.

JAMES BLAKE: Well, I do now. It's 0-2 for me (laughter). I don't know if the other players do, I didn't really talk to them. I probably didn't think it would be a good idea to ask them beforehand, like, "So do you hate it as much as I do?" But, no, at least it gives an opportunity for more people to see you as opposed to being out on Court 5 like I was in the first round. But you'd like to put on a little better performance than I did today for them.

JAMES BLAKE: Well, my mom is a relative and she's from England. Her sister, and our cousin that she's staying with. But I think that was it today.

JAMES BLAKE: Yeah, we're going out to dinner tonight. I'll get a chance to see them. Hopefully, I'll be in a better mood by then. I think they'll keep me happy.

JAMES BLAKE: Haven't decided yet. Unfortunately, this wasn't part of my plan.