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BNP PARIBAS OPENMarch 12, 2010Andy RoddickINDIAN WELLS, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: Questions, please. Q. So you got a brief rest and ready to go again? ANDY RODDICK: I think so, yeah. I feel like I needed to build my body back up a little bit. I just had some nagging things here and there. It was frustrating going in when you don't feel like you're all there. So I feel ready. I feel prepared, which is a good feeling. Q. What was it like watching Davis Cup? It's been a long time since you were sitting on the sidelines. ANDY RODDICK: I enjoyed it. I thought -- you know, not enjoying not being there, but enjoyed watching the guys compete. I thought they did a pretty good job trying to navigate their way through pretty tough circumstances. I think it would have been a lot harder for me not to have been there if I didn't feel like the guys behind me were very, very capable of playing well. Q. Do you think the guys are going to play hard tonight? Are you looking to these matches in any way for the tennis part of it? ANDY RODDICK: I don't know that I'd read too much into the tennis part of it. You know, I think there's definitely a bigger purpose here. And if that wasn't the case, I don't know that we'd be witnessing an event like tonight. But I think it's great. I think it's -- I think it will be a lot of fun to watch, regardless of how serious anyone takes it. Q. Will you stay here and watch it? ANDY RODDICK: I don't think I will stay here and watch it. I probably will try to catch a little bit of it. Tickets are tough, so I... (laughter.) I'll go home. Q. Do you get the sense that the season is really just starting all over again? I know you've played a bit since Australia, but a lot of players haven't played anything at all. Is it a sense of a new beginning of the season? ANDY RODDICK: I think so. It always kind of feels like that when you have all the players in one place. You know, after Australia we all kind of go and play our own kind of schedule. We have our own agendas. You may cross some paths, but this is certainly -- you know, you kind of get the sense of being at a really, really big event again, and a big swing in the year when you come this tournament and play on through Miami. Q. Were your post-Australia aches and pains concerning at all, or was it just the normal wear and tear on a body that's played tennis a long time? ANDY RODDICK: Maybe both. (laughter.) If that's an option. You know, it's something you can play through, but I think the more annoying part is not being able to prepare the way you want to. And then when you go into a tournament knowing you're not prepared and then you're not playing up to what you want to, it just becomes more and more frustrating. So, you know, especially now in my career it's definitely important for me to get those little pockets where I can kind of put everything back together again to make sure that I'm ready to play again. Q. Does being married help kind of put you back together? ANDY RODDICK: The aches and pains? (laughter.) You know what, I have trouble making a correlation between being married and my body's physical health. Don't comment everyone. (laughter.) Q. When you have these pockets to put it back together, what do you do? How do you put it back together? ANDY RODDICK: Well, you know, you get up in the morning, and whether it's, you know, some sort of fitness workout, whether it's a track workout, whether it's gym, and all of a sudden now you have to get on a court also. I think the biggest thing is working in treatment throughout the day, you know, and you can actually plan out a schedule. When you're at a tournament it's tough, because you can play at 9:00 one night and then the next day, and it's not on your terms. You kind of just have to adjust and make the best of it. When you're home you can set a schedule, you can do everything professional, diet, treatment, kind of line everything up. And, you know, like anything, if you do anything for an extended period of time, things start working the right way. Q. Two things: Were there any parts of you last week when you were watching Davis Cup that thought, oh, maybe I should have gone or I want to go? And then No. 2, how much were you yelling at the TV? ANDY RODDICK: I don't -- gosh, I don't know about yelling at the TV. I certainly, you know, enjoy trying to see how the guys are going about their matches and trying to, you know, like we all do, predict what's going to happen in the next -- you know, you become a 10-minute psychic. But no. I made the decision for my health for this year. To be honest, I don't know if I would have been the best guy over there this time. I don't think I was put together the way that I needed to be. I don't know that I would have played any better than John and Sam. They certainly were the hot hands going into that tie. Q. Ryan Harrison played well last night. He's 17. He says he's a serious practicer and he's got himself up to that level at 17. Can you talk a little bit about what it takes for a 17 year old vis-à-vis discipline of life compared to the average teenager to achieve what he's achieving at the moment? ANDY RODDICK: Yeah, I mean, it's -- you know, if you want to be a professional athlete, especially a professional tennis player because of the individual nature of it, it becomes that much tougher, especially at a young age. But, you know, I like everything I've seen about Ryan. He's less about the lifestyle that tennis may present and more about wanting to be a tennis player, which I think there is a distinct difference. Unfortunately, most of the kids you see coming up, you know, see the lifestyle. He literally is a fan of the game. He asks a million questions, which is great. He works really hard. Never, you know, asks why or complains about being tired. I've had him down in Austin a bunch, and, you know, I like what he's all about. I think he's got a pretty good sense of professionalism for someone who is 17. Q. What sort of questions does he ask? ANDY RODDICK: Oh, gosh. A lot of things. Before his first match in Australia, he was kind of all about -- well, he comes a lot and asks about players and obviously scouting reports and whatnot. But also kind of, you know, What do I need to be careful of playing my first match? What do I need to -- what did you feel when you played? You know, he just asks a lot of smart questions, you know, to which I give a lot of dumb answers. (laughter.) Q. So on court, what do you like about his game? What does he need to improve? ANDY RODDICK: Um, he has a pretty aggressive mindset, which I think is good. Um, I don't think anything's perfect yet. I don't think he's completely polished. I think there's a lot of room for growth, which is a good thing. You know, I think you can name on one hand people who have kind of had things figured out when they were 17. So I like the fact that he has weapons, you know. Those things are important, because even if you're not playing your best, you can, you know, kind of work around those and, you know, kind of figure things out on the fly. Q. What would be a good tournament for you here? ANDY RODDICK: What would be a good tournament? Q. For you. ANDY RODDICK: Well, I don't know. I mean, you come here and you try to win a tournament. I feel healthy; I feel fine. There's definitely no crutch for me at this tournament. I expect to play well. Q. Considering you're niggles and injuries through the years, and you see someone like Rafa at 23 who's had some pretty serious injuries, Ryan Harrison coming up at is 17, do you ever think there should be a limit of tournaments for young men, play like the WTA? ANDY RODDICK: No. Q. Why not? ANDY RODDICK: Well, why? Because if you limit the number of tournaments that Rafa plays when he is 17, who says he wins two of those Slams? You can't take away -- I mean, some people, those are the best years. I don't think you can. Q. He won the French Open at 18. ANDY RODDICK: Okay. Well, then 18. My argument is the same. I don't think so. I mean, if anything, it's a bigger issue of we're going to come back around to scheduling mandatory events. I think there needs to be -- you can't have black and white issue when there is a lot of gray, such as injuries, age, you know, a lot of things. You can't just print out something on paper when it comes to, you know, professional sports and performance of a body and expect it to work out perfectly. I mean, that just doesn't make much sense. Q. So you don't think there should be like a pitch count for young tennis players like they do in Major League Baseball? ANDY RODDICK: No. Q. Tournament count? ANDY RODDICK: No. Q. Are you putting your house up for sale in Austin? Are you done with Texas? ANDY RODDICK: No, no, no, no, no. We're building somewhere else in Austin. Q. Isn't it pretty big? Your current house is pretty big, so you want something bigger, more rooms to clean? ANDY RODDICK: We're actually thinking about buying an RV and touring the country. (Laughter.) Q. You should do it. ANDY RODDICK: So we're -- yeah. End of FastScripts |
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