James Blake
James Blake
James Riley Blakeis an American retired professional tennis player. Blake is known for his speed and powerful, flat forehand. During his career, Blake had amassed 24 singles finals appearances, while his career-high singles ranking was World No. 4. His career highlights included reaching the final of the 2006 Tennis Masters Cup, the semifinals of the Beijing Olympics and the quarterfinals of the Australian Openand US Open, as well as being the former American No. 1. His two titles for the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTennis Player
Date of Birth28 December 1979
CountryUnited States of America
If I couldn't play tennis again, am I still going to be happy going back to school, maybe going to business school, doing whatever else I could do? ... Would I be able to be happy if my eye never came back to normal and I couldn't really be athletic at all the rest of my life? Could I find a way to still be happy? All those I tried to answer yes.
If I'm playing tennis like this, I'm a guy that NOBODY wants to play. I think there are a lot of guys who don't want to see me in their draw.
I figure most people, it's going to be their game plan to attack my backhand, ... I got a lot more confidence in it. When I have time to hit it, I feel like I can really go after it and hurt people with it, as opposed to playing defense all the time. I think I passed him with three backhands that first game and that's probably something he wasn't expecting.
I brought that up just about every 20 minutes of the match. 'Yeah, good call, it's going to go quick.'
I definitely feel like I'm a better player than when I was 22, ... There are certain things that have improved: My defense has improved a lot, my serve has improved a lot. I feel like mentally I'm just a little stronger. I don't think there is any way I would be able to do what I'm doing right now two or three years ago.
I can't stop smiling right now, ... If I could play here every tournament, I would never retire.
He tightened up in the second set and played great.
He's one of the hottest players on the circuit right now, ... And I'm playing close to my best, so it should be a good match.
He's not quite ready for it. Most 16-year-olds aren't. It's very rare that a kid of that age is ready to compete at this level.
He's got so many fans that I think they're also going to be cheering very vocally for him.
I could not have dreamed a better ending than this week, ... Everything clicked. I was feeling good all time.
I can't believe how well things are going, ... I can't say enough how much this is a dream come true.
I can't believe how well things are going. I am waiting for the alarm clock to go off and I'm going to wake up, but I don't want to.
I came out here and played pretty well from the start so I'm pretty excited.