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
balls courts fans game good guys served top
The courts were great, the balls were great, and the fans were great. No excuses. (Roddick) had to make the same adjustment. Antony served very well. These guys are all so good you have to be on top of your game every night.
biggest difference good playing serve time
My serve was the biggest difference today, ... It's good to be playing so well at this time of the year.
break confidence early match months points regrets second serve six win
To win on Tommy's serve was great. It was welcome. I had no regrets going after his second serve on match point. Six months ago I wouldn't have had the confidence to do it. Early in the year, the break points were the ones I was missing. I need to keep those points going my way.
against ball best bet bets bucks faced guy hits hold hundred offer practice practicing safe says serve tennis
I never faced Pete (Sampras) in a match. I think from watching, his is the best serve ever. And he is the only guy that I would probably not take the bet that he would so often offer in practice -- he's down love-40, says '10 bucks, I still hold serve.' I probably wouldn't even take that against him. So many times he would come back and win. He would just put it on the dime. I also wouldn't take the bets when we were just practicing our serves, he put just a tennis ball can on the other side, and says, 'A hundred bucks for who hits more.' That's not a safe bet with him.
andy beat guys impossible level played plays second serves week
Andy plays at a different level than the other guys I played this week but I know it's not impossible to beat him, ... I was going for too much (on my serve) because I didn't want him to get my second serves and sometimes that backfires.
against best correlate lefty looking serves win
This couldn't have been better preparation for that match, ... He (Lopez) has one of if not the best lefty serves out there. If he doesn't, Rusedski probably does. I am looking at the two best lefty serves back to back and getting a win against one could correlate to getting a win (against) another.
game good rest rolling served
I served very well, and once you get rolling with one part of your game the rest of it follows, so it's a good feeling.
clean couple hit rattle serve winners
On clay, his serve still isn't a weapon, but he can back it up really well. Here, he wasn't able to do that. I was able to hit a couple of clean winners off of first serves, and that can rattle you early.
bad follows game good great partly player pressure putting rest rolling served
Alberto's a great player but had a bad day. I'd like to think that was partly because of me, I was putting pressure on him the whole time. I served very well, and once you get rolling with one part of your game the rest of it follows so it's a good feeling.
point returns seems serve three win
Tommy just steamrolled me (in 19 minutes) in that first set, ... He returns your serve so well, it seems like you have to win every point three times.
ball both free good great hits serves
He's a great player. We've had some really good matches. He hits the ball so clean, we're going to have a lot of points. There's some good shot-making and we both have pretty big serves to get free points.
break chances deal five gives match near obviously pressure serve
His serve obviously gives him a lot of confidence. I think I had about five chances to break in the match and didn't get near any of them. It's frustrating to deal with because it makes you feel under pressure when you serve.
ace except focus hitting holding matter move mph serve serving
His serve is a joke. Sometimes it doesn't matter how you return. He can ace you out of a game. If he's hitting his spots, serving at 140 mph from that angle, there's not much you can do except say 'good serve' and move on and not get frustrated. I have to focus on holding serve like I did today.
free points serve
He didn't get many free points on his serve and I was getting some on mine,