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
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.
Even though individually I didn't have the best of weekends, I consider this week a 100 percent total and complete success.
Beating guys like that the way I have the past two days makes me think I can do hopefully some really good things the rest of the week here and the next two weeks at the Open,
I was very excited to be out there. I kind of knew what to expect with what I've been going through the last week and a half, with my friends and family coming out, and I don't think Igor quite did. It hit him pretty quickly and they were pretty vocal. That's just a lot of fun.
It doesn't get better than this, ... If every week were like this I would never retire.
Olivier and I had a great match in the Davis Cup on clay a few weeks ago, ... It's nice to have a rematch against him on indoor hard.
I look forward to playing a guy like (Haas). He is someone who really has been at the top of the game and whether or not his ranking states it, he is one of the top players in the world, ... Beating guys like the way I have the last two days makes me think I can hopefully do some good things the rest of the week here and the next two weeks at the U.S. Open.
The baseball thing is a joke. Ten games out of a 162-game season for steroids is a joke. Two years is much more of a deterrent. It makes guys realize that you can't get away with it. You can't do this until you get caught and say, 'Oh no, it's not a big deal if I'm only out for three weeks or something.' If you're out for two years, that's a sizeable percentage of your career.
The baseball thing is a joke, ... Ten games out of a 162-game season for steroids is a joke. Two years is much more of a deterrent. It makes guys realize that you can't get away with it. You can't do this until you get caught and say, 'Oh no, it's not a big deal if I'm only out for three weeks or something.' If you're out for two years, that's a sizeable percentage of your career.
It hurts to lose right now but when I look back on this week I'll be satisfied that I played some good tennis,
Dean is doing a great job. He's extremely laid-back and an extremely knowledgeable coach, which I think fits great with our team. He's there to help if we need it. He also knows not to probably go overboard; we all have our own coaches, we all know kind of what we're working on in our games, and he just is there to help keep our focus there this week and keep our spirits high, I guess.
Just to keep me calm, ... I might have been a little too hyper if I was going out there in front of those crowds this week ...
He was trying hard to get out of it, but we put so much pressure on him last week that he had to do it.
I have said it before, that if every week was like this, I would never retire,