Frank LorenzoSince Andy Roddick retired, no American player has step up to the plate to become the sensation, and the US Open and the rest of the tennis tournaments have been taken by the Europeans, most specifically Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. With the hard court part of the season entering the calendar, it might be the right time for John Isner to step up his game and becomes the main player for the United States.
Since Andy Roddick retired, no American player has step up to the plate to become the sensation, and the US Open and the rest of the tennis tournaments have been taken by the Europeans, most specifically Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. With the hard court part of the season entering the calendar, it might be the right time for John Isner to step up his game and becomes the main player for the United States.
“It’s been a stretch of the season where in the past, I’ve done extremely well, and it’s helped my season out quite a bit,” Isner said on a recent conference call.
“Obviously, the main goal is you want to play a lot of matches, you want to win a lot of matches, but you want to be 100 percent ready for the big one in New York. So for me I’m taking it a tournament at a time.”
The US Open stars on August 25th, but it has been 10 years since an American won it for the last time; in fact, it was Andy Roddick in 2003.
“I’m not thinking about the points at all. You’re looking to take that mentality into any stretch of the year,” Isner said. “I feel like, in the past few years, I’ve had pretty decent starts of the year but not great. I sort of saved my seasons by doing extremely, extremely well in the summer. I feel like I’m in a little better position than I have been in the past, so look at it that way, and I can kind of take a little bit of pressure off me.”
Isner is a long shot in the tennis betting odds, listed 100/1 to win the 2014 US Open.
