Martin’s Analogies Miss Mark

It falls to Todd Martin, the tennis player, to educate his hosts about American college football. Not as hard as educating them about his old school, Northwestern.

“Me in the quarterfinals on Centre Court?” Martin responds. “That is hardly as big as Northwestern and Notre Dame.”

This completely baffles the foreigners in Martin’s audience. What does tennis, or football, have to do with a church in Paris?

“OK,” Martin says patiently. “Northwestern had so much trouble winning for so many years and all of a sudden they upset this other university called Notre Dame. They won the Big Ten.”

The big what?

“The Big Ten is one of the bigger athletic conferences in America,” Martin says. “That allowed them to go to the Rose Bowl.”

The Rose huh?

“The granddaddy of them all,” Martin says.

Oh, you mean the Wimbledon of American football?

“There you go,” Martin says.

In return I would expect someone to explain to those of us with an eagle on our passport the menu in the media cafeteria, featuring on this day something called Persian lamb curry. But the moment passes and each side moves to what matters more - amplifying a new local hero named Tim Henman, the first Brit in the All-England quarterfinals in a couple of decades.

This is a huge deal around here. As someone recently noted, the biggest British contribution to tennis is the Fred Perry sports shirt.

Now Martin stands between Henman and outright xenophobia. Martin will be, he was informed, the most hated man in the kingdom.

“You’ve just got to play it like any other match,” Martin says, “block out the crowd and realize you’re there to do a job, no matter whether people want you to do it or not.”

This duty has recently fallen to Pete Sampras, who always seems to be the guy to do in the latest local hopes.

“Andrew Foster a couple of years ago,” Sampras says. “And (Greg) Rudeski last year. I played (Mark) Philippoussis in Australia (and lost) with his home crowd behind him, so it makes it difficult. But Todd is a professional.”

Sampras said he has played Europeans in the U.S. Open and been rooted against.

“Americans root for the upset,” Sampras said. “They’re more concerned about their beer and hot dog.”

You don’t want to be an American any more? he is asked.

“I’m proud to be an American,” Sampras is obligated to say.

“Pity the country that needs heroes,” wrote Bertold Brecht.

Brecht didn’t know how silly it could get.

“Is God an Englishman?” Henman was asked.

“Pardon?” Henman responded.

Guess not.

However it is viewed, whether Martin is the pressured outsider taking on the collective ambition of a nation, or if he is the calm veteran of Grand Slam moments, which Martin is, having reached the semis both at Wimbledon and in the U.S. Open and having lost to Sampras in the Australian final, it promises to be the match of the tournament, and this tournament needs a match.

This Wimbledon has been described as Sampras and a bunch of guys from Eastern Europe who were missing the day they passed out vowels. But between MaliVai Washington and Alexu Radulescu there are more than enough vowels to accommodate most of the Balkans.

“We’re all trying to do the same thing, and it doesn’t matter if you guys have heard of us before or not,” Martin said.

Trying to keep the moment in perspective, Martin offers yet another American example.

“If you ever saw the movie ‘Hoosiers’ … ” Martin begins.

No hands are raised.

“It’s the story about a high school basketball team in Indiana,” Martin continues. “The court measures the same in the big game as it does back in the sticks.”

Martin’s point is met with frowns. The Wimbledon of underdog movies, he should have said.