NEW YORK -- On a rainy Wednesday, the kind of day that intensifies our anticipation of a covered court at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, the talk of the U.S. Open still spun around Victoria Duval, the irresistible 17-year-old who knocked off 2011 champion Sam Stosur on Tuesday.
For Duval, this was a tremendous victory. But for all the adults on the scene -- the marketers, the media, the sponsors, the agents, the coaches and, not least, the USTA -- this was a dream result as well.
An ascendant player arrives on the big stage. She has the requisite "backstory," the term of art to describe the ability to tell a larger narrative through this athlete. (Surely you've heard about her kidnapping as a 7-year-old and her father's remarkable survival during the 2010 Haitian earthquake.) That Duval speaks flawless (if impossibly high-pitched) English and is able to address the crowd here in her native tongue doesn't hurt. Nor does the fact that she is (sort of) a product of the much-embattled USTA.
Tennis tends to eat its young. And that's after assaulting them in other ways: drowning them in hype, peppering them with requests and burdening them with expectation. The compendium of upstart players who rode a wave after a successful tournament only to crash ashore is a vast one. Duval had barely finished giving her endearing postmatch interview on Tuesday -- winning over still more fans -- when she was being compared to other prospects at her age. To Venus Williams, who broke through in 1997, when she made the final as an unseeded player in her U.S. Open debut. And to Melanie Oudin, the cautionary tale, who reached the quarterfinals here in 2009 and has seldom been heard from again.
To hype or not to hype is a vexing question. On its face, it seems distasteful. These are teenagers, seduced by bright lights -- Duval appeared on Good Morning America on Wednesday -- and attention. Unlike team sports, there is no infrastructure to handle requests and shield the player from the cameras, microphones and glad-handers. The interest of agents, usually a membrane of protection, militates against a measured approach. (You represent Duval? It would be a dereliction of duty not to try to cash in on this surge.) Pity the kid. And, some would say, LEAVE HER ALONE!
But these calls of "Give her space" and "Give her time" also seem a bit disingenuous. Part of the pleasure of being a sports fan entails finding the Next Big Thing. Whether it's watching the NFL draft or trying to steal a fantasy-league bargain, spotting future stars is part of the drill. There's an expression in tennis, "If you play, you're fit. If you're fit, you play." It applies to injuries, but could apply to hype as well. If you're out there, you've inherently agreed to a certain level of scrutiny. If you're not ready for the acclaim that comes with winning, don't turn pro.
Don't tag Duval the Next Big Thing? Fine. But declining to express admiration for her performance against Stosur and (measured) excitement over her prospects? That's naive.
The good news here: If Duval's play on the court is an indication, her factory setting is "poised." Part of what made her first-round win so sweet is that it was Duval who had the superior will and served out the match at 5-4 in the third set against a veteran opponent. You'd like to think that an athlete capable of handling that pressure can deal with what comes next. Whatever that might be.
Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/tennis/news/20130828/us-open-victoria-duval-mailbag/#ixzz2dPaiXkJs
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