Great Rivalries Carrying Sport To New Heights

Bjorn Borg had his ideal foil in John McEnroe, icy Scandinavian cool versus Super Brat bombast. Pete Sampras had Andre Agassi, the so-called Sampragassian Wars pitting buttoned-up serve-and-volley elegance against baseline perfection in frosted mullet and jean shorts.

‘Fedal’ paired Swiss timing with bullring tenacity, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Now Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner, who have collectively accounted for the last eight major singles titles, who have now contested three straight Grand Slam finals at Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open, are carrying on a tennis tradition that has seen the sport shine brightest when opposites attract.

“I’m just really happy to be building such a great rivalry against Jannik,” said Alcaraz this summer in Cincinnati. “Jannik and I, I think we’ve done great things in tennis already, in such a short period. But I just let other people talk about our rivalry, the things that we have done for the history books in tennis. I’m not thinking about the history we’re making. We have such a long career ahead of us, just to see how far we can go. If we have already made history or not is just for others to discuss.”

Team World captain Agassi, making his Laver Cup debut this week in San Francisco, had plenty of rivals in his heyday, including countrymen Jim Courier and Michael Chang, German Boris Becker, and even Team World vice-captain Patrick Rafter. But there was something special about his contrast with Sampras.

“Me and Pete, we were opposites on the court, opposites off the court.” — Andre Agassi on his rivalry with Pete Sampras

“You’re darn sure not guaranteed a rival because a rival is not just someone who plays at your level. In a lot of ways, they’re the antithesis,” the former No. 1 Agassi told LaverCup.com on Thursday. “They’re the opposite of who you are, whether it’s lefty-righty, Nadal-Federer, Borg-McEnroe, baseliner-serve-and-volleyer. Me and Pete, we were opposites on the court, opposites off the court.”

“When you look at Sinner and Alcaraz, it’s the same thing,” he continued. “You’ve got one who’s so dynamic, always smiling, just bringing people in. Then you’ve got the other, Sinner, who just kind of brings his game in such a controlled-aggression kind of way. You have all the ingredients for something great. They’ve already played 15 times. They’ve played in the finals of Slams almost as much as me and Pete, and they’re still so early in their careers. It has all the makings to be as special as any rivalry we’ve seen.”

“We are two different players,” said Sinner last month. “He’s obviously very fast on court. With maybe other players, the point could be over at times, but he reaches certain balls. He can read the game in a different way. We know each other better now. It’s a very tactical game. He prepares for the match in a different way than he used to prepare for it. Me and my team, we do the same. We have different game styles, but also how we are on the court and off the court. We are just different.”

While ‘contrast’ is a recurring theme when looking at the sport’s all-time rivalries, ‘change’ is, too. With each great rivalry the sport itself continues to evolve.

Explained Agassi: “I think the thing that changed the game most dramatically was the string, because once you create an opportunity for a player to be rewarded with consistency by swinging more aggressively, you’re changing the trajectory, you’re changing the rules of engagement, you’re changing the size of the court even though the dimensions have never moved. You’re making the court way bigger.”

“That means you can’t take over the baseline and you can’t take over the net, because you’re committed to a court position that can still be vulnerable. Pete used to take over the net; I used to take over the baseline,” he added. “Now you’ve got guys who play further back and are taking huge cuts with margins. The game’s changed because of that. The Big Three were really an example of that. Now you’ve got a player in Carlos who can do everything the Big Three did inside of one player. The movement, the defense, the RPMs, the spin, the touch. It’s almost like those three are showing up in one person.”

Agassi and Rafter, of course, will be tasked with slowing Alcaraz when his roster goes up against Team Europe beginning Friday at the Chase Center.

“Every one of these guys are capable of winning a set against anyone at any given time, of putting themselves in a situation to play a tiebreaker to win the match. Anything is possible,” said Rafter of his lineup. “The guy has serious power. He’s a great athlete, but everyone is vulnerable at certain times. It’s about trying to go in there and coming up with a game plan. He’s tough, he’s brutal and he’s at the top of his game.”

“The thing you have to hope for is that he gets too creative out there,” said Agassi. “You hope he crosses that line every now and then to give you some hope.”