Andy Roddick and Mardy Fish: American Tennis Dynamic Duo At US Open By: Justin Chaffee

Written by: Staff on 5th August 2014

Andy Roddick and Mardy Fish: American Tennis Dynamic Duo At US Open By: Justin Chaffee |

Greetings fellow tennis fans. Let’s rewind a few weeks back. While the ATP and WTA Tour were gearing up for the start of the US hard court season, Andy Roddick was busy playing World Team Tennis. As a huge Roddick fan, I made sure I live streamed every match featuring Roddick and the Austin Aces. If you are unfamiliar with the World Team Tennis format, here’s a quick rundown. The home team decides the line up, and all matches are first to five games. The events include Men’s Singles, Women’s Singles, Mixed Doubles, Ladies Doubles, and Men’s Doubles. Despite the shortened format, it was good to see Roddick competing again. He still had that intensity in his eyes, the desire to win, those witty comments, and even the occasionally outbursts at the umpire. All the classic traits he was known for.

As the World Team tennis season concluded, Roddick was featured in numerous interviews, and in one of the interviews, the coach of the Austin Ace’s, Rick Leach let it slip that Roddick and good friend Mardy Fish had been playing with the idea to play doubles in the 2014 Us Open. Andy would come out of retirement for one last hurrah, and Fish would put down the golf clubs for a farewell tournament. I was excited to say the least, and was hoping that this would be true. A few days later, we found out Fish was in, now it just came down to jumping through some hoops. Unfortunately, this is where it all ended, due to the USTA drug testing and retirement rules. It’s a lot of mumbo jumbo but here it is: Since, Andy Roddick properly filled out his retirement papers on the ATP Tour, (which would also benefit players ranked below him because it would give them opportunities to move up and bonus money ) Roddick also fell out of the drug testing regulation. The drug testing policy is strict in tennis, and that’s one of the benefits to keep the sport clean, but in this case, this is where it has its drawbacks.

Andy would have to be active in the drug testing system three months prior to entering the US Open. It was deflating news that Roddick and Fish could not play in the US Open because of this, but the USTA stated that they would award them a wildcard for next year’s tournament.The good news is that there is always next year, but what about now? As we all know a lot can happen in a year, Roddick and Fish both have busy work schedules, and personal family lives that may prevent them from playing next year. It’s in cases like this where I think the drug testing policy is at fault in tennis and should allow some sort of leeway given Andy Roddick and Mardy Fish’s careers and reputations as people and players.

In his playing days, Andy Roddick was always known as being extremely committed to his sport, and carrying the weight of American tennis on his shoulders. In my mind he is the epitome of what an athlete should stand for. He put everything he had, day in and day out into his practices, his matches, and his training. He never once was tested positive for steroids, and besides a hall of fame career, the guy has one of the biggest hearts in terms of giving back off the court, since Andre Agassi. Now, Mardy Fish, may not have the resume that Roddick has, but he is someone who battled his way back from numerous injuries, and even battled as much as he could through heart complications, never cheating. After the disappointing news, Andy devoted a segment of his Fox Sports Live Podcast, Roddick & Reiter to this topic, and we had the chance to hear the sole purpose for Andy wanting to temporarily come out of retirement. It was for his friend.

Mardy Fish suffers from heart complications, and he never got that final run, or farewell tournament that the other Americans experienced. Again, Andy wanted to do something selfless, something for his friend. I think this in itself is significant on so many levels in the world of sports and also in life. In sports, we hear so much about money, steroids, and other controversies, and not a lot of light is shown in what makes sports so special in the first place. It’s the innocence of it. This story had the potential to not only be a feel good story, but also something some sporting fans, may have needed to be reminded of, and even if they didn’t something kids could see. We would see and example that it’s not about the paycheck, it’s about playing from the heart, playing to inspire. In this case the spotlight would be on Mardy Fish, and it would be a selfless act. If you have a chance, please google the definition of a hero, or heroism. I guarantee you, that somewhere within the definition you will see that the attributes that make up a hero come down to one common theme: A hero or act of heroism is one person doing a selfless act for another. Now, this is on a much smaller scale, than saving someone from danger, but it’s still the same message, and to not see Roddick’s heroic act honored by the USTA is sad, and I understand the rules of drug testing, but if there ever was a time to have an exception to the rule it would be this.

When Andy announced after his first round win at the 2012 US Open, that the tournament win or lose would be his last, it came as a shock to some, but from this moment on, the US Open became something even more special than the last slam of the year. It became a bittersweet tournament, a swan song. In every match Andy played, he played fearless tennis. It was exciting, edge of your seat stuff, because we did not know when his last match would be. It was patriotic, and the closest thing to a fairytale, we would witness on a tennis court, since Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi’s final run, and it was good for tennis, and American tennis. At the end of it all, the decisions have been made, but my fingers are crossed for the 2015 US Open.

Topics: American tennis news, Andy Roddick, Atp, Mardy Fish, Sports, Tennis, Tennis News, World Team Tennis, Wtt