What Happened to Rafa’s Killer Instinct?
Rise and Fall of the Raging Bull
ATPTour.com calls Rafael Nadal the “Under Pressure” leader, referencing an index that draws from break points converted and saved, tiebreakers won and deciding sets won. He also boasts an all-time best match win percentage, 83.2%. These numbers are largely supported by outstanding performance in his early career. Back then, few, if any, ever doubted the raging bull’s clutch factor, given his relentless mentality and exclusive ability to crack the great Roger Federer. As Nadal’s confidence on tour grew, he did not lose a slam final from Wimbledon 2007 to Wimbledon 2011. Believe it or not, that 2011 Wimbledon final was Rafa’s first slam loss to Novak Djokovic, however, few found the result surprising. In 2011, Djokovic had been absolutely crushing Nadal, winning 4 straight Masters finals against him, including two on clay. Djokovic would continue his dominance against Rafa, winning the 2011 US Open and 2012 Australian Open. Seven consecutive losses punctuated by a fifth-set choke in the most physical match of all time, the 2012 AO final, would terrorize anyone’s self confidence. Fortunately for Rafa fans, he did win their next meeting, in Monte Carlo 2012, but Djokovic’s thoughts were elsewhere, as his grandfather passed just days earlier.
A Higher Peak and a Deeper Valley
Nadal would not truly turn the tides of their rivalry until 2013, with a series of hard court wins in the North American Summer swing, leading up to his second US Open crown. To this day, the Rafa fan inside me holds the 2013 US Open Final as a personal favourite. It meant so much for Rafa to beat Novak in a final. Following a career best season, Rafa held strong form into the 2014 Australian Open. In the final against Stan the Man, he tweaked his back, an injury that cost him any chance at winning his second Australian Open that year. He then went on a cold streak, losing two more finals to Djokovic, and even losing on clay to his normal whipping boys, Ferrer and Almagro. Any confidence earned from an underwhelming RG crown, won against a sub-par Djokovic, was obliterated by grass court losses to meme-lords Dustin Brown and Nick Kyrgios. The remainder of his 2014 season consisted of early round losses, injuries and appendicitis. To be honest, I felt like his career was over. His mind and spirit seemed broken by an aging body and a Serbian national hero.
Of course, I was right, his career was over. In 2015, he lost a bunch of matches to foes that had rarely troubled him before. Berdych crushed him in straight sets, even bageling him (Bagel Mug available). Fognini beat him THREE times in a row, twice on clay and once from 2 sets-to-0 down at the USO, how embarrassing. He also lost his first clay matches to Murray and Wawrinka. 2016 would be equally dark, threatening to be his last year on tour. More unusual losses piled up with Thiem and Cuevas defeating him on clay and Pouille scalping him in a 5th set tiebreaker in New York before ultimately ending his season on a 2-match losing streak to Dimitrov and the great Serbian, Victor Troicki. He ended the season, clearly suffering physical and emotionally. Knees and belief were in short supply. His killer instinct had abandoned him repeatedly in the past two years, his body was failing him, surely his career was over.
Resurrection
I guess I was wrong, Nadal’s career wasn’t over.
He came back from the dead with something to prove. From 2017 onward, Nadal would win 5 more slams (at the time of writing). Still though, his killer instinct and performance in finals isn’t what it used to be. In 2017, he lost his first slam match to Roger Federer in 10 years.
Somehow, he lost an ATP 500 final to Querrey, as well as 3 more matches to RF, including 2 finals. Coming to Wimbledon, Nadal’s reworked aggression looked ready to reclaim the kind of results that defined his early grass court career. Shockingly, he lost to Gilles Muller 15-13 in the fifth set. 2018 was better in terms of upsets, but would be less successful. His most painful loss came to Djokovic, 10-8 in the final set of the Wimbledon semifinals. 2019 was more of the same. Strong overall performance, but an inability to find the next gear in the most important moments. He earned the beating of lifetime to Djokovic, clearly showing that the pain of his Wimbledon loss was still present. A third set tiebreaker loss to the underhand-serving KyrGOAT came in Acapulco, as well as a slew of awful performances on clay that supported an astonishing three consecutive losses on the surface. Though the 2019 USO was a great 5 set win that took huge mental strength to win, he should never have given Medvedev a chance in that match, having bageled him only weeks earlier.
Where is My Mind?
It is 2020 and Nadal’s killer instinct seems to be returning, but I doubt we will see the kind of mental resilience we saw pre-2014. Djokovic just beat him so many times in so many big moments.
Whenever I see Nadal fail to serve out a set, get sucked into a tiebreaker or get pushed to a fifth set, my stomach churns.
He’s my hero, but I doubt him in big moments because I remember the times he used to doubt himself.
I will never forget that backhand put away up the line that Nadal pushed wide, leading up a break at 4-3, 30-15. He lost that game, and the match, the 2012 Australian Open final. It was the worst miss of his career. To be honest, I stopped watching tennis from 2014-2015, because I was sick of seeing Nadal choke under pressure. Thankfully, I can still remember the good times, (mostly finals against Federer, hahaha) but more recently recovering from an opening set bagel, to defeat Thiem in 5 at the US Open. It was the most ruthless barrage of power and spin I have ever seen on the tennis court. Thiem swung with drone-Iike precision and nuclear devastation. But Rafa came back. I don’t think any other player could have come back from that position.
His fighting spirit got him through that match and it will get him through the rest of his career.
The raging bull against the dying of the light. Vamos Rafa.
by Beckett Chung, media cowboy @theslicetennis
