“Sometimes I wake up one morning and find a jungle: a snake biting me, the next day a tiger. » The man who made these remarks, at a press conference in Paris, does not only have a gift for metaphor. He also won 22 Grand Slam tournaments in professional tennis. This Monday in May at Roland-Garros, he had just been knocked out in three sets by the fourth seed of the tournament, Alexander Zverev, before leaving the court, fist raised, greeted by the sort of ovation that one reserves on farewell tours.
Exit Rafael Nadal, out in the first round on the clay of France, a first for him in this tournament where he has an almost incredible record of 14 victories in 18 participations, and whose legendary red surface will remain forever marked with his mark almost superhuman.
Talking about the injuries that punctuated “Rafa’s” career is like wondering what Mario Lemieux’s career would have been without chronic back pain and Hodgkin’s disease. A widespread opinion among experts is that the Magnificent was a better hockey player than the GOAT in title, Gretzky. The two concluded their legendary runs with comparable average points per match (around 1.9), and if the Marvel will have garnered a total of 1134 more points, it is by playing 572 more matches than Super Mario. We repeat: what would the latter’s career have looked like without the fight against cancer, the long sick leaves (a full season in 1994-1995), the premature retirement and these herniated discs which brought tears of pain to his eyes in the locker room where someone else had to tie his skates?
In tennis, the question becomes: what would Rafael Nadal’s career record look like today if his body, for 21 years, had not become this assembly of advanced components deteriorated beyond any possibility of recovery and holding together by a supreme effort of will?
It’s hard to believe that with a healthy left elbow, left foot, knees, abs, back, ribs, left hip and left thigh, he wouldn’t be sitting in front of Djokovic at the top of the world today. tennis history with 25 Grand Slam victories under his belt.
In January 2023, when, handicapped by a bad hip, he was knocked out in the second round of the Australian Open, he made this comment at a press conference (quoted by West France): “It hurts, as always. But now the cup is beginning to be full and there will be a time when it will overflow. »
Sixteen months later, after Nadal described himself, in Paris, as “psychologically destroyed” in front of journalists, this moment of letting go and accepting the wear and tear of the parts of his superb machine could well have come for him. As a relative of his said after his withdrawal at the same Australian Open this year: “He’s not an injured tennis player. He’s an injured person who plays tennis. »
Let’s imagine Nadal and another survivor of the operating rooms, Tiger Woods, the man with 29 injuries and operations, who meet in the VIP lounge of some international airport and who start, like two grandpas, to discuss their sores. The conversation might go something like this: “Hey, Raffie! How are the bones in your left foot? — Ah, still the chronic pain. It’s because of my Müller-Weiss syndrome. – I heard about it. Could this have anything to do with your old scaphoid fracture? – Maybe. But at the moment, it’s more my micro-tear muscle in my thigh that worries me. Obviously, my back is broken and my tendinitis in my knees follows me like a shadow, and then, I always feel this little discomfort in my abdominal area. What about you, Tiger? How is your knee? —Are you talking about my left knee? (He laughs.) This one deserves to have his own CV. Over the past 30 years, doctors have removed two tumors, a cyst and scar tissue, drained a lot of fluid, and the cartilage was repaired. But I also tore my anterior cruciate ligament, and then there was this sprain of the medial collateral ligament. And I’m not even telling you about my sprained Achilles heels and my double stress fracture in my tibia. Currently, I am living with plantar fasciitis diagnosed last year and the after-effects of a complicated procedure to fuse the bones in my ankle. »
With that, too proud to ask for a wheelchair, they get up, smiling like gritted teeth, and leave each other as good friends to head, not without stiffness and with a discreet limp, towards the boarding bridge. (For medical information, thanks to François-David Rouleau of Montreal Journal.)
These two men, who are in some way patched products of medical science, have in common the fact that they have written some of the most beautiful pages in the history of their respective sports. Nadal who, at the age of 33, took a final turn at the top of the ATP rankings and who, two years later, was champion again at Roland Garros, was as strong as Agassi’s return to the top in 1999. As for Tiger’s victory at the 2019 Masters Tournament at the venerable age of 43, sometimes considered the greatest sporting comeback in history, all disciplines combined, it was truly a miracle.
And the greatest tennis player in history? Federer was the perfect boy, the type to reassure mothers-in-law. Djokovic looks like a tormented teenager who has yet to make peace with his gray areas. Nadal will have been the most important character cool three. Let’s ask the question another way: which of these gentlemen would I want to go for a beer with after work?
Cheers, Rafa…