James Blake
James Blake
James Riley Blakeis an American retired professional tennis player. Blake is known for his speed and powerful, flat forehand. During his career, Blake had amassed 24 singles finals appearances, while his career-high singles ranking was World No. 4. His career highlights included reaching the final of the 2006 Tennis Masters Cup, the semifinals of the Beijing Olympics and the quarterfinals of the Australian Openand US Open, as well as being the former American No. 1. His two titles for the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTennis Player
Date of Birth28 December 1979
CountryUnited States of America
Its amazing how good you feel after you win. Six months ago, I never would have had the maturity to come back. I got through it.
I feel that I'm playing just about as well as when I was 20-something in the world. I think I'm a more mature player, a more in-control player. I think I'm playing as well right now as I was when I was 20-something in the world. I'm happy I'm back, happy that I'm playing well again.
Most of my maturity and my different perspective comes from the last year, The J-Block.
That was an amazing point, ... It shows how well you have to play to get a break to get ahead of him. Those are the kind of points earlier in the year I would have lost earlier in the rally.
If I'm up two sets to one and a break, I'm not going to start getting ahead of myself, thinking, 'This is Andre Agassi, the legend, I'm going to beat,' ... I'm just going to try to keep the same maturity and the same focus and perspective I've had so far this tournament and this whole year.
I know I won't be able to enjoy my title too much,
I think Japanese audiences are much more attentive than a London audience.
I didn't want to just rest and try to win just on my name, or just because I thought I had done well last week. Obviously the score line shows that I kept my focus the whole time.
I played his brother a few weeks ago. Both fight very hard. They play great defense. So it tough to put balls away even on indoor hard.
It looked like Rafael was getting a little upset towards the end of the match noticing that my fans were pretty vocal, ... I'm proud that they never make it personal and they never do anything too negative toward the other player...maybe it helps that it was during the day and they maybe didn't have quite as many Heinekens today. That helps, I think.
If we have to fight for money, let's fight for money and let's get it into this region.
It took a while for the fans to warm to Pete Sampras,
It was one of those days where everything was going in.
It was one of those days when he is playing well and he is getting the breaks. Things tend to feel like they are snowballing.