Binky Griptite's Ghetto Funk Tennis Hour

Bill Simmons recently mentioned this Sports Illustrated article which attributes Luis Gonzalez's late-career surge in home runs to an open batting stance and using more pine tar. Simmons points to this article as the perfect story to sum up baseball's steroid era.

Last week's Sports Illustrated included this article on Rafael Nadal. I suspect it will become the perfect story to sum up tennis' steroid era. S.L. Price writes:

It's that attitude that had made Nadal—a natural righthander who was raised on clay and once used his serve merely to start rallies—the best lefthander since Rod Laver, an all-surface player with one of the best volleys in the game, and a server whose average delivery had risen in the past year from 107 mph to 119. Then, in an August practice session before the Open, Nadal shifted the grip on his racket to stabilize his wrist and began popping serves in the low 130s. He was broken only five times in New York.

So Nadal picked up 12 MPH on his serve through hard work? Then he picked up another 11+ MPH by shifting the grip on his racket? I'm not sure that hard work and a grip shift adds that much pop. And it took him 8 years on the pro tour to realize that he was holding his racket wrong? And he's a natural rightie?!?

I think Nadal picked up some extra oomph at Dr. Galea's office.

Here's a photo of Nadal taken at this year's U.S. Open.


Here's an undated photo I found (in TR's bathroom, of all places); I'm not sure if it was altered.


I'm not the first person to think that tennis has a steroid problem. Go to that link for photos of insanely jacked female tennis players ... if you're into that sort of thing.