By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Monday March 16, 2020
Taylor Fritz opens up about the player experience during the Coronavirus pandemic and what he'd like to improve during his time away.
Photo Source: AP
American Taylor Fritz was in the midst of a successful start to the 2020 season, coming off his first 500-level final in Acapulco in late February, and sitting at a career-high ranking of 24 when the Coronavirus pandemic took hold of tennis and forced a suspension of the season.
Then it all came to a screeching halt as the globe shudders in the wake of the pandemic.
Speaking with Paul Annacone, Tracy Austin and Steve Weissman on Tennis Channel last week, Fritz opened up about the shock that he and his mates felt when the news broke that Indian Wells would be cancelled and the tour would shut down until late April—at the very least.
“We kind of saw it coming, but I’m still just so unsure of what to do because you never really get time off playing tennis, so you you’re not used to having just six weeks to do whatever, so it’s kind of like a shock,” Fritz said, adding that he would stay in Los Angeles and take a few days off before he started to work in what amounts to his second pre-season.
“Probably just take a little bit of time off, I’m sure after not even a week I’m going to want to start practicing again,” he said. “I don’t like really doing nothing for too long.”
Fritz is not totally hopeful that the ATP will be able to begin its season when the six-seek suspension ends. His next event would be Madrid in early May (May 2nd, with Rome starting immediately after on May 9) and Spain and Italy have been devastated by Coronavirus. Italy has 27,980 confirmed cases as of Monday afternoon, with over 2000 deaths. Confirmed cases are also on the rise in Spain, France and Germany, and how well the European nations can combat the virus will play a key role in whether or not the tour can resume on the clay in May, before Roland Garros.
There are no guarantees, and Fritz is aware of the fact that he and his peers may have a lot of time for practice on their hands. The current break in tour activity could end up being longer than the typical tennis off-season by a good amount.
“[It could last] even longer than an off-season,” Fritz said. “We’ll see if it is actually going to be six weeks, because the first tournament back after six weeks is meant to be [Madrid. with Rome after that], so that’s still up in the air of course, so we’ll see.”
Fritz says that players communicated in a giant Whatsapp group and played a role in the decision making of the tour. They voted amongst themselves and passed on the result to the ATP Player Council which took it into account before dealing with ATP Tournaments and governing body as decisions to shut down various events were made.
“The way we all stayed updated was through this massive group chat we have on Whatsapp with all the players pretty much, so we we’re all just talking and a lot of the guys from the council kind of came in and said ‘This is what we’re thinking of doing, can you guys vote yes we keep playing or no?’ and yesterday (the day before the six-week shutdown was announced) was a lot of back-and-forth, some people playing we should play without fans, a majority of people saying ‘look we should just call it.’”
The topic of playing events without fans was discussed and there were many differing opinions. Fritz shared his own, saying: “The points I was making were: If we go to a lot of these places and play, even without fans, it’s only a matter of time until a player gets the virus and then you can’t play for a couple weeks and then other players get it. We all know we’re healthy so we probably wouldn’t be impacted too much, but it’s about who we can pass it to and then also you end up not playing for a couple weeks the tour is not even the tour when half the players have the flu and can’t play.
“You have to think about the potential people that you are spreading it to that might not be able to handle it—that, at the end of the day is what is most important.”
Fritz says the group was polled for a majority and the vote was passed on to be used by the Player’s Council, who then used it to make the final decision.
As far as the American's tennis goes, he improved to 8-6 on the season after falling to Nadal in the Acapulco final. Fritz believes he has been able to move into the Top 25 this season because he has increased his strength and stamina and is now able to handle long weeks on tour without seeing his body break down.
Staying healthy has also been key for the 6’4” Ranch Santa Fe, California native.
“I think it’s just a combination of working hard, doing a lot of consistent gym work, like getting stronger. I felt like in Acapulco my body felt fine for the whole tournament, which is not typically normal—after a couple of matches I usually get pretty sore or like beaten up. Staying healthy is a big part of it—I have dealt with a good amount of injuries here and there so kind of just being able to stay healthy and keep building off the work I have been doing has been making a difference.”
Fritz says that his biggest goal during the time off will be to work on his forehand so that he can shape it into a world-class weapon that can help him attack the game’s elite forces. He also wants to clean up his game and be more consistently aggressive during points.
“I think I need to work on things like making my forehand a bigger weapon," he said. "It’s a strength of mine but I want to get it even better to where if I get that mid-court ball the points over. And I think I make too many errors sometimes, I think I sometimes let people back in the point too much.”
Fritz is coached by David Nainkin and works with Brent Salazar on the fitness side. He also works with Roger Federer’s former coach Paul Annacone. Annacone has a different idea of what Fritz needs to improve in his game to get to the next level and the dialog is ongoing between the two about how to weight their practice time.
“Paul wants to work on the transition a lot more, which I agree I want to work on but it’s not the foundation of my game,” said Fritz. “We’ve been working on adding it but I think I really need to work on what makes me good and get better at finishing the points because I think when you play the best guys who are just faster you need really, really big weapon.”
With the Coronavirus pandemic threatening to linger into May and potentially long beyond that, Fritz will have ample time to fine-tune his game for whenever tennis does resume again. If he makes the most of the time he could become the top-ranked American and a Top 15 player in pretty short order.