Ode to Rafa and Roger

By Chris Oddo / Thursday, January 22, 2014

Federer-Nadal: Other rivals have played
more matches (five to be exact) and hurled more insults at one
another (Mac-Connors?), but no rivalry in the history of tennis
has captivated legions of fans in the same way that Rafael
Nadal and Roger Federer have.

Federer-Nadal, Edition 33, By the
Numbers

Polar opposites in style and demeanor, Fed and Rafa exhibit
similarities, too: the same unbridled love for the game, and
the same infectious enthusiasm for promoting the sport and
embracing fans and followers worldwide. It is this pure,
unaffected love for tennis that bridges the gap between the
rivals and, essentially, has Federer and Nadal functioning as
one giant, tennis-championing entity.

Sure, they have been bitter rivals in the past, but never
enemies.

Combatants, yes! Desperately driven to defeat the
other, maybe even obsessed with it, yes!—but never
enemies.

Rafa is a lefty, idiosyncratic and physically bombastic. Roger
is a righty, regal and physically lithe. The pair represents
two different schools of thought. One icy, stoic,
contemplative; the other fiery, intense, indomitable. But in
the end everything that Federer and Nadal are, both
individually and collectively, amalgamates nicely into the
perfect contrast, providing something for everyone.

Inside each is a bit of the other. Federer, the purist, has a
bit of the revolution in him; Nadal, the revolution, has a bit
of the purity in him.

And unlike the Yankees and the Red Sox or Lakers and the
Celtics, you don’t have to hate the other because you love the
one. Tennis fans know what each means to the game, and most
(though not all) leave a special place in their heart for both.
(If you don’t maybe you should?)

The special and unique vibe that Federer and Nadal have
cultivated fosters a celebratory mood when they meet these
days. At 32, Roger can’t really be expected to squeeze wins out
of Nadal, the phenom who is still in his prime and seeking more
of the dominance that only he and Federer have enjoyed in this
the golden era of tennis. But one never knows, really, and that
is why we look to episode 33 of the rivalry with every bit of
the excitement that we had on the eve of the 2008 Wimbledon
final. We know the tennis can’t possibly be as sublime as it
once was, or the territory as precious, or the stakes as high,
but what we might end up lacking in on-court fireworks, we can
easily make up for with nostalgia, regardless of the outcome.

The notion of all-out war that we felt so furiously in the
rivalry’s formative years is still there. But also, the notion
of a dignified, cultivated rapport exists as well. Now that a
great deal of the smoke has cleared from their early gunfights,
we know the truth: Rafa would not exist in the way that he
exists without Roger, and vice-versa. Essentially, without one,
there would not be the other.

And so here we are, nearly 10 years on since their first ever
meeting, surely closer to the end than we’d like to be, yet
still in the throes of our own passionate beliefs about the
rivalry and how it relates to our fanhood, ourselves, our love
for the game, etc…

Federer and Nadal have been the prism through which so many of
us came to see tennis at its finest, most regal, most
ambitious, most transcendent self.

The game we know and love has been done proud by these two
champions in every way possible, and a massive void will exist
when the time comes that these two won’t face one another
anymore.

And so it is that Roger and Rafa will be inextricably linked
throughout the annals of history. And so it is that we prepare
to watch them play—surely one of their last few meetings, but
who knows?

Nadal and Federer, together with their followings, have ushered
tennis into a golden age. We are here right now, experiencing
it. That is not hyperbole, it is truth. We owe a lot to Federer
and Nadal, and on a day like today—just a normal January day to
so many in this giant, preoccupied world, we come to pay
tribute, to search for glimpses of what this rivalry once was,
and to hope that it can still stand on its own without the
nostalgia.

But if it can’t, we will always have that to fall back on.

And, of course, the videos:

1. Wimbledon, 2008

2. Australian Open, 2009

3. A Little Bit of Everything (great highlight
package)

4. Rome, 2006, the Fifth Set

5. Wimbledon, 2008, the Conclusion