Tennis Mailbag: The Nick Kyrgios Saga Exposes One of the Sport’s Central Conflicts

Jon Wertheim answers your questions, addressing the Australian player-turned-broadcaster’s disparaging comments. Plus, Maria Sharapova’s Hall of Fame bid and a legal detour.

Kyrgios has come under fire for a disparaging social media comment he made toward a women's tennis player. / Danielle Parhizkaran-Imagn Images

Hey everyone …

•R.I.P Robert Lansdorp, a true tennis giant whose fingerprints are all over the modern game. Here’s a short Sports Illustrated tribute I wrote (gulp) 20 years ago.

• I greatly enjoyed this podcast on Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and the 2008 Wimbledon final. (Aside: Am I the last person in the world to know the great Sally Phillips was the daughter of longtime Wimbledon chieftain Tim Phillips?)

• Here’s the latest episode of the Served podcast. 

• New York fans, it’s the Garden Cup.

Some Q&A …

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Even if I didn’t care about tennis, I’d read your work just for the fun parts (e.g., Pennetta “sticking the dismount”). Also, appreciate how carefully you criticize the players when criticism is warranted. But, wouldn’t mind if you went harder on Nick Kyrgios. Can’t believe ESPN foisted such a crude specimen on us. Surely Mary Carillo and the other women—and the other guys, for that matter—loathed sharing the booth with him? We turned off every match where he showed up with his sneering and mumbling, constantly airing out his tiresome history of beefs with other players.)

Thanks as always, Jon.

Ann Cain

• Thanks. Just to be clear, Mary Carillo did not work for ESPN during the U.S. Open and, thus, did not share a booth with Kyrgios. But your point stands. 

One of the saddest sights I witnessed at the Open was Chris Evert sitting with Kyrgios. On one side of the screen sat an 18-time major champion who embodies decency, dignity and strength. On the other side, a tennis talent profligate who—barely a year after his domestic violence guilty plea; having already established a track record for objectifying WTA players with crude references to their sexual history—thought it was a good idea to tweet this. (Incidentally, I reached out and asked ESPN if they intended to comment on this incident. Per a spokesperson, “nothing planned.”)

I quite liked Andrea Petkovic’s riff on Kyrgios. The same way he has self-sabotaged his playing career, his lack of discipline and impulse control (and demand for attention) have already undermined a potentially bright broadcasting career. 

I was discussing this incident with a non-tennis friend who works at ESPN. He was gobsmacked by what had happened. Wait what?, was a phrase in heavy rotation, followed by guffaws. I had to explain the crazy tennis dynamics multiple times. I made this analogy. Imagine if, say, Troy Aikman [ESPN’s Monday Night Football commentator, a former player] mocked a starting NFL quarterback, culminating in a sophomoric tweet, implying he had already ahem, romanced, the player’s current girlfriend … a girlfriend, who is also an athlete the broadcaster might be in position to cover one day? Oh, and tennis being tennis, Kyrgios and the disparaged female player share an agent? 

The response: “Oh, he would be out of a commentary job by the next commercial break. No doubt.”

Kyrgios advanced to the 2022 Wimbledon final before pursuing a broadcasting career. / Mike Frey-Imagn Images

I keep thinking about Kyrgios. How this was such a breathtaking lapse of decency and sound judgment. How he is now 29, the prime of a tennis career fading by the day. And how we should just green-light the 2034 Kyrgios sports doc now. We already know the beats. 

Scene: A whip-around of the Kyrgios trick shots and brilliance, over Robbie Koenig’s always excellent breathless play-by-play calls. We see Kyrgios beating Nadal at Wimbledon. We hear the gushing about his talent. We hear the familiar refrain that this isn’t the Aussie tennis player of yore. Move over Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall and Pat Rafter and even Lleyton Hewitt. This guy is a punk rocker. If he’s too loud, you’re too old!

Then cut to the meltdowns. We hear the accounts of his blowing off practices to play video games or watch the Boston Celtics. We get the inside-the-locker-room account of the lucky-he-didn’t-get-his-ass-kicked 2015 disgrace in Canada and the toothless ATP response. Mischa Zverev goes on camera and recalls the tanked match. We get Stefanos Tsitsipas calling Kyrgios an “evil bully.” Maybe more damning, there are the prescient quotes from young Casper Ruud, identifying Kyrgios as someone unworthy of serious treatment. 

Act II: We have a sitdown with Kyrgios. First, we get the backstory. The Wu Tang Clan photo. The references to “husky lad.” Beard flecked in gray, he says words to the effect, “I wish someone had grabbed me by the collar and said, ‘Nick, you are so gifted. Other players would kill for a fraction of your talent. Stop being your own worst enemy.’ I wish someone had called me on my crap. But no one did.”

Cut to 2022: Kyrgios wins the Australian Open doubles title. (Not before nearly coming to blows with another player.) He reaches the 2022 Wimbledon final (Not before nearly coming to blows with another player). Finally, maturity and talent are winning out! But then …

Act III: Kyrgios gets injured, He loses motivation, he realizes that TV is pretty easy, pays well and tickles the attention pleasure center, without the vulnerability of competition. But here comes the hubris. The dopamine of social media has him bullying the world’s No. 1 player, who also happens to be coached by a fellow broadcaster.

We get a sports psychologist using words like “complex” and “contradictory” talking about how Kyrgios is great with kids but less great with adults, capable of great kindness but also great cruelty. He was great at tennis but the sport was a singularly bad environment for him. We hear the obligatory lines about how he thrives in team environments, where credit and blame are dispersed. We hear about craven agents and handlers who enabled Kyrgios, motivated more by keeping him as a client—“If he could have pulled it together and actually won a major, he could have been worth nine figures!”—than by acting as responsible stewards. 

We are left with the portrait of a former athlete processing so much unmet potential. He looks at the camera, and smiles, “I did it my way” and “I was great for the sport.” 

But he cannot mask his regret. He knows that he committed a cardinal sin of sports: He was blessed with talent and didn’t honor it.

Fin.

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Jon, I have a theory. As a tennis fan in the 90s, there were specific shots by the pros I tried to master. Pete Sampras’s hook forehand was the big one. I watched the U.S. Open final and while I like and respect Jannik Sinner, I cannot think of a single shot he hit that I would think to imitate the next time I took the court. Is it me or do players no longer have signature shots?

Wilson W., NYC

• The hook brings you back. I ain’t telling you no lie. The hook brings you back. On that, you can rely!

Where were we? Oh, right, signature shots. It’s an interesting question. I think of Novak Djokovic’s imitations and how instantly we know John McEnroe’s side-winding serve or Boris Becker’s rock-back or Evert’s precise and efficient ground strokes or Jimmy Connors’s two-hander or sky-hook overhead. 

But as I think of today’s game, I’m not sure I buy the premise of the question. The Nadal banana forehand? The Alcaraz drop shot? The Ons Jabeur drop shot? Iga Świątek’s windshield wiper crosscourt forehand on clay? The Ash Barty slice? Aryna Sabalenka’s heater? The Frances Tiafoe forehand slap? The shots of today might be harder to execute. No recreational player is hitting Nadal’s spin-laden, Luxilon-abetted lefty forehand. But it’s a signature shot, no?

Nadal is known for his lethal lefty forehand, a shot hard to replicate for the average recreational player. / Amber Searls-Imagn Images

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Hi Jon,

Darren Cahill has a conflict of interest as a commentator and a coach. You are incorrect that Sinner's lawyer has a conflict because he/she also represents the ITIA. …These cases are not a court of law. The [ITIA] does not have to ever prove its case, it's simply an entity enforcing rules. It's more of an administrative hearing. The positive drug test starts the proceedings, which are pro forma. There is no insider information any attorney representing the ITIA could have that would benefit a player in these cases. The ITIA is not technically a plaintiff, they are an administrator. The player is guilty and has to prove their innocence … I'm surprised they don't have a small army of in-house counsel handling these matters. But the fact that Sinner's lawyer was also handling Moore's case means nothing. The lawyer for the ITIA is simply an administrator. They are not advocating on the ITIA's behalf.

Betty Scott, San Francisco

• Consider this a warning/disclaimer: This is likely really, really boring for the non-legal crowd. You might want to skip ahead.

I really appreciate Betty’s thoughtful response. And I went down this rabbit hole. And in the end, I reach a different conclusion. 

Again, to set the stage: One of Sinner’s lawyers, who successfully defended him from ITIA sanctions, also counts the ITIA as a client, and recently helped bring a doping case against a player. Technically, Betty is correct that the ITIA is not a plaintiff per se; it is acting in an administrative role. But I would submit that this is a distinction without a difference.

This matter is tantamount to a “litigation” matter. At the core, it is a dispute pitting a doping enforcement agency against an accused athlete, subject to the jurisdiction of the enforcement agency. If the lawyer’s previous work for the ITIA entailed, say, helping draft its office lease, it would look bad. (And, in the U.S., perhaps require a waiver from the ITIA). But that’s not what’s going on here. In this case, the same lawyer who essentially prosecuted a tennis player on behalf of the ITIA … then turned around to defend a player against the ITIA. 

Again: The same lawyer and firm that has done work for ITIA, advising on doping enforcement … simultaneously advised Sinner on defense of a doping enforcement action by the firm’s client, ITIA. In legalese: what the what? This is not a particularly close call. (As for the idea that perhaps British law and legal ethics are more lax than U.S. legal ethics, here’s the code.)  

I presented this fact pattern to a sports lawyer who works closely with governing bodies. He drew a parallel to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) and wrote: “For any lawyer that has represented USADA, that lawyer would never receive a waiver from USADA to represent an athlete in a doping dispute, before the AAA [American Arbitration Association], where USADA is the counterparty.”

Here’s another point about conflicts. Often the mere appearance is enough. 

Disclosing this conflict—we are partners in a business venture!—I thought Andy Roddick put it well the other day. In every other sector and negotiation Andy has had post-tennis, there are rules about conflicts and blurred lines between labor and management. “For some reason in tennis, you can work for this, coach this, do this, you’re on a player board. It’s so insane what we accept. If we leave our little tennis bubble, it’s looney tunes. It’s so absurd.”

Maybe that’s it. Maybe the sport is so absurd/small/insular/dysfunctional that the usual guardrails, ethical guidelines and business norms don’t apply. But I would argue all this clubbish-ness and entanglement is surely an effective way to make sure you never get bigger.

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Hi Jon,

All Australian women were out by Round 2 in New York—a familiar scenario lately in the majors. Australia has no female player in the top 100 and our four current highest-ranked players were developed overseas. Is this a topic of conversation in tennis circles? 

Russell, Melbourne, Australia.

• A) We love Australia. It’s like the Kim Clijsters/Pat Rafter/Lindsay Davenport/Jessica Pegula etc. of tennis nations

B) Three years ago today, Australia had the world’s No.1 player. The pendulum sways.

C) Keep an eye on Destanee Aiava.

D) Your point is well taken. Despite the modest population (25 million or so), for a country that hosts a major—and has millions to invest in player development—there should be more top-100 representation. 

Aiava is currently ranked No. 136 in the world. / Dan Hamilton-Imagn Images

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Hi Jon,

I’m a huge fan of the Served podcast and always look forward to hearing what you and Andy and your guests say on so many topics.

One thing that troubled me about your analyses about the U.S. Open was all of your praise for the American tennis players (men and women) who made it to the semifinals. Deserved praise I would add. But both of you completely ignored the success of Taylor Townsend (women’s doubles) and Taylor and Donald Young (mixed doubles) and Nathaniel Lammons and Jackson Withrow (men’s doubles).

I am sure if you gave them more shout-outs (which they totally deserve) more fans would flock to those outside courts to cheer them on. 

Thank you for considering this. 

Barbara Berke, Weston, MA

• Fair enough. I think between Tennis Channel and Sports Illustrated, Taylor Townsend’s name came up a lot (invariably swaddled in praise). But Lammons (SMU) and Withrow (Texas A&M) reaching the latter rounds in doubles and snapping the three-year win streak of Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury ought to have gotten more play.

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Jon,

What are you smoking supporting Maria Sharapova in the Hall of Fame? Anyone found to have used performance-enhancing drugs should never be admitted to a Hall of Fame. There is so much drug testing because athletes know using these substances corrupts sports and gives them advantages over competitors. Need I remind you Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were never inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame despite their success?  

Raymond

• Sharapova tested positive for a banned drug, with performance-enhancing qualities. Still, she will be getting my vote—and, I strongly suspect, the requisite votes for enshrinement. Why?

A) For years, the banned drug was not banned. Similarly situated players successfully appealed their ban. Sharapova may have made a strategic error trying to control the narrative. 

B) She did her time. It’s not as though she skated. Retributive justice and all.

C) Without condoning PED use, in some cases—this being one of them—it should not be disqualifying for Hall of Fame eligibility.

D) Did Sharapova disgrace herself both with the positive test and her sloppy alibi, attributing her meldonium use to an alleged family history of diabetes? Yes. Does it negate all she accomplished as a player? No.