What is wrong with Roger Federer??

[Bundes]

Unbelievable: defeats to Ivo Karlovic and Gilles Simon, some rather inexpressive players, in back to back weeks...

I won't say "disappointing season", because that's just code for "crap the media makes up to boost ratings/sell papers". C'mon, the guy has been in 2 Grand Slam finals and had a Semifinal result in the other GS already held, not to mention 2 Masters Series finals on clay. If this was anyone else, it would be an "above average" season. True, it is considerably less than what Federer had been doing the last 4 years, but calling it "disappointing", or "weak" is outrageous.

But still, it is incomprehensible. This guy is part of a pantheon made up of people like Pete Sampras, Bjorn Borg and Boris Becker. They all lost, but really, not twice in 2 weeks against inexpressive players on their favorite surface.

Federer should have mopped the floor with those guys, but instead he was handed an early ticket home, twice.

Any ideas??

[raf]

He's just gone and lost to Blake today. No offence to Blake but a half decent playing Federer should beat Blake. He had a 8 - 0 record before this match. I suppose he is a victim of his own success, for a player to have been so dominant in the last 4-5 years, now whenever he doesn't win a tournament it is a massive shock even though he really can't be as dominant as he was. Not even Sampras was as domiant as Federer.

[Bundes]

Exactly. Even worse is the fact that, had the Olympics taken place last year, he would have won it with one hand tied behind his back. We might say age is starting to take its toll, him being 27 and all, but last year he was 26 and nobody could touch him (except Nadal on clay), and a few months couldn't really make that much of a difference. It's like he's having a meltdown, possibly reverting back to the pre-2002 version of himself, when he was pretty much an average player...

But still, not forgetting, in his "worst season ever" he still made 2 consecutive Grand Slam finals and 2 Masters Series Finals. For anyone else (again, except Nadal) that would be a "great" year.

[Romone]

He's back...just a blip...

[Bundes]

Originally Posted by Romone

He's back...just a blip...

Oh I don't know. Like I said, Federer at 70% percent is still better than 75% of the field, but just as it is way too soon to state that he "will never" again play like he did in 2004~2007, it is also very, very premature to say that he *is* back to that form because he won the US Open. I suppose the last 3 major tournaments left in the season (2 Master Series events and the Masters Cup) could serve as indicators: if he does well in them, we might start saying that the "bad phase" is over and the old Federer is back. But it is also possible that he could end 2008 with the US Open as the only title of significance under his belt for the year. Which is still great, but in "Federer terms" it's still way, way off.