No one can question Andy Roddick‘s allegiance when it comes to Davis Cup. In 23 ties dating back to 2001, the Texan has compiled 31 singles victories for the U.S., second only to Cup stalwart Johnny Mac‘s 41. Injuries aside, he’s always been there when his country has come calling.
When, in January, the 27-year-old announced that he would forgo the entire 2010 Davis Cup campaign due to a lingering knee injury, it was clear that it was a difficult, emotional decision.
“I’ll miss it, for sure,” said Roddick at the Australian Open. “It’s been a big part of my career so far. I don’t know if I’ve shut the door on as far as forever goes. We made the decision later on last year. That’s when my knee was still hurt. We didn’t think it was smart to be switching surfaces from hard to clay to hard, time zones, all that. Probably want to do that as few times in the year as we had to. That played a big part.”
Roddick then echoed Andre Agassi (whom Patrick McEnroe pulled back into Davis Cup service in 2005), saying, “I never wanted to be one of these guys who played when it was convenient. I feel like if you commit at the beginning of the year, then you commit. Last thing I’d want to do is have those guys go battle early in the year, then me waltz in and try to play later in the year when they’ve been the ones to get the team to that point.”
But there’s apparently more to the story. In his book “Harcourt Confidential: Tales From Twenty years In the Pro Tennis Trenches” (co-written by Peter Bodo and due in bookstores in June), PMac claims that by the end of 2009, Roddick “was growing a little tired of the extraneous demands of Davis Cup.”
“He was pissed by the way the USTA started nitpicking the players’ phone bills, or insisting that Mike Bryan‘s girlfriend take a cab and pay her own way to the airport when she had to leave a tie a day early,” writes McEnroe, whose Davis Cup contract runs through 2011. “It was petty stuff, easily averted, and a transparent attempt by the USTA to show who’s in charge. But the reality is that the USTA has to be careful not to alienate the top players.”
