THE BEST COMBOS OF 2018

2018 DAC Doubles Club Championships

Doubles activity is up. Not exactly a news-flash to those who are playing since the experience of attempting to arrange a convenient match time with 3 others is made difficult enough when coordinating everyone’s most important schedules, but then discovering the time you have decided on is already booked… it can test the patience of the most mild-mannered Dalai Lama. (I’m sure that’s why he doesn’t play.) It also tests the limit of my in-box and delete button as I am privy to most of the e-mail chains that bounce around endlessly. Do we need a second doubles court…? A record breaking 36 teams entered this year’s doubles club championships and with that we could expand the event into 4 categories. Let’s see who picked their partners wisely…

Doubles C

Joe Moran and Ken Katz. Need I say more? What would the Doubles C draw be without them? It may drop the average age somewhat, but you would be hard pressed to find a pairing in this category that knew the angles better, knew all the tricks in the book better, and knew all the catch phrases to “Howdy-Doody”. The first time the Moran / Katz team graced the C final was way back in 2010 where they lost to Andy Housey and Anthony Fracchia. Another loss in the 2011 final, and then a reversal of fortune in 2012 when they finally picked up their first title. Four years later they repeated the win, and now once again in 2018, they were vying for their third. To reach the final this year, Moran / Katz won the 2 matches 3-0 and 3-1. On paper (at least), it certainly appeared the trifecta was well within reach.

Trying desperately to deny the veterans would be first time finalists Justin Winkelman and Tom Bejin. I’m not sure how well versed Justin and Tom are with Howdy-Doody, but luckily it wasn’t a skill that was needed against Curt Pedersen and Bruce Shaw in their first match. I think Curt and Bruce may have had the edge on that anyway. It was a royal shoot-out between the teams with Justin and Tom re-holstering their smoking racquets as the last team standing 3-2. It must have given them a boost in confidence, since the semifinal against Steve Murphy and David Pontes was – I am told – tough, but Winkelman / Bejin held strong to take all 3 games.

After a 753 e-mail train, a time was set for the final. Katz / Moran would have to rely heavily on their experience although both have be known to hustle down the ball pretty well too. It was surely the tactic that Winkelman / Bejin wanted to employ – Make. Them. Move. But as it turned out, Ken and Joe held the upper hand from the get go. Nothing was going to stop them from grabbing their third title and they swept the match 3-0!

(Just a quick side note. We didn’t get Howdy-Doody in Australia when I was growing up. We did have “Skippy the Bush Kangaroo” which was our version of “Lassie”. An outback Australian family adopted a kangaroo for a pet and apparently could understand it perfectly. It saved Timmy from drowning in the well every other week.)

Doubles B

Where Ken Katz and Joe Moran have all the squash experience that mere mortals only can imagine, Jeff Rogers and brother John have virtually none. What they do have is very quick feet. And an endless lung capacity which can be attributed to their days as hot-shot soccer players not too long ago. If the DAC had ‘soccer club champions” Jeff and John would be legends. So, there is only one way to get experience and that is by actually playing, and what better place to start than the B division of the club championships.

Based on their speed and athleticism, I seeded them second. Turns out I wasn’t far off. Doubles is a big court to cover and knowledge of angles is of paramount importance. I thought Jeff and John may struggle against the older, more experienced teams but it was not to be. Without dropping a game, the Rogers boys skipped all the way to the final, looking like they were just going for a relaxing stroll through the park.

The other half of the draw was more hotly contested. The Ted Morris and Jon Walton team were in my opinion the team to beat. They had racked up some decent wins over the season and their confidence should have been high. A dangerous first round had them up against last year’s doubles C winners – Jim Stroh and Sean Moran. Jim and Sean are one tournament wonders – the doubles club championships is the only time the pair dust off their squash racquets. They may have wished they dusted them off a little sooner this year. Almost pulling out the upset, but falling few deep breaths short, they couldn’t see the match through the 5^th game as Ted and Jon scraped in with a 3-2 victory.

In my mind, I was pretty sure they were going to win the next round too against Al Iafrate and John Roarty - both of whom are relatively new to the doubles court. And in reality, they should have done so. But Al and John ‘stole’ a victory that no doubt left the Morris / Walton team questioning their sanity. Ted and John won the first game, and were up in games 2, 3 and 4 each time by 5-6 points until they reached 13, only to lose each of them 15-14. A tough pill to swallow.

Al and John were unlikely finalists, not the Rogers team cared. It was all the same to them. Jeff and John continued on their merry way and took another matter-of-fact 3-0 win to the bank, cashing it in for a club champion title!

Doubles A

The biggest of the draws, 12 teams were competing for the honors. And being the biggest, it was also the most competitive. Neither of the teams that reached the final had it straightforward, it very easily could been a completely different foursome in the end.

The first finals pair – David “Nacho Libre” - “El Chapo” – “El Guapo” de la Torre / Zac MacVoy trashed talked their way through a 3-1 win over Dane Fossee and Scott Beals in round 1; somehow managed to work out a 3-2 victory over the number one seeded pairing of Paul Ward and Mike Petix; and I can’t imagine the verbal back and forth that was going on and even if I did I surely wouldn’t be able to print it, during the semifinal against John Mann and Colin Bayer. John and Colin got the early jump and had a 2 games to love lead before the lefty-righty combo of de la Nacho-Chapo-Guapo Torre / MacVoy came storming back to shanghai the next three. Could they win one more and go all the way?

Their opponents would be Joey Gaylord and Kevin Thomas. Joey and Kevin are a decent team but can be vulnerable depending on their motivation levels. That level maybe wasn’t at maximum in their first match against Manny Tancer and Dave Walker – who are by no means pushovers and have a ton of experience between them – and Joey and Kevin were extremely fortunate no to be kissing their club championship aspirations bye-bye then and there. No doubt they were squirming at the end, but a 15-13 in the 5^th win saw them skulk past and into the semifinals. The kick in the pantaloons pepped them up for that encounter and they were not taking any chances. Shail Arora and Charles Roby could not repeat their quarter final 3-2 performance over JC Tibbitts and Mike LoVasco and were dispatched in 3 straight games.

A fascinating finals match-up: Gaylord / Thomas v de la Torre / MacVoy. There is one recorded result between the two teams and the mental edge goes to Joey and Kevin who won that 3-0 just over 1 month ago. But luckily Dave and Zac have short memories. Or maybe they don’t and they were using it as motivation? Or, maybe a couple of post-match beers were on the line which would spur on the most passive of individual to greater heights? Whatever the inspiration was, Dave and Zac were extremely driven to get their names into the DAC record books. They succeeded in their quest and took the match 3-1, creating the biggest upset of this year’s club championships!

Doubles Open

This rivalry is not that old, but it seems to have morphed into a life of its own. Once again we were left with 2 teams standing that have both won this prestigious sports title and clearly (in their minds at least) is equivalent - if not greater – than Wimbledon, the Stanley Cup, the World Soccer Cup, and the Fossee summer annual back garden ‘bags tournament’ combined.

Jed Elley and Ryan Covell (who have nicknamed themselves “Jed-Co”, a lovely couple’s combo on par with “Brangalina”, or “Kimye”, or “TomKat”) are the current defending club champions but probably still can taste the sourness of their 2016 finals loss that catapulted their opponents into unlikely stardom and kicked off the now dastardly tug-of-war between them.

The two teams staring each other down...

Those opponents? George Kordas and John (JR) Rakolta. (Who have nicknamed themselves the “Blue Chips” for reasons I still can’t understand.) The Blue Chips took down Jed-Co in the infamous final of 2016 where JR literally sacrificed life and limb for the victory and was lucky to escape without having to visit the ER for multiple incidents. Jed-Co handed out some revenge last year when they beat the Blue Chips 3-1 on the way to their title, but it was only in the semifinal. A finals victory would make it all the sweeter.

Both teams dropped just 1 game to reach the final. Reports and comments were coming in from both teams prior to the big match…

Snippets overheard from Vikram Chopra after their semifinal loss to the Blue Chips are pure hearsay and relayed to me from George, so there is probably some self-aggrandizing editing going on, but who am I to judge?: "Happy (tears) because of what Peter and I did coming to the Final Four," Chopra said "playing on a world class stage against Kordas and Rakolta— reppin' our community and the city of Detroit, Sad (tears) because I know this was it.  The Chips have dismantled us, similar to what they did to Haggarty and Eugenio in 16’ before the Legendary Blue Chip championship.... just thinking about what we could have done better, but sometime you just have to tip your hat to the champs.” Peter Logan’s (Vik’s partner) comments to me didn’t exactly echo the same sentiments. Just sayin’.

Ryan Covell on the other hand was more focused in the upcoming contest rather focusing on past successes. Recognizing that the death-defying tactic of planting yourself on court as a human-obstacle paid huge dividends for JR in 2016, Ryan has called upon the same approach for himself this time around (and I am quoting directly with a slight edit): “My prediction is a JedCo victory and somebody will get tagged with an full swing overhand and the ball hits them right in the behind*. It’ll probably be me, but that’s the price of victory. So go ahead fellas. Hit me right in the behind*. I’m ready!!” Ummm.. yeah, Ryan. Whatever rocks your boat I suppose. I did reply to that stating that we will have a spare ball on standby in case we cannot retrieve the first one. (* word edited).

The Champs! Jed-Co all smiles!

It was on. The buildup was complete, now it was to be seen which team could step up and match their rhetoric. In front of a decent crowd itching for fireworks, the two teams put up what we all expected them do – a high quality doubles display, and hearty discussions on the rules of doubles squash. On this day though, Jed and Ryan were clearly on a seek and destroy mission. A tight first game that fell Jed-Co’s way was all that team needed. The rest was waiting for the inevitable. At no time in the next 2 were the Blue Chips threatening any sort of comeback, they were on the receiving end of a good ol’ fashioned whoopin’. The constant pressure applied to them was too great to overcome with Jed-Co’s court coverage and clever angles. The 3-0 win ended their misery somewhat and gave the reigning champs, Jed and Ryan an awfully satisfying victory. Congrats guys! I am happy to report that the spare ball was not needed, although Ryan – it was reported – was practicing hard the day before and was getting a ‘feel’ the possible future pain...

(Photos courtesy of George Kordas facebook account).

THE SQUASH SCORING SQUABBLE

I watched a decent amount of the 2017 World Series Finals in Dubai (June 6-10). The event is not for ranking but for money, takes the top 8 players – men and women – who performed the best overall in the World Series tournaments from the previous season. The players are split up into 2 groups of 4, compete in a round robin where the top 2 players of each group then advance to the semi-finals. In other words, it’s the best of the best of the best, beating each other up for a decent paycheck.

Except for the final itself, all the matches were best of 3 games. And it was, undeniably (in my mind anyway), some of the best, most exciting squash ever played. As I flip through my thesaurus, searching for superlatives to describe the event, all the words just don’t seem to meet the standard I am looking for, so I’ll invent some hybrid versions… it was… “unbelieveatastical”…. “extraincredipopping”… “phenomotacular”…

But now, because of all that “supercalifragilididdly-duper” squash, a debate has broken out amongst the faithful about possibly changing the scoring system from the best of 5 to 11 points, to a best of 3 version in the hopes of catching this lightning in a bottle more often and appealing to a greater audience.

Before you cry out in shock about how dare anyone questions the sanctity of the sport, remember, squash has already gone under some big transformations over the years. When I first picked up my first wooden 300+ gram squash racquet in 1976, scoring was to 9 only, but you had to have the serve to win a point. Techniques were a lot larger and slower back then, emphasis was on hitting 50 rails in a row before you dared hit anything else, and glass back courts were a rarity and a luxury to play on. Oh, how things have changed.

Since then, scoring moved to point-a-rally to 15 before moving to what we have now to 11, the height of the professional tin dropped 2 inches, all major events are on full glass courts, equipment has become lighter and stronger, techniques are snappier and more compact, fitness requirements have changed dramatically as the game has evolved into the dynamic accelerated version we see these days. So, is it out of the realm of possibility to accept further adaptions to the current form to improve our value and marketability?

In early March this year, the PSA trialed an actual ranking event with best of 3 scoring for the $100K Canary Wharf tournament in England. The first 2 rounds were best of 3 but the semifinals and final were then best of 5. Here are some stats from that format:

• Average length of round 1 matches – 37.75 minutes (8 matches total played over 2 days, best of 3)
• Average length of round 2 matches – 43 minutes (4 matches, best of 3)
• Shortest 2-0 match (main draw) was 25 minutes.
• Longest 2-0 match (main draw) was 44 minutes.
• Average length of the semifinals – 69.5 minutes (2 matches, best of 5)
• Final – 86 minutes (best of 5). Mohammed El Shorbagy won in 5 games over Tarek Momen.
• 7 of the 12 matches in rounds 1 and 2 ended up as a 2-0 score line.
• All qualifying matches were best of 3 as well. Again, 7 of the 12 matches ended up as a 2-0 score.

I adore watching pro squash. I travelled to Chicago to watch a couple of early round sessions for this year’s Windy City Open. One session is 4 matches, and they calculate 4 hours per. By the end of the second session, I was pretty ‘squashed-out’ and ready for a break. And none of the matches I witnessed went to 5 games. That being said, watching the first two rounds of the Canary Wharf, I was left wanting more from some of the matches. Even though the average length of the contests wasn’t that short, I felt a little ‘robbed’ with the 2-0 wins and even the 2-1 results had the air of incompleteness. (Especially the Rodriguez – Marwan El Shorbagy match!) Also, from a player perspective, I think I would feel a somewhat cheated travelling all the way to London and be out of the event in 2 games and under half an hour.

After combing through an assortment of comments left by some current top players, the general consensus seemed to be mixed. (Read here) Time and fitness being common threads.  Best of 3 would mean shorter matches, and hence less value for money. Fitness requirements for the players would be impacted. One of the reasons we play is because the unique challenges that squash offers for the body and mind. Don’t forget, however, that we aren’t trying to make squash more attractive to our current fan base, the goal is to expand that fan base and marketability. It would be interesting to have the opinions of many in the Canary Wharf crowd – ask the fans what they think and prefer.

Current World #2 - Ali Farag

Ali Farag probably laid it out the best with a pros and cons argument that one can read here. (This was written after the World Series Finals last year). Definitely worth your time. Keeping an open mind is important and Ali wasn’t completely opposed to the idea. For what it’s worth, I am not 100% opposed either. I actually think this could be a format offered for the Olympics (if we ever get in) - Round robin best of 3 format for the preliminary rounds and then semis and finals best of 5. But, I don’t agree that the best of 3 format is suitable for across the board ranking tournaments. It has its place: The World Series for example. Maybe the World Teams or European Teams events? The DAC Pro Invitational (!) like we did in December 2016.

Change is difficult. But since we are talking about it, why not take ourselves even further outside the comfort zone? As I mentioned above, the best of 3 format produced the most “scrumptilightful” squash in history. Is there a way to capture that spectacle but not lose the important objectives of the sport that caused most people the apprehension towards the best of 3 in the first place - namely the length of the matches and the fitness requirements needed to compete?

For the last couple of years, I have been more involved with the tennis world. As a squash player, I was never a huge tennis fan but for personal reasons that has changed. I have come to appreciate that tennis scoring is – simply – more suspenseful and theatrical. Games can be 4 points long. Being 0-40 down in a game is by no means an impossible position to come back from – but being 2-10 down in squash (for example) pretty much is. (How often do you see players tank a game when they feel they are too far behind to waste energy trying to catch up?) Deuce games cause mini-dramas on a constant basis, each player is permanently only a couple of points from winning a game. Upsets are more common, each winner is more valuable, each unforced error more impactful.

I am not suggesting that squash adopt the same terminology as tennis, but wouldn’t breaking up the games into more ‘mini’ dramas keep the players and fans more engaged? If each player was only a couple of rallies from taking a game at any one time, wouldn’t they be more intense? Wouldn’t the fans be more absorbed? Take away the deuce aspect and you create sudden-death scenarios. There’s drama right there. Maybe play games to 6, best of 9? Or games to 5, best of 11? Sixty seconds rest between games? Would hardly shorten the matches. A player would still have to win 30 points if they won in straight games as opposed to the 33 they have to win now. And shortening games would even up the possibility that the lower ranked player may win a game or two thus tightening up the contest making it more thrilling as well. Imagine winning 5-4 in the 11^th! And more upsets are good for the game! A similar concept was actually suggested a few years ago on one of the squash websites here. (Daily Squash Report).

I’m just putting it out there. Food for thought. Let’s not lock ourselves in a box and refuse to contemplate any ‘upgrade’ to the sport in the name of ‘traditionalism’. Surely there is a way to have our ‘delectasucculicious” cake and eat it too?