With Aussie Exit, James Blake Might Just Be Getting Started

MELBOURNE, Australia -- James Blake doesn't have to be finished. That's the lesson from his match Wednesday night at the Australian Open.

No, it's not the message he feels now, not after losing 10-8 in the fifth set to Juan Martin del Potro, the U.S Open champ. It was too emotional of a moment.

This was going to be the day that Blake would return to the big time, evidence that he can get it back at 30 following a year of injuries.

Minutes after the match, he said his phone was already filled with messages from friends who stayed up watching.

"I don't want to respond to them," he said. "But they'll still like me. (That will help) once I finish beating myself up, which will take the next few hours.

"Or days."

The truth is this: Blake played the best match he has played in years.

And those who think he's done will point out that he lost. True enough, but he played better than they thought he could.

This was classic Blake. Even as a top 10 player, he always had trouble closing five-set matches. Doing it now is no evidence that he's done.

The question is whether Blake believes. I mean, the cliché is that the mind is willing but the body isn't able.

Blake might have the opposite story. The body is willing. But does the mind know that?

I'm not saying he's going to be back in the top 10. That's not realistic anymore. But Blake, now ranked No. 45, can surely reach the top 20 again, and make another thrilling run at the U.S. Open.

That's still in his body.

By the end of last year, I thought he was in a panic about his career, playing without strategy, but instead just swinging as hard as possible. And when trouble came up? Swing harder. He had done that early in his career and broken out of it.

Well, he hates it when people say that about him, that he's a smart guy who doesn't play smart tennis. After his first-round victory a day earlier, Blake was defensive about it before anyone even asked, saying that when he loses, people say he wasn't patient enough and when he wins, it's that he should always go for all his shots like that.

But Blake switched coaches to doubles specialist Kelly Jones, who has clearly worked on his net play. And on Wednesday, Blake was looking to follow his big ground-strokes to the net.

He's not comfortable there yet, but the variety in his game was something he hasn't shown since, well, ever. And more importantly, he knew how to use the strategy, knew when to come in.

"I didn't think anything I did strategy-wise was wrong," he said.

"Nothing discouraged me until that last one I missed."

But what does Blake really think about himself? If he feels that he's getting old, then he is. And he's through.

Shortly after the match, he walked -- waddled? -- with both knees packed in ice, talking about the wear and tear of having to play on back-to-back days on knees with tendinitis.

But during the match, he moved as well as ever. He was as strong as ever.

It's just an equation in Blake's head now, whether the wear and tear is greater than the desire and belief, or the other way around.

"James wasn't a phenom ..." Andy Roddick said. "I do think he's a young 30."

The point is that Blake wasn't sent to some tennis factory a kid, drilling five, six, seven hours a day. He was a late-bloomer, so maybe he has extra years on the other end of his career.

"It wasn't good enough," Blake said after the match, which was 6-4, 6-7 (7-3), 5-7, 6-3, 10-8.

He played straight up with one of the hottest players in the world, and didn't close. That might have been partly from his head, or partly from del Potro crushing shots.

It wasn't because of Blake's knees.

When he's done beating himself up, if he can look at the big picture, then he'll see he has time left. This match wasn't the argument, but the proof.

E-mail me at gregcouch09@aol.com