For more than a month, smoke signals outside Rafael Nadal’s camp have kept the tennis world on edge, sparking predictions of everything from a triumphant spring on the red clay of Paris to him never playing another competitive match after from another hip injury. Australia in January.
The only thing that seemed clear was that the 22-time Grand Slam champion was prioritizing the clay court season in Europe this spring. Nadal said as much in January, when he returned after a year’s layoff due to hip surgery.
Sure, he was happy to be back competing in Australia, where he won the first Grand Slam of the year until 2022, but he was very focused on being in top form — or, at least, as close to it as he can get at this point. — in three months, when the red clay tournaments begin in earnest.
That was part of why he missed the Australian Open when he suffered a small muscle tear near his hip three matches into his final comeback. Logic suggested that Nadal would wait until tennis returned to organic surfaces that are far less taxing on the body and where an aging, injury-prone player like Nadal, who is 37 and plays a more physical style of tennis, would have the best chance of staying healthy.
Few were surprised when he announced this month on social media that he was pulling out of a hard-court tournament in Doha. It was the second sentence of this post that caught some off guard.
“I will focus on continuing to work to be ready for the exhibition in Las Vegas and the amazing Indian Wells tournament,” Nadal wrote on Valentine’s Day.
That would be an exhibition match for MGM Resorts against 20-year-old Spanish big man Carlos Alcaraz this weekend in Las Vegas, which will be streamed on Netflix, and then the BNP Paribas Open in nearby Indian Wells, California, which starts next week.
Now that seemed strange. However, there was enough time for him to withdraw from these events and spend another few weeks in Spain preparing the ground.
And then, last week, Novak Djokovic posted a photo of himself and Nadal on the same flight that Nadal made his way to the United States. “Vamos,” Djokovic wrote. It’s game on — at least, in theory.
Great company on the way to the USA 🇺🇸 😎💪🎾 @RafaelNadal #idemooo #vamos @atptur #TennisParadise pic.twitter.com/UDB13mp4Ux
— Novak Djokovic (@DjokerNole) February 23, 2024
But the question is why?
“If he’s fit, he wants to play,” his longtime spokesman, Benito Perez-Barbadillo, said Monday. “He is a tennis player and wants to play in the biggest tournaments. And he loves Indian Wells.”
As Patrick McEnroe, the commentator and former player who called the Alcaraz match, pointed out, Nadal often thrives on the slow hard courts of Indian Wells, where he has won three times and reached the finals on two other occasions.
Exhibition injuries are extremely rare, but an exhibition and a hard-court tournament in March, even one Nadal loves as much as Indian Wells, will improve his chances of being fit enough to compete for the French Open title in May and June , where he won 14 times and there’s a statue of him hiding his bull-whip outside center court? In recent years, Nadal has shut himself down after Indian Wells for about three weeks to begin refining his schedule and preparation for two months of clay court tennis, where the timing and style of play are vastly different from hard courts. pitches.
Welcome back, champion 👋
📷: @RafaelNadal | #TennisParadise pic.twitter.com/oVdoxv5JH0
— BNP Paribas Open (@BNPPARIBASOPEN) February 26, 2024
The elephant in the room here is money.
It is always uncomfortable to count other people’s money, to suggest what should be enough. This is especially the case with professional athletes, whose careers are generally over by 40 and who have become accustomed to a certain lifestyle.
That said, Nadal has earned more than $134 million in prize money over the course of his 20-year career. He has amassed tens of millions, perhaps more, in sponsorships and appearance fees. The terms of his deal with MGM and MGM’s deal with Netflix aren’t public, but it’s likely he’ll collect at least $1 million for the Alcaraz fight, given how much he and other players of his caliber have earned playing similar events
Nadal will not receive an appearance fee to play in Indian Wells as it is a mandatory tournament for healthy players. He has other motives. Larry Ellison, the billionaire founder of Oracle who owns the tournament, has befriended Nadal and is hosting him at his private resort.
There, Nadal can pursue his other passion – golf. He has been known to play 18 or even 36 holes a day during his stay in the desert and has already hit the links in California.
(Quality Sports Images/Getty Images)
It’s a good life. The question is whether he risks the clay season, where he probably has the best chance of winning a 23rd Grand Slam singles title. Nadal will likely try to dismiss that thought or anything that might suggest he is some kind of clay specialist.
“I think it’s OK,” said Paul Annacone, the longtime coach (Roger Federer, Taylor Fritz) and commentator. “He’s in California and he’s already practicing, he’s acclimatized. So the only question is whether it’s not 100 percent. Then don’t go. But I don’t think he would be here in California if he wasn’t almost 100 percent and ready for Indian Wells.”
Days after leaving Doha, Nadal posted a video of himself practicing slow returns with the caption, “Work in progress.” There have been more videos since he arrived at Indian Wells, but no footage of anything coming close.
All of this has only added to the greater mystery surrounding when Nadal might call it quits. Last year, shortly after undergoing hip surgery, he suggested that 2024 would be his final season and a sort of farewell tour as he visited the tournaments and cities that had meant the most to him during his career.
He then showed flashes of his old self in his three matches in Australia and got a taste of the competition he craves. He hasn’t committed to any hard and fast schedule since then, insisting he takes it day by day.
The Olympic tournament will be held at Roland Garros this summer, home of the French Open. There was speculation that it could serve as his removal. He then signed a deal to serve as an ambassador with the Saudi Arabian tennis federation and play in an exhibition in Riyadh in October with Djokovic, Daniil Medvedev, Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner and Holger Rune. This setup would seem like an odd choice for his final fights.
The Davis Cup finals will take place in Spain a month later. Maybe then? That is, assuming he can make it that far without another major injury.
For now, and for better or worse, he has a big payday in Las Vegas and a hard-court tournament (and plenty of golf) in the California desert to focus on.
(Top photo: William West/AFP via Getty Images)
