Top Ten Reasons To Dislike Roger Federer

This is a narrative about an imaginary friend of mine, but this "me" is not the author of this article. Xeno created her, she is an independent "me" now, a character over whom the creator has no authority.

This friend of mine (whose identity I cannot reveal) has been a rebel leader in the footsteps of Che Guevara for some time now and is still engaged in guerrilla warfare from the trenches.

Let's call her Vera. I met her in the Amazonian jungles during my rebel days. I was a rebel like her back then. We fought many battles together, healed each other with the stories of defeats, scars, and bruises that we suffered. There would be stories of rare success. For several days we would talk about our Serbian and Scottish commandoes' small gains.

We even shared our literary interests: Irish author Samuel Beckett was our ideal, who once said: "To be an artist is to fail, as no other dare fail, that failure is his world and the shrink from it desertion" (Disjecta 145). His theory of failure was a fascination for both of us. I even had mild secret crush on Vera; probably she did, too (at least, I imagined she did).

Since I've abandoned the experimentation with failure (she thinks I have co-opted), she has certainly been dismayed with me. It's been ages since I saw her last time. I still talk to her in my somniloquies (seriously).

In the recent years, I hear, she has shifted to urban guerrilla warfare, and, as always, the goal has been to seek independence from the Federer Empire. Since then, many have joined her cause. Here are the some of the reasons Vera and her rebel followers resent Federer for (they are the same reasons we adore him for).

Let me pretend that I am with her in documenting those reasons and use first person plural narrative voice, for shorthand.

(1) Roger's dominance has been too long, especially at majors. We see him as the establishment figure. He has broken most records of the Open era, and he is the new landmark. That makes him the establishment figure.

We try to reconcile our anti-establishment, radical left-wing political views with our sports interests and try to achieve a coherent personality, a right-wing goal.

(2) Roger almost always wins in the big events, denying others their (undeserved) share of big prizes (we twist our belief in affirmative action and social justice in a weird sort of way). Each time he wins, he breaks other player's and his fans' hearts.

He does not let others have freebie Slams and does not give them enough credit for their efforts. We simply dislike the big, centralized power because we cannot get there; and we think opposition to the establishment will alleviate our helplessness.

(3) When we think Roger is gone, he comes back strongly. When we thought his 14th Masters ('07 Cincinnati) would be his last Masters and 12th Slam ('07 US Open) would be his last Slam, and he suffered from his longest gaps between triumphs, he rose from the ashes.

Since the '08 US Open title, he has won three out of the last four Slams. The guy has not slowed down in amassing majors. Our prayers for his disappearance have been denied one more time, and it has been devastating. It is hurting badly. 

(4) We compare his lows against his highs, and still find his worst year is better than most others' best career year; witness 1 major title and 3 Slam finals in '08. We resent him for that, too.

(5) Roger is articulate, eloquent, media savvy, too accessible, too much commercialized. He has become a cultural industry of mass media. Every thing sells about him.  Media loves him, and that has been painful to watch.

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