Andy Roddick: First Round Win Provides False Positive for Roddick

I would be lying if I said that I completely bought the "Andy Roddick is the most overrated player of all time," talk. No, he hasn't been on the level of Rafael Nadal or Roger Federer, but Roddick has won one grand slam and four grand slam second place finishes. Every one of those losses came to Roger Federer.

Coming into the 2011 US Open, Roddick was something of an underdog. He was the No. 21 seed and is no longer even seen as the best American threat.

It's not entirely inconceivable that Roddick will win another grand slam. His only win came eight years ago at the US Open, but the serve is generally the last thing to leave a player. 

Roddick's serve has always been his greatest asset, so he'll be a similar player in future years that he is now.

The problem is that right now, Roddick is a one dimensional player.

Other players have been reliant on a big serve, notably Pete Sampras. But while Sampras relied a lot on his serve, he had a much more complete game. Additionally, while his serve wasn't as hard, Sampras' serve was far more consistent.

Roddick is no scrub. If he lands his serve, he's very difficult to beat against anyone. The problem is that he doesn't land his serve often enough and the rest of his game isn't good enough to play with elite players without a big serve.

So, while beating Michael Russell is a good thing, it's not something that we should get too excited about, and we won't. It was an expected win. Roddick did his job, and that can't be held against him.

Being in Rafael Nadal's bracket is normally not a good thing, but Nadal is not playing good, confident tennis. If there was ever a time for Roddick to beat him, it is now.

Still, Roddick will need to be a lot better and more consistent this year than he's been in the past. Anything is possible, but we just haven't seen enough from Roddick to believe that that will happen.